Making it green!

As we batten down the hatches here in the UK for Storm Franklin, which will be the third storm in five days, I decided it was time to brighten my life having got soaked on this mornings bike ride, by making things a bit green. Although I try my best to be environmentally friendly, this making it green refers to grassing some of my 009narrow gauge layout. I thought that this would be a visual boost in the work on that layout and as Mrs. Woody had decided (I know my place) we were having a quiet day in then the opportunity was too good to miss. 

Whereas back in the 70's and 80's model grass was mainly created using dyed saw dust or for the more adventurous dyed lint which had an art all of itself to look realistic todays modeller has a vast array of more realistic products. Static grass has been around for a few years now and it has revolutionised modelling green areas. The grass is made up of nylon fibers which come in an assortment of lengths and colours. It is all to easy to fall into the trap of modelling grass as though it were some Alpine grass meadow in the full flight of summer growth with lots of sun and rain producing a vivid bright green. Here in the UK most grass in the countryside is a mix of grasses of a much more subdued pallet of greens. My chosen shades of green were four varieties, Winter Green, Autumn Green, Patchy Grass and Dead Grass! All by Peco and a mix of 2mm and 4mm in length so about a scale 6 to 12 inches long. This was not going to be a manicured lawn!

 

The rea to be grassed is by the river and I also wanted some trees there as well. Luckily WMD Stores had three Woodland Scenics trees of a suitable size in stock. These were brought out, tested for position and then the bases glued to the base board.

Now it was time to apply the static grass using a Peco applicator. This has a 9volt battery which is used to produce a charge to the sieve at the bottom of the hopper where the static grass is stored and shaken out of. The electrical circuit is completed by an earth wire which is placed into the glue which is applied to the surface to be grassed. As it leaves the hopper the static grass fibers become electrically charged and in effect land in the glue standing up therefore looking like individual blades of grass. Just don't touch the sieve of the applicator whilst the power is on as it gives a big jolt to you just like one of those electrical fly swats - don't ask how I know!

When I first bought the applicator I was persuaded to part with £9 for a bottle of 'special' Peco glue which was supposed to be conductive of electricity. Somewhat unconvinced about this supposed characteristic I used it and it worked well. I was also soon to be taught just how conductive it was. Having got some glue on my fingers I though no more about it until I used my tablet just after finishing the grassing. The touch screen of the tablet went crazy and it was the glue and its electrical conductivity that was doing it. Lesson learnt - wash hands straight after work!

Moving back to the layout the grass application is reasonably quick and soon shows results which is nice.

Once the glue dries, which is not very long, a small handheld vacuum cleaner is used to suck up the fibers which went wide of the glue. These are then used again where there is a need for reapplication.

After an hour or so of doing by the river and behind the two huts on rthe canal wharf it looks like this.

There is still further work to do adding some more foliage but it does look a lot better than bare baseboard.

I even found time to add the headlight units to the front cab panel of the Scania 141LB. I used varnish to 'glue' these in which made the job nice and easy - working smarter not harder as I get older!

Hopefully Storm Franklin will leave as quickly as it came and we can get into some warmer weather when the grass gets green and grows!

Back to some model trains!

It seems a long time sine I did some railway modelling. In fact look back it was at the start of the year when I poured the resin model water for the river on my 009 narrow gauge layout. Well that took some time to set and rather disappointingly looks more like a swamp than a river. It needs more resin poured but having learnt my lesson about the resin not setting in cold weather I will be awaiting the joys of a warm summer day. Now there's hoping after the past few days of storms!

The bridges over the river need to be completed and so today whilst watching the rain through the window I recommenced on the shared road/rail bridge with a wooden deck. For some reason the deck no longer fitted and even using some force would not get it to line up with the bridge supports. I cut my losses and started again. Sometimes it is the best thing to do and in this case probably saved me time. With a bit of trial and error I managed to get a new bridge deck built with strips of balsa to represent planks that fits the supports and incorporates the rail track as well. It just needs to be finally glued up having seen a few trail trains cross it and then some weathering. Funny though how running trains to trail something can take an hour of time!

Although the Scania production line has take the weekend off I did manage to finish painting the door interiors. All done with a brush which for the black rubber parts involved some careful free hand work to get the straight lines I have to admit though that there were one or two less than perfect parts and one of those tricks you learn to deal with this on transparent parts is to let the paint dry and then use a pointed cocktail stick to abrade the paint away. It does work! I also painted up some of the other light lenses with Tamiya transparent orange ready for fitting to the cab shell.

Storm Eunice!

Here in the UK we are being battered by the second storm in three days. Parts of the UK have suffered not only 100 mph plus winds but snow as well. Luckily for me the storm has not been as bad as for others - so far! I did manage a 19 mile bike ride this morning whilst the wind was relatively calmish!

Doing some inside jobs I did take an hour out to d a bit more on the model Scanias. The cab of the 143H is now partly assembled and ready for paint on a calmer day.

In my usual bout of curiosity I did tape the front panels and roof to the cab sides to see what it would look like and further curiosity saw me pose it with the 141LB.

I also built the headlight units for the Scania 141 where the lens were 'glued' into their headlamp units using Tamiya varnish. The varnish acts like a glue and dries clear so is perfect for jobs like this. The light lenses for the spot lights in the bumper were also 'glued' in with the varnish. 

Hopefully by the time that Storm Eunice subsides they will all have dried. In the meantime I am just hoping that the storm does not create any additional jobs on Mrs. Woody's list of jobs for me to do!

Scania Production Line 2!

An hour or so of further progress on the Scania models.

The 143H chassis is coming together and although the mudguards need to be glued I can not resist putting parts together temporarily to see what things look like.

The cab interior is also coming along in its two tone grey which I decided to brighten up a bit with the seats getting some red panels. Interior design is not my particular forte, just ask Mrs. W, but I think that this does work! The instrument decal has been applied to the dashboard and once set the steering wheel and column can be attached and then the dashboard can be fastened to the rest of the cab interior.

Certainly a lot less parts than yesterday!

Painting the door interiors on the Scania 141H has progressed with the yellow parts having had an undercoat of matt yellow waiting for a top coat of gloss yellow.

Have to see if the production line continues with this rate of progress - There is even a danger that I could finish both models in a couple of weeks!

Scania production line.

That is what my model making feels like at the moment! Having done an 18 mile bike ride where half of it felt as though I was cycling into a brick wall and the other half as though I was Mary Poppins (now there's a thought!) being blown home by Storm Dudley and having done some Mrs. W jobs it was time for an hour more on the Scanias. 

The door interiors on the 141LB by Heller are something that I have never seen in a model before. The whole door interior including the window is moulded as part of the transparent parts. Most strange. However I have started to paint these with the door cards being painted to match the rest of the interior. I have also painted the rear light lenses with Tamiya clear red and orange paints for the rear/brake lights and the indictors ready for fitting to the chassis.

More parts of the Scania 143H have been painted, mainly parts for the interior where the browns and yellows of the 1980's are replaced by the greys of the 1990's. How fashion changes!

Lots of parts just needing a production line to assemble them!

A wet but poignant day.

A special day at Rocks by Rail Museum even though we were fighting the weather and the resultant drainage problems.

Today is the 80th anniversary of Singapore falling to the Japanese during World War 2. As a result 80,000 Allied service personnel were captured and taken as Prisoners of War. My Uncle was one of those. The stories of the brutality and hardship that those service personnel went through are countless. One in four did not survive the three and a half years they were held to tell those stories. 

Rocks by Rail is the home of steam engine Singapore which is a registered war memorial. It was captured by thr Japanese and put to work in the docks at Singapore and even to this day still has bullet holes in it from when the Japanese first landed. There are further details of the locomotive on the Rocks by Rail website located here.

I attended a short remembrance today at the Museum where the locomotive took its place as a war memorial to all those involved in the Singapore campaign. I was priviledged that my Uncle's son, my cousin and his wife were able to attend and we could remember together what my Uncle and all those with him went through. WE laid orchids on the locomotive which apparently is the alternative poppy as those do not grow in the Singapore area but orchids do.

My Uncle was lucky and came home but the experience of those three and a half years no doubt affected his and his comrades lives for ever. I have the greatest respect and gratitude for them all. Let us hope we never again experience such wars which given current issues in Ukraine is something that is even more pertinent today.

Simply Red in a box!

Not a box collection of the greatest hits from Simply Red but the undercoated parts of the Scania 143H kit now top coated and drying in a box along with the painted wheels. Doesn't look much but it was a couple of hours work, a full jar of Tamiya gloss red and a few swear jar moments with one of the mudguards deciding to fall on the floor! I managed to use a cocktail stick to remove a couple of  bits of dirt that had been picked up by the wet paint. At this point my bodging skills came in to play. As the paint was still wet I sprayed a further coat of paint on. The fresh coat of paint was viscous enough to in effect fill the holes left by the dirt removal and level out so it looks reasonable. Once I can have a closer look after the paint has fully dried and the parts are safe to handle I will be able to tell if 'reasonable' is good enough! For the moment though I give you simply red in a box.

 

Simply Red!

Even the best laid plans sometimes go differently to expected and that is what happened today. I will go into the reasons another time but I did manage to get some undercoat on the mudguards, front valance and side skirts of the Scania 143 or as I have termed it, simply red!

Sound advice!

A somewhat windy day when I felt as though I was riding into a brick wall on this mornings bike ride. However the journey home was a breeze with the wind behind me. Something that has stuck with me since I started serious bike racing in my teens was a piece of simple but very sound advice from another experienced rider which was that if you can cycle into the wind on your journey out do that so the wind blows you home. Nothing worse then turning back and having to fight the wind on your way home. Strange how advice like that sticks with you for your life and something I pass onto others.

Other sound advice I have found during my years of model making is that there are times when you need to take your time and think about what and how you are going to do something before you actually do it.  It may sound logical but sometimes, just like chess you need to be thinking several moves ahead. Not something I did in my earlier years when I built a model and then wondered how on earth I was going to paint it so that it didn't look like something involved in a paint factory explosion. Take the rear wheels on the Scania 143H. I have not fully assembled them so that it is easier to paint the hubs which are a different colour to the rest of the wheel. I also did this sometime ago well ahead of painting the other wheels so that they were all ready to be painted in one go. 

Today I actually started the painting process not only for the wheels but also the mudguards, front valance and side skirts. The rear of the valance and skirts in real life are undersealed to resist stone chips and rust. Therefore they would not look right being painted in red which will be the colour on the front and upper faces of the various items. So using that sound advice of thinking ahead I painted the appropriate surfaces with black paint. I don't want the surfaces which are to be red undercoated in black as this will make the red too dark as the undercoat affects the final look of the final top coat of paint. Having matt varnished the black surfaces the parts were left to dry.

As I also need the wheels to be painted ready for fitting before I fit the mudguards these were painted black too. The wheels will eventually be aluminum in colour and black is the perfect undercoat for that paint. The four wheels with the red hubs had to be masked before painting. I actually made one mask by rolling some paper to the diameter of the hub, taping it and then using it as I painted each wheel separately. I can then use the mask again when I airbrush the aluminum paint.

As you can see painting can be a dirty process but on occasions can get you out of assisting Mrs. W with folding the washing! As it is acrylic paint it scrubs straight off under the tap once the washing folding activity has been completed!

Hoping that tomorrow will allow the various parts to be painted in their final top coats so the areas painted black need to be masked off. This is also where thinking ahead plays dividends. It will be much easier to touch in the black areas, which are mainly hidden from sight, with a brush should any red paint seep under the masking. Touching up the highly visible red paint with a brush would be a much more difficult thing to do - for me anyway! An hour of masking will hopefully ensure a neat job. All will be reveled soon! 

Further tales of plastic butchery!

Moving back to the Scania 143H I need to catch this build up with the other Scania so I spent an hour or so dealing with the mudguards, front valance and side skirts. The mudguards were fairly straight forward as was the front valance. Clean parts up and glue together. 

The side skirts though were a different matter.  They require shortening to fit the shortened chassis so it was out with the razor saw and taking a deep breath the cutting or my case butchery commenced. 

It went reasonably well - surprisingly! The picture above shows one side skirt shortened and the amount that had to be taken out. Next stage is to get all these parts painted up so hopefully this weekend might see that commence unless Mrs. W has other plans!