Wagons built from Kits

Alongside the scratch building that I do I also build wagons from kits and this workbench is where I will share my wagon kit building adventures.
Some of my very first 7mm scale wagon builds were from Slaters kits

First an ex Midland Railway fruit van.

This was done before I dared to try my hand at weathering so the weathering was done by Chris (my good lady)



Next is another ex Midland vehicle, a 6 wheeled Slatted Milk Van.

The lining was done with acrylic paint via a bow pen over Halford's Rover Damask red. - I quickly discovered that Acrylics dry far too quickly for use in a bow pen without the use of a retarder, but I got away with it for this vehicle.

This post is a little out of sequence in so much as it's what I have been working on recently rather than catching up with previous builds as I have been doing to date. 

Seven days away from TV and internet have allowed me to crack on with quite a few of my ongoing projects.

First up I finished the remaining three Parkside Vans ready for painting - actually I tell a lie because the LNER fish van still needs guard irons and vac/steam pipes.



Then I built a Slaters Gloucester 5 Plank Open. Unlike my previous builds of open wagons I haven't gone to town on the interior detailing on this one - I went as far as scribing in the plank lines because I plan to load it in such a way as the interior won't be seen.



Then I built a Parkside NBR 4 plank open and while looking in Tatlow for the additional details that I had added to the last one of these that I built, I noted that some of these wagons had been converted for use as Coke wagons. Variety is the spice of life as they say, so of I went with the styrene rod and sheet - it was actually great practice at cutting straight strips from 1.25mm sheet.







Despite being a simple kit bash it allowed me to indulge in adding bolt head details and by dint of good fortune I just had enough styrene washers to hand to complete it.

Cracking job on the coke wagon.  I'm amazed at your precision with the rod.

Here's what might be a silly question.  Slaters do vac. pipes with a spring to represent hose.  However, the spring sticks out like a donkeys you know what.  I can loosely connect the hose connections but I'm wondering if there's a way to make the "hose" droop. 

I got some tiny rare earth magnets that I plan to experiment with connecting hoses.

John

Nice, Rob.   :thumbs

[user=565]Brossard[/user] wrote:

Cracking job on the coke wagon.  I'm amazed at your precision with the rod.

Here's what might be a silly question.  Slaters do vac. pipes with a spring to represent hose.  However, the spring sticks out like a donkeys you know what.  I can loosely connect the hose connections but I'm wondering if there's a way to make the "hose" droop. 

I got some tiny rare earth magnets that I plan to experiment with connecting hoses.

John

Hi John,

I would suggest bending some brass rod to the shape of the droop and insert it inside the spring before adding your magnet. That will hold the spring in the drooped position - If you look at the Steam heat hose on the LMS Milk truck higher up the page that's done in the same manner but without the magnet.

Thinking abut it if you make a little jig with some pins to bend around to get repeatability you could make them all join together in a very prototypical fashion.

Thanks Rob, it was the milk van that sparked the question.  Inserting wire was actually my first thought being accustomed to having pipes not connected in 4mm.  My second one was that if I did that I wouldn't be able to join hoses between wagons.  OK so no magic bullet.  The pipes can be connected to the dummy hose coupling when not in use.  My leetle grey cells will continue to race about on this question.

John

My next foray into wagon building was a brass kit for an ex Somerset and Dorset Railway HorseBox an ebay find.
Although the kit is now with Dragon Models, my kit was labeled Model Signal Engineering and the quality of the etching is a bit agricultural by todays finer standards very much showing that it was hand drawn.

It looks like it still makes an awesome model despite being a bit dated.  Must get an etched kit at some point.

John

[user=565]Brossard[/user] wrote:

It looks like it still makes an awesome model despite being a bit dated.  Must get an etched kit at some point.

John

Hi John,

If  you do I can thoroughly recommend both the Dragon Celtic connections range or Connoisseur Models (Jim McGeown) with the latter being especially recommended if you are new to etched kits.

I've been looking at Connaisseur Rob, they're supposed to be up there with the best.  I've got some kits and other work to finish, I think, before adding to my workbench.

I'm not new to etched kits, I've built a fair few in 4mm.

John

Hi John,
In that case you will have no issue with any of them. A few of the Dragon range are former Majestic Models kits and you can sometimes pick them up reasonably priced on eBay. Although I never met him, I exchanged a few emails with George Dawson the originator/designer of the range who was good friends with jim McGeown before his sad passing a couple of years ago. The whitemetal castings in the Majestic kit's are some of the best I have seen in any kit - nicelyt formed and virtually no flash.

Here's wishing you all the best for 2017

Moving on with the S&D Horsebox (although in my neck of the woods S&D stands for Stockton and Darlington not Somerset and Dorset :cool:).








Chris decided that the grooms seat needed upholstering and she had some small leather offcuts so she tooled a cover.

A whole 'nother year to do more modelling.   :cheers  7mm has been a revelation and I'm loving it.  The only question is why I didn't do it sooner - Dapol is probably the answer.

Indeed all the best for 2017.

I like the seat covering.  Here's something that might come in handy.

 http://www.mousa.biz/downloads/coach_seats.html

John

Thanks for the link John,  I had forgotten that they existed. Jim McGeown provides something similar with his coach kits

I checked Jim's site, the interiors look good.  Shame his coaches are pre-grouping.  Might be worth getting some interiors to try.  The problem is that coach seats tended to be patterned which is not easy to do.

John

Some lovely stuff there, Rob. Great modelling.

:thumbs

Next a few shots of the completed Horsebox.





And with a coat of Halfords Rover Damask Red.







And finally it's ready for a bit of weathering.

Oh, yes!  Beautiful, Rob.   :cool:

And finally some shots of it weathered and ready for service.

Geez Rob, you work fast, it takes me days if not weeks to complete a project.  :roll:  Great job though.

John