Scalefour Forum

It's not an essential tool by any means, but is a very useful "equaliser" tool, much like a resistance soldering unit. It does nothing that an experienced and skilled modeller can't knock out easily with a vice and a couple of straight edges, but for the less adept it means we can produce ...

I bought one from small shop some years ago and it both saves a lot of time and gives excellent results with etched kits. But I'm not sure I would be prepared to spend the money that is being asked for them now.

Tony

Tony

Sometimes whole minutes fly by without my dropping something tiny and important, but a partial solution is the old jewellers/goldsmiths trick of wearing an apron with the bottom fixed to the underside of the workbench. I learned this from Prem Holdaway and it has saved me hours of fruitless searchin...

Or even the generic Enamel Thinners that comes in an aluminium tin with a conical top - looks like something from the Wizard of Oz but is a lot cheaper than Humbrol. If you're lucky enough to live near a modelling or craft shop.

Tony

Springing: The limit of my abilities was to get the wheels going round reasonable freely. Ted just took them off to his workbench and in what seemed like seconds everything was perfect. I think chassis just see him coming and mutter to themselves that its time to sit up and face front.

Tony

I built a couple of them not long after they came on the market. They went together reasonably well, but I found two areas of difficulty. The first and more painful was that I found there was a huge gap at top corners of the plough blades were supposed to meet the front of the cab. I tried all sorts...

The customer service is as good as their products. I sent an email on yesterday (Sunday) asking if they sell the HOP24s singly (they don't). I'd hoped for a reply maybe by the time I got back home tonight, but back it came pretty well immediately. Not like a model railway supplier at all, really. Tony

That's pretty well what I heard. My as-yet unused Dullcote was bought on eBay UK and claims to be the US formula, I've not tried the new stuff yet, but will take my own advice about experimenting first with disposable wagons. And speaking for health hazards. For its unmatchable finish, I still pine ...

I don't know what is behind Bill's query but if I may add a word of caution - I recently tried to use Dullcoat to seal some Fox waterslide transfers (which had been allowed 24 hours to dry as recommended btw). Unfortunately a second or two after spraying them the lovingly applied bespoke transfers ...

A wonderful evocation of an interesting and largely ignored class of ocomotives. Hard to se how it could be improved - congratulations.

Tony

Dear Martin Your demo at Scaleforum last week, and your explanation, was very impressive and has got me thinking. Is there any chance you might use your phone to take video of them in action on Burford? Apart from being of itself a lovely thing to watch, it would make their practicability and the ae...

For matt varnish I have been using Marabu Mattlack aerosol for many years with good results and no problem. Its advantage is that Marabu cans are very often stocked by art shops and those catering to graffiti artists, and is cheaper than Dullcote, which is aslo very good and, in my experience, risk ...

My favourite layouts, however, were the smaller ones, specifically 'The Mill' and (kind of like its larger cousin) 'Hebble Vale Goods', together with the sublime 'Croft Depot'. Oh dear, I've just realised that the first two aren't even P4. Tut tut! My view was rather different. As someone living in...

Autocoach design gives a precedent. Off the top of my head the only loco-inspired autocoach designs were the NE porthole vehicles, which always looked a bit odd to me. The first generation of MUs (and their successors) looked to have been influenced by contemporary bus design. There is also marketin...

The thread has given lots of useful information about where you can go to get white waterslide or rub-on lettering. Finding exactly the right typeface for old lettering can be a problem, as I found when researching and drawing up the Hollar Models posters. CorelDraw have a student version which is r...

Lovely modelling, and espcially the weather. !'ve often thought, in my modelling armchair, about rainy models, but always hesitated at the complexity of painting the rolling stock. Much of it would be a very different colour from its "normal" dry state, and if you look at rainy photos many...

If I remember rightly, the main problem (other than getting the Gibson wheels on the axle square and undistorted) is that the tender is narrower than scale. The options seem to be either getting a new chassis or cutting the tender longways and inserting an extra slice of styrene. The Finecast chassi...

Wizard Models have taken on the distribution and sale of the OO and O gauge ranges of wagon posters produced by Hollar Models. Wizard will be selling Hollar posters at the many exhibitions they attend, and also online on their new web site at http://www.wizardmodels.ltd These posters were a everyday...

I am finishing one of these off as one of the BR-built engines that were briefly and unhappily sent to Ipswich shed in the 50s. Unlike the NER and LNER-built engines, these had a very visible hopper sandbox below the bunker. They are very visible and rather than build them I would much prefer a cast...

Vermillion is a synthetic form of mercury sulphide, first appearing in europe towards the end of the Roman era and much used by medieval painters. It is a very bright red in its pure form, but is often eked out with the browner red lead pigment. Unless you are painting an engine to represent exhibit...

A little delicate work with a minidrill and burr will do the trick. Behind each vertical axlebox guide iron is a sprengthening strut which has to come out to clear the wheel, and you need to chamfer the backs of the brake shoes to clear the tyre surfaces. The photo shows a train of converted Bachman...

I think in their own terms they are very decent kits. They are an excellent basis for a model, and I have packed a couple of unmade Slaters minerals to take with me on a longish overseas posting. You have to be careful about internal ironwork on these wagons - the few photos show that there is consi...

PS If I remember rightly, the Slaters kits, being old, don't have any moulded plank detail on the inside. If that is so, and you plan to run them unladen, then adding this neatly before you build the body is by far the most important bit of detailing you can do. It's not hard if you use a skrawker, ...

Brakes: I think there is a lot to be said for the ABS white metal cast brake units, particularly for a beginner and for those who want to build their wagons by the train-load and run them on a layout. Etched brake gear (Masokits, Bedford, etc) looks finer if it is built nicely, but can be a devil to...