Hello Jon,
Normally I would be trying to recreate the LSWR of the 1950s, so I'm new to this. The complete 'Downton' train is to go with a loco built with the aid(?) of a K's Milestones Falcon Class loco kit bought on something of a whim that came bereft of its primitive K's underpinnings. I have created a montage of the fateful train using the BoT Accident Report, and liked the overall look of this block train where pairs of short coaches had been close coupled to aid stability. Fitted with the not very continuous Newell Brake I reckon it makes an interesting snapshot of the state of railway technology in the early days of Verwood station on the Salisbury and Dorset.
One of the drivers for this was the availability of CAD (rather than workshop) time whilst keeping an eye on my mother. I've used this time to create each of the coaches of the train, but using only the drawings, modified by close observation of the photos in the book to guide me. The end result is that I have no knowledge of these coaches beyond what's in my Weddell Volume One. One thing I did pick up from a photo was that the doors on this van appeared to be shallow framed presumably so that there was somewhere for the droplights to go - that's if they had them of course! The loco will be stripped of its more dubious Beattie knick-knacks and will have the monstrous (Adams?) stove pipe chimney and modestly extended cab. The coaches will also be in late condition as generally photographed, with long buffer shanks, two full length footsteps and ventilators on the roof - if I can work out what they looked like. Whether they can really be 3D printed in this form (sans roof) remains to be seen, but there is always the option for me to break the completed 3D model up into parts that can be 3D printed.
These vans with their external framing seem ill suited to a two tone livery that for the other coaches may or may not have been an unlined early version of Brown and Salmon Pink. For this period they seem to have been lettered 'L & SWR', and the appropriate Methfix transfer sheet has only two of those - and that according to Gordon is only enough for one side of the Second Class coach that was in that ill fated train - cripes!
Generating the Downton block set in CAD was an unexpected little project that in trying times I have managed to generate a lot of enthusiasm for and have really enjoyed doing.
Steve