James' workbench- ex-GC locos and stock in OO

[kimballthurlow]

Hi James,
I am wondering how you fix the body to the chassis, because I have a similar project - been on my bench for years.
Does the body have a floor?

regards
Kimball

[James Harrison]

The kit as supplied has a carriage floor with fold-down solebars and a separate carriage body with fold-over tabs, which glue directly down onto the floor.

Because I made a couple of changes to the kit, the way I did it was slightly different.

I used the carriage floor and solebars supplied in the kit, but then I fitted a piece of plastic sheet over the original floor for bracing purposes. What I then did was to use the fold-over tabs on the carriage body, and I glued the body to the underframes with impact adhesive- the tabs basically provide a large surface area to apply adhesive to. To make sure I got a good firm bond, I used rubber bands to clamp everything together until the glue had dried.

[kimballthurlow]

Thanks James.
I was thinking of a method to be able to remove the body (scratchbuilt cardboard) from the chassis.
In my case, I will likely have two or three points of attachment, but I do use a metal chassis, an old Trix Twin which I lengthened.
A nut epoxied to the floor, and a screw from underneath the chassis.
I just have to sweat through that for a few weeks or months before I do it.

regards
Kimball

[James Harrison]

Aah; with these carriages, once the body is on, it stays on. I suspect if I ever need to get back inside the carriage, I'll need to drill up through the floor.

[James Harrison]

The second of the card kits is finished.





Whether because of the heatwave whilst it was being built, complacency on my part or a combination of the two, I had a few issues building this one. The body tried to warp, the roof didn't fit quite so neatly and the carriage sides tried to bow out. It's finished as a nice model but it's not quite so successful as the first one was.

I'm giving the carriages a break for a while and picking up some wagons I have laying around. The first two I'm looking at are a pair of Dapol unpainted wagons- of the 9' wheelbase wooden framed sort.

[James Harrison]

The first two wagons finished. Two down.... nine to go (mostly opens but also a bolster or two and a couple of vans).

[James Harrison]

Difficult post to make, this.

Turns out Photobucket have put a lock down on 3rd party hosting- and until rather recently all of my photos were hosted on Photobucket. Basically, if you have a free Photobucket account, you can't link back to any photos you put on it. You can continue to use Photobucket for 3rd party hosting.... for an eyewatering $399 a year fee.

This absolutely flies in the face of everything I happen to think fair, just or right.

Therefore, I have taken the decision that all of my images on Photobucket will be deleted forthwith. If I can't share them with friends, I'm going to deny them to Photobucket entirely....

So, regrettably, there are going to be few or no photos to any of my posts except for those from the last few pages.

[Manxman1831]

Hi James,

Have you thought about simply putting your photos onto the pages directly? Admittedly you would probably need to re-size them, but it could be a useful get around...

[James Harrison]

Carrying on with wagons; another one finished.



This is the last Cambrian Kits pre-grouping wagon in my to-build stash; I'd bought 7 or 8 of them a few years ago. POWsides lettering, as is usual for me.

This leaves a pair of POWsides/ Slaters kits, a Cambrian Kits Midland Railway covered van, a pair of Ratio LNWR open wagons and a D&S whitemetal GCR bolster to build, and whilst I think about it I've also got several of the Bachmann LNER covered vans to repaint, my 6-wheel brakevan to replace, I've got the basics of a 4-wheel brakevan to look at, Brassmasters GCR horsebox and newspaper van to build.....

Lots to be getting on with in other words.

[James Harrison]

Hi James,

Have you thought about simply putting your photos onto the pages directly? Admittedly you would probably need to re-size them, but it could be a useful get around...

My previous post must have crossed with this. Putting them on directly is an option to look at of course, happily though I had switched over from Photobucket to another image host a few months ago after Pb took a dislike to Facebook and locked me out of my own account. Truth be told, Photobucket had been going downhill for a while before that and the breakdown between Photobucket and Facebook was pretty much the final nail in the coffin, for me.

I can't see that this is a move that will end particularly well for Photobucket. It is not as though they have a monopoly on the image-hosting market after all, and frankly anybody prepared to pay $400 a year for a service available for free from a competitor needs their head looking at.

Of course, if my current image hoster also starts charging for the service then things will get 'interesting' and it may have to be a case of direct hosting.

[James Harrison]

Well, that's the last of the PO wagons done at least. For now, that is.



And before bits of it started off on vision quests to dark and unknown corners of the various bookcases my to-do pile lives on, I got on with GCR-ising a Ratio GWR brake third. New roof vents, new wheels, new couplings, new solebars- as this was a second-hand model which arrived already built, I was loathe to try and prise the roof off to fit an interior (that endeavour just had 'ruined model' written all over it).

[James Harrison]

Well, after a bit of a sojourn into Ratio 4- wheel carriages, I'm picking up another loco project- it's one that appeared on this forum quite some time ago, and it was finding that original post whilst researching for something else that made me wonder if I could do something similar.

So, this is my attempt at converting a Dean Sidings Barry Railway class L into a GCR (ex-LDECR) class D.



An 0-6-4 mineral engine of the Lancashire, Derbyshire & East Coast Railway. Interesting railway, that. In the middle 1890s the Company set out to build somewhere around 170 miles of track, in the process gaining the distinction of being the single largest railway scheme to be approved by Parliament in one session. Unfortunately it ultimately reached neither Lancashire nor the east coast, the only section actually being completed being the line between Chesterfield and Lincoln (and even then the last few miles into Lincoln were along Great Northern/ Great Eastern property). Within 10 years of opening it had been bought by the Great Central; much of the route closed in the 1950s but a 10-mile stretch survives as a test track.

So, the model. The real thing was built to haul coal trains to the east coast in the period 1904-06; six of them entered service under LDECR ownership, and three more were completed shortly after the GCR bought the line in 1906. They survived into the late 1930s/ early 1940s. You might see some vague resemblance between this model and the big 2-6-4 freight tank I built recently. The reason being, the LDECR's locomotive superintendent was quickly made Robinson's right-hand man at Gorton; it is believed that he had a hand in the conception and design of the GCR's freight tank locos of 1914.

Yes, the model. Let's try not to sidetracked again.

I started, as I have said, with a resin kit for a Barry Railway class L 0-6-4.



It's basically one moulding with a couple of brass and whitemetal castings to fit; of which more later.



The first thing I did was to cut the cab away; it needs to be completely replaced.



The side tanks are longer, wider and taller; so I made up some new plastic side tanks and fitted them.





Then the joint between the side and the top of the tanks had to be sanded to a radius, and then I was able to fit the chassis (I'm using a Hornby 0-6-0 chassis under it, which is what the original kit was designed for).

[manna]

G'Day Gents

Later to be come LNER M1, I've looked at building one of them in the past, Good luck.

manna

[James Harrison]

Thanks!

The kit is for a Barry Railway class L



So it requires a fair bit of alteration to turn it into a D/ M1.

[James Harrison]

The bunkers had to be extended back about 4mm, and this was done using 0.5mm plastic sheet.





Then work began on a new cab.