Rivermead Central

[40057]

Construction is underway of the ‘stone work’ in which the Benham’s office building date-stone will sit:



The curved ‘stones’ on either side (one attached in the photo) are short sections of pine moulding sold by B&Q for use in panelling, window frames etc. The whole structure will sit centrally on top of the coping at the front of the Benham’s office building.

 

[Allen M]

My method of dating a factory building

Hi all
If you would like to see the building for 'real' (post 239) it is in Kidderminster. It is located in Churchfields at the 'Y' shaped junction where it leaves the A456 Ringroad. Look from the traffic island where it cross Blackwell Street.
Was part of Tomkinsons carpet factory, now flats. The rest of the area has been re-developed for housing.

The map is a bit out of date but the arial & street views are as now

Regards

 

[John R Smith]

I was watching earlier the very excellent short film ‘Train Time’ (British Transport Films, 1952). This delivery lorry appeared in one short sequence:

I'm a bit late replying to this, but just for interest - this is a Cornish lorry (RL registration), and the load looks like vegetables in wooden crates. If so, it is probably broccoli and we are somewhere on the Helston branch line, which produced a great deal of this traffic. Cattle wagons were typically used and we can see one just behind the lorry.

John

 

[40057]

I'm a bit late replying to this, but just for interest - this is a Cornish lorry (RL registration), and the load looks like vegetables in wooden crates. If so, it is probably broccoli and we are somewhere on the Helston branch line, which produced a great deal of this traffic. Cattle wagons were typically used and we can see one just behind the lorry.

John

Thank you.

Exactly as you say, one story line in the film is a surge in broccoli traffic and the extras run to cope with it. It is indeed on the Helston branch.

 

[40057]

Tuesday:



Yesterday:



Today:



The date stone for the Benham’s office building is now ready for mounting on the coping. It will get another coat of ‘weathered concrete’ paint after it is fixed in place and general weathering along with the rest of the building.

 

[40057]

I always paint the lengths of strip wood I use to make coping before attaching the coping to the building. If possible, I use a single length for each building so the size is exactly uniform. A couple of days ago, I glued the short lengths of coping to the north- and south-facing elevations of the Benham’s office building. This has enabled me to get the precise length required for the coping on the main, east-facing, elevation. I cut that piece this morning, measured to get the centre and glued the date-stone assembly to the coping:



When the glue is thoroughly dry, I will put a couple of small countersunk wood screws through from the underside of the coping to make sure the date-stone is held securely. Then fasten the coping to the building. Meantime, this is the coping with the date-stone just resting on the top of the wall, to see how it will look:



I think the style is right for the middle of the Art Nouveau period.

 

[40057]

Some progress, at last, with the rebuilt Royal Scot. I mentioned in my post #215 that I needed to swap the motor and undertake a repair on the tender. I have started with the tender.

Although the tender is generally in very good condition, at some point the division plate behind the coal space had been hit hard. The division plate had been bent and pushed forward and the soldered joint along the base had broken and split:





The task was to get the division plate back to vertical and remove the bend in it — but without losing any more paint and, critically, without breaking the soldered joints fixing the division plate to the tender sides. I got so far with using my fingers but eventually realised I couldn’t apply pressure at the critical point because the water pick-up dome was in the way. I ended up buying some specialist jewellers’ pliers designed for bending bracelets and these did the job. The division plate is now straight and vertical and looks much better:







I’m relieved to have got this done as I was concerned about breaking the remaining soldered joints holding the division plate in place. I have run some epoxy into the gap under the base of the division plate where the soldered joint had broken. This shows up as a shiny line in the above photos. I will cover the line of glue with black paint and the repair will be invisible and plenty strong enough for normal use.

Bassett-Lowke’s model of a 4000 gallon Stanier tender was originally produced in the mid-1930s to go with the model of 6201, ‘Princess Elizabeth’. The embossed beading on the sides and division plates show that these parts at least were made using press tools. The same Stanier pattern tender model was then used for the Black 5s and Jubilees made at Northampton before WW2. It replaced the original Fowler type tender sold with the Royal Scot models when the Royal Scots were upgraded from tab-and-slot to soldered construction and fitted with smoke deflectors. Finally, just before WW2, the same Stanier tender was used to go with the ‘Duchess of Montrose’ — though this was not the correct type of tender for the Duchess. I guess, commercially, the existing Stanier tender model was considered close enough and using it kept costs down. After WW2, the Stanier tender was used only for the Royal Scot and Duchess models.

Here is a better view of 46100’s tender:



Very nicely hand painted — but made more realistic by a sheen of oil and dirt accumulated over 70 years.

 

[40057]

Sunday morning. I shall do some work on the Benham’s office building later. Meantime, a cup of coffee and a chance to reflect on Bassett-Lowke’s model of the Royal Scot.

The rebuilt engine I am working on was the last version of a model made, on-and-off, over a period of about 27 years.

From time to time, some manufacturer or other offers a new model that is a game-changer. It greatly influences — into the future — how models work, or are made, or customer expectations. In recent times, the first British-outline ready-to-run 00 model(s) made by Airfix and Mainline in the 1970s would be an obvious example. Before that, Triang’s Princess in the 1950s, which was crude but 2-rail and plastic, and ultimately triumphed over the 3-rail, superior, metal models made by Meccano Ltd.

I would argue that when introduced in 1929, the Bassett-Lowke 0 gauge Royal Scot was a similarly important milestone in the development of mass-market, realistic, model railways. First, in line with developments on the real railways, it was much larger than previous models. To run it, curves of 3’-radius or larger were required — which changed how and where modeller’s built their railways. The real loco was much more powerful than its predecessors and so was Bassett-Lowke’s model. New motors were designed to achieve this. I don’t have personal experience of the electric mechanism but the 6-coupled clockwork motor was an outstanding creation. It set new standards and was used in all large-size Bassett-Lowke 0 gauge clockwork locomotives until production ceased in the 1950s. As made in 1929, the Bassett-Lowke Royal Scot was built of lithographed tinplate sheets assembled using the tab-and-slot method. This type of construction was usual for toy trains at the cheaper end of the spectrum — but here it was being used for a large and complex scale model. Not only did Bassett-Lowke’s Royal Scot look like the real engine, the construction method chosen meant it was offered at a very affordable price. From the number around today, it must have sold well. An absolute first for the Bassett-Lowke Royal Scot was the accurate representation of the outside valve gear in a mass-produced model. Sure, the need to represent valve gear was made necessary by changes to locomotive design on the real railways but, prior to 1929, manufacturers had either chosen prototypes with inside valve gear, or simplified the valve gear or just omitted it completely. As with the new motors, the valve gear and cylinders designed for the Royal Scot were then used in numerous different models over the next thirty years.

The pride Bassett-Lowke felt in their new model comes through in the catalogue description:



To put the price into context, the contemporary Bassett-Lowke model of a J39 0-6-0 was offered at £4 10/-. The J39 was of soldered and hand-painted construction. The J39 originally had a Bing-made mechanism but the model was later altered so the clockwork motor made for the Royal Scot could be used in it.

Nowadays, a large proportion of model railways aim to represent some period in the past. It wasn’t like that in the 1920s and ‘30s. Manufacturer’s concentrated exclusively on models of current equipment, and especially on the latest locomotives. For the Bassett-Lowke Royal Scot model, it was out-of-date by 1931 as smoke deflectors were fitted to the real locomotives. The model, in its original form, was dropped from the catalogue after only a few years. It was then reintroduced c.1937 updated with smoke deflectors and a Stanier tender. The original tab-and-slot construction locomotive body was still used but with the joints now also soldered. The smoke deflectors and other additional detail such as lamp-brackets were attached with solder. The finish was, necessarily, now painted. After WW2, the Royal Scot reappeared in the catalogue in LMS black livery:



History then repeated itself as this version of the model also became out-of-date as the real locomotives were rebuilt. The black-liveried models were the last original Royal Scots offered, c.1952.

In 1954, the Royal Scot was back in the catalogue again, but rebuilt with a taper boiler and in BR livery. Only the cab, the lower part of the locomotive body, the bogie and the motor were now the same parts as were used in the models made in 1929.

 

[40057]

Some more time spent working on the Benham’s office building and it’s a few steps further on:



I will have to alter the top step (platform) from the one provided in the JS Models kit to remove the overlap on the left where it abuts the north-facing wall of the Benham’s office. I’m also putting a bigger step/platform at the bottom of the steps. I’ll put a countersunk screw through this as the fastening to keep the office building in place on the layout.

 

[40057]

I have finished the repair work on the Royal Scot’s Stanier tender. Starting with this:



The division plate now looks like this:



Not as good as new — because the originally soldered joint that was broken is now joined with epoxy. But an invisible repair, easily strong enough for careful normal use, and the division plate is straight and fully back in position. No further paint loss or other damage caused during the repair. I am happy with the work and relieved it’s done.

Many threads on WT — including this one — instance examples of modelling activities that were anticipated to be quick and simple — but turned out not to be. My latest difficulty which took me by surprise today is the clockwork mechanism for my rebuilt Royal Scot. In my post #215, I confidently (but wrongly) predicted removing the electric motor and reinstating the original clockwork one would be ‘straightforward’. It was the tender repair I thought would be difficult. I was planning on making the motor swap tomorrow and got out the clockwork mechanism today to check it over. Entirely unexpectedly, I found the motor was not working freely, especially in the forward direction. Several turns of the key were required before the driven axle moved at all, and then the movement was jerky and slow. It took me a while to work out the cause but eventually I isolated the problem to the axle and the final drive (reversing) gear-wheels which were binding. These are the gears which don’t want to turn:



The reason the gears are binding is the axle is out of alignment and that is because the two side plates of the mechanism are not properly lined up. Viewed from above, the motor is a parallelogram, not a rectangle. Now, this motor is in excellent condition with no signs of wear. On a top-quality mechanism like this one, the pillars between the side plates are fastened by small screws (10 BA), not riveted. So the motor can be taken apart and the misalignment corrected. That done, this should be an excellent, powerful motor. But I won’t undertake the repair myself. In a motor of this size, the main spring is a dangerous thing which could easily cause serious injury if it ‘escaped’. So it will be sent to an experienced repairer.

This will delay work on my Royal Scot. It’s a nuisance. But I’m confident the motor can be easily fixed. Just not by me.

For those not familiar with clockwork motors for model locomotives, here is a general view of the motor for the Royal Scot:



This type of motor was used in all large Bassett-Lowke 0 gauge locomotives after it was introduced in the Royal Scot model of 1929. However, there were two variants — with and without a variable speed control. The above motor has a speed control. Note the winder — a small square socket that takes a male key. So the hole in the body for the key can be small and unobtrusive. It’s a geared wind, a practical necessity as the spring is so strong. Also visible in the above photo are the alternative axle spacings in the side plates. The spacing used for Pacifics, except the Princess Royal class models, was 48 mm + 48 mm. All 4-6-0s had wheels spaced at 53 mm + 58 mm, which required the middle wheels to be on stub axles.

A view from above shows the massive drive spring:



The lower control lever — push/pull — is the brake. The middle control is speed and is adjusted by turning the knurled knob which is on a screw thread. The upper control lever — push/pull — is forward/reverse.

These large motors are impressive pieces of engineering. I like them as objects in their own right — not just as part of a fine locomotive.

 

[40057]

A couple of pictures of the Royal Scot’s tender in daylight this morning:





Leaving aside the bent division plate — now repaired — this is one of the best examples I have seen of this type of tender, certainly in BR livery. These models are prone to rust where the acid flux used for soldering was not properly cleaned off before the model was painted. For example, often — nearly always, actually — there will be a halo of rust around each lamp bracket. Not on this one. There is an area of corrosion at the front bottom corner of the side visible in the first photo above, but it’s small. It has taken 70 years to spread a couple of mm from the joint, so I’m just going to leave it.

Ultimately, a ‘tinplate train’ is made of steel and it will rust if kept in damp or maritime conditions. That said, the protection afforded by the tin coating, paint and varnish means carefully looked after models will generally not spontaneously deteriorate. But that is not always true. Models assembled by soldering which have flux residue under the paint will rust even if kept in a dry environment. The paint will flake off from models that were not properly degreased before painting however carefully they are treated. This is a known conservation problem for some manufacturers (notoriously, the products of the Leeds Model Co.), or particular periods (late 1920s Hornby) or specific models (Bing 0 gauge 112 tanks).

Perhaps counterintuitively, rust tends to be less of problem on older Bassett-Lowke models. Up to the 1940s, tinplate was produced by dipping steel sheets into molten tin — resulting in a good thick surface layer of tin. Later, the tin coating was applied by electro-plating and was much thinner. Early models were often thickly painted and then heavily varnished. Lithographed models were usually varnished after assembly. In about 1950, Bassett-Lowke stopped varnishing its range of lithographed locomotives and rolling stock. The resulting semi-matt finish was probably more realistic but — in combination with a thinner tin coating and possibly lower quality steel — it made the post-WW2 models very vulnerable to corrosion.