Hornby class 50, Bachmann class 03 and some DCC musings

After a hectic week and even busier weekend, very little modelling has been done. However, what a weekend, with a brilliant stag do for one of my best mates. But back in the world of modelling, I did manage to clean out my modelling room and get some projects in order, ready for the workbench. Two of the upcoming projects are detailing and weathering a Bachmann class 03 shunter and a Hornby class 50. To this end I did get over to The Model Shop at Exeter, and had a discussion with the owner regards DCC decoders.


The Hornby Class 50. This upcoming project is going to have both PH Designs packs added, as well as weathering.

After running in the locomotives on dc, I added a six pin chip to the 03 and an 8 pin chip to the 50. Both of the locomotives on the Amberleigh DCC track performed poorly. The Hornby Class 50 in particular, but the performance of the 03 was not what I had expected either. After speaking to young man at The Exeter Model Shop, it was apparent that the poor running of the class 50 is well known, due to the cv settings. He gave me some advice on how to change these.


Another of the upcoming detailing projects, a Bachmann class 03

As I only have a Bachmann EZ system at present I can not program decoders. So after doing a lot of reading on the net, and also discussing with several modelling experts I have decided to purchase an NCE powercab, for the development of my Watergate layout. This will allow me to program decoders to optimise running and I hope to be able to significantly improve the running of these two locos.

One other thing I achieved at the weekend was sorting out of the wood to build the baseboards for Watergate Halt. This has got me really excited about building my next layout. I hope to get the baseboards built and track wired ready for the long winter of modelling. Other than this, there has been no other progress on any of the model projects. However, I have a free weekend coming up, so I hope to make some inroads into the my current workbench projects.

Wagons, wagons and more wagons (CCT, PMV, Whale and POA)

Over the last two weeks or so, what little spare modelling time I had has been spent building the PMV, whale and converting the POA wagon. It has not been the most productive of weeks but these models are now nearing the paint shop. The POA sides were gentle melted with a blow torch and then the sides were filed. This is trying to recreate the look of the battering these wagons used to get when being loaded with scrap. The couplings have been added, so this is ready for some transfers this week.


The battered sides of the POA wagon

The whale wagon has been constructed over a few months. I never seemed to get enough time to really sit down and get on with the build. I was originally thinking this was ready for the paint shop, but the second photograph shows a slight mismatch on the canopy on the end, where it joins the body. Overall, I feel that my modelling of the canopies was not great and I am considering redoing them. The model is nearly there, but not quite, I think another evening with those canopies is required.


The nearly finished whale wagon


This photograph shows the slight mismatch between the canopy and the body handrail.

The PMV is the standard Parkside kit, with just some proper handrails added from 0.5mm brass wire. This one is ready for the paint shop. I have the other CCT painted, now requiring some transfers. I am hoping for a couple of spare evenings this week to get these models finished. Ultimately I am trying to build a small engineering train, supposedly for carrying spare parts between depots. It will consist of the PMV, the CCT and the 12ton van. Each will be finished in Engineering olive green. Each will be weathered to a different state.


PMV nearing the paintshop

BCK coach lighting (ptII), a vanfit and some OTA timber wagons

The BCK with working lights, at last!

Another week flies by and this week has been a good one in modelling terms. I managed a couple of evenings of modelling and made good progress on several projects. One thing that has been finished recently is the the lighting on the mk1 BCK, which I fitted with an Express Models lighting kit. When I posted about this last time, there was a significant light bleed between the roof and the coach sides.


BCK on the evening service into Amberleigh

I started off with a solution of taping black insulation tape across the gap in the roof. I waited a few days and really should have known better, but yes it unravelled. After a few more days general pondering on how to fix this I came up with the following solution. Cut a thin strip of plasticard to the length of the coach sides. Then sparingly glue the coach sides back to the roof. Then place the strip of plasticard between the roof and the side and sparing glue down. The trick was then to cover the top of the plasticard and the gap between the roof and the side with glue and glaze. Once this had dried I simply painted it black and hey presto, no light bleeding!!


And this is how I solved it. Glued plasticard into the join between the coach sides and roof, and filled wth glue and glaze before painting black



Is that guy really wearing sunglasses? It's dark outside

As with all projects, you live and learn. I could now add this sort of lighting unit in much quicker time - and I am about to start on a mk1 SK soon. However, there is still one thing which I am not satisfied with, but I am going to live with. When you look through the coach on a close up, you can see the glue marks, which Bachmann used when fitting the glazing. Not Bachmanns fault for sure. But had I realised I would have painted over these. Also I realised the passenger I glued in the seat had sunglasses on, not probably the most realistic thing for a coach that will mainly run at night!!!! Overall though I would highly, highly recommend the Express Models lighting kit and advise anyone to add these to at least some of their coaches. You will not be disappointed with the result.


New 12T engineering wagon to run with an olive green CCT and PMV in departmental use

I also purchased a couple of new wagons this week. Work is slow at the moment and I really want some sound units for some of my DMUs, class 47s and 33s, so I am trying to save not spend money. However, the Hornby OTA is now available and the Model Rail limited edition 12T engineering wagon has been on my list for ages. I am currently building a PMV and CCT, both of which will run in an engineers train on Amberleigh, with the 12T vanfit. This is probably a fictitious train formation, but I think it will look pretty good. The CCT is almost painted and the PMV is almost built, so hopefully this project will not be long until fruition.


The new Hornby OTA wagon

My other significant purchase was the Hornby OTA wagon. I have been keen to get my hands on the Hornby and Bachmann wagons since they were announced, not least since I have been building this wagon from the Cambrian kits every so often for a few years (I have only made 3 though!!). Lapford handled a lot of timber traffic in the 1980s and I have been building these wagons for a train on my layout. Looking at the Hornby version, it just does not look quite right to me, although I am not sure I can really put my finger on why.


A kit built Cambrian OTA A

Part of it is undoubtedly the very light blue livery it is painted in (presumably it is OTA-C), with the underframe all blue as well. It looks very plasticky compared to the Cambrian offering. I am going to take it apart and detail it alongside the second POA wagon and see if it will come up trumps. But I do wonder if it is like the Flangeways mermaid: - a wagon that you wait for ages on, and then are just a little disappointed when it arrives. These are only my views and I wait to be proved wrong. With a bit of detailing it might just turn out well, but I am waiting to be convinced....I might just stick with building the Cambrian kits instead.


A very poor photograph of three Camrbian OTA kits

Other than that all is going well on other projects. The class 121 project is almost ready to properly start, although I am considering a new chassis. The PMV and whale are within touching distance of being built. The large logo 47 is ready for detailing. The CCT is almost ready for transfers and the POA and OTA are hovering above the workdesk, just waiting to be started.......

Half term, the tarka trail and a video

This week my son came to stay for half term and we spent a lot of time cycling on the tarka trail. We visited both Yarde Halt and Watergate Halt, two concrete southern stations in the heart of Devon. We cycled 24 miles on friday and also stopped off at Torrington and Bideford. Bideford is an excellent station to stop at, with a southern PMV and 20t brake van parked up there, two of my future projects. This is why we live in Devon, beautiful countryside, great access to the outdoors and very few real railways left!


East Yarde Halt

In the evening my son and I have been started building some Parkside kits. He is building a southern CCT and I am building a southern PMV. Both of these wagons should see some service on Amberleigh, or on the forthcoming Watergate Halt. I will put up a post later in the week on the actual modelling we have done.


Watergate Halt

Now my son is becoming a very clever young man and he decided we should make a video of Amberleigh trains. Just using his ipod he made a little film, with me just keeping quiet and driving the trains (badly) behind the scenes. This is his little effort and I think quite fun. One little problem was 47035 would not run over the points, so some laborious track and wheel cleaning is in order.


The PMV at Bideford

Other than that a few projects are very close to being finished and the lighting for the BCK is sorted out - the coach looks great now. I will put up a post of this later in the week

Class 108 DMU back on the rails

Finished weathered DMU. The weathering on the front is a little more extreme than I originally intended, but I still think it is passable

I finally got around to re-detailing my class 108 NSE DMU last night and it has returned to provide the passenger service on Amberleigh. I originally detailed this using a craftsman kit and paint-brushing on various shades of railmatch enamels for weathering. At the time I was pretty happy with it, but subsequently have found the finish leaving a little to be desired.


Wider shot of the first car

With this in mind I ordered several wiper masks packs from from PH designs, with this being the first loco to test them on. Last weekend afforded me the time to tackle this project again. Probably the finish on the front windscreens is a little heavy, as I got carried away with the wiper masks - but I am happy to put it down to modellers licence!


Evening service back to Barnstaple

The body had various shades of sleeper grime, roof dirt and weathered black sprayed across the bottom of the body. Matt back was also painted into the door frames and the excess wiped away with a cotton bud dipped in white spirit. The other key issues were tidying up the decoder wires and the fitting of the driver. Even though the weathering job is much heavier than the previous attempt, I am much happier with the result.


The brighter light in this photograph is due to it being early morning, with the first service of the day to Torrington.

Just undertaking this little weathering exercise reminded me of how good a model the class 108 is and how much I like first generation DMUs. It also got me round to thinking about the half built DC kits class 119 DMU I still have not got round to finishing. I really want a two car 119 and 3 car 120 DMU for Watergate Halt. I am seriously thinking about using the Replica motorised chassis for the kits instead of the Black Beetle motor bogie as supplied with the kit. Tempting, but we shall have to wait and see what time is available after summer..


Finally the DMU has a driver

On other projects the BCK lighting has proved a much more difficult task then I had originally expected. This projects is still in progress and the fix has been much more laborious then I had hoped for. However, I think it will work, but I will post again to describe it later next week. It is definitely a feature of the Bachmann Mk1 construction, with the sides fitting onto the roof that causes this problem - the mk2 coaches being a 1 piece body shell will not suffer the same problem. I still have not got round to finishing the whale, finishing the paint job on the CCT or building the PMV. I also have a stack of locomotives for detailing and a load of detailing parts....

Express models Mk1 BCK coach lighting

The BCK with the lights on

A busy week passed and although I had to cover my girlfriends shifts in the local pub over the weekend, I still managed to get a fair bit of modelling done. I mainly concentrated on re-detailing my class 108 DMU and also fitting the first of several coaches with an express models lighting kit. This project did not go entirely too plan!


The effect of running some black paint into the door seams is clearly visible from this picture

The coach is a mk1 BCK which is one of the coaches that will eventually run on my forthcoming Watergate Halt layout. Having gone fully digital, the latest DMU releases highlight the lack of coach lighting on modern 00 gauge coaches. So I intend to light at least four of my current coaches to form a rake that will operate an early morning/later evening service, as was often the case on the tarka line.


The interior lights highlight the internal passengers and detail

I detailed the coach body in my normal manner, based on Geore Dent's methods, mainly involving running weathered black paint into the door seams and removing any excess paint with a cotton wool bud dipped in white spirit. An airbrush was used to separately weather the lower sides, underframe and roof. The bogies were also removed and painted and weathered separately.


The light bleed between the roof and sides is also evident in this picture - how frustrating

In order to detail the coach the properly I separated the sides and roof and floor. I painted interior seats a light blue colour and added the lights as per the instructions (with a straight feed to the rails not using a decoder). I reassembled the coach excitedly, soldered the contacts on the bogies and put it on the track. The lighting effect looks excellent, but, and it is a large but, there is a clear gap between the roof and the body sides. The light clearly seeps through the gap at several distinct points.


A slightly dark photograph, with the light bleeding clearly evident between the roof and body sides.

It was all a tight squeeze to get everything back together and I wonder if this has just pushed the roof a little too far. I also think I am going to have to seal this gap between the roof and sides with araldite to similar. However, I am weary of squeezing some glue onto the body sides, which I was really pleased with the finish on. I am now going to have to take it all apart, probably sand a bit more off the top of the compartments, glue the sides and resolder it all!!! So nearly finished but not quite. However, the lighting kit is excellent and the effect worthwhile, so I hope with another evenings effort I can get this one finished this week. I will post again later in the week to show my efforts....

POA scrap wagon

Finished POA conversion, with a pretty severe weathering job

We spent a lovely weekend camping in Dorset this weekend, but the net result was no modelling again over the weekend. However, work seems to have eased a little at the moment and I am home for at least two weeks now. This has given me sometime to actually sit down and do some modelling. Anyway, it looks like I might actually finish some models this week!


End view showing the comparison to the factory finish


And same again

The first thing I have finished this week is the conversion of the Bachmann SSA wagon to a POA wagon. The conversion only requires removal of original transfers and the addition of POA transfers on a black data panel box. The couplings were converted to 3 link couplings (see earlier post) and then a fairly hefty weathering job was applied. All in all I am pretty happy with how it turned out.

I now have the second one to do, which I want to damage a bit more than this first attempt, with a more prototypically bashed top. I also need to add some loads from Ten commandments or similar. The interior of the wagons were not really sprayed, due to holding the wagon from the interior, so I might hand-paint some weathered black pain onto the interior, once I have the loads in. I am looking forward to running a short scrap train on my branchline.


Another view of the finished POA wagon


The original Bachmann weathered finish on the SSA

I took some of the photographs of the modified wagon with the original Bachmann wagon, which comes ready weathered. I thin that it makes for an interesting contrast. The factory finished weathering is ok, but very light and all one colour. I am not going to bemoan the quality of Bachmanns offing, it is excellent. However, with a few evenings work on the airbrush, I think a much better weathered finish has been achieved.

All other projects are progressing nicely. The whale is nearly built now, the lighting unit is almost fitted in to the BCK and the class 108 is currently in pieces for some further weathering. I received the weathering masks from PH Designs last week, so my class 108 is the first test of these. I have also done a little more DCC research and have decided on my preferred DCC controller for the next layout, Watergate Halt. As soon as the baseboards are built I am going to purchase this controller, but I will leave the details of all this for another post....