The LNER Encyclopedia

Atlantic 3279 wrote: ↑Wed May 27, 2020 11:53 pm I agree, without reservation. I'm afraid I'm using what I already have, and have had in stock for many years, acquired on favourable terms.

Behind the w-irons, springs, and step-boards, weathered and rotating, I hope that my cost-cutting will not be noticed by too many observers.

Mike, you have sharp eyes: without having it pointed out and then zooming in on the pic, I thought they were Mansells so I think you'll be fairly safe...

I have taken no chances, hence the Mansell inserts seen in the more recent images on the last page.

Atlantic 3279 wrote: ↑Thu Jul 30, 2020 9:44 pm I have taken no chances, hence the Mansell inserts seen in the more recent images on the last page.

Aha yes, just reached them; very nice - are they the MJT ones?

Home made resin castings, as thin as I could make them. Still not really as thin as they need to be in order to fit totally flush with the tyre edge in every case.

Atlantic 3279 wrote: ↑Fri Jul 31, 2020 10:06 am Home made resin castings, as thin as I could make them. Still not really as thin as they need to be in order to fit totally flush with the tyre edge in every case.

Ohh - nice job! I should have known they would be of your own making

Effectively three graining coats in different colours plus painting of interiors produced this: At this point I thought the external finish adequate for a model of a new teak coach, but a bit pale for ageing 6 wheelers, even if fairly recently renovated. After a test, a thin over coat of Dulux "Mahogany" satin Woodsheen richened up the colour nicely to an orangey-brown without making it red, giving a pleasing resemblance to the colour I'd achieved many years ago on my D & S 6 wheelers. Ends have now been painted in 1930s black, the sides gloss varnished to seal the finish and promote transfer adhesion, and most of the insignia bar running numbers added. There's still plenty to do, including glazing, commode handles (bright or brown?), couplings, brake pipes and weathering. A cautious trial showed that it is possible to un-clip a roof without damage, so I've clipped all three roofs in place to see how well they fit without further attention, and to permit some photography: Here's my earlier D & S d.245 for direct comparison with the latest example. Cornice level and roof width are definitely different, as is the relationship between solebar and upper stepboard. I may tinker with the D & S cornices, but other changes would be too much to contemplate....

Very nice little set, aren't they

Hi Graeme
I think your idea of tinkering with the cornice on your D&S coaches is sound. On mine I've fitted the cornices somewhat lower.
Andrew

The carriages are creeping slowly towards completion, in fact I think that weathering and glazing are now the only main jobs that remain, although as some of the following pictures show I shall have to do more than merely clip the roofs onto the bodies if I don't want to leave a gap where the top of the side meets the cornice on the edge of the roof: A quick glance with the naked eye does not immediately reveal the disparity of side heights and roof widths with the new vehicles standing in line with my earlier D & S exampls, but this photograph confirms that the discrepancies are there. Ballast, in the form of rectangles of lead cut easily with snips from "unrolled" walls of old lead water pipe has been slipped in "dry" under the seats of the passenger vehicles, or glued to the floor of the luggage van, bring thw weight of each vehicle to about 95g, roughly matching my D & S examples. I believe this makes the suspension do a more meaningful and effective job of keeping all of the wheels on the track.
I decided that I couldn't tolerate the way that the central parts of the width of the roof on the D.245 third curved upwards at each end. I tried softening it in very hot water, pushing the offending areas downwards and then quenching it in cold water, but after a while the distortion re-appeared. I filed the tops of the ends to give it more freedom to sit down and again heated, straightened and cooled the roof, but again it assumed the wrong shape when left clipped onto the body. I concluded that permanent physical restraint was the only answer, so I've super-glued a length of solid 4mm square plastic to the full internal length of the roof. Even then, a dry run confirmed that simply leaving the top of the plastic beam dead-straight wouldn't be quite enough to do the job, so I filed a slight taper each end before gluing it firmly in place. That seems to have forced the ridge of the roof to stay nice and level, so far. In an effort to make it possible to use reasonably realistic-looking Smiths dummy screw link couplings on these carriages without risking buffer-lock when they have to be propelled, and to afford some facility for coupling to vehicles fitted only with tension locks, I've fitted a rather oddly shaped set of wire "goal posts" to each headstock. That dropped central section is supposed to act as the bar for an adjoining tension lock, whilst being sufficiently low and slim to avoid any snagging of the screw link coupling or a shunter's coupling pole. It isn't a perfect arrangement though, and only works at all tolerably if the Tommy-bar on the screw coupling is kept nice and short. The head of the pin that forms the Tommy-bar also needs to be at the top, not at the bottom as in the latter position it snags on the wire crossbar . I've a feeling that I may end up eliminating that central section of wire and simply having a small goalpost just in-board of each buffer head... The available side-play on the middle wheel set of the long luggage composite initially showed some signs of being insufficient for smooth passage through some of my crossovers, but perhaps it is settling down to better behaviour with use. If problems require action in the longer term I shall have to ditch the sprung bearing-holders which take up some of the space between the W-irons and substitute an axle floating on some long springy wire as in the D & S arrangement

Graeme,

Do you like the D&S floating 'middle w-iron' solution?

It seems a little unsound to me, but perhaps it is the track laying that might be at fault usually. Or occasionally not sufficient weight in the vehicle?

You clearly have much more model running experience than most. Perhaps 'Jonathan W' might like to comment too?

Well you have answered one of the above whilst I was posing the question!

John

The D & S floating middle W-iron seems to work properly for me, with enough downward force from the springy wire, although I removed the fold-down flanges from the sides of each central hole in the floor pan of my D & S vehicles in order to give more scope for sideways movement. I then had to blank-off some of the hole in the floor pan so that the W-iron could not tilt over sideways and then get stuck....

Very nice coaches all round
Is it possible to tell though where the height disparity between these and the D&S arises - is it chassis, sides, or just the roof profile? And do you know which is more accurate?
Chas

The recent ones by Bill Bedford have the more accurate dimensions. The discrepancy has been aggravated by a mistake that I now realise I made in building the earlier D&S kits: I put the representation of the cornice / gutter on the edge of the roof, which had a flat base, sitting on top of the side. Hence the bottom edge of the cornice is level with the top of the side. That seemed to be the easiest way to get the neat results, without gaps or wavy edges, using the skills I had at the time. The cornice should, I now realise, actually have been applied with its top edge level with the top of the side. I may alter that feature of the D & S vehicles in due course. It will also make the roof look a little wider, more like the recently built ones.

Discussion of this topic with Andrew Emmett has also revealed that there's an overall width error in one of the D & S carriages, but that can only be rectified or disguised by major surgery involving the underframe. That will have to stay as it is, along with the discrepancy between upper stepboard positions in the two varieties. My guard's look-outs stick out too far on one of my D&S six wheelers too, and that won't be altered either.....

The D&S Solebar looks about twice the depth of the resin version? looking at the photos .Presumably that will make the Coach body therefore higher ?

The Solebar is approx 11".

I think when I've measured D&S it was about right.