7mm On Heather's Workbench - wider and longer

Steph Dale

Western Thunderer
Heather,
On Other Railways of my experience the timber used in the carriages internal construction was filled and sanded to a very fine finish, the 'wood' finish and 'planking' was applied by feathering. It was very rare indeed for plain varnished wood to be on show, even in guards compartments.

Steph
 

Heather Kay

Western Thunderer
Heather,
On Other Railways of my experience the timber used in the carriages internal construction was filled and sanded to a very fine finish, the 'wood' finish and 'planking' was applied by feathering. It was very rare indeed for plain varnished wood to be on show, even in guards compartments.

Steph

Good points. I know Slater's GWR 4-wheelers show planking on the compartment dividers, so I'm sort of assuming that what was done under Dean in the 1890s also happened in the 1860s. Having said that, the famous image of the wrecked BG clerestory reveals the interior of a typical compartment, and from that I don't see any obvious texture or planking. None of the four coaches I'm dealing with had third class compartments, where I would expect some comforts to be lacking, so I am happy to assume second and first were much more finely finished.
 

Heather Kay

Western Thunderer
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Right, this little lot now has roofs and the makings of interiors. I have to admit I have sort of run out of steam with them again.

My current brain cell taxing thing is working out the best way forward. I have some final soldering work around the bodies as they stand, mainly to do with door droplights and end detailing. Once the "hot" work is done, should I start the painting process, glaze, then install interiors? Or, install much of the interiors, paint, glaze and fininalise interiors?

*sigh*

Either way, I still have a mammoth task ahead. It's nearly a new month, and time to get some other commissions moving again. I may take this fag end of the year to work around various projects to keep things moving. Onwards and upwards!
 

Heather Kay

Western Thunderer
The mammoth has lumbered into view, and taken up residence on the bench. With the worst of the winter over, the paint shop ought to be a usable environment soon, so it’s time to get some builds ready for primer and paint.

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This one is next for door droplights, having had end lamp brackets done yesterday.

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This one is almost ready for the paint shop. Droplights and end lamp brackets done.

The two shorter coaches will get the works done over the next day or so. All have had their wheelsets blackened, too. I’ve also had a tweak of the interior fittings, currently labelled suitably and stored safely on another shelf. I made the seat masters using the Slater's seating kits, and included the head-height wings on both first and second class. During these coaches' sojourn on the shelf, I had been bugged by seeing the second class wings in the windows. The obvious solution, therefore, was to literally clip the wings so they didn’t show. It’s taken nigh-on six months for that to percolate down to my brain cell.
 

Heather Kay

Western Thunderer
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That’s one chore I don’t have to repeat too soon, thankfully. All four now have droplights. One of the E3s, that’s the longer ones, and the E6, fought me most of the way. Each droplight needed to be clipped and trimmed to fit round the hinge retaining strips - admittedly, a problem of my own making. Only two hinges dropped off, and I spotted them before the carpet monster claimed them as tribute.

What’s next? After a break from the tedium, I think the roof clutter needs organising. The brass roofs also need some way actually being held in the bodies. If the warm weather holds, I think everything will then be cleaned, then primed. The lengthy task of painting can then start in earnest.

I’m off for a lie down in a darkened room for a while.
 

Peter Cross

Western Thunderer
I have a tiled floor in my work shop, and bits still disappear, Even when said room has been emptied.

Nice looking work there Heather.
 

Heather Kay

Western Thunderer
Just when you think things might actually be on the up, life goes and chucks yet another monkey wrench in the works.

Last week, a tooth that had had a lot of pain, aggro, dentistry and hard-earned thrown at it, which had been behaving itself, decided to act up. While my face ached, I really did not feel like work. Worries about having to go through all that malarkey again weighed on the mind.

Anyway, having had some medical intervention, things are beginning to improve. Back to the bench, with the 1970s playlist up loud.

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Having found I actually can make epoxy resin work, I fitted the oil lamp bases and bodies to the plastic roofed coaches. Getting those sloping bases just so was a fiddle, so I opted for the long setting stuff to give me a while for adjustments.

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The brass roofs were easier, as I could solder the whitemetal castings in place. I’ll clean up the extra low-melt later, then glue the lamp bodies in place. I’m just marking out for the lamp servicing cradles, but that’s a tale for the next instalment.

What’s playing at the moment? Electric Light Orchestra, Kuiama, from ELO 2, somewhere about 1975.
 
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Steph Dale

Western Thunderer
Y'know it's funny, but whenever I see your 'wider and longer' thread title I start thinking about Avro York, Blackburn Beverley and Shorts Belfast...

Steph
 

Heather Kay

Western Thunderer
A brief and unillustrated update: all underframes have been etch primed, had a coat of red oxide acrylic primer, and a basic dose of dirty black. If conditions are right later, I’ll flip 'em over and dirty black from above as well.

Now recovering on the sofa, as it got a little warm in the paint shop.
 

Heather Kay

Western Thunderer
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Another step closer. All the underframes and "bogies" have been airbrushed with a mix of matt black and brown, then top coated with satin varnish. Then I remembered to add a notional impression of vac brake pull rods…

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The bodies are now undergoing their ultrasonic bath, and I hope to get at last etch primer on over the weekend. So far, on,y three hinges have come adrift, so I’d best fish them out before I drain the bath!
 

Heather Kay

Western Thunderer
Four brass bodies have had etch primer applied.

Can I just say how much I hate etch primer? I chose to use Precision's two-part stuff, as it has an almost indefinite self life. The instructions say to mix the primer and activated thinners in equal parts. If I do, all I get is cobwebs as the paint dries before it hits the surface I’m spraying - no matter what pressure I use either.

In the end I just glooped more thinners into the mix until it seemed to spray adequately. As it’s the thinners that is supposed to do the actual work, I hope it ends up alright.

Now to leave things alone for a day or so, though with this fine weather the upstairs paint shop is nice and warm which won’t hurt.

Now, what's next?
 

Heather Kay

Western Thunderer
Some time ago I alluded to a saga about the lamps on the roofs, as if the roofs haven’t proven to be enough of a saga in their own right. With the bodies finally in the paint shop, I started to work out how to solve a little problem.

Now, these coaches are oil lit. Each lamp had an associated trivet, onto which the lamp could be placed for servicing. It also acted as a stowage for the lamp blanking tops. For various reasons, it is the trivet with the lamp top that I have to fit to these models.

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Of course, I drilled the roofs to take the trivet castings, as they all have a little peg underneath them. Of course, if I’d thought about things a bit harder, I would have spotted right away the trivets would sit on an angle. They’re really designed to sit on the apex of a curved roof, not halfway down it.

This rather brought me to - another - halt while I tried to work out what to do about it. I wondered if the castings could be tweaked so they could sit as flat as possible. They couldn’t. Time to let it fester for a bit to see if I could come up with a workable solution.

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Eventually, I came up with this scheme: angled slices of styrene tube, capped off. Fourteen of the beggars on one coach, which all have to about the same size and angle. Well, I worked out a basic method that gave me a relatively similar shape for each bit of tube, reasoning I could adjust for fit by sanding if required.

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And so it proved. No perfect, but then nothing about these roofs is perfect. Everything is more or less square, give or take. Well, to be charitable, it’s about the best I can manage so it’ll have to do. I’ve only another three to do, after all.

What about the trivet castings? I haven’t found a way of reliably marking a centre point for drilling a location hole in my new plinths, so I’ve chopped the cast pegs off instead. Hopefully, adhesive will hold things in place well enough. I suppose I ought to get on and make some more styrene dust.
 

Dikitriki

Flying Squad
Hi Heather,

With regard to the plastic tube, you could have drilled holes in the roof and glued the sections in at the correct angle; that way you would only have to finish off one end.

I do like the busy roof mind, and presumably there is all the external piping:)

Richard
 

Heather Kay

Western Thunderer
Hello Richard. A good idea, and with a clearer mind I ought to have come up with it, too. There are some technical issues why it might not be ideal for this job, though. One would be my complete inability to drill a hole large enough without tearing the roof to shreds!

I do like the busy roof mind, and presumably there is all the external piping:)

Richard

Sadly, being oil lamps, there’s no additional pipework. I don’t think many of these coaches survived long enough to get gas lighting. Those built as “convertible”, and which were transplanted to narrow gauge underframes will have been converted to gas, but that wouldn’t have been until some time after the broad gauge had disappeared.
 

ICH60

Western Thunderer
Hi Heather
All looking very nice
What was your source of the oil lamps and trivet castings?

Ian
 

ICH60

Western Thunderer
Thanks for the info. Are they S111 from the BG list.

I have made a 3D model from the drawing from the BRJ article from John Lewis with had a drawing which I am thinking of getting printed, though some details are only a few thou thick so not sure how they will turn out
 

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