john dew

Thanks Phil The wine was quite stunning (in the best possible way) but more on that later today. I am used to the Mountains on the West Coast but the Rockies were something else again. Awesome is an over used word but very apt in this case Best Wishes John ps I will get that PBV finished......I promise

Thanks Mike Sadly you are probably correct......I think its a five hour flight to Vancouver from Toronto........mind you "someone else" might think you should see more of Canada in which case jump at the chance Best Wishes

Thanks Mullie glad you like the shots. Definitely a trip to add to ones bucket list. I should have added the roads were of a generally good standard and my English friend had no problem driving both there and later on Vancouver Island Cheers John

Morning all I have been away for a couple of weeks.....you may have noticed a slight reduction in the "likes" "funny" "friendly supportive" graph. Be prepared for a sharp spike as I read the 10 pages I have missed. We went on a road trip through the Rockies. If you are planning next years holiday you may or may not want to look at my most recent totally off topic post on Granby.......I dont want to clutter Rob's thread with off topic stuff (heaven forbid).......so here is just one sample Reverting to topic (sort of) I can report that Elk sausages are quite palatable Best wishes from Vancouver

Hardly done any modelling since my last post......I think I may have added at most two grab handles to the brake van! So wildly off topic I thought I would show you some photos of the trip we have just made through the Canadian Rockies with some friends from Harrogate. You can do this trip in three ways......by rail, the Rocky Mountaineer which is I believe fantastic but very expensive, by coach, less expensive but somewhat inflexible or by car. We opted to go by car, more flexibility and with 4 people more economical. We flew to Calgary from Vancouver and met up with our friends who flew in from Heathrow. We rented a car and took a week driving back to Vancouver where we returned the car when they flew home. Brilliant trip......thoroughly recommend it. If you are hesitating these photos (albeit shot with an ipad) may tip the balance Calgary to Banff takes less than two hours. Its a great overture as the Rockies suddenly emerge from the flat Alberta prairies. The drive from Banff to Jasper took over 4 hours but was absolutely spectacular. The constantly changing vistas on the Icefield Parkway as we drove past the Columbia glacier were the highlight of the trip After a couple of days in Jasper we drove back to Lake Louise Thats the view that the guests at Chateau Lake Louise get every morning! We stayed one night in Lake Louise.......not at the Chateau I hasten to add (if you want read about the low point of the trip check out our reviews in Trip Advisor of the Deer Lodge Lake Louise) Its a the long drive back to Vancouver........... The train and coach trips break the journey at Kamloops which is not a particularly attractive town. We chose to travel a little further to the south and spend a couple of days in Kelowna and the Okanagan wine country Sometimes life is just too tiring and stressful........I will post some more vineyard shots tomorrow once Mr Gates has stopped updating my comutors Best wishes from a sunny Vancouver

I wonder if the shirt button would have been a more popular livery if the GWR had originally used that size on locos. I know it's "wrong" but to my eyes it looks quite pleasing

Hi MIB Welcome back.....you have been missed. You are very kind about my progress with the K40......I know from Cranford how adept you are in the paint shop so I suspect you are flattering me ,nevertheless it's still very encouraging.....thank you! You are correct about the drop light grilles.....I asked the question on ANTB and got a couple of definitive responses . So I have modelled them that way......the problem being that on dropped drop lights the Roxy SR grille doesn't look quite right......as I said above next time I will not have open windows....one lives and learns Best wishes John

Very nice Rob......the perfect finishing touch. I am still experimenting with printing on thin paper but it looks too obvious right now Green with envy in Vancouver

Its far too hot to do any gardening so I have pressed on with the decals and glazing under the welcome shade of a very large sun awning First a word about livery. The K40 Brake Vans were built between 1931 and 1933 ie prior to the introduction of the shirt button livery. However at some stage in the mid-late thirties a number of these vans were painted in overall dark brown. I opted to use this livery primarily for convenience but also I think it will look more appropriate on the daily milk train. There is a lengthy thread on RMWeb about The N gauge society's model of a slightly different van of the same era with a lot of very useful detail about livery......including the offset shirt button. I was so glad the GWR limited the numbering to two digits........not sure if its old age or what but the number transfers seem much smaller than when I last used them. Drove me scatty trying to line up "43" at each end. I now realise that on one side I stupidly put the "Luggage" lettering on the wrong double door......should be on the door with a handle. I think I have spares but unsure whether to bother changing them. Here is a very cruel close up The grille on the drop light does look a tad clumsy in this shot. Phil suggested hand drawing but knowing my drafting skills that would have been even clumsier. The Roxy etchings are designed for Southern Vans but work well on this model with closed drop lights however on half open windows the thicker base is exposed.......lesson learned for next time.....dont drop drop lights! Last and final job: door and grab handles.....now thats something I am really looking forward to!

Thanks guys......that makes sense and my life easier!

Hi guys I have a question for the GWR experts. The K40 brake van that Mr Duck so kindly set up for me is slowly (very slowly) progressing.......you can read the harrowing details in my Granby thread....Edwardian called it the Agony and the Ecstasy.......agony is correct not sure about the ecstasy bit......in any event I am far too old for that sort of thing. I am adding the security bars using Roxy SR etchings. The bars for the fixed lights are straightforward but I have a problem with the drop lights. Phil set up some of them half open. I dont know whether the security grill was part of the drop light itself or was permanently fixed to the aperture itself. Can anyone help? Puzzled in Vancouver John

Thanks Phil Still got a lot to do ......Grab Handles and Door Handles for instance!! So the next challenge is some way off although I have the donor's sister so I may eventually try and repeat the whole exercise from scratch. I will ask the grille question on ANTB Regards

Thank you James. The agony I can readily relate to........ecstasy is, perhaps, a little over the top. Regards John

Thanks, as always, for the likes guys. The snails pace progress of the K40 Full Brake has if anything slowed! As I wrote above a number of outside factors limited modeling time but I also ran into assorted problems with the actual painting. Having scrubbed the van with diluted vinegar it was washed with the Canadian equivalent of Jif/Cif and then rinsed. As I was using Vallejo Acrylic for the top coat I brush painted a single coat of their surface primer. Given hindsight, that invaluable gift, I may have been better to spray on a standard primer from a rattle can. At the very least I should have applied a second coat of primer and spent more time rubbing down. The Vallejo acrylic top coats went on really well and appeared to cover a multitude of errors and dried with a nice dense matt finish. However, prior to applying transfers, I brushed on a protective coat of Vallejo matt varnish. Not good is an understatement........every brush stroke and defect were cruelly exposed......fortunately I only did one side. After more than a few choice words I bit the bullet and started to try and sand down the blemishes using 2000 wet and dry. In part this worked but in one section the primer started peeling away like a rubber mask. Eventually I had to strip the entire section back to the bare brass which then took forever to re prime I finally finished the painting a few days ago. Finally a rather flattering full frontal.......you aint going to get any closer! Rather than try again with the varnish I sprayed on some of the artist's fixative that I use to protect my Scalescene printed sheets I am quite pleased with the satin-like finish. The surface is by no means perfect but the van certainly passes the 3' rule......it almost scrapes past the 2' rule Next job is to apply decals, followed by glazing. I got some very nice delicate etchings of security bars from Roxy......they are designed for Southern Vans but they will work ok. I do have a question for the experts......the horizontal bars for non opening windows are straightforward but I would like confirmation that that the grilles were attached directly to the drop lights rather than the aperture itself........so where Phil has set some drop lights half way open I should only show half a grille? Regards from a rather cloudy Vancouver John

That's a great shot....looking at the fire bucket stand.......that looks like white paint to me so maybe I was right after all.....rather than just being military

Thanks James Yet another occasion when one needs a multi. Button......in the end I settled for " funny" .........I do like your sense of humour. Kind regards John

I am afraid I havent updated this thread for a while. Apart from the normal summer diversions.......gardening is so time consuming..... we have had to cope with some family issues. I found time to do some modelling but had some problems getting paint to adhere to the brass sides of the Brake van. Hopefully this is sorted and I can shortly post some photos that will not horrify Mr Duck. Meantime by way of light relief and completely off topic here is an illustration of the unexpected hazards of gardening in Canada Three of us were beavering away (as one does here http://yourmodelrailway.net/images/emoticons/icon_lol.gif) noisily shifting a load of gravel.........we looked up and about 15 feet away we saw: He was quite brazen and it took a lot of shovel banging and shouting before he moved off to pastures new You can see that he is quite street wise.....walking on the correct side of the road.

On this day in 1966 I was already quite old......I was managing Littlewoods store in Manchester......I vaguely remember having someone listen to the game on a radio and having the goals announced on the tannoy to cheers or groans from the customers.......I watched the replay on tv at home in the evening. I will always remember Nobby Styles cavorting around the pitch with the cup!

I meant old in terms of age not service!

6 I guess we are competing for the title of oldest known supporter of ANTB! It must be the climate here in the Pacific North West I remember going to the South Bank Exhibition ......but I was in the Fourth form then (long trousers and all)

Thanks Rob.......time I went to the optician It will be a while before I do any glazing but best I start thinking about it now! Are the horizontal bars individually fitted or can one buy them in kit form? Similarly are grids available for the drop lights......? Worried in Vancouver John

The drill bits and wire took somewhat longer to arrive from the UK than usual but once they got here I was able to fit all the end fittings surprisingly quickly. I took your very sound advice Rob and didnt bother with door bumps........and what a great idea that was.......thank you (and MIB) There are recesses in the doors for door handles and grab handles. These have been backed with styrene and predrilled. Both types of handles are finished brass so will be fitted after painting.......that looks like being a real picky jobhttp://yourmodelrailway.net/images/emoticons/icon_rolleyes.gif Here is the non step end White metal jumper cables and corridor connector. Grab handles from brass wire and lamp holders (not supplied in the kit?) from a long abandoned Perseverance (sadly I didnthttp://yourmodelrailway.net/images/emoticons/icon_wink.gif) kit. Close up of the corridor connector hangar assembly. This was the fitting I was not looking forward to at all but it went together surprisingly smoothly.......not perhaps exactly the same geometry as the diagram but it is still far more detailed than most of my RTR stock The kit only came with only one corridor end door but this van will be marshalled in the middle of a milk train so I modified a second door using a spare from my new Collet Bow end coaches Here is the step end with curved hand rail and the supplied end door The bogie step board is on only one side, I am still unsure whether to fit them.......they dont look very convincing and because I am using the unmodified donor chassis they are a total pain to fit. I suspect will not last long in operation. So the next step is priming and painting.......but before that everything has to be cleaned and degreased........Comet recommend a thorough scrub with household cleaning product called Cif (used to be Jif) followed by a wash down with a solution of vinegar and water I have no idea what Cif or Jif is (Mrs D has a vague recollection of the latter) We are thinking of using a local product called Simply Green ......non abrasive we use it on stoves, BBQs and the boat..........any suggestions or advice will be much appreciated. Regards from Vancouver John

Hi Rob I have found the little cameos of your K42 brake van very helpful as I slowly persevere with my K40 project. A question about security bars on the windows. I cant quite make out whether you have bars on your model or not? If there was a precedent I would prefer not to fit them.......not leasr because I have a number of half open drop lights (too late to change now I fear) and I assume that any bars would be fitted to the door rather than the drop light. Regards from Vancouver

I thought that was a brilliant photo. It may be wishful thinking but the end branding looks different from the other examples we have seen. It almost looks as though it may have been superimposed.......ie painted off site on thin board and mounted to the carriage end rather than painted directly on. I dont believe these B Sets were swapped around a lot so there is no valid reason to have removeable boards. As I said it is probably wishful thinking but I think it would be possible to replicate the appearance by ordinary printing (ink out the cut edges) rather than have to make transfers...........I am tempted to give it a go. Regards from Vancouver

Nothing to do with broccoli.......but a question for the experts The last batch of 52xx were made in 1940.............would that have been in black? Failing that were any of the earlier 52xx repainted in GWR war time black?