Mercian Models Festiniog horse dandy.

I haven't done any serious soldering fo quite a while now, so to get my hand back in I've dug this little Mercian Models kit out from my stash. Its for a Festiniog Railway horse dandy, a type of waggon used in the Festiniog's early pre-steam days. Empty rakes of slate waggons were hauled from the harbour uphill to the quarries by horse, returning by gravity. Dandy waggons were attached to the train for the horse to ride in on the return journey. Early dandies were entirely wooden, later ones, like the subject of this model, had wood frames and iron bodies. The door for the horse is on the straight end. After the introduction of steam some metal bodied dandies found further use for carrying coal. One now survives at the Welsh Highland Railway.

The kit comprises of a nickel silver etch for the main body, wheels, wheel bearings, etched couplings and a whitemetal horse. Instructions cover two A4 sheets, one sheet of general etched kit building notes and the other specific to the kit. This model is part of Mercian's Knightswork range, so called because each kit can be assembled in a night.

The main body is in one piece, which needs to have rivets punched out, panel lines scribed on (there are half-etched grooves on the inner side of the etch, running a blunt knife along them raises a line on the outside of the body) then carefully folded up. I use a drop hammer type riveter, from Eileen's Emporium, which distorted the body slightly. One end is shaped, for the horse's neck, so a little careful bending is required. Here's the body, with wheels in place;

I didn't bother fitting the wheel bearings, the pin points run in etched holes and its quite free running. Once the body was soldered up the floor could be fitted. But the etched floor was too small so I cut out a new one from brass strip. Once the floor was in place I fitted the two outer axlebox covers, for the first (middle) cover I used 188 degree solder and for the outer 145 degree. Even so care was needed to prevent the first layer from coming unstuck whilst soldering the outer layer in place. After that it was all plain sailing, using a mix of 188 and 145 degree solders to add the couplings (RT Models, I didn't fancy the supplied ones), top strip, and brake and hinge detail;

I'm quite happy with the way its turned out, but some of my soldering leaves a lot to be desired. More practice needed! Paint will be sploshed about in due course. But not until I do a bit more cleaning up, digital cameras are great for spotting little blemishes.

Door end, the two straps are in fact hinges;

From what I gather, looking at photos of the preserved vehicle, the body should be red oxide and the chassis black.

Paul.

Testy - please ignore.

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Seriously, why did you click?

N Brass Locos Glyn Valley Tramway Horse Drawn Coach - part 5.

As part of my spate of finishing off old projects I dug out this little coach. It was actually mostly finished a long time ago, the final steps being giving it a coat of Testors Dullcoat, glazing, and fitting the coupling loops and wheels.

I left the coach in its two main parts, body and chassis, for painting. As the body is a tight fit over the chassis there's no need for any additional means of holding the two together, handy should I ever wish to fit figures inside.

The instructions state that at one stage (date unknown) the body was possibly painted with buff sides with mid-green ends and ventilators, which is the livery that I've chosen. Which leaves the actual colour hues open to interpretation without further research, especially as the fashions and paint pigments of the day would have been very different than they are now, so colour schemes that would look odd to our eyes might have been the height of fashion back then. I've not added any lettering, in part due to my lazyness and partly because I want it to be a generic coach rather than one belonging to any particular line.

For the body sides I chose Tamiya XF-57 Buff, for the ends XF-5 Flat Green and the roof XF-20 Medium Grey. XF-69 Nato Black was used for the underframe. All applied with an airbrush, over etching followed by auto primer, both from rattlecans.

Glazing is just clear sheet, glued in place with Rok-It card glue.

Here it is again, with my Penrhyn workmans coach and a Saltford Peckett, which I think makes an attractive if somewhat odd little train;

Quite a nice little kit of a very unusual prototype. And no, I will not be attempting to make a working horse to pull it. But I can see myself building a few more small etched coaches, of different designs.
This kit is available from N Brass Locos.

Paul.

Peak Forest tractor.

I passed through Peak Forest today whilst out on the fatbike, and spotted a 37 sat idling whilst crossing over the railway bridge on my way home. I've stopped carrying a camera on my rides, so about 3/4 of an hour later I drove back, parked up, and took a few snaps. By this time the sun had down a bit, making for poorer photos, and I regret not going straight back out when I got home.
Still, its not every day that I see a 37;

In the background sits a shed, waiting to pull away;

And a (very poor) cab view;

All the time it sat there the engine was running. A waste of diesel to my mind, unless they're a pig to start so you daren't shut them down...

Paul.

009 Society RNAD flat wagon.

One of the great things about the 009 Society is the steadily growing range of wagon kits produced by the Society for its members. Of course you do need to be a member to buy one, but anyone modelling in 009 should be anyway!

This particular kit, the fourth produced by the Society, is of a type that were used in Royal Naval Armaments Depots, but the kits usefullness to modellers is mostly due to these wagons being sold to preservation societies.

My own two were started last year, I built them up but didn't get much further because I a) wasn't sure of the paint scheme and b) I don't care much for painting anyway. I built them according to the instructions, apart from adding a little shelf behind the bufferbeams for the couplers to attach to. A strip of lead (aquarium plant weight) sits under the floors for a little added weight. They went together very well, but there's a slight twist in the floor which I haven't managed to get rid off. Whether this will be a problem or not only time will tell.

I found an article about Dean Hill (an ex-RNAD depot) online, which used some similar wagons, so I then had a paint scheme to copy, all over black with yellow ends.

First job was to give them a squirt of white Hycote auto primer, followed by another squirt of Humbrol 69 gloss yellow. After giving them a couple of days for the paint to harden I masked off the yellow panels and finished them in Hycote matt black primer, again from a rattlecan. I would usually use a dirty weathered black but the wagons in the photo look very clean, so I left mine alone and finished off with several coats of Testors Dullcoat (they needed more than one coat to tone down the gloss yellow). The clean finish does mean that they make an interesting contrast with my other stock.

Couplings are Greenwich, fitted after painting.

And here they are with my Rushby's Resins battery loco;

I might yet build a couple more, some had one or two plank ends which would add a bit of variety.

Paul.

Parkside Dundas DM65 Hudson dropside bogie wagon.

I've not done much modelling recently, so to make up for a lack of effort and get myself back to building I've been finishing off a few projects, some of which have been hanging around for quite a while.

This kit was started last year, I got as far as the painting stage but then stalled, possibly because I'm not keen on painting...

Its rather a nice kit to build, the parts are all crisply moulded and fit together well. The floor is moulded in two halves with holes for the bogie pivot screws, and its worth putting the effort in to disguise the join. Two screws are provided to attach the bogies, the floor needs to be countersunk for the screw heads so they are just below the surface, then the screws can be glued in place and the heads hidden with a filler. After the body was finished I epoxied a strip of lead (aquarium plant weight) under the floor. Just for the record I managed to snap off the brake standard, luckily there's a spare included. Couplings are RT Models etches, using the larger NGWC003 loops, chosen as the smaller size suits the bogies better than any of the larger alternatives.

I was going to paint it black all over, so I started with a squirt of Hycote red auto oxide primer. But the red oxide looked just right so I left it at that, at least for the outer body. The inner body is a mix of Humbrol Leather and Citadel Rhinox Hide, and the bogies are painted with Phoenix Precision Dirty Black. A squirt of Testors Dullcoat finishes things off.

It sits nicely with my A1 Models diesel;

Which is partly why I bought it, I like to have stock that suits my locos.

Paul.

Saltford Models Lewin plateway loco and waggon

An unexpected eBay win led to one of Brian Clarke's more unusual offerings landing on my doorstep. Its an unpowered model of a plateway loco complete with a matching waggon and a piece of black plasticard with cast whitemetal plateway track to display them on. Both loco and waggon came built and finished in grey primer;

The loco is based on 'Tiny', a Lewin loco which ran on the Middlebere Tramway, which carried clay near Corfe Castle, in Dorset. The Middlebere Tramway started out as a plateway but was converted to edge rail before steam power was introduced. Lewin were based in nearby Poole and made a few small industrial locos as well as portable boilers and other steam machinery.

The model however differs from Tiny in many respects, not least that Tiny never ran on plateway track, having been fitted with flanged wheels from new. Also the model has a haycock firebox, a different style of chimney, and a lift up smokebox door.

However, none of that matters to me. Like many of Brian's models the loco has a charm all of its own.

One possible reason for the haycock firebox could be to make room for a vertically mounted motor. The kit was supplied either powered or static, and the position and size of the firebox would I think be in keeping with a tiny Sagami motor driving the back axle (*see note below). That however is just conjecture on my part, without seeing a powered example I cannot be certain. Later on Saltford listed a 009 Lewin, using the same main body castings but with a cab and of course a different chassis. The cab hid a Mabuchi motor, driving the rear axle in typical Saltford fashion.

The waggon looks to be a generic plateway type, and like the loco is cast whitemetal, but with etched brass wheels.

Both chassis members are insulated from each other and mounted on a plasticard floor, so the waggon could be hauled by a powered loco.

The track is made up from cast whitemetal blocks. For a working model Brian also sold etched brass track. He also produced a small booklet called 'An Introduction to Plateway Modelling', a fascinating read.

All of this came in the original box as sent by Brian, complete with notes in his uniquely humourous style;

Many years ago I scratchbuilt a pair of waggons, based on a drawing in Brian's book, but like so many things they never got finished. Wheels were to be N scale whitemetal wooden cart wheels. Perhaps its time they came out of storage for painting and finishing. I do have a small bag of plateway rail sections as well.

Incidentely, Ambis make etched nickel silver plateway track (and fishbelly rail).

Information on 'Tiny' can be found in 'Stephen Lewin and the Poole Foundry', Russell Wear and Eric Lees, long out of print, and the more recent 'Fayle's Tramways' by Chris Legg published by the excellent Twelveheads Press.

Paul.

Addendum: Funny thing memory. I seemed to remember one of these being described in the Goods Arrival pages of 'Model Railways' magazine, and a quick look through my copies in the loft finds said description in the October 1983 issue. A single photo and a few words obviously made an impression on my young mind, although it was some years later that I built my first Saltford kit (a Simplex, still extant but rebuilt with a better motor and improved drive). The reviewer managed to build the waggon with its sides upside down...

*I've now found out that the motor was a larger can motor driving the front axle.