Sprung and damped...

Fiddly little pieces of plastic, I'm glad that's one side's axleboxes finished...

It's been quite a productive evening of modelling and the Schoema is starting to become an engine, rather than just a body. I'm more of a 'if it looks right' sort of modeller really, no matter how hard I try to finesse my models - that's not to say what I model is clunky, more, I'm not a complete slave to the prototype. That will be evident to the rivet counters but what you see here more than conveys the prototype's underframe to my eye, and when it's all black and weathered it'll blend together anyway.

To me it's about making the finer details quite pronounced, obvious and, well fine. The rest then becomes a canvas to show off these hi-lights - and on the chassis I thought that the dampers are the things that are a touch unusual and will draw the eye - hence these are the finest bit of modelling. The rest is cobbled together from plasti-strut and plasti-rod styrene sections from Evergreen and the bottom of my 'off cuts' box. I'm going to finish this side with the pipework and sand boxes before moving onto side 2.