In between building the Kirk coaches I have also been assembling the other exNBR bogie CCT. This one will be finished in LNER livery for my own stock.

In NBR and LNER days the side panels were all half beaded this has been added using 0.8mm half round Plastruct strip.

NBR-LNER Bogie CCT

Although I will be making the sole bars from plastruct strip they are too long to make it out of one length so it will need to be joined.

In order that this isn’t visible on the finished model I plan to draw up and cut some 10 thou overlays. Which I plan to rivet in the same manner as the tar tank. This is in the hope that it will save me from drilling, cutting and inserting the many stubs of rod that would otherwise make up the multitude of bolt/rivet heads visible on the sole bars.

Another one that rolled of the work bench this week is the scratch built tar tank that I made the tank body for some time ago.

I am particularly pleased with the way that the pipework has come out.

Scratch Built Tar Tank

Scratch Built Tar Tank

Scratch Built Tar Tank

Scratch Built Tar Tank

Scratch Built Tar Tank

Scratch Built Tar Tank

Scratch Built Tar Tank

Scratch Built Tar Tank

While taking photos yesterday I completely forgot the LNER Container. I managed to get the body painted a couple of weeks ago but I wasn’t happy with the colour so I mixed some more. While I had the transfers out I applied some. The photo that I am working from has the container on an ex GER OCT which was before dedicated container wagons were produced. On that basis I am going to leave the paint work fairly pristine although I will no doubt weather the OCT when I get that far.

Silhouette Cut LNER A Type Container Lettered and Painted

Silhouette Cut LNER A Type Container Lettered and Painted

Silhouette Cut LNER A Type Container Lettered and Painted

I had thought that I had brought everything up to date as to my Christmas progress but I had forgotten the NER Implement wagon until I spoke to Graham Beare this morning.

When I began to do more work on it I realised that I had stuck the wrong axlebox/spring castings on, in my haste I had taken those from the Lowmac kit not the IMP. Fortunately I had stuck them on with Rocket Gel Superglue and I managed to prise them of without causing any damage to either the wagon or the castings.

This is where it’s got to so far.

Scratch Built NER Implement Wagon

More progress was also made on the Great Northern Railway Open Carriage trucks. All of them now have brakes and yokes etc.

Scratch Built GNR Open Carriage Trucks

Scratch Built GNR Open Carriage Trucks

Sadly I ran out of parts so didn’t get any further with the 6 wheeled North Eastern Railway truck but I did make good progress with the Great Eastern Railway Open Carriage Truck.

Scratch Built GER Open Carriage Truck

Scratch Built GER Open Carriage Truck

The W Irons and spring arrangement fittings are all either cut on the Cameo or styrene rod – a bit fiddly but immensely satisfying when it all came together.

Another of my last week’s endeavours was to make up and underframe for the tar tank.

My spares box yielded axle boxes/ springs and brakes while the “cameo” spares box yielded W Irons and Crown plates. I will need to cut more of the other washer plates for the solebars but since I already have an assortment drawn for other wagons that should be a simple matter.

Scratch Built Rectangular Tar Tank

Scratch Built Rectangular Tar Tank

One thing that I did notice when checking my drawing for making up the underframe is that this wagon has a 10′ wheel base whereas the Slaters version has either 9′ or 9′ 6″. Which will account for the the differing overall length and the reason that the transfers fit without adjustment.

It makes you wonder whether Slaters (like other manufacturers) developed the kit around reusing some existing underframe parts in their range and then adjusted the tank length to fit. But subsequently someone else developed the transfers around the longer wheel based drawing.

I can see lot’s of sound business reasons for doing this.

Inspired at the time when a gent called Adam built a 4mm scale scratchbuilt Lowmac on a couple of forums that I frequent, I recalled that when buying NER Implement wagons and Lowmac kit’s from Jim in the past he packed a couple of extra axlebox/spring castings. With that in mind and wanting to expand the wagon fleet in this direction I ordered and collected another of each kit from Jim at the Keighley show. This gave me a spare set of axlebox/spring castings for each type of wagon.

So when I was ill a couple of weeks or so ago I drew up the parts for an implement wagon to see how it looked.

Then last weekend in between working on the GER OCT and the A Type container (I was a busy boy because I also finished fitting the handrails to the Parkside unfitted van) I assembled it.

Silhouette Cut NER Implement Wagon

Silhouette Cut NER Implement Wagon

I didn’t get any further with it because I had left the relevant volume of Tatlow at home in Wakefield….. Which seems to be the story of my life just now – I hadn’t been able to assemble the container the weekend before due to leaving the information at home.

And then there were five…

Although last week was a bust from a modelling perspective due to being ill. When I started to feel better I did get a bit of drawing and cutting done which allowed me to make a start on what I think are the last two open carriage trucks for now.

First I made up the body and basic underframe for the GER OCT that I was enquiring about the origins of on various forums

Modified by CombineZP

Modified by CombineZP

The plan is to finish this with an A Type container (which I have made start on drawing up in Inkscape).

Last but by no means least (because it’s a bit of a beast at 34′ 8″) is a former NER 6 wheeled OCT. Apparently in 1917 these had their sides removed and bolsters added for the conveyance of Aeroplane parts.

NER 6 wheeled OCT

NER 6 wheeled OCT

NER 6 wheeled OCT

I made more progress on the OCTs now having two 21′ and one 18′ examples in similar states of build.

GNR 18 and 21ft Open Carriage Trucks

GNR 18 and 21ft Open Carriage Trucks

GNR 18 and 21ft Open Carriage Trucks

and finally a photos of the star and some modified spring hangers. The cast W Irons and springs were kindly cast for me by Kerry Viney in Australia but nice as they are they didn’t quite match the spring hangers on my drawing but some time ago when I was experimenting with drawing up springs and hangers in Inkscape I had drawn up and cut some hangers which I hadn’t used. I found that If I glued 3 layers together by inserting them on a length of brass wire to index them I could them cut the loop end off and insert them on the bottom of the solebar like you see in the close up below. Not perfect in that they could have been a little wider but now I have the proof of concept adjusting with will take moments before recutting. I will do this for use with the next half dozen that I have, which I plan to use on an NER 6 wheeled OCT

GNR 18 and 21ft Open Carriage Trucks

In between other jobs I managed to get a squirt of black paint, the transfers and some weathering on the tar tank.

What was interesting having built an lettered a Slaters kit, is that I took the measurements for this from a Skinley drawing. That drawing must relate in some way to the Slaters transfers because unlike the Slaters’ kit the transfers went on in one piece without having to make any adjustments to letter spacing to take account of the panel size and layout of the rivets.

My Slaters example took several sessions/hours to get the transfers on whereas these went in in about 15 minutes tops for both sides.

My main reason for building this was to do further experiments with the crackle medium to see if I could reproduce cracked tar runs on the tank. I am pleased with the results so far.

7mm Scale Scrtach Built Tar Tank

7mm Scale Scrtach Built Tar Tank

7mm Scale Scrtach Built Tar Tank

7mm Scale Scrtach Built Tar Tank

A quick squirt of primer later and the “rivets” are still visible.

Scratch Built Rectangular Tank

Scratch Built Rectangular Tank

Scratch Built Rectangular Tank

A lot will depend on the results of my ongoing painting experiments using Crackle medium but it’s looking more like I will build an underframe for it by the minute. – Like Horseboxes, you can never have too many tank wagons.

In between while the brain can’t cope with anything too involved I wanted to do some more experiments with Crackle medium because I want to weather my Slaters Tar tub. Like when I did the doors I would rather put my efforts into something useful as opposed to just testing things on a an offcut of styrene. As I was looking for something else a couple of weeks ago I came across a Skinley Drawing for a rectangular tank wagon.

I scanned it, imported it into Inkscape and very quickly cut out some 10 thou overlays for the top, sides and ends. A search in my spares box dug out a spare filler cap. The drawing has a deep filler neck so I glued it to a spare Parkside Vacuum cylinder which was the right size.

I then glued the overlays to some pieces of 60 thou and assembled it all to make up a tank body – I am still not sure as to whether to leave it as a grounded tank or to knock up and underframe and add it to the stock list. I suppose that will depend on how happy I am with the weathering job.

Scratch built Rectangular Tank Wagon

Scratch built Rectangular Tank Wagon

Scratch built Rectangular Tank Wagon

This is straight from the cutter, I haven’t drilled out the rivets and added stubs of styrene rod.

The next step is to put a coat of primer on and see how it looks then.