Wagon Train

This posting concludes what turned out to be a 3 month project to recreate the goods train pictured in our reference book*. Our train includes five 1-plank wagons with tarpaulin covered loads and is hauled by a G6 0-6-0T locomotive. The view of the train in the book is truncated so we can't see its full length but our model train length shown here is ideal for the size of our layout.

The G6 is a brass etch kit from N Brass Locos (with added detailing) on a GF 57xx chassis and its build was described here: G6.

The final addition to the loco was the lettering and numbers from fox transfers, which were extremely fiddly to apply, being so small.

Number 278 is shown in the book photo. It was sheded at Basingstoke and operated goods traffic between the Thornycroft factory and the marshaling yard at Basingstoke. The 02 class loco was also used for this purpose.

The 1-pank wagons have scratch built bodies and loads on Peco chassis. Their build was described here: 1-plank.

* The Basingstoke and Alton Light Railway by Dean et al.

David

0-6-0 G6 Tank Locomotive Kit build - Part 3

Click for Part 2

The body was now ready for painting...

Some of the gaps created by some edges not being flush where appropriate were filled in, and sanded back. The brass was cleaned up ready for painting

Halfords car primer was sprayed on all sides covering the body. Light coats were applied, leaving 15 minutes between coats. I started with the underneath, waited for it to dry, and then turned it over to paint the top and sides. It took about 2 hours to get a nice even coat around the whole body.

Now we could apply the top coat. Using a mixture of gloss and matt black paint, and some white spirit to thin the paint, a couple of coats were sprayed on the top and sides. The underneath, touchups and inside of the cab were hand painted with the matt black paint. The buffer beams were then hand painted with red.

The top coat ended up with a slight mottled effect due to the mixing of the gloss and matt paint, which is noticeable on the cab roof. Although not perfect I think it will pass as "distressed".

A couple of extra details were added like the valve, vacuum pumps, coal and of course the fireman and driver (to hide part of the motor that can be seen in the cab).

Just need to find the right southern N gauge transfers for the livery.

Ed

0-6-0 G6 Tank Locomotive Kit build - Part 2

Click for Part 1

With Christmas holiday season upon us, and an improving wrist, we started on assembling the G6 body. This project has turned into a father son affair, I took on the role of sanding the edges, and bending the brass, while dad was chief gluer, cutter and assembler.

Parts were cutout from the fret using a sharp knife, and then either filed down or sanded using wet and dry paper to remove the notches. Using the supplied instructions which were very comprehensive and detailed the parts were assembled and glued. Using a vice, and a straight edge parts where bent into shape. There are some very fiddly small parts especially the detailing. We found that it was difficult to create the ribs on the boiler using the supplied wire, so in the end a novel idea of using cotton thread soaked in glue and then applied to the boiler was slightly easier than trying to form the ribs from wire which just kept on springing out. The iron handles and boiler rails were also particularly tricky especially threading the wire though the boiler rail fixing, in fact we lost one in the carpet as it pinged out and landed on the floor - good tip: Don't use pliers for that part, as no spare is provided. However a few hours later we managed to find it, but slightly too late, as by that point the whole boiler railing had already been glued in place minus one fixing. In the end we still glued in the rail fixing but we could not thread it on the wire any more. From a distance you don't notice this and even close up you really have to look for it.

At every stage we were testing the body on the chassis to make sure it fitted and aligned correctly. It is mentioned in the instructions that the body will sit higher than it should due to the motor impeding on the boiler. There is a rather drastic fix which is to file down the magnet. We were not too happy in doing that but to give us some extra room we compromised on filing the edges of the plastic surrounding the motor, this made it sit a little lower but still not as low as filing the magnet.

Once we had finished the body and some of the detailing we thought it would be good to make sure we have not damaged the chassis, nor that any of the body was impeding on the mechanics. We were a little worried to begin with as when we set it going on the track it would not move. On closer inspection we found that one of the steps was bent a little too close to the wheel interfering with the side rod. Once we bent it out a little bit away from the side rod, the train moved without needing to do anything else, pretty impressive we thought.

All in all about 4 afternoons and a few evenings to get it to this stage.

Next up painting...

Ed

0-6-0 G6 Tank Locomotive Kit build - Part 1

Following on from this post ...
Back in August as a Birthday present my parents brought me the N Brass Locos 0-6-0T G6 Kit. The kit is made up of etched brass parts which when cut out, folded and then glued/ soldered form a 3D body, and using the Farish 57xx chassis makes the complete train. However, August turned out to be a month fraught with danger as I managed to break my wrist in a off-road cycling accident. I was in no fit state to build the model so it laid in the display cabinet until my wrist recovered sufficiently enough to build it.

Ed

... And Happy New Year to all our followers. This year sees us attending Basingstoke Model Railway Show, in March with Cliddesden.

Farish N gauge 57xx Pannier tank to G6

As mentioned in the previous post, we need a 0-6-0 G6 to work the yard at Thornycroft. There are no n gauge R-T-R models of this locomotive on the market, but a search shows up a brass kit made by N Brass Locos - this requires a Farish 57xx chassis. So the next thing was to find the chassis. A search of the popular internet auction site brought up a few options, as we only wanted the chassis we waited for an auction which started with a low price (£0.99), and waited to see what the price would rise to just before the auction ended. I put a late bid in and won it for £27.99 + P&P, not a bad price as most appear to sell for over £30, and only wanting the chassis did not want to pay over the odds.

One of our main concerns was the height of the guides on the wheels, as previously mentioned. The sizes seem to change depending on age of model. To our delight when it arrived, the wheel guides were on the low side which meant it would roll over our faux concrete track without any problems. The loco is in pretty good shape, and ran around our board without problems. The only minor issue is a few paint dinks, which are hardly noticeable. It'll be a shame to to change it's body, but a Pannier 57xx never ventured down the B&ALR line as far as we can tell.

Just need to order the N Brass kit next...

Ed