Rob. Like all things the technique is in planning
The Letraset, since it was made for copyright type work, had register marks to ensure you got the spacing and lining right,
so I guess the idea is to try and replicate that in some way.
With your skills, I am sure you will find a way to create what you need. Actually, what you need to consider is the way the
signwriter might lay things out. A thin pencil line or using a ruler, or a strip of sticky tape would work, for instance.
john coffin wrote:Rob. Like all things the technique is in planning
The Letraset, since it was made for copyright type work, had register marks to ensure you got the spacing and lining right,
so I guess the idea is to try and replicate that in some way.
With your skills, I am sure you will find a way to create what you need. Actually, what you need to consider is the way the
signwriter might lay things out. A thin pencil line or using a ruler, or a strip of sticky tape would work, for instance.
Paul
Got you, Although I used some low tack tape to get the distance from the line of rivets at the top and the initial line straight it was all by eye from there. As you say planning is key and changing your mind three or so years later doesn't help with planning
Next up is the first of the earlier vans with wide-boards and beaded joints. This one also happens to be the one with a saggy roof - perhaps a sign of it's age by this point.
I have really enjoyed the making and painting of these vans - probably why I have put so much time into them.
Last but not least, I did one of them in NBR livery.
I learned when reading Tatlow's LNER wagon collection recently, that the NBR was the second largest of the constituents of the LNER (after the NER). This came as a bit of a surprise to me because I hadn't realised just how big the NBR was. That's probably one of the reasons that so many of the ex NBR wagons made it into the 1930's still in faded NBR livery - there were so many of them.
Apart from the shabby paintwork, this one is in quite good condition for it's age.
I learned when reading Tatlow's LNER wagon collection recently, that the NBR was the second largest of the constituents of the LNER (after the NER). This came as a bit of a surprise to me because I hadn't realised just how big the NBR was. That's probably one of the reasons that so many of the ex NBR wagons made it into the 1930's still in faded NBR livery - there were so many of them.
Just a thought about this statistic; was the number of NB and NER wagons perhaps inflated by mineral wagons, compared to the other companies? It does seem that the NER moved a lot of coal in company-owned wagons - POs seemed to be very rare - and the Scottish companies (I'm thinking particularly of the CR, I admit) also seemed to have a lot of (small!) mineral wagons. Would be interesting to compare the numbers of goods wagons and vans between companies.
I learned when reading Tatlow's LNER wagon collection recently, that the NBR was the second largest of the constituents of the LNER (after the NER). This came as a bit of a surprise to me because I hadn't realised just how big the NBR was. That's probably one of the reasons that so many of the ex NBR wagons made it into the 1930's still in faded NBR livery - there were so many of them.
Just a thought about this statistic; was the number of NB and NER wagons perhaps inflated by mineral wagons, compared to the other companies? It does seem that the NER moved a lot of coal in company-owned wagons - POs seemed to be very rare - and the Scottish companies (I'm thinking particularly of the CR, I admit) also seemed to have a lot of (small!) mineral wagons. Would be interesting to compare the numbers of goods wagons and vans between companies.
Quite possibly, I don't have my copy to hand until the weekend so i can't see if there is anything to indicate that might be the case. I will try to remember to look when I lay my hands on it.
More playing last week with some scrap offcuts of styrene sheet has moved me closer to not needing to buy parts from Parkside or Slaters.
These are produced from 3 layers the two outer ones in 0.25mm (10thou) and an inner layer of 0.5mm (20thou). Once stuck together (using limonene) they are just as sturdy as the ones that I have from Parkside.
As you can see from the photos I tried a few different variations to see what was possible.
The springs are made up from 8 layers of 0.25mm and were in true Blue Peter style some I cut earlier and discarded as not being any good - I had cut some round ends for the hanger that were just too fragile and I have been breaking the round ends off and using them as washers under bolt heads when detailing.
To say that I am pleased with them is a bit of an understatement!
As I said earlier last weekend was made up of lots of small steps.
I also managed to get the support brackets added to the solebars of the NER CCT (I got it on it's wheels a few weeks ago but forgot to take any photos). I have also done a bit more at the NBR bogie CCT but not enough to warrant taking any photos of yet.
For the last couple of weeks modelling has taken a back seat to gardening, and no that doesn't mean anything further has been done on the Rhubarb Triangle. It's been gardening up North.
I did manage a bit of time at the bench though and those of you who look in the small adds may remember me advertising a couple of 3 Aitch wagon kits that I had bought from the Guild E&T lists?
There wasn't any interest in them as they were so I decided to build the second one and add some detail and decay to them to portray them as condemned wagons ready for breaking up.
The first one was the 5 plank version that I had already assembled. I added a false floor (made from some styrene planked sheet that came with my Dragon models Caledonian single Bolster kit - I must ask Chris Basten for the source of it because it's actually quite good stuff). Over that I added inner sides that were scribed and washer plates etc. added to. Finally after painting I found various bits and bobs of scrap junk to add a bit of interest inside.
Unfortunately we have had storms here today which have resulted in odd lighting that has enhanced the reds in the rust which are much more subtle in reality. - Apologies too for the photo overload, I was struggling with the light and liked them all.
Because I hadn't assembled the second wagon I had a bit more scope with what I could do with it and Chris suggested an opening door. Out with the Olfa cutter to add the planking detail inside and to remove one of the doors. A bit more hacking and assembly gave me this.
Robpulham wrote:Because I hadn't assembled the second wagon I had a bit more scope with what I could do with it and Chris suggested an opening door. Out with the Olfa cutter to add the planking detail inside and to remove one of the doors. A bit more hacking and assembly gave me this.
Might I repectfully suggest that condemned wagons almost always had some remains of their former livery / identity, even if this was minimal and illegible?
To be honest I had thought of it but because they are destined for the small adds to raise some much needed modelling funds, I couldn't justify spending any more time on them - At what I have done I won't be anywhere near a £1 per hour, let alone the new minimum wage
The NBR D39B van has also progressed to just needing a roof and couplings.
The brake levers proved to be a little challenging, none of my many Parkside or Slaters spares were long enough. The answer was to laminate a piece of 0.25mm either side of a piece of 0.5mm and leave it over night to dry thoroughly. - in the same manner that I did the W Irons earlier.
I then cut a couple of tapered strips and applied limonene to both sides where I wanted the bends to be (one bend at a time) once the limonene had softened the strips I made the bend with some round nosed pliers. I then used some self locking tweezers as clamps to hold the bends in position while the plastic hardened again.
I spent most of Saturday on a very enjoyable whistle stop tour of the Yorkshire Dales so modelling time was much reduced.
What did get done was further detailing on the NER G1 and G2 vans.
They are still very difficult to photograph whilst still white.
Also after a marthon 10 hour cutting session I made a start on assembling the layers for a NBR D42B van which is visually very similar to the D39B van but it's wider and higher. I will be making the ends for this one myself so it will be interesting to compare them to the Parkside ends on the D39B when I get that far.
