Author name: Rodney Hall

Week ending 15 September 2024

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With Scaleforum getting closer more attention to preparation of stock, getting the ground surface ready for the terrace and tweaking and practicing the timetable on ABB.

Meanwhile Rhobat made some fascinating finds among his late father’s model collection …

This whitemetal GWR ex-Barry Class G 0-4-4T in OO. Rhobat plans to repaint in Barry Crimson

See the 4 August post for more on the Barry G class or click on Barry in the tags above to get all the Barry related posts.

and this pair of GWR Steam Railmotors, also in OO. Little is known of their origins.

Five of us attended Guildex in Stafford, and LBH made a few purchases:

A pair of S7 wagons, which on later examination proved to be sprung but had become gummed up. A few minutes attention freed up the axleboxes and they ran well.

They came in LMS livery, which LBH is removing to allow repainting in Midland colours.

And this Brecon and Merthyr Composite, superbly painted by Dave Studley. Luckily the conversion to Scaleseven was a quick and simple wheel swap.

Paul S has been sorting out the ground levels in preparation for the planting of the terrace Mr Chairman is working on.

Thursday saw an extra session snuck in, again for preparation for ABB‘s trip to Scaleforum – the throws of signal arms were adjusted, wheels were cleaned, routing macros were corrected, a fiddle yard casette split into two match traffic demands

Friday and Mike E arrived with his latest bargain. Only three of these prototypes were built by the Southern, with both 3rd rail and pantograph pick-up. The pantograph does actually unfold. Also the cab lights turn on, though it’s not apparent in the shot.

Mike E has also designed and fitted laser-cut window frames on the ABB Villas.

Mr Chairman has spent a while on the window furnishings on the terrace to good effect.

Seeing LBH struggling with the boiler fittings on ADR 14, and knowing that it’d be great to run it at Warley at Statfold, our resident Wizard kindly offered to fit the fittings and has also done a wonderful job of cleaning it up and removing LBH’s extensive extraneous solder.

Sunday and Mr Chairman has completed a trial assembly of the terrace.

Week ending 15 September 2024 Read More »

Week ending 8 September 2024

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Monday afternoon showed quite a good attendance at the club but little found its way in front of the camera

Preparations are naturally intensifying before ABB goes to Scaleforum. In a desperate last gasp effort LBH thinks he has fixed the problem with one of his S7 Victory class.

The ABB preparations include glueing in the structure for the long terrace taking care to get everything vertical. The laser cut parts are so accurate that a layer of primer paint has to be filed off before they will slide together.

You can see there are a couple of really early-bird customers in the chip shop waiting for a fresh batch of chips.

Tuesday and a Zoom session. Rhobat took us through the development of Caerphilly Works by the Rhymney Railway, then Steve B emerged from several internet rabbit holes with pictures of various sorts of gear-driven engines.

An extra quick session on Wednesday saw the final wall in front of the semis installed.

By Friday Mr Chairman had completed a lot of work on the terrace, which is starting to look the part ….

And the Chip Shop

A rake of ex-LMS stock, built by Mike G was put through its paces and passed with flying colours.

And the recent work of the cottages was blended in and the fencing given some weathering

Week ending 8 September 2024 Read More »

Week ending 1 September 2024

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No meeting on Monday as many of us were occupied elsewhere with it being a Bank Holiday

Tuesday saw more run-throughs and tweaking of the ABB timetable prior to Scaleforum. This exposed some maintenance needs on the stock, some of which is thirty years old, including this coach bogie.

Friday saw more timetable run-throughs on ABB and this ex-GWR 28xx was unearthed from the stock intended for LMJ.

It ran pretty well and hopefully will be able to make an appearance at Scaleforum.

Week ending 1 September 2024 Read More »

Week ending 18 August 2024

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The Dog Days of 2024 are upon us and things are a tad quiet at the club before we do into a jam-packed Autumn with the club being involved in four exhibitions plus an Open Day – put a note of 10 November in your diaries.

Rhobat and Fred are working together to produce a satisfactory bunker on Rhobat’s BR Class J. The first step is to create a mock-up using the rough cut pieces shown here.

Tuesday and Luke’s shunting plank has been erected on the new legs. After a bit of electrical soldering work we did some trial running.

Also the fence in front of the semis on ABB has been fixed with ground built up around it.

Friday and preparation of ABB continues. While the track and cassettes were being cleaned, the loco roster were in for wheel cleaning. Selecting 1954 as the time period does mean there are a lot of black engines and the picture is a bit reminiscent of Barry scrapyard.

Meanwhile Wagonman is preparing some GWR 9ft coach bogies in 7mm scale. The four of them are supposed to be identical. However, the pairs come from two different manufacturers and in the closer shot you can see that there are differences.

LBH rolled the second boiler for the B&MR Class 36. In the horizontal view you can see one of three temporary straps that were put in place while the internal gusset, seen in the end view, was soldered in place.

Week ending 18 August 2024 Read More »

The second half of the year starts.

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Monday is our only meeting at the clubrooms this week. Tuesday we’re on Zoom and Friday many of us ar helping Mr C set up Pavilion End at Penarth Exhibition at St Cyres School, Penarth.

Five of us made it to the clubrooms on Monday but with most of us continuing to work on he same projects we have no new photos. Sorry!

Tuesday bought our monthly electronic get together on Zoom and we had presentations from Mike E with his very appealing proposal for an American Short Line layout in 0 scale, a blatant plug for the Industrial Railway Society in the guise of info on the locos of Maritime (Pontypridd) and Varteg collieries from LBH, a fascinating selection of images of terraced houses culled from the web for research into window frame painting practice in the ’50s from Mr C and a fine collection of railway and family pictures from Stephen Bell.

The second half of the year starts. Read More »

GBVs Pontnewynydd (twice), Rhymney and York

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First up this blog is this poster print of York that has been bequeathed to the club by Rowena, the widow of our founder member, club stalwart and Secretary, Tony Bennett.

York held special place in Tony’s affections having spent his student days there.

The Wizard is still working on the Rhymney Goods Brake Van in Scaleseven

Andrew N has recently completed his second Pontnewynydd break van in P4, the first, on the left is from an ancient Falcon Brass kit, the one on the right is a recent product from the 247 Developments stable. Here is the story of the latest build.

Tuesday and more work on the doors and windows for the terrace. The green door has come out very dark because of the red primer. Perhaps the white primed one would have been better. The white of the window frames is too stark, so the second frame has been overpainted with light grey, thought it’s come out looking cream.

Last seen back in mid-May as basically a flat pack the GWR Hawksworth autocoach has been put together by Wagonman. There’s a lot of detail on both ends because of the autogear. Windows, couplings and paint will come next.

Friday

Work on the terrace continues with the pavement to the front. The grey primer is being overpainted with a white / grey acrylic mix. The laser cut edges to the flags made it easier to run the paint up to the edges.

And LBH almost finished a wagon – in this case a NDR (aka A(N&SW)DRCo) two-plank example with the help of Bernie’s paint job. Just couplings remaining to be fitted.

GBVs Pontnewynydd (twice), Rhymney and York Read More »

Layout Room Developments

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With the introduction of daytime meetings on Monday afternoons we found the red curtains often opened providing us with too little privacy. So we decided to apply a frosted-effect film to the inside of windows.

Having applied the film to the windows in the layout room we found an unplanned consequence – the red-wash that permeated everything in the room (see 16 June blog) has been replaced by a for more appealing natural light colour during our daytime meetings.

Before
After

Layout Room Developments Read More »

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