4mm An EM Workbench: Mineral allsorts

[AJC]

A comparison between the dia. 1657 and whatever this diagram actually is. The confusion arises from the fact that @hrmspaul ascribes a couple of different options, 1656 or 1658, to similar vans and I don't have the Essery books to hand to check (and it doesn't much matter for the purposes of making a model from a fundamentally accurate kit and a good clear photo).



The key differences are already apparent and boil down to the height of the veranda screens (see yesterday's visit from Captain Cock Up). The strapping will be very different when I get that far but the family resemblance is obvious.



Note that, like Geoff Kent, I've added a bit 0f 10 thou' by 30 thou' strip to beef up the springs. The other thing that I dimly recalled from reworking the earlier, unfitted van is that the bearings need to be inset a fair way to ensure that the solebars are parallel when you put the wheels in - a few twists of a 1/8" drill were needed and the flanges of the pinpoint bearings should be inset rather than proud or even flush (for this particular kit) to achieve free-running.

Adam

 

[iak63]

Niiiiice!

 

[AJC]

Niiiiice!

Thanks Ian! I like this kit and until I chanced upon the pic' in John Turner's collection I was tempted by the late-series extended wheelbase version illustrated in Geoff Kent's Wagons vol. 3 (or stretching the wheelbase on Hornby's LMS horsebox; that LMS thing of doing what the Midland did before gradually producing something the right size for the job akin to what the GWR and SR had been doing for decades. Everyone spots the 4F to Black Five transition, no one looks too closely at the other end of the train!).

Adam

 

[Martin Shaw]

Adam
The camera is full of pics of Sentinels, coming to a forum near you soon.
Regards
Martin

 

[AJC]

Adam
The camera is full of pics of Sentinels, coming to a forum near you soon.
Regards
Martin

Excellent! And many thanks.

Adam

 

[AJC]

Now with all the strapping that I've either take off or is required for the conversion. For practicality this has all been done in 10 thou' which is a bit thick for the most part - so I'll leave it to harden off for a few days before sanding it back a touch. I guess it'll be handrails and lamp irons after that; I wonder whether I have sufficient brass angle to do the footsteps?



Adam

 

[AJC]

And here it is the other way up with the brake gear installed (and safety loops still to be added) and quite a bit of lead sheet:



Note that the brake linkages added in 0.3mm wire are slotted into holes and glued at each end - I drilled through the actuators with a 0.5mm drill and a very deep breath (first go, too!). These don't get in the way of removing the wheels for painting and the safety loops will also, prototypically, just protect the yokes. Of course, it transpires that I'm out of 3mm x 1mm angle so progress that looks like progress will be a little while away yet...

Adam

 

[AJC]

And here we go, a brake van with the defining visual feature, the footboards now fitted:



The footboards are knocked up from bits of scrap Nickel Silver (which will please @adrian) with brass for the toe boards at the back. Fans of Captain Cock Up will be delighted to hear that now, just as the epoxy cures, he has made his presence felt and I have I FOUND a length of 3mm x 1mm angle ideal for the purpose.

Adam

 

[Lyndhurstman]

It looks very nice, Adam.
Although I do like a finalised scale representation of something real, it’s also good to see it naked, as - in addition to paying testament to your knowledge, interest and skill, - it informs on the variety of sources and materials that can be used to lift something everyday into something special.

Cheers

Jan

 

[AJC]

Thank you Jan - it's always good to show your workings, I think. What I neglected to add was that the hangers of 0.7mm Nickel Silver wire, filed flat on the front face. Much stronger than strip.

In truth, the supplied plastic footboards are sustainable and make up a reasonable representation, but ultimately caused the withdrawal from traffic of my first attempt for several years while I got my act together (and bought/used any number of lengths of angle bought for the job for other purposes!).

Adam

 

[AJC]

Nearly ready for paint:



Lamps, strapping details, vac' pipes (through pipes only) and roof - rainstrips, chimney for stove, location strips underneath. There won't be a fully-worked interior but since I've modelled the door open at one end, I'll have to add something. That can go in after painting, however.

Adam

 

[iak63]

That is one fine looking beastie Adam...

 

[AJC]

That is one fine looking beastie Adam...

Thanks, Ian. I'm looking forward to getting it painted because then I can start something else! A pair of something else, but a pair of what?

Adam

 

[AJC]

A quickie. Back in February, we went up to Durham visiting my sister and her tribe and, obviously, we went to Beamish and this item took my fancy:







It's a modernised farm tip cart. The shafts for the horse have been sawn off and a drawhook for tractor haulage added - classic mid-century farming bodging. Most obviously, however, the cartwheels have been replaced with something off a pre-war car with pneumatic tyres. A week later, I happened to be at the Tonbridge show and saw that Dart Castings have a kit for something similar (but a little bigger) so here's my rendition of something similar:





The wheels are off a die-cast Ford van which is a bit more modern than the wheels used on the real thing, but not so much as to be wholly implausible, I think.

Adam

 

[matto21]

Love the work you've done to the BV - the footboards from brass (?) look excellent, far better than my thinned plastic versions!

The farm cart will be a fun project to paint and weather too!

Matt

 

[AJC]

Love the work you've done to the BV - the footboards from brass (?) look excellent, far better than my thinned plastic versions!

The farm cart will be a fun project to paint and weather too!

Matt

Thanks Matt - the footboards are laminated from scrap nickel silver etch and brass strip; 3mm x 1mm brass angle would have been easier (if more expensive!) but I didn't find the length I had in stock until afterwards.

The hangers are from 0.7mm nickel silver wire with the front face filed flat; having built one of these before, I found that the plastic footboards were prone to damage. Actually, it's probably the moulded hangers that are particularly vulnerable and mending things is really, really boring...

Already started on the cart. On the other channel, Paul Gallon has shared pictures of something very similar in use in the early '80s: Adam's EM Workbench: A lineside quickie.

It might seem hard to believe, but he has the date of original build of that vehicle as 1948 - a useful reminder that horsepower was the default setting in much of Britain well into the post war period. In my other life, I spend a certain amount of effort trying to spot when that ceased to be from documents not intended for the job. The clue, incidentally (and confirmed by chatting with farmers and family), is reckoned to be when acreages of oats - the main fodder crop for horses - declined.

Adam

 

[AJC]

And painted:



I'm quite pleased with it, though the lighting is far from ideal...

Adam

 

[Lyndhurstman]

I'm quite pleased with it, though the lighting is far from ideal...

Adam

You've every right to be pleased with it, Adam. It's a smashing rendition. It really looks the part.

Cheers

Jan

 

[AJC]

Having a tidying up exercise, having finished a few things which have now all been popped away in the box files:



This quickie project began here: 4mm - An EM workbench - an agricultural quickie and is now complete in grubby BR livery and traders' labels (dog food and wool, courtesy of Hollar Models). Buffered up to it is something left unweathered when we moved house and which has only just resurfaced. This LMS brake, the old Airfix body on a Bill Bedford chassis. I think I may have started it when I lived in Norwich so call it finished now mans that it's been over a decade in gestation.



All done. In the process, of course, I've found other unfinished productions...

Adam

 

[matto21]

Stop posting pics of that BV! All its doing is pushing me to redo the roof on mine!

Lovely work as ever!

Matt