Garden Railway Forum

Andrew wrote: ↑Tue Jun 21, 2022 1:11 pm “…the use of figures was a very hot topic”

Thank you. I hadn’t realised it was already seen to be controversial.

Interesting (to me) that he runs through some of the arguments — and arrives at precisely the opposite conclusion. The one he doesn’t mention (as I found — and as Philipy suggests) is that passenger vehicles, let alone a whole train of them, just look empty if you don’t put a few seated figures in the windows — and in this case, it seems to me, it doesn’t matter at all that they’re ‘static’. As Peter says (and I can illustrate) an obvious lack of crew on moving locomotives doesn’t look wonderful either.

I haven’t done a particularly accomplished job painting the cheapo Preiser clones in dull, much simplified colour (largely) — but I have to say the overall effect is still much better than I’d expected.

I think your Thumper really looks the part - well done. Have I missed a post about your sound effects? Are they only added to the videos, or have you installed a sound module? If so, which one please?

Lonsdaler wrote: ↑Tue Jun 21, 2022 10:04 pm “Have I missed a post about your sound effects?”

Thank you. I’m afraid the audio’s just added in the video edit. My notion of using a thumping, ‘Xtra Bass’ Bluetooth speaker kind of fizzled out with the motorblock issues (and expense). I still fancy having a go, though — perhaps after a visit to the Spa Valley…

BertieB wrote: ↑Wed Jun 22, 2022 9:38 am

Lonsdaler wrote: ↑Tue Jun 21, 2022 10:04 pm “Have I missed a post about your sound effects?”

Thank you. I’m afraid the audio’s just added in the video edit. My notion of using a thumping, ‘Xtra Bass’ Bluetooth speaker kind of fizzled out with the motorblock issues (and expense). I still fancy having a go, though — perhaps after a visit to the Spa Valley…

That's a shame, it would be great if you can achieve it, although it would need to be played infrequently, to avoid annoying the neighbours

What’s going on here?
Philipy has kindly moved this thread from ‘rolling stock’, enabling me to also drone on about locos and any other vaguely relevant nonsense. Thank you.

It’s a bit crude but I like the chunkiness

Before coaches can be pulled (or pushed) by appropriate locos from the recently rationalised home fleet, I’ve become aware (again) that there’s a list of long-ignored repairs to plod through.

This fun-scale, ‘might’ve been’ Q1T, for example, required repairs, a bit of a tidy up (now benefitting from newly applied ‘mixed traffic’ DIY decals) and the return of its R/C receiver, which had been lent to other locos, as Deltang (and more recently, Loco Remote) had become unavailable. It stayed forlornly on the shelf for most of the past year or two. Strangely, that seems to be where most breakages happen.

But, at last, I’ve got some more (Micron) receivers…

The Q1T (or would it be a Q2 ?) is a lovely chunky beast.

Magnificent! Why was the funnel so broad?

Rik

ge_rik wrote: ↑Fri Jul 22, 2022 6:57 am “Why was the funnel so broad?”

Ouch! Partly because of Bulleid’s enthusiasm for multiple jet blastpipes (wide chimneys on Lord Nelsons, MN, Q1, WC/BoB). But also because, aware of this, I’ve gone and done it too big…

BertieB wrote: ↑Fri Jul 22, 2022 10:35 am

ge_rik wrote: ↑Fri Jul 22, 2022 6:57 am “Why was the funnel so broad?”

Ouch! Partly because of Bulleid’s enthusiasm for multiple jet blastpipes (wide chimneys on Lord Nelsons, MN, Q1, WC/BoB). But also because, aware of this, I’ve gone and done it too big…

Sorry, didn't mean to sound critical, I was just curious.

Rik

Rik — Perfectly OK — Not what I meant to suggest. Always been slightly awkward about the funnel, it is a bit big.

[edited for being incoherent]

Permanently equipped with appropriate Deltang/Micron !

I haven’t quite worked my way through the list of cosmetic tidy-ups but at least variously appropriate Deltang / Micron receivers have now been installed in everything that isn’t actually in bits on a shelf somewhere upstairs. I no longer have to swap the receivers around.

Just testing

The garden is looking rather sad though, which makes sitting outside in the evening with toy trains on the go, a little less pleasing. It’s been quite hot, with negligible rain and the soil is rock hard — you might as well tend the ‘flower beds’ with a pickaxe. The greenery is generally not green at all and not looking too healthy. Watering, not actually illegal yet, appears to just sit on the surface till evaporated — I don’t suppose much of the stuff I planted earlier in the year will survive. Harrumph.

The ‘lawn’

This drought is hell in the Nortwest...

Lonsdaler wrote: ↑Thu Aug 04, 2022 8:03 pm This drought is hell in the Nortwest...

The grass will come back. It looks crispy and dead but that's nature's way!
Monty Don (of Gardener's World fame) reckons to give shrubs etc a good soaking once a week so the water percolates down deep rather than dribbling a bit on every night. My wife agrees with him so he must be right!

invicta280 wrote: ↑Sat Aug 13, 2022 10:27 pm The grass will come back. It looks crispy and dead but that's nature's way!
Monty Don (of Gardener's World fame) reckons to give shrubs etc a good soaking once a week so the water percolates down deep rather than dribbling a bit on every night. My wife agrees with him so he must be right!

Agreed about the grass recovery...eventually.
However Monty has what he continually describes as "heavy clay soil" but that he can push a spade into with one hand. A week without water on mine and a Kango struggles!

I finally managed the pilgrimage to the Spa Valley Railway — between covid and cancelled and/or rescheduled holidays and travel — for a solitary orgy of Thumper noise and Harvey’s Best Bitter. It was another quiet, lovely day but I was surprised to find that, sadly, my iPhone videos suffered from intrusive wind noise, so there’s not much useable audio from the trip (which had been a key reason for going). But parked in a siding, they also had a (particularly tired, scabby-looking) 33, the next project…

Exquisite, distressed signage and typography

Class 207: swoon! (According to legend, first years should travel in the luggage racks)

Steam hauled, restored Mk1: fabulously comfy. Shame about the plastic glass

Cabs under attack from filler-primer, plastic putty, several grades of sandpaper; roof parts, not yet. Motorblock artfully placed so you can’t read my notes


May 2021 and Angr607, on this very forum, introduced the 3D print & acrylic, Gauge 1, Class 33 kit from Bowaters Models and, a pleasant surprise, accepted my request to knock out a scaled-up version at 1:27 (to sit with my existing, oddly proportioned fleet).

It’s been my first experience of large 3D printed components and in attempting to deal with the characteristic striation, I’ll admit to being a little heavy handed with filler and subsequent vigorous sanding. I’m modifying the kit to accommodate Piko motorblocks and it will be battery powered with Loco Remote control.

Ideally, to sit with my green coaches, it should be turned out in the original, disagreeable dark green and off-white livery. I can’t face doing one of those, though. Trouble is, so many of the Class 33 liveries seem to have been specifically conceived to make them appear as ugly as possible — have you seen the Network SE effort? Wow! You’ll notice from the snap I’m toying with alternatives that may not be historically correct.

The kit offers a great opportunity for anyone up for serious, OTT weathering though. I particularly remember rail blue versions becoming especially grotty (as we would have said at the tIme) with tatty, dented, flimsy-looking, bodywork panels and miserably faded paintwork: fit and finish you might expect to see at the allotment. Even when quite recently overhauled and repainted they soon seemed to get offensively grubby, too. There are plenty of photos online of horribly scruffy examples.

However. Construction of the kit — which is somewhat semi-scale (that’s fine with me) — is very straightforward and offers plenty of scope to get carried away detailing it, should you so wish. I wasn’t wildly enthusiastic about the appearance of the real ones back in the day but I guess I’ll just have to learn to love them.

I do like that 33... I know we've been here before and disagree, but I LOVE the 33 aesthetic, even in fading blue - the Swanage Railway's one crops up on their webcam sometimes and sea air's definitely getting to the bodywork, but it makes me nostalgic... I reckon they look best in green, with small yellow panels, but also like 'em in "Dutch" livery and Railfreight Construction, as they appeared when I used to watch them double-head Channel Tunnekl construction trains through Foots Cray...

I must get to the Spa Valley sometime, it looks wonderful. I wouldn't admit to it, but although I've never sat in the luggage rack of a Thumper, it's possible that I may know what it's like to ride to London in the luggage rack of an EPB, drinking cheap lager as a precurser to a night out in New Cross. And even that I've been married to a fellow luggage rack drinker for over twenty years...

Andrew wrote: ↑Tue Aug 23, 2022 2:09 pm “…a night out in New Cross”

I like the all-over ‘freight grey’ livery on 33s (though I’d never be able to make a decent 3D double-arrow logo for the cab side), similarly, I think the ‘sectorisation’ freight livery design is inspired — but, weirdly, I don’t think I ever saw either of these on a 33 at the time they were current. There’s loads still to do before I need worry about painting but right now I’m tempted to go freelance.

To disguise the 33’s dodgy aesthetics, I think the key thing is — the extended, cab window surround has to be black (not off-white, cream, yellow, maroon or anything else). The ‘grey, red stripe, large logo freight’ and ‘rail blue, large logo’ liveries both look really neat (on other locomotives) but I believe neither were applied to 33s. Perhaps just because the body side windows get in the way? Well, I think we might be getting the chaps at Eastleigh to take a look at it…

I have, in the distant past, spent perhaps more time than was strictly necessary, in seedy south London nitespots, venturing to Deptford, grotty parts of Greenwich, Charlton, even Woolwich(!) — but New Cross… You win!

BertieB wrote: ↑Wed Aug 24, 2022 12:48 pm

Andrew wrote: ↑Tue Aug 23, 2022 2:09 pm “…a night out in New Cross”

I have, in the distant past, spent perhaps more time than was strictly necessary, in seedy south London nitespots, venturing to Deptford, grotty parts of Greenwich, Charlton, even Woolwich(!) — but New Cross… You win!

Was there a nightclub in Woolwich?! I was born there and, although I never lived there, my last job before I moved to Bristol was working in Woolwich public library, which was an experience. The readers and staff used to wind each other up into a state of apoplectic rage, at which point one or other party would send for The Manager. Alas, that was me...

New Cross was (and maybe still is) home to The Venue, a gloriously grotty club where "The Only Living Boy in New Cross" by Carter USM was an unsurprising favourite on the dancefloor - I still have a huge fondness for it. For those with a liking for 90s pop punk, here it is: https://youtu.be/imcSt2HyzEo

And, for those who'd prefer to stick to the trains, New Cross's other claim to fame is that it was the birthplace of the Ffestiniog's "England" locos: https://www.georgeengland.org/about-george-england

Ooh, and it was a terminus of the East London Line, which has an interesting history toohttps://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/East_London_line:

OK, back to work, I think!

Andrew

BertieB wrote: ↑Tue Aug 23, 2022 11:08 am I finally managed the pilgrimage to the Spa Valley Railway — between covid and cancelled and/or rescheduled holidays and travel — for a solitary orgy of Thumper noise and Harvey’s Best Bitter.

Great railway, great beer. I was last there last September when there was a Class 33 and I picked up a s/h copy of Branchline to Southwold at Groombridge station...

Andrew wrote: ↑Tue Aug 23, 2022 2:09 pm I wouldn't admit to it, but although I've never sat in the luggage rack of a Thumper, it's possible that I may know what it's like to ride to London in the luggage rack of an EPB, drinking cheap lager as a precurser to a night out in New Cross. And even that I've been married to a fellow luggage rack drinker for over twenty years...