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| Making Wagon Sheets (Tarpaulins) - Hints, Tips & Smaller Projects. - Getting You Started. - Your Model Railway Club | ||||||||||
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col.stephens Full Member
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Yes, you have always called them tarpaulins but, in fact, they should really be called wagon sheets. I bet you didn't know that, did you? Anyway, how to make them in model form? Let me start by saying that basic idea is not mine. I read about it on another forum and ran with it, adapting it to suit my own particular requirements. This method should be suitable for any of the smaller scales up to and including 7mm scale. I model 4mm scale and the examples shown will be in this scale. There have been discussions before on this website regarding the best material to use for the wagon sheet (or tarpaulin if you must), and even a discussion on the most suitable material for the miniature ropes, tea bag string even being suggested. I wish that I had seen that before I started. So to work. Firstly, if you live in the UK pop along to your nearest supermarket and buy yourself a pack of Tunnock's caramel wafer biscuits. They are those lovely chewy, chocolate covered wafer bars, which are particularly nice with a hot cup of tea. I understand that Tunnock export worldwide so hopefully those of you not fortunate enough to live in the UK might be able to get your hands on them. Failing that, get yourself a UK penpal! Next, pop the kettle on and make your favourite brew. Enjoy one of the caramel wafers but do not throw away the foil wrapper as this will form the basis of our wagon sheet. The foil is attached to a paper backing which forms the inside of the wrapper. This paper will be the outside surface of our wagon sheet. Now, down to business. Brush off any chocolate clinging to the inside of the wrapper and screw it up into a ball. Now carefully unwrap the ball and gently smooth out the wrapper. It should now be covered with small creases and be quite pliable. Remember that it is the paper side which will form the surface of our wagon sheet. Wagon sheets were usually around 21 feet long by 14 feet wide, or thereabouts. So, with reference to your particular modelling scale, cut the required number of sheets from the wrapper. Each wrapper will provide two wagon sheets for 4mm scale and one for 7mm scale. The following picture shows two wagon sheets cut from one wrapper. The ink marks on the paper side are a result of my working out where the ropes would be attached. Once I had established the positions I transferred the marks to the rear (foil) side of the sheets. I would add here that my intention was to make two sheets but I prepared six, my reasoning being that I would probably make a hash of the lettering and numbering on some of them. The idea was to select the best two at the end of the process.
It appears that wagon sheets in the steam era were normally black in colour. My sheets were intended for my Southern Railway layout, Farleigh, so they would be black with white lettering/numbering.
I painted the paper sides of the wrappers with black acrylic paint from a cheap tube bought for £2, which I mixed with a small amount of white.
More soon.
Terry |
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col.stephens Full Member
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Strictly speaking, the wagon sheets for the Southern Railway, and some other railway companies, should have the company initials, sheet number and manufacture date on all four sides. All I was looking for was a reasonable impression of the lettering/numbering so I decided only to put them on the two long sides. In my armoury of tools I came across this paint pen which had been purchased for a previous project...
Don't be fooled by the words 'extra fine point' as the resulting paint line is over 1mm wide, although this is suitable for our needs. I did consider using a paintbrush but thought that the pen would be more controllable.
In order to ensure that the numbers and letters were correctly positioned on the sheet I made a small card jig. The appropriate positions of letters and numbers was ascertained from a book in which I found drawings of the sheets used by the Southern Railway (An Illustrated History of Southern Wagons, Volume Four' published by OPC).
As you can see, when the left-hand side is lined up with the left-hand edge of the wagon sheet, the rectangle marked 'S' is in the correct position, and when moved to the right, that marked 'R' is in the correct position. The holes are cut to the correct height and width of each letter.
The small, long rectangle at the bottom gives the correct height for the numbers and is placed centrally beneath the letters once they have been painted on the sheet. The bottom edge of the jig is lined up with the bottom of the wagon sheet.
To prevent the paint from creeping under the edges of the rectangular holes, I glued strips of card on the reverse side of the jig to lift it slightly away from the surface of the wagon sheet.
Terry |
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col.stephens Full Member
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The company initials were applied with the paint pen using the jig as previously mentioned. The resultant letters needed a certain amount of refining to get the correct shape. To achieve this I used a Pilot drawing pen and a straight edge. The pen contains black ink.
When satisfied with the letters the numbers were then applied, once again using the jig. As with the letters, the numbers were tidied up with the Pilot pen.
Once happy with the numbering, the sheets were given a spray with matt varnish to eradicate any shine left by the Pilot pen black ink. The sheet was now given a couple of washes of thinned brown acrylic paint to tone down the lettering/numbering and give it a weather worn look.
Terry
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col.stephens Full Member
My photos:
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To represent the ropes I bought a reel of polyester thread of an appropriate brown colour. Lengths of the thread were glued to the foil side of the sheet, with five along each long edge and three along each short edge.
My chosen wagon was built from Cambrian Model Rail's kit No. C33 - LBSC/SR 5 plank open wagon. I chose to make the kit to include the bar to support the wagon sheet.
https://www.cambrianmodelrail.co.uk/store/C33-LBSC-SR-5-plank-Open-Wagon-p94430416
I draped the wagon sheet over the bar and placed three dots of superglue along the length of one wagon side. I found that my usual white acrylic glue would not hold the foil inner in position. The sheet was positioned and held in place until the glue got a hold of the foil inner. This was repeated on the other side of the wagon. The ends of the sheet were folded and secured with a few dots of superglue. During this process I referred to photographs to get an idea as to how real wagon sheets were positioned. Another compromise was now necessary. Obviously the ropes cannot be secured to rope hooks on the solebars as per the prototype, so the ropes were taken under the solebars and secured underneath with a dab of superglue.
On the wagon ends a similar situation occurred although two ropes were diagonally crossed and secured around the buffer housings. Again, not strictly prototypical but it suited my purpose. At this stage I touched up some of the edges of the wagon sheet as the foil inner appeared to be showing slightly in places.
And here is the wagon with the wagon sheet in place. I think that it captures the general look of the prototype and is not often modelled.
I mentioned that I required two wagon sheets. More on the other wagon soon.
Terry
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Petermac Admin 
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That's nice Terry - any excuse I can get to try those Tunnock's caramel biscuits is most welcome ...............  I think they must have deleted our part of France from their export portfolio - I've never seen them here but assume "other wrappers" are available ............  Sheets or tarpaulins eh -  If you're a sailor, ex or exisiting, they'd have to be tarpaulins. A "sheet" is a totally different beastie on a sailing boat.................  Incidentally, in days of yore, a company called "Smiths" produced a very good representation of wago tarpaulins (sheets) - not sure if they're still available. ____________________ 'Petermac |
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BCDR Moderator 
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Hi Terry, I use the printer and a template drawn up in a graphics program (CorelDraw or similar). White or very light grey lettering, dark grey background). Use lightweight cheap paper. Print, then crumple/fold the paper until the fibers get broken. Cut and fold to shape using glue to keep the shape. New sheets have white lettering, almost black background. Older ones grayer lettering and mid grey background. I use the spray function for splatter. Nigel ____________________ ©Nigel C. Phillips |
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Petermac Admin
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"The spray function" ???
____________________ 'Petermac |
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Marty Enjoying the Journey 
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You get the "spray function" from eating a Tunnock's biscuit while you are working on a wagon sheet. One of these days I'll get into putting wagon sheets on my N scale rolling stock, it will be an interesting exercise in miniature modelling... thanks for the suggested methods. very useful. cheers ____________________ Marty N Gauge, GWR West Wales Newcastle Emlyn Layout. Newcastle Emlyn Station is "Under construction" |
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Petermac Admin
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Marty wrote: You get the "spray function" from eating a Tunnock's biscuit while you are working on a wagon sheet.  ____________________ 'Petermac |
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| This is topic ID = 17167 Current time is 11:50 am |
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