ScR steam in the 50's

Ha ha. I was only joking. Can you imagine postage to Oz just to receive a smashed engine shed.

Thanks Ben

Cheers
Evan

Merry Christmas and happy and healthy new year to you and yours.

Hi Richard. Ho Ho Ho , Seasons Greetings to you, where have all the skiers gone? Best wishes Kevin 

Couple of shots of the Dornoch Pannier cleaning out on shed at Helmsdale.

Hi Richard.  Here’s wishing you and all your family and friends a happy new year . And onwards and upwards with all your projects. Best wishes Kevin

Thanks - all well here in the Far North and plenty plans and projects to keep me busy - the list seems to grow rather than diminish....

Another 2020 bash was a take on the proposed Class 4 for the Highland lines drawn up by Stanier and included in the 1934 build list that also saw the first Class Fives appear. Unfortunately it was dropped for some reason and trials of the Fives made this project redundant, but I felt the layout should have one of these never-builts.It is a bit of a mish mash - the chassis and boiler a Hornby loco drive Railroad Black Five, which has its origins in the early seventies  and a Hall chassis, so is noticeably too short for a real Five, but just right for a Four. Hornby kindly upgraded it some years ago, leaving the wrong body dimensions but adding a top notch mechanism. Unfortunately for me they added the correct 6' drivers instead of the original 5'6" ones which would have been perfect for this conversion…So, a spare set of Radial ones were fitted, along with the Hornby crankpins and valve gear which perhaps surprisingly ran perfectly as soon as it was put on the tracks. The boiler was removed from the footplate and lowered as much as I could and a cab from a GBL static model - copied from the current Hornby model - was attached. I tried a Stanier tender but felt it overwhelmed it so a Midland type, as shown in the original drawings, became its partner. Couple of shots showing it in its new home - it is quite different from its larger sister when seen side by side - and a glimpse of what might have been.
And a look at the two types together.

Nice job done there. As you said they're quite different when seen side by side.

Latest off the bench is a revisited Small Ben, the proper size this time - the previous ones were built round the T9, which was too large for it, although matched a proposed version that never got the go ahead. This one is a real Heinz - Radial chassis with 6' drivers, the old T9 boiler lowered and shortened, Nucast cab sides and splashers plus various fittings from varying sources.

Both locos look really interesting Ben, I can see why you felt the urge to model them and you’ve done a great job. The footplate over the front bogie pushes out a long way on the little Ben. Room for a plate crew picnic. 

Thanks, both the same loco - you can only see one side at a time…. :cool: I'll go over them later but another five are following….waiting for commissioned transfers ATM. Here's the fleet.

That's a great looking loco Richard and, judging from it's mongrel origins, a real labour of love  :thumbs

Then you announce that you have another 5 on the stocks !   Would I be correct in assuming it's a firm favourite of yours ?

I'll ask before someone else does - why the two liveries ?  Not sure if your layout is roundy-roundy but we have the post nationalisation " British Railways" when running anti-clockwise and the lion logo when running clockwise …….. :hmm   Does the Far North Line run in two distinct time zones ?

I like Small Bens! They all have differences between them and are technically rebuilds of an earlier bash of a T9, which were too long and with bigger drivers, but passed muster, just. The arrival of the Hornby Radial supplied a 4-4-0 chassis  that suited many small such locos so I rewheeled these and started building Nucast bodies but half a century of white metal locos left their toll and I lost enthusiasm for the project, but picked it up using the old bodies. The boiler was shortened and lowered and Nucast cab sides and splashers plus various other bits melded together with some encouragement to give a 95% accurate model this time round. The different crests were for variety - the layout is a roundy plus terminus and only one side of any stock is seen, except for locos which can be turned.

Here are a couple of bench shots showing part of their rebirth. I was only going to do two but as I had the remains of five and a stockpile of cheaply bought Radials I just carried on to save going back to the project later. I also built a sixth round the T9 based on a drawn up plan for a larger version of the class that never got the go ahead

Well, after a long gestation they are all running and on the roster. Here are the clan of Bens gathered at Helmsdale. I will take a closer look at them later but two big refurbishment jobs have taken a lot of time, but have been worthwhile, and I am sorting the final touches  now.

One of the tasks was to alter the shed layout to a more authentic  representation of the real thing. When I built the layout because of lack of space I used Peco 3 way points in places, including the shed tracks. This, while working as a space saver, showed up horribly in photos and also developed contact problems as I hadn't bothered to bond the rails beforehand, never having had much in the way of trouble with before. I therefore decided to use one of the two sidings in front of the signal box that were there as per the prototype as a feed to the shed, which gives a much more realistic approach to the shed facilities. I u sed the new Peco bullhead points as well which although still to their geometry do look a good deal more like the real thing. Here are one or two pics.

I also added some interior lighting to the shed to see what shed shots I could get. Any will be impressionistic  rather than replicas as I skimped a lot on interior work - for a wooden and tin throw up it had a lot of lattice and timber work that would have taken far more time than I was willing to spend on it, but have done enough to be passable, I think…the visible light was tucked away out sight .. this was a sighting shot rather than a composed picture…

Couple showing the old arrangement and the two sidings. I'm far happier with the changed track.



And a photo of the real thing, showing where I have had to juggle things to suit the space I was working in. Like Eric Morecambe's composition, the notes are all there but not in the right order….

That looks great. I've always liked this layout and doing away with the 3 way has improved it further. The inside shot of the shed looks good too. You say you haven't modelled everything, but that inside framework must have taken some time.