Yorky D's Küchentisch: Nowt for ages...

[Yorkshire Dave]

I've had a second attempt at hand lettering a wagon for a coal merchant on the Met. Close up it looks pretty grim but from 50cm to 1m it looks ok.



This time it is on a Slaters 7 plank end door wagon which was easier to work on as the sides were painted and lettered before assembly. The italic Load 10 Tons and MET. RLY. being from decals and lettering I have kicking around.

I need to find some italic Tare lettering and numbers for the tare weight on the lower plank under the running number but I begrudge paying a tenner for a sheet of decals for two words, six numbers and four dashes/full stops.

The keen-eyed will note this is a Charles Roberts 7 plank end door wagon whereas it should be a Gloucester 7 plank end door wagon. I could not find a kit of the latter with a 16' body which means the underframe will receive some attention in due course to bring it closer to the Gloucester type.

 

[Yorkshire Dave]

While visiting the Vintage Carriage Trust's bookshop at Ingrow among some books I purchased I also acquired a late 1950s early 1960s Tri-ang Southern suburban EMU for a song. Catalogue picture below.

The unit itself follows no prototype but is an adaptation of Tri-ang's late 1950's interpretation of Mk1 coaches. The bodysides have a continuous curve and droplights. The EMU cab is a cross between the original LSWR torpedo and SR 1925 EMU stock, however it does look the part.


It comprised of a powered driving brake third, two intermediate coaches and a dummy driving brake third. Three of the vehicles were of late 1950s and one intermediate coach of 1960s vintage. I didn't use the coach below as the pervious owner(s) had damaged this side attempting to take the roof off.



Also two boxes were supplied.



The box for the powered driving brake third also contained it's original small bottle of Shell oil



I modernised the unit for a bit of fun whilst retaining the body shells, roofs and underframes. It utilises the latest Hornby SR EMU 8'9'' drive and SR 8' steam bogies, Southeastern Finecast flush glazing and Symoba close coupling units between the set. It received a repaint into SR olive and decals added and as mentioned earlier it is not a model of any 3-SUB prototype.




Alas, I do not have enough of these nor a loaf of bread to recreate the famous advertisement but managed the below by merging multiple exposures.

 

[simond]

It might well be famous but its fame didn’t extend to my childhood…

 

[Yorkshire Dave]

 

[Yorkshire Dave]

I picked this pair of EFE Bristol RE LL single decker buses for a tenner each with the aim of converting one of them into a dual door variant as used by Luton Corporation Transport prior to 1970 when they were taken over by United Counties. EFE do not produce a dual door version.

I vaguely recall these in the late 1960s when we used to come over from Germany to visit my grandparents in Dunstable.



The models were taken apart, the bodies stripped down and the door removed from the later curved windscreen variant and inserted into earlier flat windscreen variant.


Then the centre pillar of each four-leaf bi-fold door was removed to create two pairs of bi-leaf doors as fitted to the Luton Corporation Transport variants.


I also started work on a Britbus Park Royal bodied AN68 Leyland Atlantean as used by London Country. Ala it suffered from Zinc Rot/Zinc Pest/Mazak Rot. You would have thought with today's technology, manufacturing processes and quality control this would be a thing of the past but unfortunately alloy batches still get contaminated in the die cast world. There are known models produced recently that are affected by Zinc Rot - including model railway locomotive chassis.


When it comes to buses, modelling a London Transport/London Country fleet is a lot easier than a provincial fleet due to LT's standardisation - the main area of research here is the correct garage code and the bus type for the route chosen for the time period portrayed.

Provincial fleets tended to buy their buses in smaller batches with each batch having a subtle variation. Like any modelling, photos are paramount for the year portrayed. A good example is the Bristol VR double decker with their windscreens, radiators and position of the rear engine air intakes. You can easily have a Series II version modified with a Series III curved windscreen but retaining the series II engine air intakes.

All good fun.

 

[Yorkshire Dave]

....and they all come at once .

Several 4mm vehicles have rolled off the workbench. All are diecast and have been broken down, stripped, repainted and details added.

Firstly a DMS. The photo below is one of mine taken at the bus station outside St Albans (SA) garage in the late 1970s. DMS 1912 was allocated to PB (Potters Bar Garage). The beauty of modelling London Transport and London Country fleets is that there are decals available.


Not quote the right adverts though.




A United Counties (UCOC) Bristol VRT. I created the number plates on the Mac. The fleet name and destination panels are from decals.




Luton Corporation Transport (LCT) dual door Bristol RE LL. Route 6 was Luton Bus Station to Dunstable Downside Estate via Houghton Regis. LCT sold their undertaking to UCOC in 1970. The destination, number plates and side Pay As You Enter were created on my Mac while the crest was from a decal.







And the LCBS MB has received its number plate. The 'modernised' RF on the right finally received her indicators. These two were allocated to Tring Garage (TG).


Several RFs were modernised by LT in 1966/7 for Green Line use with the main differences being the curved drivers' windscreen, twin headlights, revised side indicators and waist line beading for the lighter green stripe. NLE 572 was allocated to SA (St Albans) and LYF 392 to TG (Tring).




The irksome thing with the EFE buses are the missing side panel lines which I add by using car head/tail light repair tape.