Heljan O gauge class 25 - dcc sound - nearing completion

This week I managed to sit down and tackle the install of the class 25 ESU Loksound XL decoder into the class 25. This locomotive has been sat in the paint boxes since last summer, but over the last couple of months I have made a concerted effort to move this model towards completion. One of the big stumbling blocks was the fitting of the DCC sound chip - in OO gauge this is the most simple of tasks - take off the backing plate and put the new chip in - solder up a speaker and you are good to go. In O gauge this was a slightly more daunting task.

The factory finished bodyshell - note the end glazing is out - but the side glazing has been left in. I could not get the side glazing out without damaging the body shell.

The class 25 from Heljan has come in for loads of criticism on internet forums - mainly to do with a perceived error in the cab end.  When I got my version (about 6 years ago now) I was worried that the model was inaccurate (O gauge locomotives are not cheap!) - however, since taking it all apart I think it is a cracking model.  A bit of detailing on the body and the model really comes to life.  So progress so far has been to spray and then varnish the body shell - this weathering was applied on top of the BR blue factory finish, using streaks of faded blue, before building up the weathering coats. I found the glazing a nightmare to get out, so I ended up leaving some of it in place - however before I finished varnishing I removed the masking from the glazing - to blend the model together. This was a big mistake, as the glazing reacted with the thinners in the varnish and clouded over - I have tried to correct this with a little acrylic varnish, which has been partially successful - I guess it is all learning! The glazing now looks OK - although the original glue used by Heljan for the glazing is noticeable on the factory finished model (see above). Likewise, the underframe had the bogies removed and was weathered separately to the bogies before reassembly.

Weathered body shell - note the streaks of faded BR blue - it is all finished with a satin varnish. Also note the clouded windows after reacting with the thinners in the varnish - this has now been partially cured.

The finished underframe, prior to the DCC chip install.

With the body only now needing the final reassembly (a job for later this week/next week) I managed to fit the DCC sound chip yesterday. Not knowing what I was doing meant that it was quite a long job. In the end through it all works - I wired in the track feeds and the motor connections first. After this I added the headlights to the front light / rear light terminals, whilst putting the tail lights on the Aux1 and Aux2.  All the lights on the Heljan locomotive work through a common positive and these were all wired through U+, via a 10KOhm resistor. It took some time to get it done - whilst watching some You Tube tutorials (thank god for Hither Green!) - as I had to work out quite what I was doing alongside testing it as I went. Of course the biggest concern was getting it wrong the blowing the chip up - luckily this did not happen!! 

Wired up DCC chip - with the common positive U+ resistor feed yet to be placed in its terminal. The track feeds and motor are to the left of the chip, whilst the lights and Aux functions are on the right.

So jobs for this week are to reassemble the body shell by adding in the glazing, put the roof fan back (it is now non motorised), put on the headcodes (Railtec) and then finally reattach to the chassis. The underframe needs the DCC chip secured alongside making a small plasticard cradle for the speaker, which will then be glued to the chassis block. Fingers crossed that it should not take too long to achieve this and then hopefully I will have finished my first O gauge locomotive.  Lots of lessons learnt about how to handle O gauge locomotives whilst weathering them, removing glazing, masking, installing the DCC chip after removing the PCB board - so hopefully this will stand me in good stead fr future projects.

And it all works (somehow!!!!!!)

An O gauge Heljan catfish wagon and some other bits and bobs!

We are still bedding into the new place, with plenty of work to do on the house. However, the really crazy time of moving and unpacking has largely subsided and I have had more free time to model in the evenings. I have also had the airbrush up and running and managed to do some painting - this has certainly helped gain some momentum with a few projects. Having taken stock of what projects I currently have on the go, I decided I really needed to focus on a few projects t get them over the line. So this weekend is going to be dedicated to finishing a few items of rolling stock and buildings for the O gauge layout, which I can hopefully set up next weekend for some detailing.

Weathered catfish wagon ready for the layout.

So the first project I finished this week is some pretty standard weathering of a Heljan catfish wagon. This wagon is in olive green livery and served as a test bed for weathering/detailing rtr stock in O gauge, alongside the Dapol fruit van I recently finished. The weathering was pretty simply applied, being two shades of rust, followed by various shades of sleeper grime, weathered black and frame dirt, etc. It was all done via an airbrush using Railmatch enamels.  I feel reasonably happy with it, although the final finish could have been further developed, such as fading out the olive livery, etc. I have another Heljan dogfish to weather soon, and have ordered a sealion wagon and shark brake van - so the engineering O gauge train is slowly taking shape. There are some other wagons to add to this mix, such as a lowmac, various spoil wagons and probably another dogfish, but these kits are yet to be purchased or built!

Other end of the finished catfish wagon.

Other projects in the paint box include a nearly finished class 25 - which just needs two more coats of varnish and then it is ready for reassembly/dcc fitting, plus a 12t box van ready for transfers. So hopefully there are a couple of other projects I can finish over the weekend. On the modelling desk is a partially constructed Slaters lowfit wagon and I have made a very slow start on the first of the O gauge milk tankers, which I am really looking forward to constructing. Finally the O gauge buildings of the pub, dairy office and quay masters cottage really need to be finished off, so this week I am going to spend some time on getting them done to. Plenty to be getting on with anyhow and a little bit of free time to spend on these projects!

Partially constructed Slaters lowfit wagon.

Slaters O Gauge Conflat

Well the last few years have been pretty hectic with moving around - we have moved again and it is our 3rd home in 3 years. However - the best news is - this is our forever home - or at least our very, very long term home. The bad news about this move is that - my time has been sucked away into house repairs almost continually! This has left little time for modelling. The other very bad news about the house move from a modelling perspective, is that although I have lots of opportunity for a modelling room - I do not currently have a room where I can operate my layouts.  This is limiting layout progress, so I am currently focusing on building some wagons.

Built Conflat A ready for painting.

The latest off the workbench is a Slaters Conflat A wagon. This wagon has pretty terrible instructions - and the break gear is a nightmare to assemble, as shown in the picture instructions. I pretty much had to rebuild the wagon underframe part way through - which was a bit of pain, but finally it has been finished off. I am now building a Slaters Lowfit wagon and I am trying to assemble the brake gear first, before gluing the completed assembly to the wagon - I think this will work a lot better.

The completed underframe of the Conflat A wagon.

Alongside the Conflat A/Lowfit I have been tinkering with a Parkside Fruit D in OO gauge.  This will be onw of the final wagons to go in my engineering olive green train. It is interesting how small I am finding the OO gauge wagons now - they are tiny in comparison to the O gauge stuff. I think that once I have finished the detailing on Pottington Quay - I might solely focus on O gauge - as I am finding it a much more enjoyable scale to model in. However - I will keep the Pottington Quay layout for running trains in OO gage as I have previously finished off so many trains and kits! There has also been a little painting going on recently - the O gauge class 25 is nearly completion, amongst other projects - so some little slow, but steady progress.

Pottington Quay - the new layout and a modelling new year!

I hope everybody has had a fantastic xmas and I wish you all well for the new year.  Over the xmas period, alongside eating way to much and doing a lot of great walking, I have made a lot of progress on the Pottington Quay OO gauge layout, amongst other modelling projects.  

I initially spent some time building the curved baseboards that I ordered from Tim Horn last year (obviously they were awesome and went together like a dream). After this, I aligned the curved boards  to the pre-existing Pottington Quay scenic board and built a simple straight fiddle yard board (Tim Horn again).  I then laid and soldered the track down for a continuous run. This was a pretty simple wire up and three points have been installed on the fiddle yard and one on the scenic section.  These are now ready to lay down the track for the fiddle yard sidings and quay front, but I did not manage to get that far over the xmas holiday. What has been awesome was to plug in the NCE powercab and just run some trains on the loop - it is amazing how different it is to operate the trains on the continuous run instead of the terminus to fiddle yard as per the Charlton layout.  For a start - many of the trains had a much lower top speed than I anticipated. Secondly, the way you have to drive the trains is quite different, notching up and then easing the power off - all good fun - but it will take some time to learn how to operate it all properly.

Curved end of the coninuous run.

The main scenic board for Pottington Quay.

The class 45 speeds through Pottington Quay.

The full extent of the scenic board.....this might be extended.

Alongside building the OO gauge layout, I have paint stripped the O Gauge SPV and Dapol milk tanker (that is another blog post in its own right) and I also stripped the paint on an OO gauge CCT and PMV.  These are all now pretty cleaned up, partially rebuilt and are now ready for re-entering the paintshop.  The platform has also been rebuilt on Pottington Quay and likewise this now needs some repainting.

Class 45 leaving Pottington Quay.

Class 25 bringing in a passenger service.

Well it is dark, as a warship speeds through!

So at the start of January what does the modelling year hold for me?  Well initially we are about to move to our forever home early next month - this will be a real relief after several years of hopping around.  Once we are moved in there is a lot of decorating to do. This will take up a lot of time. However, after the initial burst of sorting out the house, I have a summer of modelling planned. I have an O gauge layout and an OO gauge layout to finish and that is the goal this year, alongside getting back on the exhibition circuit. I have a drawer full of model wagons to build, alongside Warships, Westerns and Hymeks to detail and sound chip in both O and OO gauge! So I have plenty to do and an exciting year of modelling planned.

Happy Christmas one and all

 A happy Christmas to everyone!

Superstrip 2 - revisiting some old wagons

With Christmas looming, I finally have some time to indulge in modelling. I have been craving some dedicated modelling time and it feels great to finally be able to get stuck into some projects. The current main task is to finish building the baseboards for the continuous OO gauge loop. I have built one of the five boards I need, so later today I hope to get another 1 or 2 finished off. The aim is to be track laying and soldering by Wednesday and to be operational by Thursday - but lets see. In the meantime I have got the airbrush up and running again and have put a little bit of paint on a couple of wagons and the class 25. My other big task at the moment is to paint strip some wagons. The first of these is an O gauge Parkside SPV. I managed to make a real mess of the transfers when I did this wagon originally and tried to hide the poor transfers with some weathering. The wagon never ran that well anyhow, so it has been stripped and washed, and I will start to clean it up later today and sort out the running issues.

Original paint finish on the SPV, which I then tested out some weathering pencils on.....

Now stripped and ready for repainting.

The next two wagons are both OO gauge; a Parkside CCT and PMV, which I built and painted years ago. These were amongst the first wagons I finished when I had my first airbrush. I was delighted with them at the time, but on reflection they could be significantly improved, so after at least 12 years or so, they are in the paint stripper. 

The CCT and PMV in the paint stripper.

Lastly, I recently purchased an O gauge Dapol milk tanker. The factory finish paint job on this wagon was very thick, with a noticeable seam on the body side.  I tried to file this away and then blend it in with some weathering, but I am not happy with it. So instead I am going to go for a full repaint - this will head into the Superstrip bath this evening.

Dapol O gauge milk tanker out of the box - notice those seams!

The paint seams filed away.

First attempt at weathering - this is no ready for stripping.

Currently, I have loads of kits to build and lots of locomotives to sound chip and detail. Therefore, I am at a point with my modelling, where I am trying not to buy anything else, but finish what I already have! It is great to be able to recycle some old wagons and I am looking forward to painting these over the coming weeks. I have a modelling desk full of kits to build over xmas, so I am hopeful that I can get the OO gauge continuous run operational and get some wagon kits built/tidy up these older wagons.

A continuous run in OO gauge - Pottington Quay refurb!

I have not had much time for modelling recently and had a spell of a few weeks away from home.  During this time I was mulling over various modelling projects. I have been a bit frustrated with the lack of train running recently as the O gauge layout develops, and I have a lot of very good OO gauge rolling stock just sitting around in boxes.  Putting all these things together - I made the decision to make a continuous run OO gauge, using the Pottington Quay baseboard as the scenic section as soon as I got home.  My logic for this was:

1.  I already had the baseboards necessary to complete a continuous run.

2.  I did not need to finish detailing the layout - I just needed a continuous run - to stop the rolling stock (especially the sound chipped) locomotives from seizing up.

3. Having a working OO gauge layout will hopefully inspire me to get the Pottington layout finished - although this can be done at a meandering pace.

4. I have gathered a lot of the materials to get this layout operational over the year - so it is probably time to make a start. 

The layout pre-dismantling.

So Pottington Quay needs a complete rewire, all the trackwork replaced and all the point motors replaced.  My layout building skills have come a long way from this earlier attempt - and there is nothing for it but to rip it all up and start again. So yesterday I ordered all the track I need to make at least one continuous loop with the points needed for further extension.  The original track on Pottington Quay was taken up - and this will be recycled into the fiddle yard and the cork underlay was arduously scraped up. 

Pottington Quay in the post Beeching era - track removed!

The jobs for this week are to build the curved baseboards (Tim Horn) and construct the straight fiddle yard to finish the continuous run circuit. I reckon with a bit of imaginative point laying I can accommodate a western or warship with 6 mk1 coaches in the 'offscene' run around - which will be far too long for the layout - but it will definitely be fun to sit down and watch with a beer in hand

Removed extension of the platform for repainting.

Whilst dismantling the track work I took a scalpel to the original station - I was not happy with the paint job, especially on the extension.  It came off with a little bit of damage done - but this is now on modelling desk to fix up this weekend and get back into the paint boxes asap.  The plan is to get the continuous loop run operational before the start of xmas - I think this is doable - once the main loop is complete - I can add the rest of the track and point motors at a more leisurely pace over the coming year. I am not completely decided on the new track plan - so having a bit of time to mull it over will be beneficial.