On SRman's Workbench

The 1907 GWR Mink van has now been completed. The photo was taken before I fitted the couplings (using the same methods as before). One addition to this and the 10T open wagon has been to use some brass wire to replace the very fragile tiebar between the 'W' irons.



The next job will be to paint all three GW wagons in the standard grey (or as close as I can get to it).

 

Continuing with the trio of Great Western wagons, I have now painted them: a coat of grey primer, followed by a coat of matt (or satin) black, then brush-painted with Humbrol #79 blue-grey, and a coat or two of SECR wagon grey (which is the closest colour I have to GWR wagon grey). I removed the wheels and couplings before painting the wagons. The van roofs have had one coat of white primer sprayed over the grey primer, followed by a coat or three of Humbrol #34 matt white.

The photos show them after the black coats then after the first coat of wagon grey. I'll continue until I am happy with the result, then I'll decorate with suitable transfers (more pictures will follow to show these steps).

 

Hi kimbo. The wheels are metal Romfords as supplied in the kits. They do have a nice patina to them but I will paint them separately eventually.

I did wonder whether to replace a couple of axles with Bachmann's rather nice split spoke wheels, to give a slightly more archaic look to the wagon(s). I'm not sure if that would be accurate, though, as I don't have any reference material for the GW (my books mostly relate to the Southern Railway/Southern Region and London Transport (underground)).

 

Now just awaiting transfers and maybe a little weathering.

 

The first lettering has now been added. As I said earlier, the pre-grouping period GWR wagons really should have 25" lettering for the "G W", but I only have 16" lettering available. This is probably correct for the Mink D, but not for the other two, but it will have to do until I can get hold of something better. I haven't any of the small weight and number transfers in the script typeface they used, so they too will have to wait.

This, then, is how they currently look, posed with my Hornby LSWR M7 0-4-4T and a Smallbrook Studios LSWR 18 ton road van.

 

And just for fun, an aged version of one of those photos:

 

Thanks Ian. The Dublo signal box was inspired by what Phil Radley shows on his website (http://www.radleymodels.com/l-t-stations-depot-and-track-side-items.html). I bought a tatty and dented example at a swap meet and painted and detailed it a bit, including adding an interior and some glazing.









I know that LT would probably have had some electro-mechanical miniature levers but trying to model those would be a nightmare, so I stuck with commercial brass point levers. The table was made from plasticard off-cuts, and the ledger from reduced copies of a real one. The track diagram was made in Word then scaled down.

 

Thanks for all the compliments.

 

Well, thanks to a fellow BRMA member, who very kindly sent me some spare PC/HMRS pressfix transfers he had, I now have Great Western transfers of the correct size and style to not only do the "G W" lettering but also the numbers and weights. I have made a start on the Mink wagon, removing the previous smaller "G W" letters, and replacing with the scale 25" letters (compare them to the open wagon behind, which hasn't been altered, yet). I have also added the weight and tare inscriptions on both sides, but not the actual wagon number, yet. The close-up photo also highlights a couple of very minor paint touch-ups required.





I posted the wagon photos on a couple of other forums too, but a couple of their members noted the SR concrete hut in the foreground and pointed out that it is a bit of an anachronism for the pre-grouping era; these huts probably date from the 1930s onwards. However, since I have glued the hut down, I can't just take it off the layout to get a better setting for the photos.

 

Quite some time ago I started building a London, Chatham & Dover Railway (LCDR) brake van from the etched brass Roxey Mouldings kit. It was 95% complete when the build stalled due to my problem in effectively attaching the footboards. I have now done so using wire hangers bent to support the boards. The upper ends of the hangers are hooked and superglued into holes drilled into the brass solebars, while the step boards are soldered to the lower supports.

The smaller steps under the guard's doors are also soldered, although one of them took me several attempts before it stayed solidly put.

The whole lot is painted South Eastern & Chatham Railway (SE&CR) wagon dark grey with black below the solebars. Lettering has commenced with HMRS pressfix transfers, but is not yet complete. I have glazed the various window openings but I'm not sure that all of them should have "glass" in them - it's not at all clear from the drawings I have or any of the limited number of photos I have seen.