Atlantic's works: Portable layout - Scenic details next

[Atlantic 3279]

Thanks Iain.

It may be remembered that before Mike Trice and Dave Sutton rendered valuable assistance with the matter of correct bogies, I was going to use 247 Developments allegedly 11'6" LNWR bogies in modified form, and I had in fact built a pair then tried them under the carriage. Whilst they are not nearly as nicely detailed as the Trice / Sutton versions, nor completely correct in details, I wanted to keep open the option of using them at a later date either under another Doncaster 12 wheeler model or as a means of effecting a quick change of coupling systems on the D.79 diner.

Whilst I had been thoroughly puzzled by the variations in springing that I'd seen over the course of the early years on the Doncaster 12 wheeled bogies, and I'm sure I still don't know the whole range of possible variations, it seemed to me that those bogies that retained short leaf springs for the axleboxes (rather than having the later long ones with intermediate bearers for the inner ends) probably tended to still have leaf springs for the bolsters too. I have a feeling that the coil-sprung bolsters tended only, or mainly, to be seen on those bogies built or rebuilt with the longer springs for the axleboxes. I think the change to the bolsters came after the changes were tried for the other springs, but I could be wrong......

Anyway, with that in mind I tried some further modifications to one of the 247 bogies with its short, directly mounted leaf springs. More to follow:

[Atlantic 3279]

Thus:

The side of a 247 white metal bogie as assembled in slightly modified form, the tie rods and bolster end representations raised up by cutting and re-joining the original castings.

After some fiddly cutting out with a piercing saw and careful trimming back with small files I had removed the representation of the coil spring from one of the integral bolster ends. I had originally envisaged taking out the whole of the original bolster end and replacing it with a complete resin part, but when I looked at the inner face of the bogie side I could not see a convenient way to do a full swap. Accordingly, I then cut back one of my resin cast copies of a leaf-sprung bolster end to leave just the spring, and offered this up to the gap I'd cut in the bogie side. I had to trim the new part a bit more, and trim away a little of each of the main spring hanger rubbers on the 247 bogie before the new piece would go in. I then adjusted it to try to make it look right and super-glued it in place.

The main spring hangers should of course be moved further apart, leaving plenty of room for the bolster spring, but I'm only aiming for improvement of the most obvious features of these bogies.

Here's a direct comparison of the side as previously assembled, and the side with both new but unpainted bolster springs let in.

Here with paint applied.

I now intend to alter the second 247 bogie to match, and I'll be altering one of the bogies built with Mike's parts so that both of those have the later coil-sprung bolsters, since at the moment they are "one of each type".
Whether the results of the alterations to the 247 bogies justify the amount of work they involve is a matter of opinion.

[earlswood nob]

Good morning all from sunny Surrey

I think that close attention to fine detail rewards the constructor much more than the observer.

Reading this forum since I retired and got back into modelling, has improved my work greatly. I also enjoy the research into the correct details of the models. Perhaps I should have taken up Information Science instead of Research Chemistry, but I don't think Information Scientists existed when I left school in the middle 60s.

Keep up the fine work, I enjoy it, and it gives me things to aim at.

Malcolm (aka Earlswood Nob)

PS. Suffering from withdrawal symptoms from modelling as I'm watching so much rugby.

[Atlantic 3279]

Enjoy the rugby Malcolm, my wife will be shouting at our television too......

[Atlantic 3279]

Apologies to anybody who was hoping to see me at Hartlepool show tomorrow. Illness (not mine) has intervened.

Good news of course for anyone hoping not to see me .

[drmditch]

Apologies to anybody who was hoping to see me at Hartlepool show tomorrow. Illness (not mine) has intervened.

Good news of course for anyone hoping not to see me .

So - bad news for those not hoping not to see you !
Such a profusion of negatives!

(Although I am currently planning to visit on Sunday.)

Hope those who are ill recover quickly.

[Atlantic 3279]

Now why would Kingy deliberately cast all these incomplete resin carriage sides?

He must be up to something. Could it be a start on some actual model making again rather than merely some technique-testing parts? More later perhaps - about time too, as some (including me) might say.

[jwealleans]

He's planning a FrankenDiner?

[Atlantic 3279]

By Franken Howlden?

Okay. As some know I've more recently become aware of a potentially easier way to get sides (or more) for another ECJS diagram that I'd had in mind. I might in fact exploit that option, but perhaps with a twist that I would never have considered were I to be doing all the work for myself. Before deciding about that, I decided to see whether something that had been an option in my original plan for the D.79 was actually reasonably viable - even if the amount of time and work that went into the D.79 had for some time recently put me off the idea of trying anything else that carried the risk of complications.

Part of the reason for originally selecting the D.79 vehicle was the belief that those carriages may have retained their original small droplight-type windows even though first-class ECJS diners and the majority of GN owned clerestories were re-fitted with larger windows after Gresley took full control. I'd also noted that another ECJS diagram that would provide a reasonable partner to the D.79 had the same style of windows, and recent acquisition of the relevant Isinglass diagram revealed notes that seemed to leave open the possibility that these vehicles too retained their small windows when most of their GN counterparts were modernised. Closer study of that drawing, another in Hoole's book, and more particularly a carefully scaled photograph, suggested to me that I could produce the necessary sides in a tolerably simple way, since it appeared possible to use portions of D.79 side including 4 or 5 windows apiece to create much of what was needed. The parts don't just fall together perfectly of course - I've had to add narrow slivers in a couple of places to be able to make two sides of the same length, and I'll have to remove some of the beading lines and add or repair others, but so far, so good:

Very awkward of me to fail to reveal my chosen diagram for the new vehicle and to mask the running number in the above images, isn't it?

[Dave]

Very interesting stuff Graeme....will you have lots to show at Wakefield if you go ?, everybody seems to be
aiming for the Sunday.

[JASd17]

I think I have it.

But I have sent the answer via email.

John

[Atlantic 3279]

Wakefield appeals, as family matters rule out Leeds. Have noted Sunday in my diary.

John is first with the correct intended coach ID.

[Atlantic 3279]

With no shortage of other things that I should have done long ago, no more has actually been done to the new carriage sides that I'd put together in basic form. I have however found time to scan one of them and tidy up its image to something like the complete appearance, partly to test the effect and partly to create something that I can send out as a pattern to somebody who may eventually make some sides in matching style for another carriage diagram.
The new carriage I have in mind is an ECJS D.30 pantry third:

John Edgson's notes, a surviving GN diagram book, and a photograph of the other side of a GN carriage published in F.A.S. Brown's "Stirling to Gresley" indicate that the GN had some pantry thirds whose sides were originally the same as EC D.30, although the type and position of the bogies was not necessarily the same. Those vehicles were GN D.73. My image above of the side doesn't quite agree with either the Isinglass drawing or the drawing in Hoole's book in respect of the positions of the vertical beadings in the lower parts of the sides, but.... the only photo I've seen of of an EC D.30 and of the other side of GN D.73 show the beadings where I've put them, aligned with the beading in the top half of the side.

John Edgson's notes and the GN diagram book also indicate that most of the GN equivalent vehicles where rebuilt with larger windows for the saloons, becoming D.78B, as shown below in my additional mock-up image, but no alteration of the EC D.30s is mentioned, that's why I believe I can get away with modelling the original type of windows even for use on a 1930s layout...

[Atlantic 3279]

Stand A85 at the NEC this weekend, if anybody attending is interested. Mr Wealleans should be next door, or thereabouts too.

[Dave S]

I will be there on the Sunday, If I can find a suitable container I'll bring along the USA Pullman. (still casting roof parts)