The Heybridge Railway, 1889 to 1913

[Richard Gawler]

Richard,

there’s lots of info re RCH wagons in the resources section of WT.

Isn’t Brymbo a bit out of area for your railway?

HTH
Simon

I am allowing myself a few wagons from well out of area. Without these, the traffic will be an interminable flow of GER in and salt and agricultural equipment out.

I am sure the root cause of this is excessive imagination. Essex received its coal from the North East, brought by ship and then on to Chelmsford by barge. Nevertheless, my railway is bringing in special grades of coal from South Wales, for Bentall’s foundry. Similarly, the region received its timber from Scandinavia, but my railway is bringing timber from Scotland - doubtless to make the frames of Bentall cars.

There weren’t many steelworks in East Anglia, so I reckon Wrexham is as feasible as South Wales (again) or the North East. Wrexham is quite a long way away all the same, so maybe one day I will make something more believable. The Modeller’s Licence is a fine thing.

 

[Richard Gawler]

Well - if one accepts the signwritten Empty Brymbo GWR to be accurate, the wagon is likely to have left Brymbo with a load of some kind as it was expected to be returned empty.
Brymbo had two collieries (one of which supplied coal for export via Liverpool) for its own use but also bought in coal from other producers.
It had its own ironstone quarry at Hook Norton and would also have brought in bulk limestone - but all these are loaded to Brymbo, not empty.

My guess would be crushed slag, but if a consignment of engineering steel (in short bars) or quality iron billets for Bentall's foundry had to be shipped to Essex then why not?

Yes. The load from Brymbo could be something which Bentall's couldn't make themselves, or couldn't make in sufficient quantity. The tenuous part is explaining why this arrived in a wagon belonging to Brymbo and not one from the fleet of the GWR.

 

[Richard Gawler]

My seven PO wagons bought and built so far, sorted by distance travelled to reach Heybridge.

The first left is for E H Bentall (the only wagon carrying outgoing products), the next is for a local supplier of oil. The origins are then Colchester, Gunness, Bristol, Wrexham and Swansea.

The balance will get better as I build more wagons for businesses in Essex and neighbouring counties. Supposing I devise half a dozen operating sequences to portray the railway on specific days through its existance, then the four rather "remote" wagons will appear rarely, and probably not together.

 

[Richard Gawler]

Painted. I am sure I have spent longer taking photos of my Brymbo wagon and writing about it here than changing the brake gear.

At the end of the day, this will now blend in better with my other wagons, and the mismatch of paint on the solebar will all but disappear when weathering happens. For the Heybridge Railway, the location will probably jar more than anything else but I do have now have a wagon from a steel works.

 

[Richard Gawler]

I have managed to raise the baseboard holding the baseboards by 45 mm and this gives me a space to put a tray for my current project underneath. I fancy making some kind of chassis from aluminium angle to replace the under-baseboard here; this would give me a better storage space.

The bit of track over the bookcase extends for barely half a metre. This ought to be trivial but somehow it makes operating much more satisfying. A train can now run for a few more seconds and looks as though it is going somewhere with a purpose not doing a demonstration. Maybe Heybridge Basin will be a through station with sidings beyond when set up at home.

 

[chigley]

what i have used as a frame underneath is office partition frame which is 45-50 mm H section

 

[Richard Gawler]

what i have used as a frame underneath is office partition frame which is 45-50 mm H section

What a good idea.

I have found a smaller, one-inch version:
1 in Continual Run - Aluminium Wallboard Profile

I can imagine two parallel lengths of this, with timber battens holding the two lengths apart. Vertical legs going downwards from the timber battens onto the top of the Ikea Kallax.

 

[chigley]

I got mine from a local scrap yard

 

[Richard Gawler]

My Y14 travelled along the route of GER main line today, though in its transit box and partly along the ‘electric’ (suburban lines) added in LNER days. This was to visit the Ilford and West Essex MRC to enjoy their club open day.

The club has a rather fabulous 7mm FS layout called ‘Taw Magna’, which seemed to enjoy its model visitor as much as I enjoyed meeting members of the club.


BR train provided by the host.


Somehow, the scenic setting brings the model to life. I cannot achieve this this sort of look on the bare test track at home.


Ignoring the van, I can pretend this is some kind of locomotive exchange and trial.


The Citroen on the bridge brings this view into the realms of preservation . . . I will have to guess, the other road vehicles are preserved as well.

This is the first time the Y14 has run on a scenic indoor layout. Many people remarked on how well the loco ran and one person expressed disbelief that the chassis is rigid. To be honest, the combination of loco and layout performed impeccably. The trackwork here is first class.

Thank you to the Ilford and West Essex club for welcoming me and Y14 and letting me do this impromptu running session

 

[Richard Gawler]

My best photo from yesterday retouched to remove a piece of fluff under the station canopy and the distant club room.

Friends tell me I am a perfectionist and I am never satisfied with my efforts, but this photo is somehow important to me. I "made" the smokebox door here (I added details onto a brass blank) and I "made" the Roscoe lubricator too (from bits of tube and wire and a spare hand wheel) and they look "alright". The chimney and dome are white metal castings and these look okay too. The tiny curvature near the front of the running plate "just happened" during the build but I think it has become fortuitous; this loco has seen a little life.

So I will put the neck on the line and say, if I can get this sort of look on a layout or diorama of my own (minus the BR(W) overtones!) then I will be happy and even (just possibly) "satisfied".

(Photo taken with my Panasonic TZ-90 in its fully-automatic program mode and under fluorescent lighting!)

 

[Robert Dawson]

I have to admit to slapping a wash of umber acrylic paint onto my LED strips when lighting backgrounds to room boxes…seems to be ok..

 

[Richard Gawler]

First annual report!

When I finished my Slater’s rectangular tank wagon in September last year, I promised myself I would build a wagon every month for a year or give up on 7mm scale; and the ex-MR van is my twelfth. I fitted a crane tank and a platform shelter into this year too. Fundamentally, I am pleased with all of the models I have made. The weakest is probably the Jubilee wagon (3.5 mm too long and no pin points on the axles) but I have bought a fresh kit to try this idea again.

I am building a might-have-been railway and to my mind it should have might-have-been trains, or at least slightly vague representations of them. I mean, the railway would seem a bit odd if it had specific prototypes working on it, day in and day out, when we know these prototypes really worked somewhere else.

The mix of wagons I have assembled is actually pretty fair to represent my imaginary railway; the only real shortfall is some GER stock for through workings from the Witham to Maldon branch. There are kits out there for some of these but of quite an advanced nature, so these wagons can come along in their own time when I feel I am ready to tackle them.

Before then I have a couple of larger models in mind: a brake third coach and a GER Y14. Both from Jim Mcgeown. I am gathering up specifications and photos of candidate Y14s to start the loco after the clocks change, and can use the coach before then to get some experience with the micro flame torch.

The Y14 will be a fairly involved build for me, so I expect I will drop out of it from time to time and this will be a good opportunity to work up the cattle wagons. I need to have a think about trackwork too. After I have built my first B6 I expect I will get a reality check on how much model railway layout I can actually have. I have made a start by reworking a Marcway 6ft point into something near to 0-MF, this might find a place mostly buried in ash on the layout.

My model making got a bit intense during the summer time and I want to slow down the tempo a bit. So posts here may get a bit less frequent. But please, everyone, thank you for all of your support and advice and ideas during my first few months on WT.

Second annual report!

It is now two years since I bought ‘Blackwater’ and almost as long since I started to build rolling stock. I have sold my GWR ‘Hydra’ because it was that bit too modern for the scene I want to portray, and this now leaves me with 2 coaches and 23 wagons. These include all of the stock the Heybridge Railway can reasonably possess, plus some visiting foreign and PO wagons. The main gaps are wagons belonging to E H Bentall and businesses nearby, and one or two more from the GER. I have bought and built locos for the three operators on the line (you can see this railway was invented by a modeller!), these being the railway itself, Bentall’s foundry and the GER.

The plan for Year Two was to build a Y14, a brake third coach and a diorama; and finalise the track plan for a full-size layout. I have managed the Y14, a saloon coach and the first set of baseboards; plus two more wagons and three small scenic items. But no diorama.

I am hoping this workbench topic will eventually show how I am evolving as a modeller. I am rarely writing about the same task twice unless I find out a better way to do it. So, for my second brass wagon (the tender truck) I fixed the cast axleguards with epoxy glue, but by the time I did the Gloucester PO wagon I soldered everything together. Assembling the flares on the tender of the Y14 helped me a lot with my soldering technique because soldering is the only way to make a solid job and I just had to apply myself until it came right.

My soldering is definitely getting better but painting is still terribly iffy. When I was working up the lighting inside my Dapol coach and paying a lot of attention to white balance, I swapped the LED bulb in my pendant lamp for a 100W halogen bulb and then my precious 150W pearl bulb. Both incandescent bulbs give better colour rendition. The 150W bulb gives the best colour but is pretty much irreplaceable nowadays, and will probably discolour the ceiling, so I have settled on the halogen bulb. I will have to write off the running costs as a part of my hobby but the light is so much better.

Logically I really should now be applying myself to build the diorama for Heybridge Basin, but I cannot work up much enthusiasm for this – I want to build another loco. The reason (if I need to justify this) is to try to stretch myself a bit. And, I will want someone else to paint the loco so this way I can start the diorama while the loco is away or if I find myself stuck.

 

[simond]

In my experience, there’s little point in forcing myself to do anything, as I’ll not do as good a job as if I’m fired up with enthusiasm.

Of course there are those jobs that have to be done, to allow other things to work, and sometimes there is little option but to get the finger out, but in general, I find “thinking about it” (for months, possibly) generally leads to some motivation to do it, and the result is more satisfactory.

At least, that’s my excuse.

and, it’s a hobby. We’re doing it for fun. Do the bits you enjoy!

 

[Richard Gawler]

My struggle with the diorama concerns its design features, especially in its localisation as "Essex". These details are softer, less definite than those of a loco or wagon. I have plenty of ideas but not enough to make a start. With a bit of luck, inspiration will come along during the next few builds. Knowing me, then when I know what I am trying to build I will start and won't be able to stop.

 

[Yorkshire Dave]

The diorama design inspiration will come once you start studying old photographs of Essex coastal villages and towns - even possibly the Essex marshes. A local building style will become apparent and there will be some buildings which will undeniably shout 'East Essex' and therefore set the locale for you.

 

[simond]

Sound advice, I think.

 

[Richard Gawler]

There are cottages and a pub at Heybridge Basin which date back to the 1880s or so and could make fine models - but for a scale-sized baseboard. I think I should at least look at the smallest buildings belonging to the Chelmer and Blackwater Navigation. There is a small office at Paper Mill Lock which oozes the character of the waterway. Something like this could work if I can shoehorn it into the scene.

 

[Yorkshire Dave]

The building choice will fall into place once you have settled on a track plan. Out of curiosity I idly searched Heybridge Basin 1900s on t'interweb and there's a lot of photographs out there.

Obviously this part of the Essex coast remained a popular destination since Olaf Tryggvason led a Viking invasion in 991 (Battle of Maldon) with 90 longships carrying 4,000 warriors in the Blackwater Estuary.

 

[Richard Gawler]

I have put my present thoughts on my layout topic (7mm - Heybridge Basin) so I can return to the trains here.

 

[Richard Gawler]

I bought the kit for the MW class F in November last year, when I felt the Y14 was going to work out okay. I am hoping this kit is a sensible progression for me. It is my first loco with outside cylinders, first with suspension, first with sprung wire pickups, and first with a two-stage gearbox.

It is also my first brass kit for any coach, wagon or loco not created by Connoisseur Models; and so my first without Jim’s marvellous instructions and a first without the unwritten but frequently re-quoted words, “they go together”. Slater’s have few loco kits on their web site but this one has the year 1985 on its etches, and even the name of the designer too. Their wagon kits are good, so I can be optimistic.


There are four etches for the body from 0.4 mm brass, one for the chassis from 0.5 mm brass and one for the side rods from steel. There are alternate parts for different cabs and spectacle plates and one of the etches is devoted to an enclosed cab. The parts are numbered on the etches, which looks good, but I see numbers 1 to 6 at least are used twice, perhaps not so good.


The detail castings are of a very good standard so if they fit I should be able to build a good-looking model. I am guessing the metals here are pewter as well as white metal and brass. Nice touches include turned steel buffer heads (though I might take these for my GER van) and plenty of spare half-etched holes to practise embossing rivets. The boiler has been machined as a brass cylinder and will need work to open up space for the motor.

I have stumbled upon an essay on these locos in MRJ number 6, and gone on to find their magazine project to build the loco from scratch in 4 mm scale. I could never cope with the intricacy in the smaller scale, but in 7 mm I think I have a chance.


The bench is rarely anywhere near this tidy!

I have made a modest start on the frames but the current September heatwave makes it far too hot to do much more. Hopefully an update next weekend.

Contents

1. Lower Firebox and Ashpan (page 47)​

2. Frames and Attachments for Brakes​

3. Front Suspension​

4. Crossheads and Connecting Rods (page 48)​

5. Gearbox and Motor​

6. Rear Crankpins​

7. Front Crankpins​

8. Cylinders (page 49)​

9. Front Splashers​

10. Design Features for Superstructure​

11. Cab Sides and Coal Bunkers​

12. Cab Back (page 50)​

13. Running Plate​

14. Boiler​

15. Saddle Tank​

16. Cab, Brake Standard and Steps​

17. Springs and Sand Boxes​

18. Smokebox​

19. Underpinnings (page 51)​

20. Clack Valves​

21. Chimney​

22. Firebox (page 53)​

23. Reverser Reach Rod (page 55)​

24. Motor Mount​

25. Brake Gear​

26. Test Running (1): 9V Battery; and Control Decisions​

27. Battery Bracket (page 56)​

28. Injector (page 57)​

29. Choosing the On/Off Switch and a Fuse​

30. Saddle Tank (completion)​

31. Test Running (2): Radio Control (page 58)​

32. Sanding Gear​

33. Test Running (3): Endurance​

34. Cab Roof (omitted)​

35. Dismantling and Snagging​

36. Battery Charging Connector (page 59)​