Close Coupling

Owing to the big move (successfully completed but now unpacking!) not much has been happening on the modelling front.  Last night was one of the first forays back into it, but with my train shed out of action (still packed boxes are in it along with other "stuff") it was limited to what I could do on the dinning room table.

This consisted of working though my collection of 101s (RR, SYWP Green and BR Blue 3 car), my collection of Blue Ribband Mk 1s and my Class 411 and sorting out close couplings.  I set up a reverse curve using some Kato 315mm radius curves and set to work. 

The results are quite pleasing.  One short and one long Farish NEM Rapido in each Mk 1 and these go round happily both pushing and pulling coupled long to short.  For the MUs of all persuasions, I have used the Dapol knuckles.  For all 4 sets a pair of shorts worked fine.

For those wondering what my train shed looks like - picture below.  7.5m by 6m and no, I don't have t share with the car!  I do have to share with my own workshop but that is ok as it is MINE, ALL MINE  (Bahahahahahhaha!)  (Tinks (in best Bluebottle voice) "maybe I have been in the outback too long" Untinks)

The Last Post

This is probably the last post from Longreach as we are leaving on Saturday for home - and the train shed!  4 years in the bush minus my main layout has been at times quite depressing particularly as I would (like I did today) get some nice models and not have anywhere nice to run them (the RR and SYWP 101s arrived today).  I won't have my layout probably until the New Year but it will be much closer (at 30 mins instead of 12 hours drive!) than it has been in a while, and with my full set of tools and my shed, I can make a proper start on some of the plans I have, together with faster progress on some of the things which I have started whilst out here.

The last bit of modelling was done today - I got some black on the K class.  Tonight I have spent some time sorting out and packing away my work bench.

Photo of the K below - looks pretty good.  Once I get the steps on, I will do some detail painting before looking at the transfers - then there is the tender bogies and I will be done.

Victorian Railways K Class Part II

Progress has been made on K190 with some of the brass detailing bits having been done.  As you can see in the head on shot, the body isn't on square (and the handrail above the smoke box door needs fixing) but it does sit square - just not fitted correctly for the photo.  I still need to do a bit of cleaning up around the cab windows and add in things like the steps and so forth before painting in black.  I tried to organise it so the light would work on this one too (see the 3801 updates below) but almost drilled a hole in the middle of the smoke box so decided to abandon the project where it is.  I will paint the inside of the light silver prior to glazing.

The tender has had no work done as yet - I have to sort out the lack of bogies for it so inspiration has been hard to come by.

Victorian Railways K Class

Along with the Badger Bits C38 kit mentioned previously (now waiting for me to get to Brisbane and Horizon Hobbies to purchase the paint recommended by the Australian N Scale e-Group) I purchased the VR K Class kit as I had been on a trip from Lilydale to Yarra Glen with K 190 around the same time as 3801.

Like the 38, it is a resin casting to fit on a Micro Ace chassis.  Unlike the 38, no mods are necessary to the chassis and the loco body was easy to clean up.  Progress pic below, followed by one of the real thing I found on the Internet (Michael Greenhill's photo from Flicker.)  I plan on making mine look like this, minus the sticker under the cab window so it is an ideal shot for inspiration for the model.  I have thoughts on the motor in the cab but haven't explored options for making it smaller yet.  Next step with the body is to drill out the chimney and then put on the brass etch detailing bits.

More 38 progress

I have almost got to the point with my 38 that all which will be left will be spraying it green, the detail painting the cab roof, cylinders, front end and light before putting the transfers on and the glazing in before coaling the tender.  This means I have managed to fit the front buffers and steps, fit the cab steps, put on the rear buffers and fit the tender ladder and put on the hand rails - I have, at the time of writing, only put on the RH side one.  LH side hopefully later today.  I have also managed to fit the body to the chassis square - my initial efforts had it a little RH down but a bit of clearing of the inside of the has solved this.

The twist in the ladder has been fix - I guess that is one of the uses of close up digital photography!

You can see the slant in this pic taken with the motor removed but the light on.  Quite pleased with the effect although I will be dimming the light once I DCC the loco.

38 progress

Having put in about an hour of work on the cleaning up of the cast for the body (which needed a bit, but only on the underside of the footplate and around the front steps - the boiler was very clean with no need to file or fill). 

The Micro Ace chassis which is supplied for this has a light in it so I have painted the whole black (including the tender so there should be no problems when I come to paint it all green - at least the green will have the same undercoat) to stop the light shining where I don't want it.  I due course (tonight possibly) I will drill out the front light and after painting fill it with some Micro Glaze or something similar.

Don't worry if you are looking at it and thinking the body is high at the cab end - it is.  It does go on straight but this was a quick photo session to show progress to a couple of people and to update the blog.

My parents sent me the photo below - I am the one of the left looking at the photo with my brother.  This was 3801's first trip on the Main South to Moss Vale following its return to steam in 1986.  We had travelled up from Melbourne on the Inter Capital Daylight (instead of chasing it in a car as we normally did) and then following the return from Moss Vale caught the Melbourne Express (the replacement to the celebrated and much missed "Southern Aurora" sleeping car express) overnight back to Melbourne.  I am planning on making my model look like this - possibly without the two little boys in the foreground however!

NSWGR C38

A few years back I met Phil Badger of Badger Bits and Ixion fame - prior to the initial Manor release actually - at the AMRA Exhibition in Brisbane.  Phil had emailed me prior to the show to say he was coming to Brisbane for it and would love the opportunity to catch up.  His intended 30 mins ended up being 3 days and at least one evening into the small hours as he learnt a lot about British steam locos from myself and Ben of Oz (check out Ben's stuff on RM Web by searching for nebnoswal - he is doing a great job of building Sturminister Newton on the SDJR in his shed in Victoria).

Phil brought with him this:

Now for those who don't know a lot about Australian Steam the NSW Government Railway C38 hold pride of place - mostly because the class leader, 3801, travelled across the continent in 1970 and again in 1988 prior to Flying Scotsman doing the same in 1989.  (Had the Victorian Railways not scrapped their S Class 4-6-2 Streamliners, then the C38 may not have had top spot.)  Suffice to say, 3801 is the Australian equivalent of 4472.  The model photographed on my "St Alban's Priory" layout is of 3802, the next in the class.  5 were finished like this, and 25 without the bullet nose and cowling on the top of the boiler.  Similar to the LMS Duchesses the streamlining didn't make much difference to the capabilities of the class.

I have been eyeing off getting one of my own pretty much ever since and in today's post I got both the Badger Bits kit for the C38 - with 3801 transfers - and a kit for a Victorian Railways K class 2-8-0.

So far work has progressed on cleaning up some of the flash on the body - resin cast and it goes on a Micro Ace chassis.  Can't really tell you much about it as Phil forgot to put the instructions in and I haven't yet emailed to ask for them!

Photo to date:



All things considered it is a pretty clean casting.  Further progress photos and postings in due course.

Something a bit different

Introducing the EMD FP7-DC Demonstrator. 

I was inspired earlier this year by Nick Dibben's "Willow Bridge" in NGS-J 2/11 to dig out some of my US stuff and have a play - which in turn had the Darling Daughters get out their assorted collection of stuff, practically all of which has been purchased because they liked it and is generally of US outline and from the bargain bin at hobby shops (no sense spending a lot on something which has a better than average chance of heading to the floor at the hands of a 2 year old, although it has to be said they are all very good with the trains - mine and theirs).  Amongst the stuff we were playing with were some Bachmann FP7s which I had purchased with the intention of using them and the TPM MU motorising kits to make some EMUs for "Swallow Street".  With that layout being in store pending a rebuild in 2012, the making of the EMUs took a back seat and now that Farish has announced their entry into RTR EMUs (with the hope that they may shrink the 2EPB and MLV from OO down) there isn't much incentive to do anything with the pair of A units nor the one B unit I have left. 

As a result I had a thought and the photo above is the result.  The main idea is from the Victorian Railways B Class - see here - but the B is a Co-Co and a bit longer than this.  So I have dubbed it the FP7-DC Demo.  The FP7 was a passenger rated version of the F7 with an extra 4 feet for the water supply for the steam heat boiler.  As this is a Double Cab version, it made sense to call it the DC.  As there were never any in service the Demo was pretty obvious. 

I have done some filling of holes prior to putting new ones in.  The two donor bodies were PRR and NYC and these had different number boards so this has had to be fixed.  A bit of milling and removal of metal from the chassis was required to fit the second cab on but this was fairly straight forward.  Drive chain wise, nothing was needed to be done. 

I have a bit more filling to do prior to working out a paint scheme - maybe EMD like this loco.  Then there is the refitting of the couplings and putting it to work on the kids layout - probably as Dad's Engine so there isn't too many fights over it!

Chivers LNER CCT

I had a win on eBay a few weeks back, picking up 3 LNER CCTs from the Chivers stable already built from the USA for the right price (compared to a new kit - and that included very quick by US Mail standards, postage).  I have been hoping to get a few more of these to go with the one example I have from when Chivers was still producing the whole range of their N Gauge kits (unlike the current situation where they seem to drip feed one shop in Preston, UK - I obtained 2 GWR Pythons from their eBay store following a tip off on the 2mm VAG a month or so ago).

When these landed the first thing I noticed was the paint job looked better in the pictures!  Not a problem, as I was thinking of BR era (57 were built in 1950) rather than LNER so into the stripper they went.  The clean up was pretty easy and then I had a closer look at the build.

A few issues need to be resolved.  The Chivers kits are probably the best for minimum flash going around and these are no exception.  There was the odd bit in the window apertures so I sorted that out and a bit on the roofs.  Closer inspection of the roofs showed that while the vents had been fitted, only 4 out of 24 were aligned correctly so I have chopped them all off and will replace them with spares that I have - although I am leaning towards putting Ultima torpedo vents on instead because they are bigger and while possibly not to scale, they look "right" compared to the Chivers option.

On reflection the paint jobs will be three - one is going to get LNER teak to join the collection of LNER vans I have - and I will put 2mm replacement W irons on so I can put it on the 2mm track easily.  One is also going to be painted BR Blue - although possibly not as weathered as the photos on Paul Bartlett's wagon site (link to the right).  The third I am not sure about.  I have one in Crimson so it may be painted maroon to give me the fourth option.  Time will tell.

Dapol Class 26 Review

Having read good things about this (and having seen some pictures of the blue one attached to some of the new Mk 1s from Farish) I decided to get one on a whim as it doesn't fit my modelling interests - they were mostly based in Scotland I believe.

My example arrived last Friday (21st) and ran beautifully from the box.  No dramas at all.  The only complaint I had (and this is almost universal with my new era diesels) is the red is on all the time and cannot be switched off - OK when running light engine but not too flash when hauling a train.  The other minor grumble I have is the blue seems to be a bit too green when compared with other Blue Era models I have (and not just the Farish ones - seems Dapol have changed the paint spec).

I went to put a TCS EUN651 chip in it and that was when the trouble started.  The instructions don't warn you the lights are attached to the chassis.  I found out that they are plugged in from a post here on the N Gauge Forum.  Initial efforts to put the chip in proved to be far from easy.  To start with the body wouldn't sit down correctly so after a few attempts I removed the chip and put the blanking plug back - the blanking plug is noticeably shorter than the chip I chose so I wondered if the chip wasn't the best choice.  No dramas really I figured I would email Dapol and ask.

As it happened, the wires leading from the plug leading to the LED cluster managed to work loose.  The infamous Dapol dry solder joints seem to have finally struck me.  Mind you, I don't have a lot of Dapol locos as I have been made gun shy of them by the horror stories of the Mk 1 versions - although the diesels tend not to have these in the same abundance as the steam locos.  Now sending it back is usually the cry in case like this - and fair enough too.  The loco had merely been run for an hour and now one set of LEDs wouldn't light up merely by the owner attempting to DCC the loco.  No tools near it.

Since I was emailing Dapol about the chip I added the information about the light.  Joel @ Dapol replied quite quickly asking, not unreasonably I thought, for photos.  So I sent them off.  Nothing heard from them since so a bit disappointed considering there was a few hours left in the business day over there when I emailed the second time - POETS perhaps?

Fortunately I have been able to fix the LED cluster (seems the soldering of 2mm kits has paid off in other ways!) and by removing some padding and replacing it will some tape (since I assume the padding is part of the insulation protection for the plug) I have fitted the chip of choice and the loco is now happily trundling around DCC and ready to go.  Still have the red LED issue to sort.

I have discovered one other niggle - the coupling pocket.  It would be handy if Dapol included a bogie surround which was minus the pocket - or even a spare which the owner could cut the pocket off.  The pipes and bits which are included in the bag can only be fitted as far as I can tell with the coupling pocket removed.  Now this would render the locomotive as a one direction loco.  Not a problem for a DVT or a steam engine (such as the forthcoming A3 or A4) but on a 26 it is a bit of a pain.  More because if you change your mind and remove the pipes to sell the loco in the future you can't replace the coupling.  So I am not sure - I haven't worked out a train for this loco yet but it may end up hauling some Mk 1 coaches with Sc numbers whereupon I may remove the coupling and put the pipes in.  In the meantime, a short shank coupling is going in and we will see what happens.