4mm An EM Workbench: plastic steels

[AJC]

Incredibly!

I wish I could work that fast

Well it does help having rebuilt one recently and a little planning - picking an hour's worth of work and just doing it with some music or the radio on - means that a quick result is achievable. In the meantime, I've had a tour round the country and picked up this pair of containers left with dad for spraying. These insulated meat containers have now made it into ice blue and with a little more persistence, have been glossed with Klear (lots of thin coats, 8, I think) and lettered with a mix of Fox and ModelMaster transfers. It's dry and warm today so they'll get a dose of matt lacquer shortly...





It's amazing the difference natural light makes to the colour isn't it?

Adam

 

[AJC]

While looking for something else the other day, I came across parts of three Ratio GW opens late of the same estate that yielded the GW fruit van body (more of which anon) in a pretty awful state but which, when disassembled, have yielded sufficient bits to make two good wagons since the body mouldings are quite nice. The mouldings as supplied have axleguards moulded integrally at a 9' wheelbase and by my era of interest, the survivors mostly had 10' wheelbases and vac' brakes, the latter added by BR in the '50s. I don't suppose I shall get around to doing much more with these for the moment, but just to keep things tidy, I got them into something approaching basic rolling wagons. This means, in the one case, a new underframe from spare Parkside bits and a 40 thou' sheet floor with BR 'W irons' (quite a number of these GW wagons gained these when converted to vac'brake) and stretching the 9' wheelbase of the other.



The Parkside BD container just happened to be on the bench; I think it has found a home here rather than add to the Great Conflat Securing Chain Backlog. Slightly more of what was done to the stretched chassis can be seen in the picture below. The complete solebar assembly was sawn off the side moulding, dressed square with a big file and then cut into three bits.

The bits were reassembled on a strip of 20 thou' plastic sheet in approved Geoff Kent fashion (using the centrelines of the springs to set the wheelbase at the required 40mm (10' in 4mm scale - obviously the width of the saw cuts needs to be accounted for in the spacing) before being assembled to a new floor. The floor is part functional, consisting of 40 thou' sheet between the solebars and part cosmetic; piece of 20 thou' sheet cut to fit between the wagon sides and ends with a bit of 10 x 30 Evergreen strip to reinforce the solebar/floor edge.





They can now mature for a bit until I'm ready to do something about 'em. Meanwhile, back to the Lowmac.

Adam

PS - thanks, as ever, to @hrmspaul

 

[AJC]

...that yielded the GW fruit van body (more of which anon)

And here it is, though the roof needs another coat of paint and a spot of touching up prior to weathering, more or less complete.



Adam

 

[AJC]

Above there's before weathering, below, there's after:



Parked up next to it are other items from the weathering selection - since the lids were off the paint. Since the Dogfish is in view:



The streaks down the side are presumably a consequence of ballast being loaded wet and seem quite a common feature. In the scheme of things this one isn't too grubby, but suffering from the effects of use. Next, we come to containers, the pair of FMs featured earlier which look, if I'm honest, much the same as one another, but one is on a wagon so I've chosen to show that one here:



Many months ago, there was also a BD container, also sat on a conflat and like the FM, no chains, yet, but these are coming and possibly soon, or then again, possibly not. Until about three days ago, it looked like this:



And now, like this - the difference between the Freight Brown and the bauxite is still noticeable.



Adam

 

[Alan]

I do rather like a well weathered wagon, Well in both terms, well being lots of weathering and Well meaning well executed weathering.

 

[AJC]

I do rather like a well weathered wagon, Well in both terms, well being lots of weathering and Well meaning well executed weathering.

Thanks Alan, and thank you to all those who clicked 'like'.

Anyhow, here's a bit more SR lowmac, this time with a tad more detail on the axleboxes, and the chain pockets have become fully formed, if not tidied up. The bits sticking out of the deck are the handles - in the real thing, these were holes inset into the lids with a bit of strip across the top. On the model, these are shallow holes at 2mm diameter. A 2mm strip of 20 thou' has been slightly rounded on the ends and let into those holes before being secured with a drop of solvent. Once they're fully hardened off in a day or two, I'll trim them flush with the deck.



All this activity is only bringing the task of making four sets of identical springs and hangers closer...

Adam

 

[AJC]

Since I've been far to busy to worry about putting off making springs for the lowmac, the Trestrol has been weathered and, since it was just about bright enough this morning, has been photographed prior to loading - because I really think this is a wagon that will benefit from it - and it's an impressive thing - just imagine the size it would be in 7mm!



I especially like this 'reverse angle' shot of the trestles.



So that's more or less there, barring the aforementioned load and the crud of hammerscale and detritus that should be in the well. Back to spring-dodging...

Adam

 

[Dikitriki]

Mmm, that is nice. I am thinking about how big it would be in 7mm

Richard

 

[JimG]

Mmm, that is nice. I am thinking about how big it would be in 7mm

And 1:32

Jim.

 

[MartinWales]

And 1:64

 

[AJC]

G3? 5" gauge?

I'd want working brakes in those scales though...

Adam

 

[AJC]

Thanks all - now, I've had a bit of a think and made a start on a set of springs for the Lowmac. There are various approaches that could be used:

• Spend ages seeing whether I or any of the parts manufacturers had anything suitable
• Making a jig of some kind and building them up leaf by leaf like the real thing. In styrene - and scale thickness would be 5 thou' or thereabouts - there is a very real risk of a big solventy mess.
• Photocopying the drawing, gluing that to some plastic sheet and cutting out of, say, 60 thou' sheet - this carries with it the risk of the blade going 'ping'
• Or...?

Well here's what I did, based to some extent what Geoff Kent and dad did when similar problems turned up. First, some measurements:

The spacing between the spring hanger centres is/was 3' 6" (14mm in 4mm scale) with a bit of overhang at each end - I reckoned that 15mm would be plenty long enough. I marked out two pencil lines 14 mm apart on a piece of 20 thou' styrene sheet with a centre line between them. I chose 20 thou' because it's easy to cut, and can be laminated onto 40 thou' to bring it up to thickness.

Marking out the curved top edge was simply a matter of finding something of a suitable diameter, about 4"/10cm in pencil. then made a small mark with the point of a scalpel on the centreline, 2mm below the curved line and scribed all the way across the strip and gently, 1mm either side of that centreline as a guide for trimming the bottom edge of the spring. See the picture below:



Note that I've trimmed the strip off over width to make up the full length of the spring and marked out one extra to allow for errors. The acceptable springs were then mounted on 40 thou', solvent welded in place and will be allowed to set prior to further shaping and detailing.



Adam

 

[AJC]

And here the Lowmac rests at Christmas, no more will be done until New Year now. The springs have been shaped - steps filed into the undersides to represent the leaves (I didn't bother to scribe the leaves in themselves) - straps added and the mountings added. If I wanted to be critical, I think that I've made the springs themselves a bit too deep but you'd have to be very intimate with the prototype to notice. A few more deck-support brackets have gone in under the ramps and the access panels for the draw hook springs added to each end of the deck.





So what's still to add? Many, many rivets, works plates, label clips. securing rings and, I suppose, a coat of paint. Oh, and the load...

Adam

 

[AJC]

The other thing to add is the second Lowmac, and in a Blue Peter moment, "Here's one I made earlier..." Well, rebuilt, anyhow, since this one is an original Airfix creation, yellow plastic and all:



Of all the possible versions of Lowmac produced by the pre-nationalisation companies, BR chose to produce 52 examples to a GER design (despite a new design being developed and built by the LNER immediately before Nationalisation - BR built more of those as well...) The modifications made to the kit were fairly simple - new shrouds over the buffers, new buffers, brake levers and re-modelled axleboxes. Its a bit shorter than the SR vehicle and lower-rated in terms of weight so should present a nice contrast when employed in a train.

Happy Christmas

Adam

 

[Lyndhurstman]

The other thing to add is the second Lowmac, and in a Blue Peter moment, "Here's one I made earlier..." Well, rebuilt, anyhow, since this one is an original Airfix creation, yellow plastic and all:


Of all the possible versions of Lowmac produced by the pre-nationalisation companies, BR chose to produce 52 examples to a GER design. The modifications made were fairly simple - new shrouds over the buffers, new buffers, brake levers and remodelled axleboxes. Its a bit shorter than the SR vehicle and lower-rated in terms of weight so should present a nice contrast when employed in a train.

Happy Christmas

Adam

Hello Adam,

For its humble origins, the Airfix product scrubs up nicely, I think. Your representation does, at least

Happy Christmas - and thanks fro the inspirational thread.

Cheers

Jan

 

[AJC]

Hello Adam,

For its humble origins, the Airfix product scrubs up nicely, I think. Your representation does, at least

Happy Christmas - and thanks fro the inspirational thread.

Cheers

Jan

Thanks Jan - it helps that the wagon is fundamentally sound. Thank you for your thread - much better written than mine - too.

Adam

 

[AJC]

Happy New Year. I hope it's brought you some welcome rest. Following Christmas, two opens have become three. The third is a BR-built, LMS design from a Parkside kit and, like the GW pair, would have been retro-fitted with vacuum brakes. The mouldings are excellent, marred only by the axleboxes supplied which were not quite one thing nor the other. The whitemetal ones shown are from MJT/Dart Castings and will be altered before painting.



All the various holes in the ends are for Rumney Models tarpaulin bars - these would be really good in 7mm for those of you so afflicted - drilled using a supplied jig. Clever stuff. The GW one (rear) has also received new axleboxes, this time LNER pattern which were occasionally retro-fitted, Masokits screw couplings and MJT buffers of a Dowty hydraulic type.



The other alteration on the GW opens was to scribe the extra 'half' plank in, using my digital vernier gauge. I know this isn't what they're meant for, but...

The container, by the way, is complete and ready for paint. This one will be crimson.

Adam

 

[Lyndhurstman]

Nice work again, Adam. And Happy New Year

Can I ask if you made the securing rings on the container? I hav one I'd like to treat in a similar manner.

Cheers

Jan

 

[Dikitriki]

I'm more interested in finding out how Adam is going to lash the container to the open wagon.....I have 2 7mm efforts to finish along the same lines.

Richard

 

[AJC]

Can I ask if you made the securing rings on the container?

Sure - the large ones on the corners are quite simple: the anchor points in the corners are made from spare links from Masokits screw couplings; you get two short and one long links - the leftovers, short in my case, are extremely handy for all sorts of things, cut in half and glued into holes drilled at 45 degrees into the corners. The links are just formed around a bit of scrap 30 thou' from bell wire (13A fuse wire would do). The smaller lashing rings are from the kind of soft brass wire that comes wrapped around Rioja bottles (having carefully removed and disposed of the Rioja) wrapped around a 0.75mm drill. They're held in with bits of scrap fuse wire folded and twisted around before being stack into place in 0.5mm holes.

I'm not altogether certain that containers were always lashed in place in open highs - though they certainly were in medfits - since there's not anywhere for them to go. I am going to check this. Watch this space...

EDIT: OK, the lashing here looks as though it's holding the sheet on rather than the container in place:

45345-92101 Knott End Junc. 20.6.67

These seem to have no lashing at all:

6983 Otterington Hall on goods in Goring Cutting 1965

6983 Otterington Hall on goods near Goring. Feb'65.

This is less relevant - because the British container is sitting on a Dutch flat wagon on the dockside at Hook of Holland (but it's a lovely photo! EE 350hp 0-6-0 too) - I doubt the wagon would have left the docks without some form of lashing:

Hi-Res ER1219

Adam