Brettell Road - Back to wagons - and a correction.

[Phil O]

The photo's look very atmospheric, just like a damp night.

Only one slight criticism, a bigger resistor to reduce the light intensity might improve it even more, when I was a kid the lights had a sort of yellowy glow to them.

Phil

[dal-t]

In raptures over here - if 'having your country back' actually means anything, that does it for me! But two questions, if i may. Firstly, knowing the camera seldom records as the eye sees, was there a (deliberate or otherwise) change in colour balance between photos 1-3 and 4, because the tonal value of the last looks very different to me? Secondly (with a supplemental!) are the lamps grain of wheat or LEDs (because if the latter, a different resistance wouldn't affect the yellow glow, would it, surely they either work or don't on the supply you feed them)?

[Paul Townsend]

are the lamps grain of wheat or LEDs (because if the latter, a different resistance wouldn't affect the yellow glow, would it, surely they either work or don't on the supply you feed them)?

No, LEDs can be brightness controlled by series resistor ( and other ways too). The values required can be found by trial and error for any particular led as they vary enormously so long as you don't go below the minimum value for the voltage of your supply and the manufacturer's quoted max current.
eg. a typical basic red led drops around 1.5v itself and has a max rated current of 20mA so for a 12v supply the min R=(12-1.5)/20 Kohms, say 520 ohms. A common value used would be 1kohm but 4.7Kohms would pass about 2mA and give a dim glow.

[David B]

Chris Langdon wrote an article on the subject - Taming the LED - in the first issue of Finescale Railway Modelling Review.

[dal-t]

Thanks for that - although it was actually the colour change I thought behaved differently. Interestingly, the pack of LED lights I bought recently says - 'Run on 3V, any less they won't work, any more you'll break them'. Seemed quite clear, but obviously there has to be some tolerance around '3V', even from the suggested battery supply.

[Alan Turner]

Thanks for that - although it was actually the colour change I thought behaved differently. Interestingly, the pack of LED lights I bought recently says - 'Run on 3V, any less they won't work, any more you'll break them'. Seemed quite clear, but obviously there has to be some tolerance around '3V', even from the suggested battery supply.

The resistor acts as a current limiter not a voltage dropper. The LED still sees 3v.

You might find this useful: http://led.linear1.org/led.wiz

regards

Alan

[jim s-w]

The lamps are grain of wheat but the building lights are LEDs. They do appear brighter to the camera than they do the eye.

The last image is deliberately sepia

Cheers

Jim

[Paul Townsend]

Thanks for that - although it was actually the colour change I thought behaved differently. Interestingly, the pack of LED lights I bought recently says - 'Run on 3V, any less they won't work, any more you'll break them'. Seemed quite clear, but obviously there has to be some tolerance around '3V', even from the suggested battery supply.

The colour change that you get with varying filament bulbs will NOT occur with LEDs, just the brightness. This is fundamental physics of their nature. However, our brains are sometimes fooled into thinking that a dimmer light is a different colour. That is one of the many reasons why lights on camera appear different to directly viewed.

Some leds, especially those packed in nice screw fittings with bezels with pretty chrome edges etc have built in resistors and are specified for a particular voltage, usually 5 or 12v. For MR panels that is relevant. For use in scenics you are more likely to want smallest and cheapest package i.e . the naked plastic package where my recipe is relevant as these are less likely to have built in Resistor. However there may be a few out there which do. I have never come across one labelled as for 3v but would be very wary of using an led with NO series resistor at all, hard to tell if these 3v ones have an R or not. The other thing to bear in mind is that the inherent voltage drop I quoted as around 1.5v varies between the different colours, RGB and White. Latter will usually drop the higher figure so maybe your 3v ones are White?

[dal-t]

Many thanks, your confirmation about the colour change (or not) is pretty much as I understood it, but I may not have stated that as clearly (or as brilliantly?) as I might.

The LEDs I bought don't appear to have resistors, but they're built into plastic lamp standards so they could, I suppose, have them embedded. The quote I gave about 3V was on the packing. I haven't actually lit them up yet, as I only bought them for the standards (considerably cheaper than 'unlit' ones, including P&P, probably another example of Chinese 'dumping'). However, as they're going on a dock scene designed primarily as a photo backdrop, I probably will idc link a couple to a battery pack to see what effects I can get (without expecting to be able to equal the full atmosphere Jim has so aptly captured).

[jim s-w]

You can slightly tweak the colour of LEDs by painting them with revel translucent paints.

[jim s-w]

Picking up where I left off last time, a few more dark pictures.




I'm sure we have all had the frustration of glancing something interesting out of a train window but it being hidden away so that a proper look is impossible?  That was the idea behind this image.

I've been building more wagons too.



More of the same! Another Airfix 16 ton mineral wagon and another 12 ton LMS diagram 1832A van from the Cambrian kit. (C101)



An ancient Three Aitch Mouldings kit for a LMS 20 ton coke hopper. Built with Bill Bedford W irons.   I know Hornby are going to do one of these but building a kit is much more fun! There are more wagons on my site.


My warehouse is starting to look a bit more like a building now. The canopy is another old Arifix kit adapted to suit. I've mentioned before wanting to depict some life inside this and the following pictures hopefully do that.





Most of the figures are Dart castings ones with a Bachmann gent thrown in. The last picture is the reason for the title of this entry as the cat is modelled on my own cat Moo!  Anyway remembering that Brettell Road is set in the rain, Moo has obviously snuck in to somewhere nice and dry!

[jim s-w]

Work has progressed on my warehouse. Starting with bedding in the building and adding the now familiar neglected feel to the end of the sidings.  Just need a light airbrush of general gunk colour to tie it all together.


I've installed the second floor which means the final lighting for the first floor is also in place. I used self adhesive copper tape instead of wire and found it made things so much easier. Something ill definitely be adopting for the other floors and buildings

Finally a couple of pics of the Deeley tank parked up for the night.


Cheers

Jim

[jim s-w]

What we have here is a typical midland type yard lamp from RMLectronics. They kindly supplied me an incomplete model as I wanted to change the flat ladder supplied (an understandable commercial compromise) with one of Colin's 3d versions. I felt the light was a bit white so I painted the LED with some revel translucent yellow. The effect of this can be seen below.



Although Brettell Road is basically a personal plaything there has been interest in it going out to an exhibition or two at some point. With this in mind I have included a couple of viewer friendly hidden details in the warehouse for those who like a good look at little details.



First up a lorry unloading scene using a modified base toys lorry and a couple of Airfix platform figures painted to look like factory workers.



Secondly a hand crane included to give a suggestion of how goods get from one floor to the other. This is very loosely based on one at the SS Great Britain museum in Bristol (well worth a visit if you are in the area. There are a few remains of the railway there too along with some old wagons that are also worth a look.)

[jim s-w]

If you can call diesels modelled as they appeared 30 years ago modern, a few have escaped from New Street and ventured to Brettell Road. They have since been rounded up and shepherded back to their own world!

[jim s-w]

I fancied a diesel shunter for Brettell Road.  I was quite taken with the idea of bringing my decades dead mainline class 03 back from the grave with a High Level Chassis but as I though about it I drifted away from the idea. A quick win would be just to get a Black 08 and swap the wheels but where is the fun in that? 



So what I have ended up with is basically the class 08's older brother, the class 11.  Work so far started with a Bachmann 08. I fitted the smaller 3ft 11 wheels and Brassmasters coupling rods. Some general underframe detailing has been started along with the spring overlays from Mr Horn.  Rather than file off all the bodyside doors I thought it easier to just replace the bodysides so that I had a nice flat base to work on.



The cab roof of a class 11 is a lot more like a continuous curve than the 08 and it just so happens that when lima did their model they completely cocked it up!  So much so that it appears they might have been working from class 11 drawings as it seems to match pretty well. So it's a no brainer to swap the cabs over.   I have also reduced the depth of the bufferbeam and will need to relocate the buffers.

[RobM]

Excellent interior detailing Jim…. …….will you be able to persuade exhibition managers to turn all the lights off when you exhibit…..
Rob

[jim s-w]

Thanks Rob

How about scaleforum 24hrs? Who else is up for the night shift?

I do have a plan and you often hear show organisers saying that there's a darker area of the shows anyway.

Cheers

Jim

[Noel]

A new incarnation of the famous tent?

[RobM]

…..or in Miroslaw Balka's "How It Is"……..

[garethashenden]

I really like this layout. It's so well done and impressive. I need to get back to my layout now, I'm feeling inspired.

[jim s-w]

Time flies doesn't it? Yesterday marked the 2nd anniversary of when we first cut wood for Brettell road. I have to admit I didn't think it would take this long but then it was only supposed to be a play thing and wasn't supposed to be too serious. I guess, much like the way that New Street was originally only supposed to be the wolves station throat in 8ft, it all went a bit wrong!

image.jpeg

Google Earth style view of progress so far.

[jim s-w]

While the left hand end is coming along pretty well, as seen in the last post, the right hand side is looking a bit neglected so more building work is required, starting with...



...a bit of cheating. This is actually to go behind the large warehouse on the left and is a blatant short cut. The reason for its existence is an excuse for the chimney, perhaps when the warehouse was a factory in its previous life it had a small steam engine or something? In truth you will only see the chimney so I could have missed out the building completely or just used a box but I had an old Hornby water tower so why not just use that instead? I knocked up a new roof, gave it a light dusting of red primer and blanked of the windows with a bit of scrap ply I just need to paint the door and weather it.



No such short cuts on the more visible bits though. This little building is based on a picture I found on the brumpic site. Construction is 2mm card clad with plasticard while the arches are left overs from New Street. The steps are plastruct and microstrip.



The real life Brettell lane and surrounding area has an awful lot of pubs so I decided to have one on the layout. Construction is the same as above and the windows are modified Brassmasters ones. The roof slates are from Mr Horns laser cutter.



This is the rear view in roughly the position it will occupy on the layout. I knocked up a little store hut too.



I find things like guttering to be strangely therapeutic. The actual gutters are half round brass from Eileens while the rainwater downpipes are 1mm brass with a single strand of electrical wire double wrapped to form brackets. Experiments have shown mounting the gutter brackets on top of the wall is the most robust way to secure them with the roof adding extra reinforcement later.

[RobM]

Interesting way of 'plumbing'. Shame some of it will not be seen. Have you built the chimney yourself?
Rob

[Phil O]

Jim

Are those arches and door furniture etches readily available, please?

Thanks Phil

[jim s-w]

I haven't Rob. It's a HO kit (vollmer I think) although the bricks would be quite big if used in a HO setting.

Phil. The door furniture is supplied as extras on some of the brassmasters etched Windows. The arches are left overs from New Street so not available, sorry

Jim