7mm BR Diesels

[mickoo]

Lee, at the rate your using it, you'll soon use it all up anyway

Tamiya is good stuff for the very edge of the area you need to mask, but blue Scotch tape is better for covering large areas where you don't want over spray. It's not bad for an edge if it's a long straight edge and in a crease, say a tender side on a footplate but not so good for a large flat area like a coach side between blue and white, it's quite a thick tape, same as Frog I suppose so you can end up with a bit of a ledge.

Mick D

 

[daifly]

You are presumably aware that Frog Tape is a brand not a description. Frog Tape produce several different types of masking tape for a variety of purposes. This might help to identify the correct tape for your needs.
Dave

 

[Healey Mills]

You are presumably aware that Frog Tape is a brand not a description. Frog Tape produce several different types of masking tape for a variety of purposes. This might help to identify the correct tape for your needs.
Dave

Hi Dave,

Thank you., yes I was aware. I have the yellow Multi-surface tape... I know it is supposed to be low adhesion but they take it to a whole new extreme!!

Cheers
Lee

 

[Healey Mills]

Erm.... I'm not sure how this is going at the moment. The no.2 end to 40126 has had the 'darker' blue applied after a considerable amount of time was spent masking an area that resembled that on the actual loco. Mixing the paint took ages too, trying to get a sensible match that, on a model, would not look out of place or ridiculous but also looked close to the real loco.

The end result (sorry about the poor quality pic):



I couldn't fit the loco body on the chassis correctly because the underside of the cabs are all sealed off to prevent over-spray entering them. However, looking at the loco it does seem odd and wrong but I think this is predominantly due to the faded blue on the nose. At the moment I'm not sure whether I should have made the faded area wider. Hopefully once varnished, numbered and then weathered it might all tie together... fingers crossed

Cheers
Lee

 

[richard carr]

Lee

Looking at photos it is almost impossible to see the light blue panel, virtually every photo I have found the panel is covered in dirt, I did find a couple that hinted at light blue panel under some dirt.

I'm sure it will be fine once it is weathered.

Richard

 

[Healey Mills]

Lee

Looking at photos it is almost impossible to see the light blue panel, virtually every photo I have found the panel is covered in dirt, I did find a couple that hinted at light blue panel under some dirt.

I'm sure it will be fine once it is weathered.

Richard

Oh I hope you are right Richard... I feel like I'm on a downward slope with this build at the moment. Perhaps too many new techniques and ideas at once

 

[Mr Grumpy]

If all else fails, just give the whole thing (excluding yellow ends) a waft of blue, it will look perfect I'm sure!

 

[Healey Mills]

If all else fails, just give the whole thing (excluding yellow ends) a waft of blue, it will look perfect I'm sure!

Ha, I'm sure you're right. I guess I just need to take my time learning and suck up the failures as well as the success.

I'm sure the techniques and failures will stand me in good stead for the next ones

 

[mickoo]

It's more obvious on some engines than others.


Copyright to existing owners.

The colour varies from light blue to grey.

As noted earlier, rather than being a colour change I think it's a matt anti glare paint, probably BR blue but is more susceptible to weathering than the normal gloss paint and thus fades much faster. The edge is too hard and defined for it to just be simple weathering so it has to be something applied. It's present on too many engines over too greater a time span to be a random thing.

It's also present on class 37 if you look really hard but to a much much lessor extent.

Anyway, y'all get the idea and at the end of the day rule #1 applies, they're your toys so y'all can do what ever you like with them

MD

 

[Healey Mills]

Thanks for posting those pics Mick... especially 009!

I agree with what you have said but also, Richard has pointed out that on many engines it largely goes unseen.. probably due to the dirt covering the entire area on the nose tops. One thing I have noticed now is that the dirt strictly follows the lines of the 'anti-slip'/ anti-glare paint.. give or take a smidge. The occasions that the light blue/ grey 'patch' does stand out is where I believe the windscreen washers have been used a lot and hence you are left with a large area at the foot of the outer windows that is cleaned/ de-greased.

That's my theory... and I'm sticking to it!!

Either way, there is definitely a difference in the paint applied to the nose tops. I may not have quite captured it correctly this time... but I will... eventually

Cheers
Lee

 

[mickoo]

Once it's weathered it'll look fine

As for unseen, I'd have to disagree, you just need to look at more pictures Having said that, I've several photos of particular engines through out their life and it has no hint of a lighter panel so it appears that it may not be a universal application.

Dirt, yes it does, which adds to the deduction that it's a matt paint, either anti glare or anti slip, not that you'd want to be standing up there anyway.

To take away the hard edge you can scrub the light blue area with a very soft burnishing brush, like a fibre brush but much softer, that'll start to show the darker blue underneath, or you could try with some thinners and a cotton bud, just enough to soften the edge and make it look more blended, unless of course your looking for the hard edge shown on the images above.

MD

 

[mickoo]

Just as a closure, I browsed my BR blue pre TOPS folder and found this, straight out of the paint shop at Crewe in 1971 with a definitive light blue panel from the factory. It's the only picture I've managed to find that proves (in this example and this shopping only) the top was painted light blue from the outset.



Copyright Derek Jones

 

[Healey Mills]

Superb

 

[richard carr]

Mick

I have to say that for all the time I spent in the 80's running round after 40s I never ever noticed this, but there is the proof above and as you say its a lot more common than you think.
I suspect its an anti slip coating just in case any one goes up on the nose to open that inspection hatch door.

I'm just going to stick to mine being dirty though its a lot easier !

Richard

 

[Healey Mills]

I have to say that for all the time I spent in the 80's running round after 40s I never ever noticed this, but there is the proof above and as you say its a lot more common than you think.
I suspect its an anti slip coating just in case any one goes up on the nose to open that inspection hatch door.

I'm with you on this one Richard. From spring 1980 travelling behind 40's and I never spotted this at all.... the thing is, as Mick has said, once you do spot it the nose covering is something you look at straight away now

Cheers
Lee

 

[mickoo]

Richard, neither did I and I'm a bit of an anorak with details like this. I only noticed it a few years back whilst researching LMR engines at Crewe in the 60s, specifically dates of warning panel yellow applications. Some later more weathered photos showed a light grey panel appearing and then I looked at blue engines and noticed a similar trend.

I mentioned it on the class 40 flickr site where they list details and differences in great depth.

As expected it was dismissed, but the more we looked at all the images on the site the more of them turned up. Like us no one had noticed it before and some of these guys can tell an engine from 300 yards away just by the handrails, flash symbols and paint chips!

As you say most of the time it's covered in crud so isn't overly obvious, plus there are engines out there that do not show this feature.

MD

 

[daifly]

I'm just going to stick to mine being dirty though its a lot easier !

I think you're on safe ground anyway. No sign of light blue on these noses.

 

[oldravendale]

I wish I'd thought of buying one of those nose sections. It would have made a grand garden shed.......

B

 

[Yorkshire Dave]

I feel like I'm on a downward slope with this build at the moment. Perhaps too many new techniques and ideas at once

Hi Lee - don't worry - I sure we've all been there, I certainly have. And thy is doing a reet grand job wi' t'40s .

As noted earlier, rather than being a colour change I think it's a matt anti glare paint, probably BR blue but is more susceptible to weathering than the normal gloss paint and thus fades much faster. The edge is too hard and defined for it to just be simple weathering so it has to be something applied. It's present on too many engines over too greater a time span to be a random thing.

It's also present on class 37 if you look really hard but to a much much lessor extent.

As Mickoo, Richard(s) and yourself have commented about the anti glare/slip paint applied to the long 'short hoods' of class 37s and 40s (not sure about class 55s). I have checked my class 45 photos and this panel is not evident - just a layer of dirt (acting as an anti glare panel?) where the washing plant brushes could not reach.

 

[mickoo]

Dave, it's just the EE class 37 and 40 as far as I've found, something to do with the bonnet length and seat / viewing position I'll wager, the Deltic is a very high bonnet and your viewing angle is much more shallow, Peaks have a similar viewing angle to the 37 and 40 but the bonnet is a different angle (flatter) and shorter.

Digressing to viewing angles, the HST window base is set high enough so you cannot see the track below a certain distance, the stroboscopic effect of the sleepers can either send drivers to sleep or have adverse side effects. When the first TGV's ran the window had a similar height but at 180 mph the effect came from much further out, so the base was raised even higher (or seat lowered, can't recall which now) to remove those sleepers that might have an effect from the drivers eye line. The effect is compounded by the fact that the drivers seat is centrally mounted, moving the seat left or right of the centreline helps reduce the effect.

The effect was really first studied on the APT-P when traveling on the WR at high speed, drivers complaining of difficulty in focusing and bad headaches. The same effect can afflict some office workers with faulty tube lighting which can flicker and is usually only visible from the corner of your eye.

I've no idea how old my kids are or their birthdays, yet I remember shite like this

Anyway, back on topic, some Deltics do have very washed out nose tops near the windscreen, which also runs down the bodyside This supports Lee theorem about washer fluid having an effect on the paint work but the effect is not hard edged and is clearly a weathering effect.

MD