Time for a long overdue update - Next up is an easybuild class 108 - to make it a bit more interesting I chose one of the Paddington hybrid units P212 , formed of a DMBS and a DTCL originally from different sets - Shawn at easybuild kindly supplied me with a set of 'Trailer' underframe fittings for the composite car. Usually the kits are sold as power twin sets , rather than power trailer sets. The real unit had some roof vents missing here and there on both vehicles, so thats a dead easy feature to model, plus as you can clearly see , one car has a small roof destination box , an t'other has a large 4 char headcode box. ive built the unit with the roof attached and chassis separate, as per the instructions, which are great. The only thing to note is for a 108 the bufferheads in the kit are a little oversize - I popped them in the lathed reduced them by about 1.5mm.
Painting this thing in NSE livery was a challenge , normally its a simpe case of looking where the stripes correspond with stuff on the bodysidess , window frames , hinges bump stops etc, but as the easybuild units are based on mk1 sides, the proportions and position of everything is different, so i had to improvise and mock up the stripes with masking tape first to see that they looked ok..If you mess up the proportions of the stripes , it then throws out the 'upsweeps' at the cab ends , or vice versa and you have a weird looking paint job!
So far so good
The trailer comp , complete with its missing roof vents.
At the other end I've made a start on the roof plumbing - the diagram for this in the instructions didnt quite match prototype photos, but then , neither does my little bachmann 108!
Next job is to fit out the interiors. On the DMBS ive picked out part of the window frames in silver, but the trailer car has them all painted in NSE blue - another nice little detail , and another reason I like DMUs
Ta for now!
Jon