A new arrival!

As I arrived for a day of volunteering at the Rocks By Rail Museum this new arrival was parked in the platform siding.

This is an Avonside manufactured loco originally named Barrington and built in 1921 making it 103 years old and to be fair not looking bad despite those years!

Barrington is an 0-4-0 loco with a very tight wheelbase making it an ideal loco for quarry type operation.

It all looks in reasonable condition under the boiler.

From the limited ability to take a picture through a rear spectacle window the cab interior also looks in good fettle.

Barrington was originally built in 1921 by the Avonside Engine Company as an export order for the Bombay Harbour Improvement Trust where she worked for about 9 years before being repatriated to the UK. Back on home turf the loco served in several quarry type locations ending its working life in the early 1970's at the Barrington Rugby Portland Cement works in Cambridgeshire. From there the loco spent time at several other railways including the Great Central and Nene Valley before going to the Colne Valley Railway from where she was purchased by one of the Rocks By Rail Museum members.

Barrington has a strong link to the Museum as Mr. D the diesel undergoing restoration at the moment, replaced Barrington at the cement works.

I have to admit that I have taken to this loco at first sight. It has lovely proportions and a hint of quirkiness which makes it just right for the Museum! Once painted up and various parts fettled it should look great.

Still dealing with steam engines, work continues with the retubing of 1391. However, as with all such jobs, there are complexities like removing all the pipework that is in front of the tubes which is a matter John and Richard are discussing in detail.

Looks as though Richard drew the short straw with having to get into the dirt of the smokebox!

Alex, having a variety of 'persuading' tools to hand to supplement his small dust removing brush continues the seemingly never ending cement and rust removal along with painting of Ketton No1. It will be well worth it once finished.

Pete and Pam continue with the painting of the Sundew cab and Martin has progressed with the dragline repaint project.

For me it was inevitably more grass cutting but with a pit stop to deal with a jammed drive wheel.

Once back on the grass it was time to make a difference in some parts of the site that had not seen any grass cutting in a while like this!

It may not look much in the picture but it does look very different on site. No doubt it will have grown by next week too!

Various arts!

It was the art of soldering for me and doing one of those long outstanding jobs that exist on my (not Mrs. Woody's list!) list of things to do. It was to solder up a phono plug to connect the power from my DCC controller to my 009 narrow gauge layout Chalkdon. Prior to this momentous moment I had used a pair of crocodile clips which was not really the best way to do things!

With this job done I can easily move the DCC controller from this layout to my USA switching layout for which I soldered up a similar plug some time ago. Amazing how time flies by!

Just out of interest, the Kato track that I posted about yesterday has a discrete means of plugging a power supply in with this socket under the track into which the ready wired power wires just plug into. That is an artful solution! 

More art on the canal which I have posted about recently in the form of the art of finding more wrong than you originally thought! Out on a bike ride I stopped off to see how things were going. More Hi Viz present and an overheard remark of 'well its rotten' which I presume is part of the lock gates which can now be inspected with the water level so low. No doubt more art will follow with the art of repairing!

Finally we have the art of realising it is just going to happen and perhaps sat navs are not that good! Whilst travelling through the Lincolnshire town of Grantham which has the East Coast Main Line railway bisecting it with several low bridges I got caught up in traffic which was at a standstill not because of the road works but due to that truck the other side of the bridge. The driver was trying to make a 180 degree turn onto a side road that goes under the arch on the far left of the picture below.

He gained a bit of an audience over the five or so minutes that he tried to turn the truck but eventually he gave up and drove off probably with a health deposit in his dashboard sware jar!

Right I am off to practice the art of making Mrs. W's dinner!

Train set on the floor!

Kato are a Japanese firm that produce a great deal of n gauge equipment that caters in the main for the home market where space is at a premium for Japanese modellers. However they have developed quite a catalogue of USA outline stock in both n and H0 scales and have done some UK both in n and 009 all at competitive prices.

This is the Kato CV1 track pack which is an oval of track which you may not think is that unusual. However, this pack is unusual!

Whereas the minimum radius n gauge track supplied by UK and most European manufacturers is 9 inches, this Kato track pack has 6 inch radius curves meaning this oval of track is just about 1 foot by 2 feet. That is small! I have a plan for it but like most of my projects will probably emerge around about the earth's next glacial age. But, in the meantime I needed to have a play so it was just like being a young lad at Christmas (only 77 days to go at the time of writing this!) with the train set on the floor!

I knew that the Kato chassis that I use for the 3D printed locos I have built would go round the curves but would anything else? Most manufacturers state that 9 inches is the minimum radius that their rolling stock will go round. Well that is not completely correct! Getting some of my USA outline stock out, most of the diesel locos would go round but given their bogie wheel configuration that was perhaps to be expected. Most of the rolling stock seemed happy enough too.

With the diesels having gone OK round the curves would a more rigid wheelbase steam loco do the same? This 2-8-0 loco had no problems.

The 4-6-2 had no problems but the lengthy coaches did! They derailed due to the couplers not having enough movement.
 

Whilst all this may seem a bit frivolous and Mrs. Woody could find better things for me to do with my time, it does prove that you can have a small layout that just about any home could accommodate. In fact Mike Potter from Budget Model Railways on YouTube proves the point with a layout he has recently built and this is the video.

It was great to see life in my USA outline stock and this has experiment has again awoken my love of the scale which means more projects whirring in my mind! Oh dear!

Workbench tidy!

After several weeks of creating a mess in the Man Cave building the Tiger 1 it was time to tidy the workbench, after all I had spent the morning tidying the house much to Mrs. Woody's amazement!

Nice Tiger tank on the cutting board!

I even went as far as giving the floor a wash bringing me to my knees!

By the colour of the water that floor really did need a clean!

So with the workbench tidy and the floor washed I had a few minutes to have a quick look at this.

More of this another time though as its time to make Mrs. W's dinner!

The art of knowing when enough is enough!

I was reminded of the art of knowing when enough is enough when Mrs. Woody and me went to Easton walled gardens. Although normally a regular place to visit, I have to admit that due to things like the kitchen rebuild, it had been several months since we were last there. In effect we had missed most of the summer views of the gardens and at the entrance that absence was highlighted by this autumnal display which showed just how long it had been since we last visited! I did think it rather nice and touching that they had put together this welcome for us after our absence but Mrs. W did highlight that it didn't state 'Woody' on it so it was not personalised to us but was a general welcome to everyone! Most disappointing!

The actual display caught my eye. The colours were just right, the composition was excellent and whoever put it together knew the art of knowing when enough is enough!

Knowing that is a great asset not only in putting seasonal displays together but when model making. Whilst I am no expert at this art but I do know that my Tiger 1 build is at  a point when it is fairly near to the point of having enough done to it certainly in my eyes.

The latest work has been to add the hull and turret hatches and then use various weathering powders to dull everything down brightness wise as well as giving the tank a working look to it. I do believe I am at the point of  having done enough to it weathering wise. I am happy with the look and adding more to it could tip it over the point of looking realistic to becoming a messed up model. 

With the hatches open on the turret there is that tantalising view of the main gun and its breech - just what I was hoping for.

Whilst I am not going to say 'finished' yet, it is close! I will look over it for a couple of days and if still happy think about mounting it on a base/diorama. Whatever happens, one thing is clear from the photos and that is I need to clear my workbench of all those things involved in this build - enough is enough!

 

The case of the missing water!

Another bike ride taking in the local canal where the case of the missing water has perplexed me and loyal blog reader Mrs. B! It was still much the same as my previous picture but in this picture there is a clue in the bottom right hand corner about what is going on. 

Given the opportunity to ask someone who looked as though they knew what was going on I discovered that a lock further up the canal has been leaking into the adjacent field. To carry out repairs the local canal group needed to reduce the water levels in the lock so used 'Stopping Boards'. This in effect reduced the level down stream of that lock hence the reduced levels. However, just like one of my projects, reducing the level upstream revealed issues around the bridge that I take my photos from. Using the opportunity of reduced levels the group are now in the throws of carrying out repairs.

Looks just like a Rocks By Rail Museum project!

With that mystery now explained and work ongoing it should not be too long before water levels return to their natural state.

Back ay WMD HQ, the watery mess on the Tiger 1 tank has now dried (another case of missing water?) and, in my view anyway, is looking good!

The 'mud' has atken on a variety of hues from the paint and weathering powders.

That 'filter'coat of dilute brown paint has toned things down. 

I just need to add those hatches, a radio aerial and some more weathering and rust and it should be good to go!

Getting dirty!

No smut here, just the Tiger 1 tank getting some more dirt added! In this case the dirt was the acrylic mud applied to the edges of the tank where mud would be thrown up by the tracks.

Whilst the 'mud' was still wet I tinted it with some paint and weathering powders.

It looks horrible at the moment but it will dry to a better finish - I hope!

I then gave the whole tank a wash of dilute brown paint to act as a filter to dull down the bright paint.

Will all this work? I will find out tomorrow when its dried and got dirty!