Weathering some Guards vans with Pan Pastels. Models straight from the box Some may have noticed my User Name has the initials SMR in it well that’s a reference to my Favourite railway company in the big land down under The South Maitland Railway, the SMR is a private coal railway in the New South Wales Hunter Valley, That still Steam Hauled Coal from the valleys mines until 1983. Recently a company Phoenix Models has released a set of Guards vans in HO scale that were the tall end of all SMR trains these are a 4 wheel van with a central cabin and a covered platform on each end for the Guard to observe, to maintain control of the train a most important job when the majority of trains consisted of 4 wheel non through braked hopper wagons the SMR vans were painted a light Gray in colour. Along with the SMR vans Phoenix also produced several other variations for government and other private railways that used the same diagram of brake Van one of these was the J A Brown company whose vans where in A deep oxide style red/Brown colour. The models are finely detailed and roll nicely however the as new colours are just way to new looking and the roof way too bright, to be on the layout so some weathering was needed. I used pan pastel powders and for these vans I use 3 sizes of small artist brushes 2 stiff 1 soft brisel. 6 colours Light Gray, mid Gray, charcoal, deep red, rust red. Dust brown. To start you need to spray a mat finish on the shiny plastic model to give the Pastels a better surface to key too doing this the Pastels won’t blow off as easily when sealing them on to the model. The gray SMR van I Started with the stiff brushes it was dusted with the light gray all over then in corners and areas that need a little highlight with the mid gray, charcoal on the frame and running boards, the roof with the mid gray some rust red also a little deep red, next a light dusting all over with the soft brush with the Dust brown this softened all the other colours together. Lastly as the SMR van has a stove and chimney a bit of the charcoal along the roof for the fire soot. Quite a difference as can be seen Next attention turned to the J A Brown, Red/Brown colour van. This time I started with the Deep red a overalll covering to tone down the bright factory colour then a overall dusting of the Dust Brown, a little charcoal around the corners Chassis and platforms the roof was the same process as the SMR however as the Brown vans don’t have the stove no charcoal on the roof Next a cote of Mat varnish to seal the Pastels in and later once it’s dry I will come back and dirty up the buffers Compared again Some extra photos that shoe the stark difference between the vans.
A bit of trivia: there's one of these brake vans in the garden at the back of the Morpeth Antique Centre.
Yes it is correct, can’t find my photos of it at the moment so here’s a web link https://goo.gl/images/eZBNTg several ended up in farm yards or at parks, for many years there was a van in a back yard that could be see as you drove along Tocal Rd at Bolwara Heights this has since gone. there is also a Browns Van at Minmi in a park https://goo.gl/images/eiczY8 and a original SMR van at Timber town Museam on the North Coast. The SMR still has one on site at East Greta Junction https://goo.gl/images/3jqWAq and the Richmond Vale Railway has a few left after a couple were burnt in the bush fires that swept through the site 2 years ago.
A definite improvement What's with the double tin roof? Is that a replacement for felt (as it would melt) or to create an air insulation break to assist cooling from the overhead sun, or both?
Timbersurf you got it with the last bit assist cooling It gets a tad Hot in the Australian sun and the double roof gives a air gap and when on the move also adds to the effect Without the second roof you would be hard pressed to even put your hand on the underside of the roof on a typical summer day Down Under
I model the SMR in what may be called the transition era where the small 4 wheel timber hoppers started to be replaced with Government Steel Bogie hoppers with this change the 4 wheel guards vans were fazed out and large Government bogie Guards vans came into use So all the 4wheel vans are being weathered in unloved conditions at the end of their service life. I found this photo last night link below that shows the buffers and coupler plate on the gray vans black so will add this to the 2 gray vans and touch up the weathering and call it dome https://flic.kr/p/4Wac9h
Continuing on with the Hunter Valley Coal-Fields theme for rolling stock weathering. To go in front of the Guards Vans a trains worth of 4 wheel Coal hoppers need weathering. Now it would be easy and quick to get the air brush out and just run the hoppers past, but then they would all look the same. I wanted the hoppers to have some variation so I have been trying various styles of weathering including using Mig product, weathering Washes and Pan Pastels or a combination of both. So tonight’s bit of my own modelling after I’d finished a DCC instal and a loco repair was to start on the Coal Hoppers. So with the work bench sort of cleaned up I made a mess of it again with little hoppers everywhere and weathering Mig’s to the left, Pan’s to the Right 20 hoppers in the middle The first 5 non air hoppers were given a wash of various mig washes Including Aged timber, dark wash, light wash, and mig Oil and grease stain to do the axle boxes, when the mig washes are dry tomorrow I’ll come back with some of the pan Pastels The next 5 were done with straight pan Pastel with various colours in different orders to give variations. I also have 10 air braked 4 wheel coal hoppers and have started on these 4 done. So 14 started 36 more to go, and the train will be weathered and ready for service. More to come
No Toto and I’m not half way there yet When you see photos of the non air hoppers trains the wagons are all very different looking due to age and ware so trying to get this feel with the train of 40 wagons Some will be left fairly clean as well to represent recently overhauled wagons. So why so many well hese 4 wheel hoppers are so small that you need a lot of them to make up a train the average in service train was around 30 to 40 wagons plus a van a good size train esp when loaded with only loco brakes and a 20 T Guards van to stop the train. Luckily the most of the big grades on the lines these were used on were mostly up hill for the train when loaded. Tonight I’ll do some more and see how many I get done by the weekend as there is a running session of a group I’ll in this sat and I’d like to take this set.
The work bench is almost full Example of two near identical hoppers These Muswellbrook Colliery hoppers were exchanged from MC to the SMR system The weathering is very heavily done all Pan Pastels with a wire brush used to deteriorate the lettering so as to be hard to see as it wouldn’t have been re-stencilled once on the SMR system Charcoal, tan rust and a yellow/green pastels have been added using the foam applicators and a brush Starting to look like the exchange sidings No two wagons have been weathered the same From this angle you can see all the variations so far only 16 more to go
Back at the beginning of this topic there were 4 Guards vans 2 got very heavily weathered the other two were left at he time to show the difference between the stark factory finish. The other 2 finally got dirty but not as dirty as The others, these two represent not so life expired Guards vans Whilst the Pan Pastels were out and we need a 48 class to pick up the wagons at the exchange siding 4817 became a in service model not a freshly out shopped loco This image comes from a google image search not great quality but looks to be part of a larger photo but shows a 48 class hauling private owner Non Air braked Coal hoppers would like to find the original source to see the full picture.
They just keep coming. Some more variety The Middle one Did have BHP as the stencil the wire brush made short work of it and I also scratched up the timbers a bit more with the wire brush quite like the effect There are 4 “B” stencil wagons all with different levels of weathering
After a bit of searching I found the original of the cropped photo and it’s from the Maitland library districts photo pool the Local passengers is just Departing Maitland station as the 48 on a Coal train leaves East Greta junction exchange sidings, running on the “Coal Road” heading for Newcastle Harbour This section from Maitland towards Newcastle was a 4 track main line
