Tuesday 8 October 2024

Colourful wagons

I've three exhibitions coming up this Autumn and with little modelling done over the summer, I've several jobs ongoing to finish some projects before the exhibitions. Most of these are focused on Hexworthy, but first up three wagons have been completed for Loctern Quay. These had just been awaiting weathering which was done with an acrylic wash followed by a dusting of the underframe with the airbrush. 

The Royal Daylight tank has also had a dark wash around the filler caps and streaked down the sides, I used water soluble oils for this which allowed a damp brush to remove paint until a subtle rain-streaked look was achieved. Whether this is spillage during loading, or just soot, is open to conjecture...


As well as weathering the weedkiller wagon, I decided the valves and spraying gear were not visible enough. I touched in the valve handles in red, and also put red ends to the "spraying" bar - since it is low to the ground and protrudes beyond the sides of the wagon, this seems a plausible measure. Although intended for Loctern Quay, this wagon could also be used in works trains to Hexworthy.


The Peco banana van has had the roof painted grey and the couplings removed to be replaced with Microtrains ready for shunting at Loctern Quay. The wash was applied then dabbed off with a damp kitchen towel until it settled in the planking and crevices, without looking overly dirty. The airbrush applied a little track dirt along the lower sides and underframe, and a little soot over the roof and upper ends. It now looks more at home at Loctern Quay - OK, it's unlikely to be actually carrying bananas, but could have been painted as a joke or advertising stunt perhaps?


Three more wagons that are colourful and distinctive, so should work well in the shunting puzzle at Loctern Quay and add interest to viewers. Now I just need to make photo cards for the puzzle, and run some tests to thoroughly check coupling reliability. 

Friday 4 October 2024

River ups and downs

Following the last post on the experiments creating ripples, I applied the same techniques to the river and stream on the layout. Or at least, I thought I was using the same techniques.

I stippled on the gloss gel and pushed it into wavelets with the airbrush, using a cocktail stick to push it into the cracks between the rocks, but after 24 hours the waves were still opaque. 


This might be OK for whitewater rapids or surf on a beach, but wasn't what I was after! I thought it might be a disaster, but actually the gloss gel layer proved easy to peel off. Perhaps it wasn't fully hard. 


So, back to square one. This time I was careful to keep the gloss gel to a thin layer with the stippling much more fine. Again, a cocktail stick was used to push the gel between the boulders. 


The airbrush has minimal effect to be honest, but the higher peaks of the stipples take on a more wave-like appearance. I tried to make these wavelets in a broadly consistent direction. 


This time the gel dried completely clear, and the ripple effect was much finer and I think more effective than before. 


The water glistens nicely in the layout lights. I then thought I'd apply the Aqua Magic as I had on the test piece.


Another disaster! As I was applying the aqua magic, the gel layer underneath started to turn opaque again. I stopped after the first length of riverbank, but there was nothing I could do but wait and see what happened as it dried. This hadn't happened on the test piece?


Fortunately, the next morning the river had dried clear again. I guess the Aqua Magic softened the gloss gel, despite that having had over 24 hours to dry. This bit of river looks nice and glossy but not really noticeably different to the rest of the river that hasn't had the Aqua Magic, so I'll hold off applying that for now. Quit while I'm ahead I guess...

Thursday 26 September 2024

Making ripples

While the river and stream have depth and look shiny, I'm not sure the effect is quite what is needed. A little while back Tom Dauben suggested I add ripples using a thicker gloss gel, hence I got a tub of Liquitex Gloss Super Heavy Gel. Once again, out came the test pieces for the river for experimentation. The base river uses gloss Modge Podge with a brown tint as described previously. 

The gel was stippled on with a small brush, giving small surface undulations and enabling the gel to be worked up to the banks and around stones. Doesn't quite look like water though. 

I then used my airbrush - without paint - to blow the wet gel. I found about 30 psi pushed the gel into little wavelets which had direction. This looked much better than just stippling, though probably the wavelets are a bit high. 


I'd noticed on Loctern Quay that the gloss Modge Podge does gradually lose it's shininess, becoming a little dull. In my test pieces, the Delux Materials Aqua Magic hadn't gone far with a tendency to thin when drying, but it was noticeably more shiny than the Modge Podge, with no sign of dulling - astonishingly it's been 2 years since I first did these tests! So I decided to try a layer of Aqua Magic over the Modge Podge. The left-hand river here has Aqua Magic over smooth Modge Podge over the lower 25%, and over the stippled and blown gel covering the upper 25%. I also tried a deeper layer of the gel on the right hand river.


Here's the results. The deeper gel (lower right in the above picture, top right in the below picture) didn't dry clear, showing it can only be used in thin layers (as expected). The stippled and blown gel does look quite effective. The addition of the Aqua Magic (at either end of the upper / left hand river) definitely makes the surface look shinier and more wet, and over the textured gel it helps smooth and level the surface a little while leaving plenty of texture. I think this combination works well, there may be better ways of achieving wet looking ripples but this looks effective without a lot of effort. 


Just need to repeat over the several feet of stream/river on the layout now.

Wednesday 18 September 2024

The writing's on the tank

I can't believe the last update on the tanker wagons was in May. Progress has been a bit intermittent. While sourcing some suitable transfers I finished the painting. The wagon chassis were painted grey, as usual for my freight stock, with black underframes. The round tank got sprayed with a red aerosol I had in the garage, I picked out pipes and valve/filler caps in metallic aluminium. The square tanks were painted off-black, as were strapping and other details. I'm not sure whether to paint the weedkiller pipes in a more visible colour?


I decided on Woodland Scenics/Model Graphics rub-down white gothic lettering. This provides a range of sizes, which was useful as I wasn't quite sure what size to use, and I thought rub-down lettering might be easier given I've not used transfers since my teens. I printed out the wording in the nearest font I could match at a range of sizes, decided which size would fit the wagons best, then found the nearest size on the transfer sheet. 


Before starting on the tank wagons I used an old Colin Ashby wagon as a practice run, lettering it for loco coal. I found the transfers easy to apply, but tricky to line up, especially if handling the whole sheet and where there is uneven detail. So, I decided the cut out each letter and align and space them onto a piece of masking tape, before transferring (ahem) to the model. Of course, this had to be done upside-down, I put a length of tape half onto a steel rule and flipped it over then placed the lettering on face down and back-to-front.


The tape was then peeled off the ruler and lined up on the model, ensuring the lettering is straight and positioned correctly, before rubbing the lettering down with a pencil.


The same technique was used for the round tank, this time I used one of the printouts to help get the right spacing - albeit in mirror! Positioning the right letters in the right order and the right way round when they are upside-down and back-to-front takes some concentration...


The tank was still attached to the coffee stirrer used for holding it for painting, so I taped that to the edge of a block of wood to hold the tank on its side. The ruler was flipped and positioned with the letters along the centre of the tank, and a second strip of tape used to hold the top of the letters in place. With everything checked for alignment, the letters were rubbed down and the backing sheet removed one by one.


And here's the result. The lettering gives purpose to the wagons, and should help make them stand out in Loctern Quay's shunting puzzle. 

I've refitted the wheels and couplings to the tank wagons, these are now just awaiting weathering, and of course picture cards for the shunting puzzle. I'm sure I put the wheels from the open wagon somewhere safe... when I find them it could get added to the fleet, though it has already served its purpose as a practice for the lettering. 

Saturday 7 September 2024

A Baguley and a pair of Bug Boxes

A few additions to the stock list today. A couple of Ffestiniog bug-boxes and a yellow Baguley Drewry. 


The bug boxes will of course go well with the England and Double Fairlie locos. The Baguley will probably end up on works trains, I don't really need another modern diesel but it is nicely detailed, looks great on the layout, the yellow pops out, and of course it runs sweetly. 


However, I was also drawn to it because of the one at Amberley, in which I had a cab ride a year or so back. 


My model will no doubt get some weathering to make it look like a well-worked loco, but I don't think I'll go as far as the "weathering" on the Amberley loco!


Saturday 24 August 2024

Gaugemaster 50th exhibition

Today I popped into Gaugemaster who were celebrating their 50th anniversary with a mini-exhibition at their shop in Ford. 


This O and O16.5 (NG7?) layout looks delightfully modelled, other than the gap in the middle - not sure if it's not finished yet. The Manning Wardle managed to get around the tight corners, though didn't look very comfortable, and there was no other stock present. 


This nice little "pizza" was displayed by the same builder (Brian Taylor according to the website), but with no trains at all!


I didn't get the name of this Southern layout set in WWII, it looked nicely modelled and featured lots of military models including tanks on road and on train, and a "Bailey bridge". 


There were a couple of aircraft being prepared too - I think this is a Tempest, or possibly a Typhoon...?

Crookham Vale is a 009 layout built by Bognor Regis model railway club. There was also a modular N-gauge layout, a Thomas layout, and some Kato "mini bases". Of course, the shop was open and had some 50th anniversary merchandise, from beer mats to special liveried open wagons. I can't say I was tempted! So not a big event, but it was free (and there was free coffee), and a good way to spend an hour on a rainy saturday. 

Sunday 18 August 2024

Railways around Bath

I've just got back from a week away with the family, near Bath. I came across the Avon Valley Railway on the outskirts of Bristol, so of course a visit and a ride was in order. Based out of Bitton station, the line was part of the Midland Railway route from Bristol to Bath, where it linked to the Somerset and Dorset. 


Our train was steamed hauled by this superbly turned out 060 tank. Apparently this Polish-built loco worked in a steelworks before being bought for preservation and brought to the UK. 


It's quite a chunky machine and, it has to be said, looks a little "overscale" - apparently it is larger than UK loading gauge. Since the preserved line is single on a double-track formation (the remaining space being a footpath and cycle path), I presume the rails can be slewed slightly to enable sufficient clearance for the cab. 

Like all preserved standard gauge railways, the goods yard is full to overflowing with interesting locos, wagons, coaches, and even a crane. Sadly (and not unexpectedly) there was no viewing area so I'll have to make do with what I could see from the train. 

While in Bath I found the former S&D Green Park station. It's nice to see the station roof and building in good condition, and being used as a market and entertainment space, even if the far end is a supermarket car park.

Having passed through the village of Box a couple of times, I stopped to photograph the famous Box tunnel portal, part of Brunel's original London-Bristol line. In digging the tunnel a valuable source of Bath stone was discovered, and so alongside the other portal a third line entered underground quarries to facilitate the extraction of stone. The extensive underground quarries were taken over in WWII to create armaments storage and part of the Bristol aircraft factory. Later, a Cold War bunker was developed, able to accomodate 4000 people including UK government headquarters. This was all hidden save the extra tunnel portal, and a few concrete structures dotted around covering entrance and ventilation shafts.

Back to normal life, and hopefully some modelling...