West End Workbench

[jwealleans]

I'll spare you pictures of paint drying - for the moment - and go on to the Parkside Toad E, which I also acquired at Scalefour North. I believe that was the first show at which it's been available. I haven't been rushing it, but it's gone together reasonably quickly this week.



What you get - some nicely cast sprues, commendably fine brake gear, no obvious problems or mistakes in sides or ends (as far as I could see) and good clear instructions. On the downside, there's more flash that I would expect to see on a model this new and the roof has neither torpedo vents nor witness marks to drill for them, nor does it have rainstrips. When I read the instructions, it also tells you to put the roof on the wrong way round according to every photo I've looked at.



Body assembly was fairly straightforward - the corners are a fiddle and I had to resort to a bit of filler to tidy them up. You may be able to see that I've pared off the moulded lamp irons so as to replace them with wire as I usually do. Above there's only one solebar fitted - I have a particular methodology with plastic kits, in that I stick one solebar, allow it to set hard overnight, then fit wheels and the second solebar against it. What is noticeable is that the body fixing brackets aren't as high as they should be, so if you fit them to the bottom of the solebar there's a gap under the body. You can see stubs of Evergreen plastic to fill these gaps. In future I'll probably make my own from 10 thou Evergreen strip as these are way over scale thickness.



Building the model as above makes it easier to fit the wheels and also allows the use of the Brassmasters jig to ensure axles are square and parallel. I used the Parkside bearings instead of my usual 51L waisted ones and the second solebar has a slight splay to allow the wheels to turn freely. It isn't noticeable, though. The van spent last night as you see it above, the rubber band applying slight pressure to bring the axleboxes in snugly to the axle ends.



Now on its wheels and free running, I've added the other side body fixing brackets, brake gear and the stepboard at this side. I'm hesitating over trying to use the Parkside steps or making my own from brass. I suspect if I do use theirs I'll be making new ones eventually anyway. I've also added torpedo vents and rainstrips to the roof and fitted inner ends and fixed lamps.

For those who might consider a Toad B from this, David Geen does the wooden ducket, as I've mentioned before on this thread. It's a waste part of a sprue as far as he's concerned, so you might need to explain what it is you're after if you try to order any. I believe I'm right in saying that there were Toad Bs built with narrow boarding and wooden duckets?

[Dave]

JW, I thought the Parkside Toad a bit of a disappointment with the standard of moulding and flash compared with some of their latest models. Little things like the planking around the duckets and that area seems to be raised compared to the side panel, floor pan planking not taken through to the edge in places, the holes for the grab rails, and the points you mention. There is also a knee at high level to the veranda entrance but it's not on the other side. I was expecting a much better rendition and feel the work involved makes it not much better than the old model brake van they did.

[scottiedog]

Jonathan - thank you for your comments on this kit. I did have a good look at it a number of times at S4N and was put off by the obvious moulding flash - not a good sign on a new product. I had intended to buy a couple but decided otherwise. I'll, now, just have to stick with Dan's NER Dia. V4 Brake Vans - hint, hint.

David Geen may not have any of the wooden duckets left as I acquired a goodly supply of them on a visit to him a little while ago - he was in the throes of "chucking" them back into the melting pot as he felt there was not a market for them! They were designed to produce a variant of the Slater's Dia. V1 "Birdcage" Brake van.

I believe you will be at York on Sunday - all being well I will catch up with you then.

[Woodcock29]

Hi Jonathan

Interesting comments on the quality of the Toad E kit. I won't be getting one as I built one back in the 80s from two Airfix Toad D kits and have more brake vans than I can ever use.

I note that the above photo shows the chimney side. I suspect there was an additional handrail near the top right of the ducket on this side. Unfortunately the photos in Tatlow's original volume and in Part 4B all show the non-chimney side as do the drawings. I think I've seen a photo of that side somewhere but can't remember where. Such a handrail is fitted to both the Toad B and Toad D as shown in the Tatlow volumes. Anyway I fitted one on my model.

Perhaps someone can confirm this?

Regards

Andrew

[jwealleans]

Well, it seems to be 'one cheer for Parkside' although I'm inclined to believe that having a Parkside kit for an LNER brake van is better than not having one. I think it reflects as well on the standard of their other recent kits that we think this one is slightly disappointing. I wonder if it was tooled up by someone different?

I have also had that thought about the extra grab handle, Andrew and had looked through pictures myself. The only relevant one I found was of a Toad D and that didn't have the extra handle where I thought it should. I did all the rest of the handrails last night, so for the moment I'll leave it off as it'll be easier to add later that try to remove and make good the holes. We're now at the point where I have to make a decision about steps and I imagine I'll end up making them from brass. I can't see the plastic ones surviving the trip to an exhibition.

I shan't be at York on Sunday - change of plan this year as I've been asked to help out on the Monday. You can have the pleasure of handing me your entrance money in the first hour, should you choose to attend at that time.

[UpDistant]

There are some photos of Toad E on Paul Bartlett's site (http://paulbartlett.zenfolio.com/lnerbrake) which show the chimney side and the additional handrail.

[Woodcock29]

Excellent thanks Updistant - I should have thought to check Paul Bartlett's photos - they have been useful previously. Also of note is the handrail on the roof which is also present on Toad Ds.

Andrew

[jwealleans]

Yes, thanks for that. I should have thought of them as well. I should have remembered the roof handrail from doing the Toad D as well.

[Atlantic 3279]

Did somebody mention Toad Es and roof handrails?

Resin / Airfix combination, for comparison:

[jwealleans]

Hesitate to mention it, but aren't you missing a handrail to the top right of the ducket?

Personally, I've had quite enough of handrails over the last couple of days. Not to mention footsteps.



The top step serves as a handy marker for drilling the holes in the solebar for the pegs for the bottom ones. Word of warning - don't try to melt them in with a soldering iron. As you can see above, the plastic shrinks and you end up with a groove in the face of the solebar.

With some primer it looks much more homogenous.



I did mean to photograph the other side, where I have added the extra handrails. I've also added the safety bars across the verandah openings, which Parkside had omitted. Brake cross rods and safety loops and a representation of the screw brake are also just about visible under there. The sliding roof for high summer ventilation is a little-known feature.

While in a brake van frame of mind, i thought of this little project which has been lingering a while; I had 2 GN 8 wheel brakevans to restore which came from Ebay. Dan Pinnock kindly let me have a couple of the etched fret of components, which were quite badly bent about and the first one was ready for Warley last year. Reading Peter Tatlow's book, though, he observes that the one in the official photo (the one the kit represents) has the verandah doors in a different place to all the others and was probably the prototype. What you may be able to see here is that I've filled in the plank grooves and handrail holes and moved the door to the inner side of the verandah, as it seems to have been on the majority of them.

[Atlantic 3279]

I must fit that extra handrail - sometime.....

[jwealleans]

I've been a bit out of sorts this weekend, so rather than make the most of the lovely weather, I found myself moping round the house. So that the time wasn't completely wasted, I built this.



This is for Wickham Market as we have a picture of one on the Framlingham branch being used for milk traffic. DS 174, ex-NER D.171 van. Very straightforward build, the only slight deviation being that Dan didn't have any roofs when he sent me the kit. I probably wouldn't have used his anyway, rolling and fitting one from brass sheet is fairly straightforward and makes a much stronger job.

[jwealleans]

Well, two weeks seem to have slipped by and I barely noticed. I haven't been entirely otherwise occupied, although I did have to give myself a firm talking to and make myself finish off some things yesterday. i don't like having too many not-quite-finished projects lying about so it was time to get a few over the line. These are mainly for the projected non-corridor cross-country train I've been working up for Wickham Market. This is probably the time that a Carriage Working document appears and shows it all up as nonsense, but such a document would be welcome and all these are types which did work in the GE section and so hopefully aren't too far divorced from reality.



Luggage Composite, cascaded from the North Eastern as has been said before. ex-NE clerestory carriages are easy to spot on photographs from the time as the Great Eastern seem to have been especially parsimonious with roof vents.



This is the lavatory composite for which Dan Pinnock supplied the missing clerestory bits. It's not quite complete as the interior is having to be built up one piece at a time from underneath (a right fiddle) and there are two short sections of corridor either side of the lav. It's ready for running trials, though.



Gresley D.244. I'm pleased with this one, it was a nice build and has made up into a distinctive vehicle.



Gresley D65 BT(4). This is a Comet kit. I've built some of their GW carriages recently which went together really nicely. Their Gresleys I find less convincing. It needs some incorrect handrail holes filling in and one or two bits of paint patching in.

Finally, this is Steve Banks' fault. He added a section on his website about Howlden 45' luggage brakes and I read it, remembered what an attractive thing they are and also that I had one in the unbuilt carriages box. We don't have one on Grantham at the moment, so I may have to try to slip this one in somewhere.



This was from Dan Pinnock's list last year, as far as I remember. The roof was a bit of a fiddle, but in the end I made a subroof, secured it, then soldered an old rail along the centreline at the top of the ends. The roof was Araldited to the rail and plastic weld used to secure the sides to the plastic subroof, so it was secured all the way round. It's ended up fitting fairly well.

[Atlantic 3279]

Do those roof lights on the luggage brake need to sink into the roof somewhat?

[JASd17]

Do those roof lights on the luggage brake need to sink into the roof somewhat?

Yes.

Dan's roofing material does frequently need a bit of structure to get the shape just right.

John