Adam

A quick update on the Hornby Trout/SECR Ballast Hopper conversion. The doors are primed and fitted and re-filled (the first pass wasn't bad, but better is better). I think it's worth carrying on so the next stop is a coat of grey primer and some transfer rivets before sorting out the door catches and other detail. The chassis hasn't been untouched, but new buffers and couplings aren't as exciting as all that... Inside... and out: Adam

The complications are inevitable (but it does look good, thus far). I know that they weren’t remotely Western Section machines but I don’t suppose I’ll be able to resist. Lots of space for a good size flywheel in there... Adam

The main visual difference between the Trout and it's SE&CR forebear are some pressed drop flap doors and making these is a fiddle but visually crucial. Those of you into 3D printing are probably laughing already but I'm happy with plastic sheet and know how to make it do what I want (mostly). You should see the number of failures littering the workbench... So from the front, a layer of 20 thou' backed with bits of 10 thou' strip: This phase from the rear: The next phase is to add more relief. Pared back 25 thou' Evergreen rod gets the pressed frame and some shaped 30 thou' the centre panels. It now needs a witness coat of primer and some filler to tidy it up. I'm reasonably happy with these so far, but the reason there's three of them is that I'm probably wrong... Adam

Here's a Slovenian example: https://www.tosh-railways.com/Wagons/UIC-letter-codes/E/Eas/i-QPwPcvg/A, and a couple from Croatia: https://www.tosh-railways.com/Wagons/UIC-letter-codes/E/Eas/i-wgRGCWp/A https://www.tosh-railways.com/Wagons/UIC-letter-codes/E/Eas/i-SPz7nhg/A Adam

You and me both. Adam

And now for something completely different. In 1911, the SE&CR acquired its first ballast hoppers supplementing its traditional flat bottomed, low-sided pens which, nonetheless, lasted in some numbers into the 1960s. These were curious things with three chutes to unload the ballast (just the one bottom door on the GWR P7) designed to be operated from track level and rightly reckoned to be sub-optimal from the user's point of view especially when the wagons were - as designed - unloaded in motion. In 1915 they added another train's worth of similar hoppers of 21T capacity with the operating wheels moved upward and a platform provided for the operator. Construction was by the Leeds Forge Co., and they seem to have been at least partially responsible for the design since they some very similar vehicles to others until their closure in 1929.* This sensible and much-safer set of features was later adopted by the SR on their later bogie hoppers but, through Leeds Forge's successor, Cammell Laird (later Met Camm), more very similar 4-wheeled vehicles were built for the LMS and LNER and by BR as the Catfish and Dogfish . Characteristic Swindon conservatism saw them get Met Camm to build their P22 design when the same company had a superior vehicle available for thirty-five years... Hornby, of course, have offered a moulded plastic version of the Trout and since examples of the second batch of SE&CR hoppers lasted into the '60s and there are pictures at Meldon which is the right end of the SR for me how could I resist? Getting hold of one has proved a bit tricky but a kind donation from @Enterprisingwestern has solved that and here we are. So apart from the lovely pressed steel side door (for copyright reasons you'll have to take my word for that unless to have a copy of An Illustrated History of Southern Wagons vol. 3 or the later Southern Wagons Pictorial) the main difference is the capacity and the consequent height of the hopper, roughly 6" lower on these early relatives. From a modelling point of view the difficult bit is the door but I have a plan for that. Here's the donor - sadly the nicely-moulded axlebox lettering has to go and the chutes are 2mm shorter than they should be (trainset wheels, but who can really tell), as do the buffers and bendy footsteps. Vacuum brakes and their associated fittings are to be added. About an hour's drastic surgery later... More later. Adam

Hi Tim, Nice work. You may feel it unnecessary, but the single biggest improvement that could be made to those Dogfish and Catfish would be substituting some etched handwheels. the real things are quite chunky so the ones to go for are the Stenson Models (ex-Colin Craig) examples: https://www.stensonmodels.co.uk/product-category/all-products/4mm-products/handwheels/ You can see the end result with these two (I'm sure I have some images of these fully weathered somewhere, but you get the effect). These particular Catfish are modelled examples loaned to the SR from the LMR based on some Dave Larkin pictures. Adam

Hi Justin, You’re right, the real thing was longer, a 12’ wheelbase but I like the smaller, shorter one you’ve done. There’s another version elsewhere on the forum:

You jammy beggar. I've no use for four of the things, but several of the SECR types - more or less identical but with rather cute dropside doors in the middle two panels - made it to BR and, well, it'd be rude not to do one. Adam

Not much later - the precursor of the Dogfish, Trout and Catfish designs was produced by Leeds Forge less than a decade afterward the P7 and at least some of those (some for the SECR, for example - that'd be a fun conversion from a Hornby Trout if I could lay hands on one) had vac' brake. There was at least one P7 rebuilt with a vac' cylinder at the end because there's a picture of it in MRJ 257. The P22s should never have been built in my view - especially as Met Camm that built most of them had inherited the Leeds Forge designs via Cammell Laird - but I've never understand the doings of Swindon... Adam

Graham - what retains the wheel set in this case is the wire spring - it’s attached by friction to the carrier and is held by the holes in - this particular instance - one of the hopper support ribs and another that’s folded out from the back of the solebar. The bridle has - or should have - no particular part to play, much like the real thing. I can’t say how well that works in 7mm but it seems to work fine in 4mm where the basic concept is more or less standard for wagon springing. Adam

It didn’t! The bracket holding it cantilevered it outside the solebar. As the wagons were relatively narrow that was ok. Adam

Thanks - the gallery that picture is in is well worth a look too. Some nice Forest of Dean images and lots of South Wales freight. Meanwhile, I’ve posted some of my travails with a Southwark Bridge Models GWR P7, the ancestor of the Herring. Hard work, but more here if you’re interested: Adam

My current, and ongoing, project is a Southwark Bridge Models (available from Roxey) GWR P7 ballast hopper, the type that the later Herring were based on. These are - characteristically - 'Swindon' though based on a commercial design (the LSWR and GNoSR had similar vehicles). I don't know about the GNoSR, but the South Western went on to more sensibly sized and a bit more operator-friendly things. Not so the GWR which upgraded them and perpetuated their folly with the Herring. But they did last until '63 so... This is not a bad kit as such, but I think that it's been shot down from 7mm and it shows in the design decisions. The chassis is a bit of a mess and leaves too much to chance in location terms though that said I managed to put it together right first time. There are a lot of tiny bits. The brake push rods, shoes and especially hangers are not really fit for purpose in 4mm. Half etched brake hangers with no backs to them are not really on. Ivan isn't available for comment following his untimely death and to be fair to him, the brake variations on this are many, varied, and made even worse than the usual Swindon norm by the retro-fitting of vacuum cylinders but that shouldn't have made it past the test etch. I'll have to get one of Justin's Herring for comparative purposes. His approach to the hopper is a bit different, having seen the instructions, but the chassis is to his normal method and I know that works and works well. The hopper, in contrast is really quite good and goes together accurately and square sufficient that the tierods just fed through all the various holes at the first time of asking. At this point, all hot operations are complete barring the upright vac' pipes which I think I'll have to make up from scratch. They're not a complicated shape but modifying a whitemetal one is likely to result in meltdown. Note the 'modern' pattern of kickstep, replacing the rather pretty, but I imagine a bit delicate, steps on a bit of rod Victorian version. The safety loops ended up mounted as I imagine the real thing was, attached to the hopper tierods: I'm sure Swindon did something more sophisticated than a blob of solder. Oh, and I've added journal reinforcements, tweaked from some Rumney Models spares. Still, the hard work has resulted in something not bad and once the paint is on, who'll know. I wouldn't build another though. Adam

While I've nearly finished a model of the Herring's predecessor, the P7 (a right fiddle), I thought you might like this picture of a real Herring at Coleford. The interior is especially helpful, I think. Adam

Even allowing for the angle and the challenges of space it needs to be bigger: mottes are meant to dominate and that doesn’t clear the roof line of the goods shed by nearly enough. The forced perspective would be more effective if the representation showed the whole thing. to get the height in the space you’ll have to increase the angle of the slope of the motte, but the present arrangement looks more cutting than Castle. Modern - damaging - tree growth would make disguise a bit easier and perhaps that’s a way forward? To allow that to have happened earlier? Adam

I like the timbered buildings which look quite convincing. The right hand building, however, and I presume it's meant to be a stone building, looks a bit odd and the main reason for this is that the Wills mouldings used are really intended for stone buildings and have been used upside down. The bits you've mounted at the bottom are called 'hood moulds' or, alternatively, 'drip moulds' which explains their purpose - to keep water from running down the wall out of the window. Used as cills like this, you'd find that the water would get trapped in the bottom of the windows. The pattern Wills have produced are utterly typical and they're so familiar I've never bothered to take a picture specifically to show one so here's a crop from a survey picture I took of Gainford near Darlington: Note how the moulding is set into the wall. Adam

I’m sure that the effect you describe is a simple trick of the light as the loco is lit from the rear. First that’s because that’s Peckett’s normal approach (and that of most builders). Second, plates themselves aren’t all that thick and the fit of the valve casing is not tight enough to necessitate a step. I’m sure they were restricted in the size of rollers available to them and that’s the reason for the chosen mode of construction. Adam

Hello Dave, I've done one of these - and the resulting thread is here: There's a good picture of Lord Salisbury here: What Peckett did with their larger locos can be seen in the picture above - they constructed saddle tanks of overlapping rings, the centre always on top. I ignored the rivets half-etched on the pre-rolled tank (WHY!?) which in any case are the wrong pitch and used Archer rivet transfers instead. One thing to watch for is the rather soft grade of brass used, but the kit is not too bad otherwise. Adam

A mix - the basic markings are CCT, the data panel from Railtec and the stencilled ‘Stoneycombe’ pieced together from a sheet of suitable stencil lettering, origin forgotten. Adam

Sorry, I've been out this morning. The Herring action starts here (five years ago, amazingly). Hope this helps.

I think that's right. The lining style (and the wasp stripe style) is quite consistent, but I'm not sure that blue was the standard colour for Sentinels (or that there was such a thing) and this was something the customer could specify. They did for steam locos however - a mid-green lined orange/black/orange, a bit like faded GWR...). Most industrial suppliers had a standard lining style and varied the colour according to what the customer asked for. Adam

You're right - sleeping baby on my arm and single hand typing doesn't aid precision! Adam

Yes, that's the precursor, a GWR P7, which would have started out much lower, probably with lever brake. On the other side would have been the vac' cylinder on a sort of outrigger and yes, Dean Churchward brakes. The Herrings had the same (pitifully small) leading dimensions but with slightly more sensible brake arrangements. Still pretty uncivilised compared to a Dogfish (based on a Leeds Forge design from the early years of the 20th century). See Geoff Kent's article in MRJ [EDIT - 257 not 247]. Adam

This one: https://rcts.zenfolio.com/rolling-stock/gwr/hA0FCA025 Dated 1959 at Evercreech, which is near enough for my purposes. It’s got 10 spoke (like Toad brakes), you’ll notice. Adam