A GWR journey through the 1920s and 30s

Very smart.  The addition of the brackets makes a great difference.
Michael

It's looking great Bill.
The brickwork is really excellent - faded and worn in places but clear and bright in others - spot on Sir.  :thumbs


The canopy brackets also look excellent although I do wonder that, unless you turn the building upside down, they can't be seen ……………..except by a low level camera  :hmm  I am therefore, looking forward to the photoshoots with bated breath !  :doublethumb

  Thanks Michael and thank you Peter, it's been great fun and I’m particularly pleased with the brackets, as they do make a big difference, as the chimneys should as well. I did a little cheat with the canopy joists made slightly deeper, so the brackets were more visible! Also, the branch height, which is above the storage roads, will be even higher than normal, as I want to enjoy more of an eye level view when operating, just as with observing the prototype. I can always stand up to admire the chimneys! 
 
I’m looking forward to detailing the rest of the station scene and have several features in mind, ready for some atmospheric photos as the station area gradually takes shape.
 
Not much modelling for a few days now, as I have a major exercise to undertake in resolving an estate’s five year tax liability with HMRC and with incomplete records! Not difficult, just potentially complicated, so my red wine intake make go up, but not while I do the sums!
 
Take care and be safe modelling,
 
Bill

Super job Bill.
From a three dimensional viewpoint I always feel that resin models have a definite edge on card but lose out in terms of finish..

With your beautifully executed improvements you are getting the best of all worlds.

Good luck with the Tax people

Keep Well.

Thanks John, I'm taking a huge short cut with the tax issue and have requested two other government agencies do some data collection and analysis for me. After all, it is what I used to pay my taxes for  ;-)

I'll get back to some modelling next week, as my eyes are recovering from too much PC and close work.

Bonne santé,


Bill

  Much to do about very little
It’s good to be back at the modelling table. A quick riffle through the plastic extrusions box didn’t produce what I thought I wanted. Although I had some suitably sized sections to represent the louvre blades to the small gentlemen’s lavatory windows, there was no way I could think of successfully fixing them in the frames, so a change of tack was required.
 
I spotted some used credit card sized Amazon gift vouchers, provisionally placed in the plastic sheet box and a plan was born and once a 6mm wide strip was cut and I started sanding the edge, I noticed it going furry, as I discovered Amazon use plasticised cardboard for their gift vouchers!
 
Delving into the plastic box again, I was soon cutting a long 6mm strip from a sheet of plasticard and once fettled, poked it through the window frame at a jaunty angle and secured it with a few traces of CA from the tip of a cocktail stick. Next was the simple task of layering up additional louvre blades glued to the previous one with Tamiya Extra Thin until the window opening was full.
 
The overall length of the layered blades projecting from the rear of the frame, was 50mm, or two of the Queen’s inches, which made the assembly easy to handle and once the glue was set, a couple of cuts with the razor saw and some passes with an emery board and the completed window fits the opening perfectly, in a small is beautiful way.




I just need to make the other one in the morning, before painting and fitting them.
 
More soon, take care,
 
Bill

That is a great solution, and your straightforward description belies the creativity and skill in getting such a neat finish.  With this level of detail I can see the station building is going to be a great one-of-a-kind.
Michael

  Thank you Michael and like most things, practice and patience is the key, as working with small pieces takes me longer than it once did, although the second unit was built in almost half the time.




The other window was finished this morning and I remembered to take a photo prior to cutting off the surplus ‘layers’ and then spent the afternoon digging in the garden, ready to plant potatoes.
 
Doors and fan-lights tomorrow and may make a start on the chimneys.
 
Bill

Super job Bill. I remember how tricky the louvres were when I made the stables*.  I admire your focus….you  have made a far better job than I.

*Will there be room for stables on your branch? Perfect for your period. People tend to forget how commonplace horse traffic was right up the end of WWII and beyond. I can remember both Milk and Dustbins being Horse Drawn in Crosby just after the War.

Keep Well

[user=434]John Dew[/user] wrote:

Super job Bill. I remember how tricky the louvres were when I made the stables*.  I admire your focus….you  have made a far better job than I.

*Will there be room for stables on your branch? Perfect for your period. People tend to forget how commonplace horse traffic was right up the end of WWII and beyond. I can remember both Milk and Dustbins being Horse Drawn in Crosby just after the War.

Keep Well

   *Most definitely John. My early childhood in Liverpool has given me a valuable start in developing a lifelong interest in social history which has undoubtfully contributed to my interest in the way the GWR contributed to this rich history in Britain.
 
I too recall widespread use of horsepower by everyday trades people and I remember the milkman, coalman and rag and bone trader sat atop their carts, reins in hand. One of my jobs at Northcroft Road, Walton, was to alert grandad of any new horsey deposits, upon which he would rush out at speed with sack and shovel in hand to get there before anyone else and we would take a sack of manure down past the GWR yard to his allotment most Saturdays and his fruit and veg were all the better for it.
 
No surprise then that Newton Regis will feature a two stall stable building and I have a most useful book on ‘Great Western Horsepower’ with a wealth of scale drawings, specifications and photos of all sizes of stables as reference.
 
Keep calm and carry on modelling,
 
Bill

It seems we all have the same memories of horses from our youth.

We didn't live anywhere near a railway line but we too had the rag and bone man, coalman, a coach built Rington's Tea van, fruit and veg trader and the "pop" man selling his Tizer and Dandelion and Burdock fizzy drinks, all with their horses and "carts" of various sizes and quality ………

I remember most seemed to have huge "cart horses", except the Rington's Tea man.   Considered more "up-market" sitting in his green and gold "shapely" van, he had a much smaller and altogether smarter looking horse than the other "dobbins".

Often the horses would have their "dinner bags" attached - hessian food sacks covering their noses so they could reach whatever was in there -  whilst they waited patiently as their master wandered from house to house. 

It amazed us that the horses could be "called on" by their drivers who seldom had to climb up onto their cart until the "round" was complete - especially as we wondered how they could see because most had blinkers fitted.

As with you Bill, our job was to watch and rush out to gather any "deposits"……………………. for the roses.

[user=1814]Longchap[/user] wrote:

 
No surprise then that Newton Regis will feature a two stall stable building and I have a most useful book on ‘Great Western Horsepower’ with a wealth of scale drawings, specifications and photos of all sizes of stables as reference.
 
Keep calm and carry on modelling,
  .
Bill

Excellent news…..I look forward to it

I expect you already know this, but there is quite a useful segment about stables in one of Stephen Williams "GWR Branch Lines" trilogy.

Secondly on RMWeb, Mikkel has built an amazing model of the stables at Park Royal. Too big for you and I but his blog has all manner of detail, plans and photos on GWR stables of varying sizes

Happy modelling…….have fun!

  Hi John,
 
Yes, I have Part 2 of Stephen Williams excellent book concentrating on buildings, fittings and traffic operation and page 43 shows the three stall stable block I’ll be modelling and darn it, it will be the third building at Newton Regis to feature louvres! Perhaps one really can have too much of a good thing, so I may build the goods shed beforehand to give myself a louvre break.
 
I’ve also copied Mikkel’s excellent two part article into my buildings database.



GWR standard design, three stall stable, circa turn of the 20^th century, shown here for educational and instructive purposes only, from above mentioned book.
 
Just as well I’m scratch building one of the smaller GWR designs, as the repetition of so many ventilators to doors, windows, under eaves and roof ridge line on a more ambitious model would reduce one to a nervous wreck!

It will however, be great fun.
 
Best,
 
Bill

[user=434]John Dew[/user] wrote:

Super job Bill. I remember how tricky the louvres were when I made the stables*.  I admire your focus….you  have made a far better job than I.

*Will there be room for stables on your branch? Perfect for your period. People tend to forget how commonplace horse traffic was right up the end of WWII and beyond. I can remember both Milk and Dustbins being Horse Drawn in Crosby just after the War.

Keep Well

Hey John never mind just after the War.  When I stayed with my Great Aunt in the early 60's the milk was still delivered by horse & cart from the dairy at the end of South Road - that also had a little shop that did super ice cream.  You may remember there was a model shop just opposite.  Used to sit in her back room overlooking the Mersey doing my modelling & watching the Isle of Man & Irish ferries coming & going - you could set your watch by them.  

Hey Mal,

I never realised you were a fellow scouser. Small world and like the Irish, we seem to get everywhere! 

 My great grandma on Dad's side came from Ireland and her daughter, dad's mum, was born in Liverpool.

Take care,

Bill

Yes Bill born & bred.  There's a Kent Street near the Cathedral (the proper one) named after my great great grandfather - I believe he prospered in the slave trade although it was never spoken of.  My great grandmother was a Rigby of Rigby's Taverns.  We used to have offices in Rodney Street.
 

….the horse could be called on probably aided by a lack of private  cars lining all the residential  streets,  perhaps?

Douglas

[user=312]Chubber[/user] wrote:

….the horse could be called on probably aided by a lack of private  cars lining all the residential  streets,  perhaps?

Douglas

That could well be Doug.

I recall, as a schoolboy, potato picking was obligatory during the autumn half term.  One employer used both tractors and horses to pull the trailers/carts into which we tipped our baskets of potatoes.  Because I couldn't be either an engine driver or a fireman, I always wanted to hop onto the tractor to "move on" thereby keeping up with the pickers.  His groom, a middle-aged Irish live-in farm hand argued that horses were much better at this job than tractors.  He had a point !  Other than when the cart was full, nobody went near the horse - it "moved on" to his commands and even turned itself around into the appropriate "next row" at the field ends.  This, said the groom, meant everyone was always picking potatoes instead of having to break off to move a trailer.  In fact, it meant I didn't get the chance to rest my aching back every 15 minutes or so………….

[user=312]Chubber[/user] wrote:

….the horse could be called on probably aided by a lack of private  cars lining all the residential  streets,  perhaps?

 Douglas

Spot on Doug, as Northcote Road, spitting distance from GWR's Walton-on-the-Hill station, never saw a single private car during my residancy in the late 50s. I think an uncle did had a motor car, but he lived in Formby with the posh people.

Currently researching the stables for Newton Regis and I think I've found a fitting prototype.

Best,

Bill

[user=1814]Longchap[/user] wrote:

 Station façades
………. I’m happy with chopping up plastics and kit bashing generally and was reasonably certain that if taken slowly, the resin casting would be kind to me and so it proved, being well cast and cured with consistent density and was easy to drill and file, with care.
 

Hi Bill,


bringing the Dewalt issue back to topic I'd not realised that your station molding was that thick:

"My choice whether to use a pin vice or my new Dewalt to create door and  window openings though 12mm thick resin walls was a no brainer,……. "

From your photo I see the Oxford name on the product and being new to resin buildings wondered if it was normal to make them with such thick walls, better suited to a Colonial Bank Vault at nearly 1 metre thick full scale.

It reminded me of typical Hornby overscale resin molding from 40 years ago but I'm highly prejudiced having had to cut out tough 2mm thick (150mm / 6in at full scale) jail-bars  handrails and window grills from my old style Hornby terrier. If it's of newer design with a higher tech polymer then it seems like an odd choice to have made the bays built up so solidly (if indeed that's the case, hard to see from the photo).