Great Eastern brake third no515

Big Jim · Post by **Big Jim** » Tue Oct 07, 2014 2:09 pm

Looking good Brian.
It never ceases to amaze me how well things were built years ago. Over engineered to the extreme and built with pride. I can't imagine much that is built today lasting as long.

An example of this would be the Fiat van I MOT'ed last week, 3 years old, 26k on the clock, light use only (belongs to a florist). It needed two rear shock absorbers and a pair of front wishbone bushes. The owner had complained to Fiat and was told it was fair wear and tear!

I can guarantee this won't be some one restoration project in 10 years, never mind 100!

Post by **Andrew** » Tue Oct 07, 2014 3:48 pm

That's looking great!

Once it's painted I reckon a trunk or two and a couple of milkchurns by the luggage compartment doors would finish it off a treat...

Snailrail · Post by **Snailrail** » Tue Oct 07, 2014 6:52 pm

philipy:104667 wrote:Oooh!!.... isn't that just crying out for a line to run in one end and out of the other, with station and storage facilities internally!

I must admit that thought had crossed my mind but obviously I don't want to go cutting holes in the structure and the difference in height would be awkward. My garden line, what there is of it, runs through the raised border you can just see to the left of the picture. Must write something about that sometime, though there's not a lot to say yet. The guard's section would make an excellent garden railway room with plenty of storage space and there is even room for an 8 ft X 15 ft oval of track. I'd have to buy another shed though to put all the junk in.

Anyway, thanks all for your kind comments, I am very pleased with how the platform idea has turned out. I shall be on the lookout now for a few suitable artefacts to add to the ambience, as Andrew suggests that would make a real feature of it. I have already ordered a reproduction GER station seat with cast iron ends, not cheap but should look superb as well as being useful.

I've just heard that my new hardwood mouldings are ready for collection so hopefully should be able to finish some of the panelling shortly. More in due course . . .

Brian

MDLR · Post by **MDLR** » Tue Oct 07, 2014 9:36 pm

Snailrail:104684 wrote:The guard's section would make an excellent garden railway room with plenty of storage space and there is even room for an 8 ft X 15 ft oval of track. I'd have to buy another shed though to put all the junk in.

You could build a modular layout 2 modules long with curved ends, and bring the modules to Peterborough!

Snailrail · Post by **Snailrail** » Fri May 29, 2015 11:17 pm

It's been a little while but here's an update for those that are interested. After the weather broke in October I just did what I could to protect the coach from the winter weather and came indoors till the spring came. But since it turned a bit milder I've managed to crack on quite well. I wanted to concentrate on getting the brake end finished first as that gets the worst of the weather.

There was a fair bit of work to do round the windows as the woodwork was looking very rotten, though when I came to cut sections out for replacement it was surprisingly solid just under the surface and quite hard work, especially as there were the remains of a lot of rusty old nails in there. My poor chisels are all chipped now ! But it was worth doing :

This was the other side at a later stage. The small half round mouldings in the centre I had made to match the originals. The larger ones I made myself from strips of wood cut from the sound parts of the old panels which I had removed. The windows were all replaced with new 6mm glass held in by new mouldings and sealed with strips of thin foam rubber. The most time consuming part was making the curved mouldings to go round the top. These I had to cut out of a flat plank of wood, then shape to match the profile and the top of the window. I made eight of these and no two are identical !

After a few coats of paint and a trim piece to tidy up the roof covering I'm happy that it looks slightly better than the picture at the start of this thread :

Then I moved back round to the side. A couple of pieces of panelling needed replacement and the mouldings renewed. The long moulding along the bottom of the centre section had come away from the side and I knew it must be rotten behind. By the time I had scraped away the rot, there was almost nothing left to fix the moulding back onto ! So it's not held on very securely but it looks ok and nobody will know what's behind it - or isn't behind it.

The side windows were also removed, cleaned and refitted with new mouldings and seals. Then it was painting time at last. Since learning the identity of the coach I felt I ought to repaint it in Great Eastern colours but I found it impossible to match the colour from a couple of photos I have. The colour I eventually chose looked awful when I put it on, made me feel quite nauseous ! I don't find the GE scheme particularly attractive anyway so I went back to my original plan. I found a red that I like and used that and did the upper panels in cream to add a bit of interest and break up a big slab of red. I think it works, even if it's not authentic. It will at least carry its proper number eventually.

It needs another coat all over in due course and then all I have to do is rebuild the doors ! I might have a little break from it now, I'm sure I had something else to do. Oh, yes, finish my garden railway. At least I've got something appropriate to sit on now to watch the trains, my Great Eastern station bench finally arrived.

Brian

Post by **philipy** » Sat May 30, 2015 7:08 am

Brian,
That is an amazing piece of work and the (more or less ) end result looks to be well worth the effort. Well done.

Like the bench as well. Are the castings genuine or a repro?

Snailrail · Post by **Snailrail** » Sat May 30, 2015 7:37 am

Thanks Philip.
The whole bench is new and made by a firm called Procast Foundry in Yorkshire. They cast the ends in iron and also make the seatback nameplates for any name you want in cast aluminium. They supply benches to heritage railways and also cast nameplates for full size locomotives.

Brian

Big Jim · Post by **Big Jim** » Sat May 30, 2015 8:12 am

That its a very good job you are doing there. I can see that a few rivet counters might be a bit peeved about the colour scheme but it looks fine to me, after all you are the owner/restorer/bloke what has to live with it.

The bench is rather fine as well.

ikcdab · Post by **ikcdab** » Sat May 30, 2015 8:28 am

The coach looks absolutely fantastic. Well done, a lot of work has gone into it.

Maple · Post by **Maple** » Sat May 30, 2015 9:33 am

best shed ever

Dr. Bond of the DVLR · Post by **Dr. Bond of the DVLR** » Sat May 30, 2015 9:53 am

What a transformation! What colour did you paint it originally? The red you've used looks quite similar to the GER red carriage colour anyway...

Post by **ge_rik** » Sat May 30, 2015 12:27 pm

WOWW!!!
I'm not at all envious, he lied

Rik

MuzTrem · Post by **MuzTrem** » Sat May 30, 2015 9:18 pm

Fantastic work! Looks like you should be ringing up your local preserved lines and offering your services to their C&W Departments :-P

Snailrail · Post by **Snailrail** » Sun May 31, 2015 9:40 am

Mr. Bond of the DVLR:111229 wrote:What a transformation! What colour did you paint it originally? The red you've used looks quite similar to the GER red carriage colour anyway...

I was trying to match the colour of this coach which I think is at the East Anglian Railway Museum, but it is very hard to match a colour on a computer screen. It looked pretty good on the colour card but when I painted the whole end it had a very pinky purply tint which just wasn't right. I couldn't have lived with a large blob of it in the garden permanently !

MuzTrem:111246 wrote:Fantastic work! Looks like you should be ringing up your local preserved lines and offering your services to their C&W Departments :-P

A friend of mine volunteers at the EARM, helping to restore coaches and I have thought of joining him. Perhaps I will when I finish mine.

Thanks for your comments.

Brian

Lonsdaler · Post by **Lonsdaler** » Sun May 31, 2015 10:02 am

The colour looks more like a burgundy. I painted my garage door last year with a shade that looks very similar - Sandtex 10 year Exterior Gloss - classic burgundy. The overall finish isn't as dark as it appears on the label on the tin!

Alan P · Post by **Alan P** » Sun May 31, 2015 6:39 pm

Brian, that's amazing, a fantastic job!

Garden Railway Forum

Great Eastern brake third no515

Who is online