jwealleans wrote:
I wrecked a safety loop getting the unfeasibly long coupling screws out ...
Tw*ts, aren't they Access to the screws can be gained by easing the wheelsets out, up and to one side (going outwards, IIRC, gives slightly more room), but you still can't get the driver in exactly vertical and you also have to watch that you don't bend out the brakeshoes.
You're not wrong, Ian, but forewarned is forearmed and I've managed the second one with nowhere near as much collateral damage.
More of a tw*t is the paint reaction I've had this morning when varnishing over the transfers. Other wagon I sprayed - fine; other side of this van - fine; one side, horrible white crust formed, dried, cracked and has taken all the paint off and even attacked the plastic in places. I have no explanation for it.
I agree with your take on the fish vans. I have renumbered both of mine and replaced the vac stand pipes with ABS/D&S variants because those included are far too flimsy. Have also painted buffer stocks bauxite - not sure where Bachmann got the black from!
Apart from some new scale couplings and AG wheels (open spoke) they are now pretty good.
I was wondering about the black buffer stocks, Nick. They've clearly worked from a single photo in Vol 4A of Tatlow so it might just be the way they're lit on there. That's obviously why the chalk panel is white.
I now need to repaint one side of mine - did you use the Precision colour? That looks closest on a casual inspection. I might well replace the vac pipes as well so they aren't directly above the coupling, that's just a nuisance at shows.
Not had mine out of the box yet, so noting all this.
On my last LNER van from Bachmann I replaced the Vac pipes with a couple of Lanarkshire Model ones, bent to shape of course....otherwise nice models with a bit of work.
In 4mm the Parkside kit (PC56) is the longer, 12' wheelbase version - to get the shorter one with correct planking and the FISH notice on the door, you remove two sections from each side, either side of the door. I did them some time ago - they're on page 34 of my workbench and there's a separate thread on doing the same conversion all the way back in 2008.
Pleased to hear that, Nick. I've just had to repaint one side of mine and the Precision colour didn't look too far away before it dried. I'll give it a coat of varnish and see how it looks against the other van. Colour variation is no bad thing anyway.
jwealleans wrote:As a further comparison, here's the cut down Parkside which used to be the only way to one of these vans.
This photograph is very useful for comparison of the Bachmann model with the 'cut and shut' Parkside. I bought seven of the Parksides when they were on offer at Scaleforum North last year, intending to convert some to the Diag. 63 version, but introduction of the Bachmann vehicle has strongly tempted me to get some of these for for adaptation with improved running/brake gear. Although I had some doubts as to whether the Bachmann model was an acceptable representation of these vans, your photograph suggests that differences between the Bachmann and Parkside versions are too insignificant to worry about.
And yet... in Issue 231 of Model Railway Journal Chris Pendlenton writes in scathing terms about the 'heavy handedness' in mouldings of Bachmann planked vehicles. 'The latest released shots of their fish vans are very disappointing indeed' he says, and 'As it is, I simply would not buy a Bachmann van or others of its stable.' Is his tongue somewhat in cheek, or is he right to think the planking grooves are excessively crude?
I don't find them heavy handed. Overscale the planking grooves may be, but if they weren't then you might not see them from normal viewing distance and we'd all sound off about them looking as if they had ply sides. I must have read that review but I don't recall whether he was basing it entirely on photos or had actually had one in his hand. Personally I'm very happy with them and will nbe keeping an eye on Hattons' Bargain corner for any excess ones to add to the Thurston fish train as well.
I think that if the planking was accurately modelled then nobody would recognise it as planking. If the planking gap is one third of a millimeter in 4mm scale, that is equivalent to one inch in real life. I don't think the planking gap is anywhere near as large as one inch. A real life one quarter of an inch equates to 0.08mm, which is three thousandths of an inch. I feel that would be difficult to see at a viewing distance of five feet.
We must also allow for the many modellers who are in middle age and beyond, where the eyesight is not as good as it was in the teens and twenties. Forty years ago I could read the hallmarks on jewellery without using an eyeglass. I wish I could now.
Modelling is always a compromise, as 00 gauge modellers we have a 4ft1in gauge, and a little more in EM (4ft6ins). We tolerate this, sometimes having to make wider splashers than scale to allow for the narrow gauge.
I feel that if a model "looks right", then go with it, and leave the rivet counters to wait for the perfect model.
For me, a highly relevant consideration is the intended purpose of these vans.
If I were forty years younger and wanting to produce a councours condition model for exhibition then I might look askance at a Bachmann moulding. More importantly, it might well take me months of work to produce a single such model.
But this is not my purpose. I'm starting from scratch and aiming to assemble a respectable quantity of rolling stock for employment on an exhibitable layout within the next ten years - after which I shall probably be too decrepit to take such a layout anywhere! I have a lot of construction to undertake in all areas, not merely rolling stock, and I have come to the view that I can only accomplish this by setting a modest standard of finished appearance but ensuring that everything visible on the layout meets that standard. Even if the planking grooves are overscale, a commercial wagon moulding such as a Bachmann that meets that standard will be acceptable, not least because I can turn out half a dozen of them in the time it would have taken to produce the very best of which I am capable.
'Good enough' may be the enemy of 'the best', but in this case my guiding principle must be that 'the whole will be greater than the sum of all its parts'.
Re- the planking, I'm with the consensus; some things you 'expect' to notice and are better being a bit overscale anyway. And that's regardless of practical considerations; as m'learned friend the Nob says, a prototypical gap would be a small fraction of an inch which wouldnt scale down at all. These vans are far from being the crudest of representations, we're not exactly looking at the old Triang Southern bogie van with its *raised* planking gaps... (or the Hornby OAA open for that matter, which has a floor made on the same basis).
Access to the screws can be gained by easing the wheelsets out, up and to one side (going outwards, IIRC, gives slightly more room), but you still can't get the driver in exactly vertical and you also have to watch that you don't bend out the brakeshoes.
