Its cold in the Man Cave!

Well, it may not be the most exciting of posts but given the cold weather it was not the most hospitable of places in the M an Cave so my stay was limited to cleaning up the 3D tractor kit ready for priming. Not a whole lot to do, but a bit of sanding on the bonnet and rear mudguards together with removing some excess print material in a few places together with mounting the parts onto a board with masking tape means they are ready for some primer once I venture back out again!

Now that should be a nice small, quick to do project whilst I wait for glues to dry!

The scenic sub base was carved to shape today - and it made a mess that hopefully Mrs. Woody wont find out about unless she reads this!

Starting off with the now solid glued jigsaw of polystyrene which Marty the cat seems to have an interest in....

...the bread knife soon carved into it. leaving the carnage of its work on the floor....

...which took some cleaning up as the beads of polystyrene become statically charged and sticks to everything ! Luckily Marty was out of the way so he is clear of any beads!

There are just a couple of small areas which need some additional polystyrene attaching so whilst I await the glue to dry that I used to fasten the additional bits, in true Woody style I have started another project! At the Narrow Gauge show that I took Mrs. W to a few weeks ago O did buy some 3D prints including a couple of wagons and also this small agricultural tractor.

Now that should be a nice small, quick to do project whilst I wait for glues to dry! Hmmmm! Famous last words and all that!

Tooth pick nails?

It was one of those, why didn't I remember that before, moments as I suddenly remembered the importance of tooth picks! Not that I needed a tooth pick for any tooth maintenance, rather that they can be used like nails to hold polystyrene together whilst the glue sets!

This rediscovery of something I have done before has sped up the scenic base build so that all the bits of polystyrene are now glued and 'nailed' together. I just need to wait for the glue to dry which may be hastened if I can sneak the thing into the house without Mrs. Woody spotting it and put it by a radiator.

It may look a a white mess of strange proportions at the moment but eventually it will be a thing of beauty just like Mrs. W! Hopefully that might get me out of trouble if she discovers it in the house! 

In the absence of Mrs. Woody!

With my rabbit hole project of the Lima DMU now finished it is back to layout building. I have moved onto scenic subbase construction for the far corner of the last baseboard I am building. I have already cut out mounting card formers to match the plywood profiles I mounted on the baseboard some time ago. To these I am mounting polystyrene from the WMD Stores which seemingly has stocks of most items I need!

As it is somewhat cold in the Man Cav I have only made a small start and I have, in the absence of Mrs. Woody today, brought the structure inside the house and in the warm to speed up the drying process. I just need to repatriate it to the Man Cave before Mrs. W gets back!

Another possible blockbuster YouTube video from WMD!

The WMD film crew have been at work again and this potential blockbuster, or more likely flop, visually goes through the Lima Class 117 DMU rebuild. 

The end! Well for the Lima Class 117 DMU rebuild project!

At last it is the end of the Lima Class 117 DMU rebuild! It has taken some time and stretched my abilities but I have learnt a lot.

The last job was to weather the roof and that was done with a few washes of my usual dilute brown paint. Just brushed on and allowed to dry as gravity and capillary action did it's job.

With that done it was time to put it back on the track and enjoy the fruits of my labour.

It may not be the greatest model in my collection but it is one that means a lot to me after the work that has gone into it.

I like it!

Now it is time to get back to building the layout for it too run on! Not sure when the end to that project will come though!

More rocks at the Rocks By Rail Museum!

Arriving at the Museum I popped my head into the cafe where I found several volunteers trying to put together the recently purchased flat pack flat pack display case for the various fossils recently donated to the Museum. They were having problems as not only were the instructions in Italian, they were for a completely different display case! Add to that that there were too many fastenings and the whole episode was becoming fraught!

However, at last the case was together and the fossils are now on full display ready for next year opening.

What should also be ready for next year is the additional drainage system being installed to link up to that installed earlier this year. Hopefully that will go a lot more quickly and should make the site around the toilet block somewhat less like a paddy field after a few days of rain.

Having actually got to the signing in room I found John being studious for a change. Apparently we have a manual for loco Mr. D which is very helpful as John needs to order some parts for the braking system. Not sure where he will get them from as the loco is over 50 years old!

For me, it was a day of being reunited with Sammy Strimmer as I continued my task of clearing the boneyard of overgrowth so that we can actually see what has been stored away for years and may actually be of use and save buying in new things! This was the start of the day.

Todays main find was not more rocks or fossils but bricks! Hundreds of them! Now nicely stacked, apart from the broken ones which can be used as hardcore, and that was a back breaking job, at least we know how many and where they are although I suspect there are still more to find  in the rest of the yard! It does look a lot more accessible now!

Richard gave me a hand in clearing out the strimmed vegetation and built this rather fine looking bonfire pile!

 There will no doubt be several more piles to go yet as there is a lot more bone yard to clear!

Those small details!

With the certainty that the Lima DMU is working it is time to bring this project to an end. There are still some jobs to do including some passengers and drivers at each end. I already had the passengers in stock as outlined in an earlier post so these were brought out and several seated figures chosen to spend the rest of their plastic lives riding on the railway! 

A dab of superglue on their backsides saw them secured in place.

The one thing I could not find in my pack of seated people was a pair of suitable drivers. A search through my collection of bits from years ago uncovered these two figures which are the old Airfix mouldings. Whilst not posed in a seated position I will cut their legs off so they fit into the cabs - Ouch!

Another detail that I noted on the real DMU was a metal mesh over the windows in the luggage compartment which Lima had not replicated.

I had some plastic woven mesh that would do the job so a bead of Glue and Glaze was run around the inside of the plastic window.

 Whilst from the inside, the mesh looks a bit strange.....

.....from the outside it looks good.

I also got the chrome pen out and highlighted the grab and door handles which just adds that little bit of extra detail that stands out.

 Just a few more small jobs like these to finish and then this project will be complete!

Its alive!

Just like the scene from the various Frankenstein films, Its alive! And whilst parts of the Lima Class 117 DMU may look a bit Frankensteinish at the moment it is most certainly alive! 

Coupled and connected together the two cars moved off. I had to adjust the picks ups on the trailing car as the motor car was slipping on the track but after that it ran a treat! 

Even using 128 step control on the DCC controller it moves at setting one which is something not all modern models do.

Right! I am one the road to finishing this!

To cut a long story short!

To cut a long story short was, amongst other things, a hit for that new romantics group from the 80s Sopandau Ballet and you can view the video here. However in my case, rather that ramble on about how I put all the things wrong identified in yesterdays post about the ongoing rebuild of the Lima Class 117 DMU I will cut a long story short by posting this photo which shows it all corrected and everything wired up and a new DCC chip fitted.

I can even fit the already painted interior panels.

Now all I have to do is get it on the track to test it! Hopefully that will be a short story with a happy ending!