365!

365 days in 2022 and during this year I have done 365 posts to this blog! 

I never started the year with the intention of posting each day but it has just become a part of a daily routine. I started this blog as a bit of an online diary for myself just so I could look back and see if I had actually done anything in the past and remind Mrs. Woody of the jobs I had done on her 'To do list'! 

I have to admit though that a benefit of writing this blog is that it has actually stimulated me to do more model making as I feel I really do need to record some progress on things. Certainly has got me off the sofa watching inane TV.

I will be having a trawl back through this years posts soon just to remind me of what I have done and compare that with a list of things I wanted to do which I put in a post at the beginning of 2022. That should be interesting!

Back in the present it has been a day of tiding things up. I put the Christmas stuff back into the loft where my stash of kits to build is stored well  out of the watchful eye of Mrs. W! Close to the hatch I grabbed these two which have been living up there for some years now and brought them into the daylight. 

Having the quick build of the SU-100 (which just needs to go into the WMD HQ paint shop) has inspired me to build something else fairly simple and quick. The great thing about Tamiya kits is that they are reasonably detailed but not over engineered and very buildable. Just what I need to hopefully get me off to a flying start in 2023!

Thank you to all those who do visit my blog and I hope my writings have at least provided some entertainment.

Hoping we all have a great 2023 and are all here this time next year, fit and well, to do it all again!

 

 

Making sense of model railway electrics!

Although I can do the basics of electrical work on model railways I am no expert and most of my work would probably be condemned by anyone with at least a modicum of knowledge! Therefore when a book comes along that covers just about everything you need to know about wiring your layout so that it both works properly and is safe you take note! This is that book!

I was very fortunate in that Ian Morton the author passed me on a copy of this latest updated reprint. I have known Ian for some years now from when he used to run his own model railway shop and he is a superbly skilled modeller, author of many model railway related books and has a superb sense of humour! I am sure this book will let me at last make sense of model railway electrics!

If you want a copy it is available at a variety of book retailers and a google search will bring you to your preferred trader for such items.

The small but important things always take the time!

The builders turned up today complete with the continuing aftermath of flu. They moved the bricks and blocks for the conservatory rebuild from round the front of the house to the back and piled them in several strategic pillars. Not sure if these pillars have a greater meaning or act as some form of  intergalactic pathway but this is a small but important step in this project. 

After achieving this they went home with coughs that could be heard above the ill maintained diesel engine of their van!  

Meanwhile the Italeri SU-100 assault gun is all but built. There are a couple of small but important things that still need to be added which are almost the signature of the base vehicle but these are taking time. Firstly there are the tracks on the front panel of the hull. I have never seen a T34 or variant without these in place. The kit parts should be easy enough to build. 7 track links just need to be joined. Easy to say but when the parts just do not fit together not easy to achieve. Being so prominent they do need to look right so there is going to be a great deal of fettling needed which will take time.

The saw that is mounted to the hull side is also one of those items that you see on most of these types of chassis and not having it just does not look right - unless of course you are modelling an Egyptian version of the tank where the need to cut wood in the desert is perhaps not likely to happen. The kit part did break into several parts when I removed it from the sprue so I have had to spend time piecing that back together. However these are the only parts I have had problems with so that is not bad!

As I had a few minutes to spare (just don't tell Mrs. Woody that I had spare time) I put my already built Tamiya Su-85 next to it for comparison and apart from the main gun barrel and the mounting mantlet there is not a lot of difference between the two. What there are relate to hand rail positions and similar. Never the less an interesting set of photos.

Now will the builders return tomorrow..........

That's big!

That's big! The barrel of the Italeri SU-100 assault gun that is! I would not have wanted to be at the wrong end of that back in WW2.

As you can no doubt tell from the photo above there has been some rapid progress on this kit which is most unlike me! I think there are about 30 parts left to fit. Mainly hatch covers, grab handles and similar as well as the tracks which are the rubber band type.

What I did find surprising is the amount of flash on some parts such as these auxiliary fuel tanks.

However despite the flash the way the kit designers have moulded these parts is brilliant. The two main parts fit together and then the ends are like a cap including the strap which means the whole issue of getting rid of the seam line is so simple. Nice!

The gun barrel is also a surprise in this kit. I would normally have expected two halves to be glued together with an end cap. Although the kit had an end cap the barrel itself is a one piece moulding. It had a very slight mould line that was quickly smoothed off . I also drilled out the end of the barrel as far as I thought safe just to make it look as though it was a tube. The photo is not great but it just about shows what I did. The end cap went at the end of this so it does look better in real life - honest!

I did mention that the kit came with a metal barrel but this unfortunately is for a SU-85 which was the next generation of this vehicle. The metal barrel is significantly shorter and smaller than the plastic one so I have put the metal one aside for another time!

 Strangely enough I did build the Tamiya SU-85 kit some ten years or so ago and There are some photos at the end of this post. In the meantime the SU-100 kit is looking like this.

Now for that Tamiya SU85. You can see that basically the gun is the only difference but it is a big difference. I have also found out that there are two more SU type vehicles - the ISU-122 and the SU-122 which may be two kits I need to build to complete the collection! However that is something for the future and if Mrs. Woody asks I blame it on Mr. Beecham for giving me this kit for Christmas!

A productive day!

A productive day model making wise. The Airfix Dodge 1 1/2 Ton Personnel Carrier has gone as far as it can without paint. The last of the body parts have been added and the figures included have been assembled apart from adding the helmets - makes painting the faces easier after which the helmets will be added.

Next up the Bachmann EWS Class 08 shunter has had a DCC chip added. 

This was not the easiest of jobs as it took a while to get the body off to access the insides. All I can say is that the screws were well hidden not just under the couplings but one under the coupling mount at the front and lets not talk about the hidden plastic clip! Anyway I got in without anything breaking or contributions to the swear jar.

What I was after was the blanking plug which is that small green part at the side of the copper coil on the main circuit board. The blanking plug allows the loco to operate on DC rather than DCC.

Pull that blanking plug off and plug in the DCC chip interface and that is it - plug and play! 

Well almost . You still need to get in the loco and put it back together! I also took the opportunity to add the separately supplied cab steps. Not sure why they are separate but it was simple enough even for me!

After all that a quick test on the layout.

I must have been inspired with progress as I have even started the Italeri SU-100 assault gun that Mr Beecham gave me. It is actually a Zvezda kit, the second they ever produced some time ago, boxed as an Italeri kit. Having already built a more recent release of theirs I can say they were certainly basic in their early kits which is actually nice! A few hours have seen the hull and wheels put together which is quick progress especially for me.

The wheels had a prominant mould line around them which required removal. Actually thinking about it I glued the two wheels together before sanding the mould lines smooth. Doing tow at once fits in with my working smarter not harder as I get older!

No idea if tomorrow will be as productive oir whether Mrs. Woody has othe plans for my time!

Boxing Day unboxing!

Here in the UK it is Boxing Day. I know from friends in the USA this is a strangely named day but as I understand it goes back in history to the days when the gentry gave a boxed gift to their workers the day after Christmas and hence it is known as Boxing Day.

For the purpose of this post though Boxing Day is unboxing day when I have time to look in more detail at my presents. I knew what I was getting from Mrs. Woody as I bought them at the Spalding Model Railway Show back in November but I had not seen them since then. Two locos, both second hand, or as it now appears in many places the much more forgiving and encouraging phase of 'pre-loved', but you would not know from their condition. 

First up is this Class 08 shunter in EWS livery.

I am slowly building up a collection of EWS locos and rolling stock and this adds nicely to that. It runs well but from what I understand it never saw any use on a layout so probably could do with a running in session. Of course this pristine finish to the body is something seldom seen on the real locomotives as they led hard lives with little cosmetic attention so it will need weathering at some point.

This Standard Class 5MT locomotive is however already heavily weathered.

A fantastically characterful locomotive which displays the unloved condition that this and other similar rollingstock was allowed to get into as British Rail forged ahead with its modernisation program of diesel and electric propulsion. Again another great runner but probably little used previously so could do with a good run in and lubrication.

I also got a gift from Mr. Beecham and it was this great kit from Italeri of a SU100 Assault Gun. He must know I have a soft spot for Russian WW2 vehicles!

Complete with turned metal gun barrel!

Nice one Mr. B and very much appreciated!

So those are my presents unboxed! As for Mrs. Woody, no Christmas would be right for her without a new handbag which she did get along with the matching purse! I just think I will get more enjoyment from my locos and kit then she will from her hand bag but I am biased!

                                             Merry Christmas!

Hope that you all have a great time!

Be happy, keep occupied and build models!

👍

A big kid at heart!

Well just one more sleep as many kids are being told today. Being a big kid myself, according to Mrs. Woody, today saw the culmination of 24 days of opening the doors on my Advent calendar and the enjoyable task of consuming the small chocolate treats revealed in each compartment with the opening of the last compartment with the very large chocolate teddy! Tasty!

Being a big kid I am also easily amused, impressed and entertained and this Bachmann Class 90 in Freightliner livery fits the bill nicely with this motorised pantograph. I could watch this for a long time! Meanwhile Mrs. W just rolls her eyes at my antics and goes back to watching Tom Cruise or George Clooney!

Anyway this is a great model and even though I have no catenary on my layout it still has a place and this evening I ventured out to my Man Cave for the first time in about a fortnight and gave it a run!  

Well now it is nearly time for that last sleeps and see if Santa brings me anything!

Why hump it? We can pump it!

 

It was concrete day at WMD HQ as the footings for the conservatory rebuild went in. And I like the philosophy of these guys! Indeed 'Why hump it? We can pump it!'. The 6 cubic metres of concrete needed for the footings would mean that 75 trips with an average builders wheelbarrow would be required to take the concrete from the front of the house to the rear. That's an awful lot of work even if I am not doing it. As the builders were still getting over flu no doubt even they would have struggled to wheel that lot and at one trip every 5 minutes, with two of them barrowing it would take just over three hours of continuous work. As it poured with rain they would have probably shrunk with all that water too.

The pumper and concrete mixer arrived at 8.30am. 

By 9am they had laid the pipes and the water in the footings was pumped out as the builders and pumper and mixer operatives enjoyed my hot drinks and bacon cobs. Well I think they did unless they threw them in the trench before the concrete went in! 

The machinery is amazing. The mixer mixes on site and carries enough materials in separate compartments to mix 10 cubic metres of concrete and the pumper can pump as quickly as it is mixed.

At the other end of the pipe the concrete flowed and it found its own level without much pushing or shoveling which pleased certain builders!

By just before 10am the pumper, mixer and builders were gone but the concrete stayed! Certainly pumping it rather than humping it paid dividends! 

It should set in a couple of days although I suspect I will still have a moat although shallow one until the brick work starts. 

Unfortunately there is no model making equivalent of a concrete pumper which would speed up my glacial speed of producing things

Things are moving on at Woody Builders Merchants.

The builders are back tomorrow! Not fully recovered from flu but good enough to get the footings concreted which is good by me. Turns that point of destruction to construction. And they have plenty of material to construct with as all this lot arrived today making WMD HQ look more like a builders merchants! Never mind! As I was once told, you can't make an omelet without breaking eggs! So WMD HQ will look chaotic for some time yet although there will be no omelets to eat unless of course Mrs. Woody decides otherwise! 

 Back in the sanity of my old man cave some more work was undertaken on the Airfix Dodge 1 1/2 Ton Personnel Carrier. This is never going to be a great model. It has major faults, many of the parts are warped leading to a leaning body and as I found out yesterday the previously installed (done by the first modeller butcher) are the wrong way round which explains a lot! However, look from about six feet away and it does not look too bad and is the best I can do without this becoming a major project. Well that is what I tell myself. The underside is finished and given the axle issue will never see the light of day again so I will glue it to a base! Topside there are a few more parts to fit but the cab and cargo bed are now glued to the chassis as well as the gun and its mount being completed.

This would be an excellent vehicle for raiding a builders merchants with all that carrying capacity!