Monday saw us welcome a prospective new member, Dennis, who enlivened the afternoon with a sick 00 engine and memories of Mountain Ash NCB. Amongst other activities Rhobat was working on his etched brass Hunslet; Mr Chairman the short wheelbase wagons and LBH fettling Llanastr track work. No pics to show though, sorry.
Tuesday was a Zoom session and time for the Christmas Quiz. Steve Bell entertained us first with a short video of a preserved line in Japan, complete with shunters wearing white gloves. The quiz tested us on railways of all sorts in Wales, e.g. name five current stations in Wales that contain the letter J? Steve finished off the session with history and pics of the Knoxville to Sevierville short line in Tennessee.
Two of us snuck in on Friday evening before Storm Darragh could do its worst.
LBH tested the fettled trackwork on Llanastr with his three B&MR locos with (ahem) acceptable results.
Luke added motor and pick ups to the chassis for the Model T based railbus.
And LBH tested out his newly-converted-to-S7 Peckett E class and fitted it with a DCC decoder. It will be named Alma and operate at the works shunter on the Tŷ’n-y-Coedcae Tar Works. Its DCC code is naturally 1854. Conversion to S7 was undertaken by Colin Dowling.
Later its dome-safety valve was fitted and now it needs weathering.
Perhaps Storm Bert deterred a few this week, but we had four members present and two guests, Phil and Cory, good to see you.
Dave is still working on the short wheelbase coal wagons and we took the opportunity to pose some of them with LBH’s Manning Wardle Class I, the B&MR’s Lady Cornelia, which was built thirty years ago, on Llanastr.
Not entirely coincidently the image is not so different from this, taken at the Rhymney Iron Works probably in the 1880s
Operating Llanastr at the open day threw up some issues with the track alignment between the baseboards, so after 40 years we thought it might be timely fix some proper dowels. Here is Paul discharging the drill’s battery to this end.
Tuesday and numbers are up to 8 today. But despite the number of people there were periods of studious silence when we were just getting on with modelling. Perhaps that was due to the drill battery going flat so PaulS had less to do.
Luke continues work on his Loriot, now applying buffers and ABB was moved into the workroom for attention to the electrics by TAFKATYS. We are hopeful for some test running on Friday.
Friday and numbers were back to normal, with Fred, Paul 🏅🏅, Mr Chairman, Luke, Wagonman and LBH all making an appearance.
The operation of Tŷ’n-y-Coedcae’s fiddle yards at Statfold proved problematic, with the operators unable to view the front of the layout so see what was happening.
So we’ve decided to try operation from the front. This necessitated removal of the board on the front of the Fiddle Yard above approx 1″ the surface, which Paul did on Friday.
Having got the Loroit to the paintshop, Luke is now working on a model T railcar. Or more exactly a pair of them to work back to back. Here’s the result of the first 30 mins work.
The Southern U class progresses on Wagonman’s workbench. The smokebox, boiler and firebox are now joined as one piece.
Monday was a little quiet this week and not much in front of the camera.
Nevertheless LBH installed some plasticard floors in the short wheelbase S7 wagons
A few more attended on Tuesday; Fred working on a DJH kit for a D95xx BR(WR) 0-6-0 Diesel Hydraulic, Luke fettling the chassis of TR’s Dolgoch, LBH fettled the old wagons a bit and
Wagonman is making great progress with his ex-SR U class mogul from a David Andrews kit. Moving on from the tender, and having previously assembled the footplate and valences, he annealed the firebox and cab roof to make bending the complex curves easier. This shows the state of progress.
And Luke and LBH discussed plans for the Open Day and the development of the design for the S4 Jubilee Layout
By Friday the 4mm short wheelbase wagon had been primed, showing the detail more clearly. Not surprisingly the correct pattern buffer heads and rams are not readily available. An attempt was made with a standard buffer head and some 2mm brass tube. It needs gluing in properly. Cutting and fettling the short piece of brass required some time on the floor looking for the ones that escaped.
Two members’ layouts were at the Warley at Statfold show; Bernie’s Orfe Quay and LBH’s Tŷ’n-y-Coedcae
Orfe Quay
A general view of Orfe Quay
The Metro tank also ran on Hadley Town. Built by the late Vic Halliwell, it had run on the layout many years ago, soon after Paul Jones built it.
Bernie would like to thank Alastair for all his help, together with Pete Rigby and Michael Sykes of EMGS for their help at the end.
Tŷ’n-y-Coedcae
Tŷ’n-y-Coedcae erected and ready for operation.
On loan from the Tanat Valley, GWR 2-4-0T No 1179 approaches Rhyd-y-Gwern halt with a short rake of B&MR four-wheel coaches.
A Victory class, a Minerva product, wheels reprofiled for Scaleseven but awaiting a repaint, eases a short freight through Tŷ’n-y-Coedcae in the Caerphilly direction. 1197 again, this time with a close-coupled GWR setSome TVR stock, painted by Dave Studley and borrowed from Wagonman
And some even stopped to look!
Thanks to the volunteer operators, Luke, Rob, Rhobat, Andrew J and Alastair. for operating and their compsany on a great weekend,
Fiji
As well as having show halls, Statfold also has the real thing. A special train for exhibitors was organised.
Monday saw five of us at the club; Andrew J was working on Lyne Road, creating a bank at the back of the station area; Rhobat contemplating repainting the whitemetal GWR ex-Barry Class G 0-4-4T we saw back in w/e 15 September while Mr Chairman, Paul🏅🏅and LBH preparing Tŷ’n-y-Coedcae for its trip to Warley at Statfold on Friday. Switchblades were freed up and electromagnet switch cabling corrected. But nothing found its way to the camera.
Tuesday was busy with further preparation for Warley at Statfold. Which meant that Friday’s attendance was just a few of us with again little to report. But here are some pics from the show over the weekend.
After many tears years LBH is getting close with his S7 Brecon & Merthyr 0-6-2T
Keeping the South Wales pre-grouping theme, TVR class V kit was unwrapped and started. Here the valance is being soldered in place, the tiny clothes pegs are really useful here.
On the etch with the cab side you can see the lack of locating tabs and there are obviously then, no matching slots. By trial positioning, measuring and marking the cab was formed, turning out to be nice and square. Help from the tutor on our course was necessary for the bending of metal though.
Back in the 29 September post there is a picture of a 3D printed tank being inspected. In fact it fitted onto the brasswork pretty well, though some material had to be cut away from around the smokebox
4mm scale found an ADR railcar chassis with motor and radio control fitted, and the start of a kit for a Sharp Stewart 0-6-0. Can you spot the coupling rod that had been overheated by an RSU?
Many shoulders to the wheel one Tŷ’n-y-Coedcae on Monday
Paul 🏅🏅made a removable shelf for the Tar Works siding on Tŷ’n-y-Coedcae. The split in the sleepers is a quick conversion from 0 gauge to S7!
Elsewhere Mr Chairman made up sprung inside-bearing units for S7 wheel sets for some wagons and Andrew J ground the old 0 gauge axles out, while LBH attended to some areas that were tight to gauge.
Conversion of this little beauty will have to wait for a few weeks though.
Tuesday’s Talk featured a presentation on Rhobat’s proposed layout. With the aim of keeping it simple and achievable it will be in 00 with a through mainline and a few sidings. It will be called Silstwn and is based on Gileston on the Barry Railway. Following on from that in a similar vein Andrew N ran us through his list of ‘Welsh stations that would make good models’. Then LBH had some additional pics gleaned from the internet.
Monday saw us getting things straight in the clubrooms, having quickly dumped ABB off after a long and fraught journey back from Scaleforum. LBH erected Tŷ’n-y-Coedcae in the vacant space in preparation for its trip to Warley at Statfold in a couple of weeks time.
Mr Chairman gave a casual glance to a 3d-printed smokebox/tank/fittings component for a TVR Class V from Taff Vale Models and pronounced himself very satisfied with the result.
Fred has done a great job finishing off LBH’s ADR No 14, here see posing at Rhyd-y-Gwern Halt.
LBH made a couple of additions to Tŷ’n-y-Coedcae in the form of a water crane (which still needs to be bedded in) and a storage tank in the Alma Tar Works.
Wagonman has completed a BR(WR) Autocoach in 0 Gauge.The trailer is a Hawkesworth A38 from an Orion kit – (now marketed by Ragstone) – finished in the lined crimson livery adopted from 1957- W223W was allocated to Gloucester in 1964 and was used on the final Gloucestershire Railway Society tour of the Cirencester and Tetbury branches before the railbus services ceased – also would have been a regular on the Chalford auto-service which finished in October 1964.
Here’s the same coach with its more modern partner. It is correct for the final service on the Chalford autotrains out of Gloucester. Loco 1472 was also at 85B at this time
Also from Wagonman is this composite coach from a Haywood Models kit. It will be used as the centre car of a three coach set suitable for secondary services.
Next on Wagonman’s list is a corridor connection – here we see it opening and closing.
As has been trailed for a while we took ABB to Scaleforum this year.
En route we called in at the Didcot Railway Centre
We stopped for lunch.
Local Hero, Trojan, performed well
A Prairie sizzled
Trojan shuffled wagons and delighted us
The Castles looked OK
ABB got erected
The terrace fitted in well
The station operator’s view.
R&R after a long day
At the actual show we tend to be busy and forget to take pictures. Here’s one from later on Sunday.
No. 4 is collecting full coal wagons from the siding to take into the off-scene factory. Earlier in the sequence it had deposited empties in the same siding.
And of course, we can’t let an exhibition pass without the customary cold tea toast.
Here we see, L to R, Mr Chairman, LBH, Paul🏅🏅, TAFKATYS, Andrew N, Wagonman and Jonathan.
