More progress was also made on the Great Northern Railway Open Carriage trucks. All of them now have brakes and yokes etc.
Sadly I ran out of parts so didn't get any further with the 6 wheeled North Eastern Railway truck but I did make good progress with the Great Eastern Railway Open Carriage Truck.
The W Irons and spring arrangement fittings are all either cut on the Cameo or styrene rod - a bit fiddly but immensely satisfying when it all came together.
I had thought that I had brought everything up to date as to my Christmas progress but I had forgotten the NER Implement wagon until I spoke to Graham Beare this morning.
When I began to do more work on it I realised that I had stuck the wrong axlebox/spring castings on, in my haste I had taken those from the Lowmac kit not the IMP. Fortunately I had stuck them on with Rocket Gel Superglue and I managed to prise them of without causing any damage to either the wagon or the castings.
First a bit of preamble. Back in 2011 for Christmas Chris bought me a few of Jim McGeown's van kits. At the time I built an LNER Refrigerator van but didn't get to the others, which were an NER Birdcage Brake, a Perishables van, and a 6 wheeled brake coach.
Around the same time we were sat having lunch in a little cafe in the village of Rosedale Abbey on the North Yorkshire Moors when I saw a picture of one of the NER Birdcage brake van's at Rosedale but this one had "Side Cotes" (duckets to me and much of the world I suspect) as well as the birdcage on top. I decided that I would like to build one so a couple of years later at a show I bought a second kit and asked Jim if he by any chance had any duff etches that contained the duckets from his NER V4 brake van and he said that he did and duly sent me them.
Having been up north for Christmas we planned a week at home before I go back to work so I dug out both of the brake van kits and modified the sides on one to take the duckets. The duckets were too tall to fit directly so I had to modify those too.
Here's where I got to the night before last.
A bit more done yesterday, alas nothing done today...
In between messing about getting my DCC working I have made further progress on the two NER Brake vans. I have been quite impressed that I have managed to add almost all the detail to sub assemblies before making up the main units and adding the solebars. The only things to add to the upper bodies are some corner plates that fold around the corners, some handrails that also go around the ends, the cast end posts and the lower footboards which I need the W Irons in place before I can cut the supports to final length.
The roof is still loose. Jim recommends leaving it loose to glaze and making it clip on afterwards I need to explore how I can do this yet.
Although I have the birdcage for the second one assembled it's not soldered to the roof yet.
Paul Gallon over on RMweb kindly reminded me that the example that I am trying to reproduce with this one also had windows in the birdcage end.
In the photo above you can seem my error. I cut out the windows using those at the other end as a template but didn't think about the fact the the side duckets have sides which protrude into the van internally and that the sides nearest the end windows partially obscure it. - Why is it that you never notice these things until you have made nice job of soldering the body together, made much more difficult by the fact that on this end I couldn't get to the inside so I had to solder it from the outside and clean up.
I have the GA for this conversion if you would like a copy, but it only has the birdcage dotted on, there is some info in the book North Eastern Brake vans by Ian Sadler, published by Railway Bylines.
At the minute I am largely working from the photo's and drawings in the Sadler book. It's interesting to note that the drawings in the book have a handrail going up onto the roof at the opposite end to the birdcage whereas Jim's instructional drawings don't so it would be interesting to view the GA.
Aside from doing some detailing work on another Kirk coach, last weekends task was to add transfers to the various Parkside builds that I have been working on recently.
Starting with the LMS Beer Van.
And finally an arty shot that was created by accident as I was preparing the photos
While taking photos yesterday I completely forgot the LNER Container. I managed to get the body painted a couple of weeks ago but I wasn't happy with the colour so I mixed some more. While I had the transfers out I applied some. The photo that I am working from has the container on an ex GER OCT which was before dedicated container wagons were produced. On that basis I am going to leave the paint work fairly pristine although I will no doubt weather the OCT when I get that far.
The last couple of evenings have seen further work on the Birdcage brakes.
Monday saw some of the hand rails and the end posts fitted. - Chris bought me a Proxxon Mini Pillar drill and a Proxxon Bench Vice for Christmas and they have been invaluable in doing these especially drilling out the cast end posts for the handrails.
Then last night saw the remaining body side handrails fitted along with the upper ones on one end. The drawing and photo from the Sadler book that I am working from has a different layout of the hand rails on the end than Jim shows in his instructions with the end rails passing through the end posts rather than attaching to the outer face of them.
The interested may wonder why I am just working on this one at the moment. That because I think that the only way to be happy with the one with duckets is going to be to remove the end with the birdcage and then cut out the intrusive sides of the ducket and I am still building up the courage to have a go at it....
Magnificent modelling, but please may I ask about the blue colour for the 'A' type container?
According to Tatlow Vol 4A and 'LNER Locomotives in Colour' (White and Johnston) Page 4, these were painted red-oxide.
I do have a number of these to finish in addition to the two I made some time ago, and the blue does look nice, so I would be grateful if you could let me know your sources.
Containers were initially red oxide, but a change was made to Oxford Blue. One of the photos in 'LNER Locomotives in Colour' shows one or more B types in bauxite in the background.
I think the colour change is mentioned in Tatlow, but it's also in the Proceedings of the LNER Study Group Symposium on goods stock, which Mr. Thompson currently has on loan from me, if you have the chance to ask him for a look? Off the top of my head I can't remember what year the change was instructed.
jwealleans wrote:Containers were initially red oxide, but a change was made to Oxford Blue. One of the photos in 'LNER Locomotives in Colour' shows one or more B types in bauxite in the background.
I think the colour change is mentioned in Tatlow, but it's also in the Proceedings of the LNER Study Group Symposium on goods stock, which Mr. Thompson currently has on loan from me, if you have the chance to ask him for a look? Off the top of my head I can't remember what year the change was instructed.
Tatlow (op.cit.) states that the BK type were blue from 1934. 'Containers, general' (which presumably includes the A type) is listed as Red oxide from 1923 through to 1947.
The picture on page 4 of 'LNER Locomotives in Colour' referred to above shows (I think) an A and a B and they are definitely not blue!
Since it is dated June 1936, and is of the Romford Exhibition of that date, perhaps it might be reasonable to assume that the latest liveries would have been on display!
I do think the blue looks smart though!
I will speak to Dr Thompson!
Last edited by drmditch on Thu Jan 26, 2017 6:33 pm, edited 1 time in total.
I'm home now, David. I didn't see that text in Tatlow, but looking at the pictures I'd have said (at a guess) that the containers with Gill Sans lettering are blue and the ones with the older lettering style are oxide.
(Edit) Haresnape adds to the confusion by saying that although one of his sources says containers were painted blue latterly, another (Harrison) says that they were dark grey. I can't recall seeing that anywhere else, not any photo to support it.
I have to confess that I have only ever seen them in blue so painted it blue. From you you have said it looks like it would have been Red Oxide at the time of the photo (1928). Mmmm, do I change it or leave it....
