David Holman

Hmm... not sure to be honest. Might just need a bit of getting used to. Wonder what a whole train of these will look like alongside the black ones? Rather emphasises how big a tension lock is compared to three/screw links. If only the world had standardised on the buckeye! Life would be a lot simpler as we'd all be using Kadees.

Transparent tension lock? Interesting! Was talking to Andy Cundick at the Canterbury show today (he was in Llanfair & Welshpool mode and very fine too). He showed me his DG couplings, which work extremely well and maybe I should have gone down that route, but with a supply of free tension locks from the Club, plus their close similarity to narrow gauge choppers, it seemed worth giving it a go. Have tried thin brass but it adds thickness to the front bar, making latching of the hook tight. Tension locks are a surprisingly complex design, with the subtle curve of the front bar, small ledge for the hook to go over and so on.

Nothing much to report, other than trying to make the cosmetic part of a chopper coupling has proved very frustrating. Cyano will stick to nylon type plastic, but the pieces are so small and ultimately not really that visible. Hence have decided to cut my losses and only add details to a few key items such as locomotives. The first picture below shows a detailed close up of a coupling on a Donegal railcar trailer. The second is the Barclay 4-6-0T while the third picture shows the same loco [with detailed coupler], alongside a wagon with just an adapted tension lock. Nuff said, methinks...

Yep, looking good. And if it just fits, then it is probably just right!

Lovely pics, but no snow on the loco though! It would be a brave soul to disfigured a prized loco for just a photo shoot, methinks.

Wonderful stuff and great to see the engine and tender together. Given my personal view of air brushes is that they are the Spawn of Satan, then the bowpen is the creation of even darker forces! Well, not quite, but they take more time to master than I've so far had time for... That said, master craftsman Ian Rathbone open a few secrets of the dark arts in his painting and lining book, the key one being the use of enamel thinners and a fine paint brush. Seems even the best don't always get it right, so when inevitable blemishes occur, you wait an hour or two, then dip the brush in thinners, remove most of it and then carefully apply the brush to the offending area. Hey presto, the excess paint lifts off like magic. Still needs care, but definitely works. As ever, practice on scrap material beforehand and use transfers wherever you can. You'll either love it or hate it. David, before you strip the paint off your new loco, might be worth trying T-cut. Shannon was utterly filthy when I acquired it, but it came up really well. If there are paint chips, you can trying filling these in, sand level then over paint and work back after with more T-Cut - though depends how bad the paint is overall.

The bogie van has been put to one side for now, while I wait for some 3d printed louvres from fellow Chatham Club member Neal, so finally decided I had to grasp the nettle of... COUPLINGS Been brooding on this for a while - the idea being to make slim line tension locks work with Dingham electro magnets and then alter them cosmetically to look like narrow gauge chopper couplings. The photo below shows just a small part of my trial and [mostly] error work this week. Making tension locks work with a below baseboard electro magnet is relatively easy. A piece of iron wire [paper clip] is soldered to the dropper on a tension lock hook. The more challenging part is refining the set up so it works efficiently. Tried various fixing points and lengths until I found that [for 7mm scale/21mm gauge] a shallow, inverted U shaped wire approx 21mm long is about right. A selection of parts is shown below. Unlike standard tension locks, I only need a hook on one end of a vehicle, with just a plain loop at the other and indeed, just loops on locomotives. The hooks have been 'jiggled' so they line up centrally. As the picture above shows, this now means the pivot point of the hook is fairly central - and thinking about it just now, the wire could probably be made slightly shorter, as [despite appearances] it does, just, balance. However, to add a bit more weight to the hook end, I've soldered a small piece of staple to the hook 'arm', which both disguises the joggle and gives just enough weight to make the hook drop drop by gravity. Was pleasantly surprised to find that the Dingham electro magnet, the pole of which is an M4 bolt, has quite a wide field of influence - around centimetre, which hopefully will make sighting uncoupling spots easier than the 3mm 'window' the rare earth magnets I'd been using with Kadees. Fixing the new tension lock assembly to my stock has proved a bit of a pain, as the nylon like material doesn't much like any sort of adhesive. Cyano is just about ok, but takes a long time to go off, while neither plastic cement or solvent will touch it in my experience. I think I'll probably need to beef up the joints with 5 minute epoxy, though not until after I've done plenty of testing. One thing I have found was, as expected, the need to add a narrow U shaped piece of wire around the staple wire extension to stop this hitting the track when the magnet is activated. The biggest problem I've had has been trying to replicate the appearance of the the chopper coupling's buffing heads, which look like the mock ups below. Trouble is, trying to fix these to either the front or rear face of the tension lock buffing beam serious limits the space required for the hook to latch on. Am seriously thinking of not bothering at all, after multiple attempts to fabricate something, not least because, for practical reasons [including my own sanity] whatever is made needs to be simple. Current thinking is to have the buffer head fixed to the top and bottom edges of the tension lock: halfish circle below and two quarterish circles above. However fixing them is another matter! I'm wondering if I epoxy two pieces of micro strip [probably 40x60] behind the tension lock bar, I can then fix the curved pieces to these with solvent. Watch this space... Anyway, have done some of my Donegal stock and, fingers crossed, this seem to be working well. The system doesn't allow for delayed uncoupling [like Kaydee, AJs etc], while the fact that I turn locos on the layout and the whole train in the fiddle yard means there will have to be clearly defined shunting moves to avoid two hooks [or two loops] meeting up. As the photo shows below, the staple wire is nicely hidden most of the time and even when pulled down by the magnet is behind the wheel, so all in all, pretty unobtrusive. Doubt if this is an original idea, but feel it could well have its uses in 4mm scale, though tension locks are not exactly prototypical in 12 inches to the foot...

Welcome to the singed fingers club! Really nice work, especially with it being so small and fiddly. Onwards and upwards!

Always welcome!

Looks like quite a find! Jealous? Absolutely!

Nice to see there are other folk who have been working in 36.75mms too - though it still seems to be a very small, or even secretive club. Often wonder just how many folk there are out there indulging? Ultimately, there is perhaps a single item that is crucial - Slater's broad gauge loco axle. Wagon and coach axles, plus wheels, not a problem, while fixtures and fittings can be found or adapted. Without that loco axle though, things would be a lot more challenging.

Tasty. Very tasty!

Lovely! Well done you.

Seems eminently sensible to me, Leslie. Even forces of nature such as yourself have to slow down sometime! Prepare to be busier than ever though - it is what retiring properly is all about: doing the things you want, rather than need to do. Live long and prosper, as Mr Spock said.

Impressive stuff - I make that at least sixty cars. Can't be a proper circus train though as there is no giraffe car, with the animal ducking it's head under bridges. Proof, if needed, as to why the silver livery on the A class didn't last long!

Should have known Mick would have a solution! However, not sure it would work at twice the scale. That said, making triangles might... Evergreen 'sidings' sheet is made to represent overlapping boards, as per on clinker built ships hulls, so hopefully it can just cut a section and fix in place.

The work I did over Christmas, drawing out coaches and wagons on plastic sheet, ready for assembly has got me on a bit of a roll, so after the three tramway coaches and red wagon now comes a Swilly van. No ordinary four wheeler this time though, it is Bogie No7, which was constructed on a coach chassis. The drawing, to 4mm scale, and photo come from J C Boyd's lovely album on the Swilly, so the bit over Christmas was to rescale things to 7mm, producing two sides, two ends and four pairs of double doors. I also scribed on the planking and cut out the two windows openings in the guard's door. These are all on 1mm thick/40thou plastic. On Wednesday afternoon, it only took a couple of hours to assemble these pieces on a floor of 80thou plastic, adding the vertical strapping as I went along from 60x80 thou strip. Recently, I've taken to using Plastic Magic to weld pieces together. For me, it is a nice compromise between rather powerful stuff like Mek and the lighter, but still smelly D-Lemonine. The bottle is less easy to knock over [so far!] and also comes with a handy brush. One downside is that Plastic Magic is quick to evaporate, so you have to work quite quickly, but a strong joint is made in seconds and you get less in the way of finger marks too. It may not have taken very long to put the main shell together, but detailing is another matter. There is a fair bit of strapping, which also needs riveting, so the GW press has earned its keep again on 20x80 strip. I always find guard's duckets fiddly things to do & forgot to do a cut out in each side [not for the first time] which will need a bit of remedial work, but they are shaping up ok. Another potential hurdle is/are the ten louvres [four each side, one each end] which can be a real pain to get looking neat. Tried an internet search in the hope that some enterprising 3D printing whizz had come up with something, but not yet, as far as I can tell. What I did turn up was a short article in MRJ 285, where master modeller Laurie Griffin had used Evergreen 'siding' sheet. In my part of Blighty, Evergreen stuff is getting ever harder to source - and indeed plastic strip generally - but managed to find some on line, so put in an order. While waiting for it to arrive, I can still be getting on with the bogies and under frame [Alphagraphix castings], while the doors and roof still need doing too. The intention is that the bogie van will be paired with another brake third and provide the train for the Kerr Stuart 4-6-2T when the Worsley etches eventually arrive, while in between there is still the harbour scene to dabble with too.

Great to see this progressing. Certainly looks like somebody knew what they were doing re initial construction, so looking forward to seeing it completed. NPQ booked again for Aldershot in October. A parcels special via the Burma Road?

Well, the little Tamiya drill has proved its worth in drilling holes in plastic for hand rails, though it will work even better when I get some sharper bits. Anyway, certainly helped me move the tramway coaches towards completion. Couplings needed [still to grasp the nettle here], but painting and lettering finished today, along with roofs and interiors beforehand, including some cheap and cheerful Peco figures. Lettering is Fox and the crests are LMS from and old SMS transfer sheet. Use the crests for my Donegal stock too, though for the West Donegal Tramway, have put them upside down. The crests also nicely cover up the Clogher Valley logo on the loco. As you can see in the photos, work has begun on the fencing for the tramway platform.

Nice! Westport Quay worth a look too. Iain Rice did two takes on the subject, as shown below.

Or extend the life of the Burma Road for a few years, maybe? Loco hauled trains, often only a couple of coaches long. There again, fictional locations can be anything you like.

If you haven't already, check the Patrick's Layout thread, on page two of this section. Shows just how well a simple track plan can work by putting the railway in the scenery. Certainly lots to inspire in those photos posted yesterday!

Planning is half the fun and I've scratched many itches that way, with 99% never making it off paper. I think you have to balance the time, effort as especially cost, against how much value you place on having such space. Our roof is too low pitched to be any use, but did eventually convert the integral garage into my workshop, by fitting double glazed, hinged doors, and adding a radiator from the central heating system, plus an access door from the porch inside the house. It has given me 16' of layout space down one side and work bench/storage on the other one and a half sides, using kitchen base units/worktops. The layout space gives room for two, one above the other and though they are only terminus-fiddle yard, they provide enough operation interest when the mood takes me. That said, I mainly build things and exhibit at shows, so though a continuous run would be nice, I doubt I would use it much.

Ordered one from Amazon Sunday evening, it arrived yesterday afternoon and put it together in front of the tv last night. The instructions took a bit of getting used to, but overall went together ok. As an intermediate drill, am hoping it will work well with plastic sheet, where my Proxxon is far too fast and melts its way through. First test later today, fitting hand rails to the tramway coaches.

A classic case of it only being half a dozen pieces for the structure, but add in all the details and it becomes more than a bit complicated! The dinky size of the prototype can't have helped - overall, looks a lot shorter than a G2 and these aren't exactly giants. As ever, very neat, very tidy and very, very good.