Make do and Mend - Keeping going

[drmditch]

Progress to 'basic box' stage.

(The roof is only placed on for photographic purposes.)

For me, the hardest thing with cattle wagons is getting the upper side bars parallel.
I really should get into the habit of using photographs at early stages of a build to check for those faults which only photographs make obvious!

Hope everybody has a good Christmas, and not too much interruption of railway modelling!

[drmditch]

A Happy New Year to everybody.

So far, the worst of the winter bugs seems to have passed me by, but I don't recommend using fine drills when liable to a heavy coughing fit. It gets expensive.

In the true 'make-do-and-mend' spirit of this thread, the solebars, w-irons, and axle-boxes have been constructed from unused components from Parkside LMS fitted underframe kits. I had thought that the shape of the w-irons was quite different to the GNR drawings, but on checking it didn't seem that different. Rather than replace the axle-box covers, I settled for cutting and filing the oversize plastic to a better shape. The advantage, of course, of using the Parkside mouldings was that it gave an easy 10' wheelbase.

Getting the new solebars fitted to the Parkside floor was a bit tricky. After careful measurement and trimming of the locating cross members, I fixed one side, and then spent a happy morning trial fitting the other side and the wheelsets. At one point I thought I had wrecked the whole thing, but eventually all was square and strong and running easily.

This will not end up as a perfect model, but nevertheless it seemed good enough to use a set of split-spoke wheels. The original still has these in Mr Banks' BR era photograph.

The 'hanging bars' above the door have been made from brass wire, flattened at one end and drilled. They should hang on what looks like a staple, but I couldn't quite manage that. A simple bent rod seems to give a reasonable representation though. At the other end they are held by a thin wire loop.

The v-hangers on these GNR vehicles have a characteristically narrow shape. I made them from solid copper wire bent and then beaten flat and the angle soldered and drilled. The brake gear (Morton single)was modified from mouldings in my spares box. I'm not sure what kit they originated from. (Unfortunately the picture seems to show up my 'working clearance' rather a lot!)

I find one of the most difficult aspects of making cattle wagons is finding somewhere to put some weight! This one has a slab of lead between the solebars obscuring the nice structural members that Parkside provide. However, I hope that this wagon will spend most of the time the right way up!

I will order GNR buffers from Mike Trice's Shapeway shop. Then there is a little more detail to add, and, of course, horrible clumsy couplings!

I have also started the basic measurements on the second part of this 'two-for-one' project, using the Parkside solebars and running gear.

[drmditch]

There was some sunshine this afternoon, so here is a picture of the GN Cattle Truck with it's preliminary weathering.
(The advantage of using acrylics is that they can be adjusted using IPA.)

EDIT - picture removed on 24/1/18. Replaced by a better one below!


This is a 'piped' vehicle, not 'fitted', and I will add the pipes once the buffers have been fitted. The buffers have been ordered, produced, and are now presumably somewhere over the Atlantic!

I'm still not entirely happy with the techniques I've used on the Cattle Truck. One of my New Year Resolutions for 2018 is to work more methodically and improve the standard of my modelling. Still, I don't think that there is a kit available for this vehicle, and this one is all mine!

Meanwhile, other components have been prepared for the other half of this project. Sorry for the crude photograph, but it shows how the Conflat V is going to be put together.

[clive0r]

I've painted a piped but unfitted (cattle) van grey!

[jwealleans]

I believe (on the advice of Nick Campling on this forum) that a piped wagon should be oxide with red upstands.

[drmditch]

I believe (on the advice of Nick Campling on this forum) that a piped wagon should be oxide with red upstands.

Thank you. I did ask this question nearly five years ago(!), and you together with 2512silverfox were lind enough to reply ....here... .


The GNR buffer stocks from Mike Trice and Shapeways have arrived, as have the buffer heads from MJT. I was hoping to photograph the finished cattle wagon this afternoon in the brilliant sunlight reflected from the snow. However, after a series of 'phone calls, there was only enough time before sunset to photograph the (mostly) finished container flat.

So, this is a Conflat V, to Diagram 81 converted (as was the prototype) from a cattle wagon underframe.

These views 'in the plastic' shows what I've done. The buffers here are castings from Lanarkshire Model Supplies. I like to provide as much representation of the brake gear as seems sensible (and I can manage to make). I do have in stock some Mainly Trains etchings for underframes and brake gear, but I'll save those for a 'proper' model. This one has to make do with my normal 'make-do-and-mend'. This totally unfair picture shows what I do.

The brake cross shaft should be 2"3/4 inches thick, but that would give problems with the fine plastic v-hangers which Parkside provide. So, I make the cross shafts with thin wire, and then use insulation from fine layout wire to provide the additional thickness. The safety loops are just solid copper wire.


However, the idea is not to look at it upside down, and from the side view, it gives what I think is a reasonable representation.

The next problem with this Conflat is the lettering. In the past I've just had to assemble the words 'Container Flat' from unused words on the HMRS LNER Wagon sheet. Does anybody know of a better source?

[drmditch]

There was some intermittent sunshine this afternoon, although I still couldn't manage a very good picture.
This vehicle will now have to be declared complete! Here it is posing with three-link couplings, although I suspect that being a livestock vehicle it should probably have screw couplings!

The vacuum standpipes are red (honest!), sorry the detail picture is even worse than my usual!.
However, you can just see here:-

that I did manage to make a (nearly) readable numberplate!

[65447]

Here it is posing with three-link couplings, although I suspect that being a livestock vehicle it should probably have screw couplings!

Tatlow Volume 4B has photographs of unfitted Cattle Trucks with 3-link couplings or screw couplings, so that'll be fine.

[drmditch]

Here it is posing with three-link couplings, although I suspect that being a livestock vehicle it should probably have screw couplings!

Tatlow Volume 4B has photographs of unfitted Cattle Trucks with 3-link couplings or screw couplings, so that'll be fine.

Thank you, but it was only posing for it's photograph with those couplings!

For normal purposes it has to revert to the clunky (but operable) ones which are standard for my railway!

[drmditch]

Improved picture of detail added above!

Here also is an improved link to the picture of the original in Mr Banks' website. ..... in BR livery.....


My modelling leaves much to be improved, but I am pleased with the techniques for the wagon plate. All it needs is MS Word and a little bit of ingenuity!

[drmditch]

.....and here (after a delay of some months) is a nearly completed Conflat V

I'm not as happy with it as I hoped. Somewhere in the measuring or the cutting I went wrong, and it's about 1.5mm too narrow.
In retrospect it might have been better to have made the superstructure in brass, because it would have had stronger edges.

I'm not sure it deserves a clever numberplate (like the Cattle Wagon above), but it may get one anyway.

[drmditch]

My rebuilt/new railway is taking time to construct. One particular feature on it's mid-level line is a bridge that crosses the room directly in front of the garden doors, and is exposed to full sunlight (unless I close the blinds and curtains.)

The model is notionally based on the Deerness/Langley Moor Viaduct on the ECML (discussed .....here...., but adapted to single line form, and with a simpler form of girder work. I've used a Double Warren Truss as used by Thomas Bouch on the Belah Viaduct and the Tay Bridge. ( This is not as risky as it may sound, because some of the original Gilkes Wilson wrought-iron trusses were re-used on the replacement bridge, and we can still travel over them today!)

Here are two spans of the eventual four span structure. Perhaps I should have taken the washing off the line before taking the picture!

Because of the situation, this model reverts to very elderly techniques using :
Card (from re-cycled cereal packets and other sources)
Matchsticks
UV stable varnish.

The only innovative idea I claim for this structure was working out the Double Warren Truss design in MS Word, printing this on ordinary printer paper, and then gluing this (using a spray contact adhesive) to thin card.

This was then cut out, and the webs, flanges, and straps built up using thin strips of card and matchsticks and quite a lot of sharp scalpel blades!

The resultant girder is 'representational' rather than an accurate model, but I will need twelve of them.

[drmditch]

The viaduct is presumed to have been built in the 1870s, using wrought-iron Double Warren Truss girders, and strengthened sometime in the 1890s/early 20th century. (The NER did strengthen a number of bridges at this time.)

Properly the central girder should have been replaced in steel, and probably in a plate girder form. However, because of the location of the model, I think it is more interesting to keep the 'see through' effect.

So, two spans are complete, and two of the remaining six girders are built. Only four to go!

[Mercator II]

Some impressive craftsmanship there, certainly looks the mutts nuts

Would love to see the surrounding its going in, and of course the rest of the layout

[kimballthurlow]

.. The model is notionally based on the Deerness/Langley Moor Viaduct on the ECML..... working out the Double Warren Truss design in MS Word, printing this on ordinary printer paper, and then gluing this (using a spray contact adhesive) to thin card.
..This was then cut out, and the webs, flanges, and straps built up using thin strips of card and matchsticks and quite a lot of sharp scalpel blades!
..The resultant girder is 'representational' rather than an accurate model, but I will need twelve of them.

Hi,
So welcoming to see the labour intensive techniques you have used.
There is a certain authenticity about the bridge construction, not to mention the manner in which fragile materials combine to produce a load carrying edifice.
Yes agree that VERY sharp blades are a MUST in this work.

Congratulations.
Kimball Thurlow