7mm , Blackney, A Glimpse of the Forest

[Alan]

You may be right Heather but I think the lining on the cab front makes the width from radiator to cab side look narrower than it is and of course the model iall one colour at the moment. Measuring the model and photo the distances appear fairly correct, radiator twice the width of radiator edge to cab edge.

 

[Heather Kay]

Measuring the model and photo the distances appear fairly correct

I think the error is the cab sides are flat. They’re supposed to angle in from the door hinge line towards the front panel/scuttle.

Of course, there may be a prototype the kit is based on that I’ve not seen. *shrug*

 

[Osgood]

I'm sure Alan can find evidence in Frank's extensive photo archive of Frank's coal truck having slammed into the front of the Nippy, the cab front of which was subsequently rebuilt at a local garage utilising the radiator from a bigger truck that was being broken for spares.

 

[Alan]

Cab painted a few other things added. Obviously radator lights a front bumber to be painted and windows added plus one or two other things

Sorry about the twig.

 

[AJC]

Hmm, I’m not sure about that cab.

View attachment 219444Thornycroft by Stuart Mitchell, on Flickr

I don’t like to be a downer on things, but the kit cab looks very flat and wide compared to a real one. The Thornycroft radiator is characteristically tall and narrow.

Look at the mudguards - there’s a fairly obvious tapering in of the cab from rear to front (absolutely normal for coach built cabs), on the real thing, absent from the model, which looks oblong in plan rather than trapezoid. That’s one of the big failures of the Coopercraft AEC, too. So whether the other details are right or not, I couldn’t say.

Adam

PS - pretty sure that Thornycrofts sold the vast majority of their chassis with their own cabs so Nippys should all look more or less alike. The ‘unusual cab’ defence is understandable, but it’s a pet peeve: it simply doesn’t apply over 95 percent of the time.