7mm On Heather's Workbench - North Eastern interlude

[spikey faz]

Old paintbrush handle.

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I have begun to fit brake compartment parts. Here is the brake third. The seat and ducket will be treated to a suitable moquette in time. Of course, I couldn’t resist fitting the roof to see how much of my hard work remains at all visible.

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I think the answer is, along the lines of Rolls-Royce salesmen when asked how much power the car might have, sufficient.

I particularly like the second picture. Just feels real to me.

Mike

 

[Heather Kay]

I’ve been refining and refining the lining - ho ho! I’m at the point where I should stop because I’m beginning to undo and redo what’s already done.



Time, then, to choose running numbers. The Sparmac kits represent the early turnbuckle underframes, so the build period spans about a decade from 1925. Surprisingly, if the records are to be believed, these vehicles lasted until the early 1960s, the full brakes lasting longest. I would have assumed the later angle-iron truss underframes would have superseded the early coaches by then. Anyway…

TK = E12264, built York 1929, withdrawn January 1962
BTK = E16248, built Birmingham 1930, withdrawn March 1962
BG = E70163, built Doncaster 1929, withdrawn June 1965

In true BR style, I assume some branding around the van carrying capacities, which I shall glean from a little photo studying. Once lettering is done, protective varnish, and some underframe paint reworking, followed by fitting out glazing and internals.

 

[Heather Kay]

Lettering started. I think I need to lay off the caffeine as my fingers were very shaky doing this. Gently coaxing a numeral into place, then - WHAP! Off it wanders!

The diagram 113 BG was rated at a 10 ton load, but obviously Fox don’t print such transfers. I’ve taken the decision, confirmed with the regional traffic office, that the van be downgraded to 8 tons for safety reasons. If suitable tiny numerals had been available I could bodge 10 together from the 1 ton transfer - sadly, I can’t use a capital O as the numeral 0 in Gill Sans is oval and not almost circular. Ho hum.

 

[Heather Kay]

All done. I’ll let the transfers dry overnight. A gentle blast of gloss varnish to fix them in place permanently, and then I can start on door furniture and handrails.

 

[Neil]

I have vague memories of a trip from Selby (I think) to York in a Thompson carriage, I have a clear recollection of the oval toilet window, and I believe that the interior was fairly drab.

 

[Heather Kay]

After fighting off Muttley, who decided today would be a good day to try and visit, I’ve got gloss varnish on the bodies. They can dry for a bit before I retouch underframe paint.

I keep putting off door furniture. I will get round to it - provided Muttley keeps his distance. He’s being a right stinker today, jumping out and catching me off guard.

 

[Heather Kay]

The underframes have been retouched to the grotty blacky-browny shade. It made sense to paint the floors, so the Humbrol acrylics came out. Hu29 dark earth for the corridor lino, Hu62 leather for the compartment carpets, and Hu32 dark grey for the van floors.

Now, about all those grab rails and door handles? Ask me later.

 

[Heather Kay]

The awkward handrails for the guard to grab.









For once, only one needed to be remade and that was because dopey-drawers here bent the return for the wrong hole.

The joints between horizontal and vertical look scary, but with a small piece of card to protect the coach side, a drop of flux and hot iron touched on the joint, and it’s all over in a split second. A quick clean up and I’ll get these blackened and painted black.

Then the long old job of the other door handles. I think I’ll save that for tomorrow.

 

[Heather Kay]

Ooh, hello! The BG is glazed, has a full complement of door handles, gangways, roof and bogies fitted. A little retouching here and there, plus a gangway cover to make up, and this one can be called done*.

I think the BTK next.



* Still hoping for the errant Kemilway 8-footer to turn up, to replace the cast efforts.

 

[dibateg]

Those 3 leg guard handrails are always tricky Heather - nice work though - looking good!

Tony

 

[Heather Kay]

Thanks Tony!



The BTK has had all the ironmongery fitted, and the glazing done. I’ve just installed the corridor side grab rails, and I’m pondering how to make the WC window opaque. I’ll need to check whether it was actually opalescent or just hammered glass.



Something that had been vexing me a little was how to represent the unique door handles style fitted to guard's doors. It is a kind of teardrop shape. Happily, the kit contained turned brass T-handles which were chunky enough that I could file out a suitable shape. The latching handles are from Broad Gauge Society spares from various etched kits. I think they’ll look good enough with a coat of black paint. All the new brass work needs some toning down, as it’s definitely a bit bright at the moment.

 

[Mike Trice]

Opalescent.

 

[Alan]

Nice, Heather I always liked the 64ft full Brakes. I built a Kirk kit for my OO layout.

 

[Heather Kay]

I spent the day just plodding through assembling the BTK.





Happy with that. Not so happy with the roof securing bolts. One is in direct view through the guard's doors, the other splits a compartment divider. I’ve elected to use a light coat of something like Copydex to supplement the pretty good friction fit.

The toilet window is just plain copier paper glued inside the glazing. The toplight has a small black oval printed to represent the clear view port. Knowing what I know now, the TK windows will be sorted out sooner. You can see that coach's carcass sitting at the back of the bench, ready to move to the front tomorrow.

 

[Heather Kay]

Had a bit of a moment last thing yesterday. As these three coaches are designed to run as a set, I wanted to check they coupled nicely now I’d attached the gangways.

Well, um, no. The bottoms of the gangways turned out thick enough that they just prevented the Kadees from meeting cleanly. Pushing the vehicles together pressed the gangways onto the rigid cast floor projection and that was that! So, my first task today was to trim away the bottom outer plate of the gangways so the coaches do couple up.

I really need a better test track. Three coaches together and I'm stuck! It really needs somewhere I can roll the models through extensive tests to check for issues like gangway plates catching awkwardly. Still, I'm sure the client will be able to deal with niggles like that if they arise.

So, on to assembling the TK then.

 

[Heather Kay]

Nearly there.

 

[Heather Kay]

Still nearly there. I actually had the roof on earlier, then noticed some stubborn dust particles. They really enjoy the static generated by the the plastic glazing. With the roof off again, I thought I’d attempt fixing the compartment wall better, and accidentally crushed the dynamo…

So, that needs repairing now. Still, I think the moquette works well.

 

[oldravendale]

B****y hell, Heather. Those seats look fantastic. That coach interior really needs to have some lighting.

Brian

 

[Heather Kay]

Thanks Brian. Much appreciated.

Today, I’m having one of those days where I need to remind myself that I really should work things out a good deal earlier in a build.

Let’s just say coupling with "working" gangways is proving a little tiresome. I’m getting there. Experience gained and all that.

 

[Heather Kay]

Problem sort of solved.

It involved partial disassembly, removal of the gangways, and filing just over a millimetre from the moulded gangway floors. That fixed the initial problem, but raised a second. The final fix was making full width and height buffing plates for the gangways so they didn’t catch on each other on really tight curves.

So, the upshot is the coaches can be properly coupled in a realistically close fashion (don’t ask me about uncoupling again: it can get messy but is possible with the aid of a couple of breakdown cranes ) and will traverse tight curves with the gangways sliding over each other. In the real world, the gangways would be automatically locked together to avoid all this palaver.

Now I’ve lost the impetus I had first thing, the weather is turning nasty, and I reckon the cat has the right idea by curling up and dozing on the sofa!