PhilH
Western Thunderer
So I acquired a Bachmann NG7 UNA without really working out what to do with it, the main reason, or should I say excuse, being that I spent a day driving the prototype some 30 odd years ago on the Festiniog Railway, albeit mainly within the confines of Minffordd Yard. That on its own would not have deserved any mention at all here on WT, but I did decide to get the DCC sound version and after running it up and down on a spare length of 00 gauge track came to the conclusion that this deserves a layout of some sort, more on that later. This is a problem, because with two other layouts in the house I've run out of spare rooms ! Unfortunately I find myself slipping deeper and deeper into this 'rabbit hole' and I've since acquired a second loco and a few wagons, but first a bit of history.
I first 'met' UNA about 1959 at Pen-yr-Orsedd Slate Quarry in the Nantlle Valley. With a school friend we used to spend the summer school holidays exploring the railways of North Wales, including the various slate quarries then still operating with rail transport. In those days before Heath & Safety legislation nobody seemed to mind a couple of schoolboys wandering about unsupervised. At Pen-yr-Orsedd Quarry we were taken to a small shed, the doors were opened and inside were two small steam locomotives by then out of use and replaced by a Ruston diesel loco. These were the two Hunslets UNA and BRITOMART.
I took a photo through the doorway showing the front of one loco, but I don't know whether it was UNA or BRITOMART nearest to the door. The date of 1960 has been quoted when they finished working at the quarry but in actual fact its probably slightly earlier than that, the last photographs I have showing them working are dated 1956. UNA was later sold for preservation in 1965.
The next time I saw UNA was in October 1970 when it arrived at Gilfach Ddu, Llanberis, with several other locos acquired by Hills and Bailey, who had taken over the old FIRE QUEEN shed to use as a workshop. It was then just bare frames (minus buffer beams), wheels and cylinders, boiler (minus smokebox) and a rivetted water tank, presumably the original. Its shown above waiting to be unloaded with the ex Penrhyn Quarry O&K EIGIAU. The work to restore the loco is covered in detail in Cliff Thomas' book on the Quarry Hunslets, mostly carried out by Tony Hills with the final assembly completed by the museum staff after its sale to the Slate Museum in December 1977. As initially restored it had a new welded water tank fitted with round sandboxes on each side (as originally supplied by Hunslet) and it was painted red, I think a somewhat brighter red than the livery carried by the Llanberis Lake Railway locos at that time.
UNA with a demonstration freight train on the Lake Railway at Gilfach Ddu in August 1983 waiting to enter the loop line, with the LLR's ELIDIR in the background just running round the passenger train standing in the platform. The first wagon is a Dinorwic slate wagon body and frame mounted on a steel chassis.
I believe the story behind the change to the green livery was that someone from the Nantlle Area, possibly a former quarry worker, told the museum staff that the locos were green. Maybe they were confused with DOROTHEA at the nearby Dorothea Quarry which was originally painted dark olive green, probably faded over time to a lighter shade of green. The tank mounted sandboxes were removed at the same time.
During this 'Green Period' UNA visited the FR for the Hunslet 100 Gala in May 1993 along with DOLBADARN from the Llanberis Lake Railway, and several other Hunslets. Apparently the museum staff were not available for the event so the Lake Railway staff operated UNA over the weekend, and being a regular Sunday driver on the LLR I was asked to drive it on the Bank Holiday Monday. It was to be single crewed (no fireman) as we normally operated on the LLR. The day started early at Boston Lodge and we set off for Minffordd with DOLBADARN leading, followed by IRISH MAIL, a line of empty tip wagons and UNA at the rear. I was told by the Festiniog pilot man don't do any pushing or we'll have the wagons off the track, so I applied a small amount of steam for the cylinder lubricators and then just admired the scenery on the way.
At Minffordd Yard IRISH MAIL was on 'drive an engine' duty at the far (BR) end of the yard while UNA and DOLBADARN spent the day shunting the tip wagons. The new volunteer hostel was under construction at the time with work in progress excavating for the foundations. The excavated material was loaded into a small dumper and driven round to the high level chute formerly used to transfer coal from main line wagons into FR wagons, where the tip wagons were loaded. UNA and DOLBADARN then exchanged the full wagons for empties in the sidings alongside the FR main line. This was coordinated with BRITOMART running into the yard on the shuttle passenger train between the yard and Minffordd Station, thus there was some movement although intermittent at times in the yard all day. Coincidently acting as guard on that train was the school friend who accompanied me on the 1959 visit to Pen-yr-Orsedd.
During the day I took the opportunity to park UNA in a suitable spot for a portrait.
......and with a wagon being loaded. At the end of the day we returned to Boston Lodge with the loaded tip wagons and the gravity slate train. I caused some amusement to the bystanders on Minffordd Station when approaching the gravity train to couple up. It had just stopped after being pulled out of the sidings by IRISH MAIL and the wagon couplings had started to open up on the gradient. I wasn't sure if I'd left enough room for all the couplings to open so decided to do a quick reverse to avoid being thumped by the end wagon !
The change back to red livery, a rather dull dark shade, is probably an attempt to get it back to the livery as supplied by Hunslet, i.e. Midland Railway Crimson Lake, but I'm still not sure they've got it quite right. Photo taken at the museum in 2011.
UNA and BRITOMART together at an event on the Llanberis Lake Railway in 2014.
With regard to the model itself, my photographs at Minffordd were taken in bright sunshine so it might appear a bit lighter than it actually was, but even so I think the Bachmann green is a little too dark and possibly a different shade. As that colour hasn't existed for some time on the real loco maybe Bachmann have taken the colour from photographs. The other possibility is that they've taken the colour from DOROTHEA at the Launceston Steam Railway which is fairly dark green from photographs (I haven't seen it myself since it was restored) but not used that for the model because it has a different shaped cab opening.
I can understand Bachmann fitting vacuum pipes to this loco as no doubt many modellers will wish to use it with passenger coaches, but UNA has never been fitted with vacuum brakes. The tank handrail has always been polished brass since restored in preservation, but it is too small in diameter - 0.45mm whereas it should be 0.58mm (the prototype is 1" dia.). A quick check on length over buffer beams and wheelbase shows these are about correct, but the overall (footplate) width is about 2½ mm over what it should be - prototype 5'-4" which scales at 37.33mm whereas the model is 40mm, presumably due to being made for 16.5mm gauge track instead of 14mm. I do like the DCC/sound set up with the exhaust sound responsive to very slight changes of power. A delay in start up when power is applied and long coast to a stop with power off controlled by a brake are just like the real thing. The opening firebox door with flickering red/yellow LED inside is a nice touch.
tbc
I first 'met' UNA about 1959 at Pen-yr-Orsedd Slate Quarry in the Nantlle Valley. With a school friend we used to spend the summer school holidays exploring the railways of North Wales, including the various slate quarries then still operating with rail transport. In those days before Heath & Safety legislation nobody seemed to mind a couple of schoolboys wandering about unsupervised. At Pen-yr-Orsedd Quarry we were taken to a small shed, the doors were opened and inside were two small steam locomotives by then out of use and replaced by a Ruston diesel loco. These were the two Hunslets UNA and BRITOMART.
I took a photo through the doorway showing the front of one loco, but I don't know whether it was UNA or BRITOMART nearest to the door. The date of 1960 has been quoted when they finished working at the quarry but in actual fact its probably slightly earlier than that, the last photographs I have showing them working are dated 1956. UNA was later sold for preservation in 1965.
The next time I saw UNA was in October 1970 when it arrived at Gilfach Ddu, Llanberis, with several other locos acquired by Hills and Bailey, who had taken over the old FIRE QUEEN shed to use as a workshop. It was then just bare frames (minus buffer beams), wheels and cylinders, boiler (minus smokebox) and a rivetted water tank, presumably the original. Its shown above waiting to be unloaded with the ex Penrhyn Quarry O&K EIGIAU. The work to restore the loco is covered in detail in Cliff Thomas' book on the Quarry Hunslets, mostly carried out by Tony Hills with the final assembly completed by the museum staff after its sale to the Slate Museum in December 1977. As initially restored it had a new welded water tank fitted with round sandboxes on each side (as originally supplied by Hunslet) and it was painted red, I think a somewhat brighter red than the livery carried by the Llanberis Lake Railway locos at that time.
UNA with a demonstration freight train on the Lake Railway at Gilfach Ddu in August 1983 waiting to enter the loop line, with the LLR's ELIDIR in the background just running round the passenger train standing in the platform. The first wagon is a Dinorwic slate wagon body and frame mounted on a steel chassis.
I believe the story behind the change to the green livery was that someone from the Nantlle Area, possibly a former quarry worker, told the museum staff that the locos were green. Maybe they were confused with DOROTHEA at the nearby Dorothea Quarry which was originally painted dark olive green, probably faded over time to a lighter shade of green. The tank mounted sandboxes were removed at the same time.
During this 'Green Period' UNA visited the FR for the Hunslet 100 Gala in May 1993 along with DOLBADARN from the Llanberis Lake Railway, and several other Hunslets. Apparently the museum staff were not available for the event so the Lake Railway staff operated UNA over the weekend, and being a regular Sunday driver on the LLR I was asked to drive it on the Bank Holiday Monday. It was to be single crewed (no fireman) as we normally operated on the LLR. The day started early at Boston Lodge and we set off for Minffordd with DOLBADARN leading, followed by IRISH MAIL, a line of empty tip wagons and UNA at the rear. I was told by the Festiniog pilot man don't do any pushing or we'll have the wagons off the track, so I applied a small amount of steam for the cylinder lubricators and then just admired the scenery on the way.
At Minffordd Yard IRISH MAIL was on 'drive an engine' duty at the far (BR) end of the yard while UNA and DOLBADARN spent the day shunting the tip wagons. The new volunteer hostel was under construction at the time with work in progress excavating for the foundations. The excavated material was loaded into a small dumper and driven round to the high level chute formerly used to transfer coal from main line wagons into FR wagons, where the tip wagons were loaded. UNA and DOLBADARN then exchanged the full wagons for empties in the sidings alongside the FR main line. This was coordinated with BRITOMART running into the yard on the shuttle passenger train between the yard and Minffordd Station, thus there was some movement although intermittent at times in the yard all day. Coincidently acting as guard on that train was the school friend who accompanied me on the 1959 visit to Pen-yr-Orsedd.
During the day I took the opportunity to park UNA in a suitable spot for a portrait.
......and with a wagon being loaded. At the end of the day we returned to Boston Lodge with the loaded tip wagons and the gravity slate train. I caused some amusement to the bystanders on Minffordd Station when approaching the gravity train to couple up. It had just stopped after being pulled out of the sidings by IRISH MAIL and the wagon couplings had started to open up on the gradient. I wasn't sure if I'd left enough room for all the couplings to open so decided to do a quick reverse to avoid being thumped by the end wagon !
The change back to red livery, a rather dull dark shade, is probably an attempt to get it back to the livery as supplied by Hunslet, i.e. Midland Railway Crimson Lake, but I'm still not sure they've got it quite right. Photo taken at the museum in 2011.
UNA and BRITOMART together at an event on the Llanberis Lake Railway in 2014.
With regard to the model itself, my photographs at Minffordd were taken in bright sunshine so it might appear a bit lighter than it actually was, but even so I think the Bachmann green is a little too dark and possibly a different shade. As that colour hasn't existed for some time on the real loco maybe Bachmann have taken the colour from photographs. The other possibility is that they've taken the colour from DOROTHEA at the Launceston Steam Railway which is fairly dark green from photographs (I haven't seen it myself since it was restored) but not used that for the model because it has a different shaped cab opening.
I can understand Bachmann fitting vacuum pipes to this loco as no doubt many modellers will wish to use it with passenger coaches, but UNA has never been fitted with vacuum brakes. The tank handrail has always been polished brass since restored in preservation, but it is too small in diameter - 0.45mm whereas it should be 0.58mm (the prototype is 1" dia.). A quick check on length over buffer beams and wheelbase shows these are about correct, but the overall (footplate) width is about 2½ mm over what it should be - prototype 5'-4" which scales at 37.33mm whereas the model is 40mm, presumably due to being made for 16.5mm gauge track instead of 14mm. I do like the DCC/sound set up with the exhaust sound responsive to very slight changes of power. A delay in start up when power is applied and long coast to a stop with power off controlled by a brake are just like the real thing. The opening firebox door with flickering red/yellow LED inside is a nice touch.
tbc
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