Friday Update: Fifteen Five Twenty...

Fridays seem to come round some quick these days, I don't know where the days are going. Although I'm not loving the home schooling, I appreciate I'm blessed living somewhere so beautiful, doing a job I love and a hobby that is so all encompassing as to help protect and nurture my mental health...

For myself this week, I decided to attempt a BR ODA. These were rebuilds of the pipe wagon, with the same FAT-19 suspension used on the Vanwide rebuilds to allow running of MOD traffic in the Speedlink network. The wagon sole bars had their W irons cut away, and replaced with those cut from the PA30 Parkside chassis. This sounds like it won't be very strong but I've done it before on another model and had no trouble. Take your time, use a sharp new blade, and leave it to set on a flat surface taking time to align it with the old position so you're axles sit straight. 

The kit is neatly moulded and falls together, it's had Accurascale buffers fitted, and I've assembled some screw links for the buffer beam. Once I build a few more wagons it will get primed and move through the paint shop. I don't like painting one wagon at a time.

The Kerr Stuart has been finished and will have it's own blog post shortly. My customer has also asked me to re-work some Branchlines bodies to more of an 009 outline, this means lowering them to match the Kerr Stuart and previously finished Hunslet's which also allows the use of new bogies, the Peco L&B wagon bogies seem to suit, more on this project next month...

The pair of Planet Industrial liveried Sentinels are nearing completion. The weathering on No.1 has been started now it's glazing is fitted - it just needs some airbrushed soot around the exhaust. 

This narrowly missed last week's Friday update - I accidentally bought a Kernow PRA wagon - and who knew they actually worked out of Purbeck's PICC works on ball clay trains... more on this concept and project another time... 

Pont-y-dulais has had it's back-scene fitted. This is from ID Backscenes and is just an overcast sky. The layout is viewed at near eye level, so it works nicely. There will be scrubby hedge and trees along the edge of the back anyway. No excuse now to not crack on with track painting, before structures and scenery are started.

Finally, another large and small post... the last of the 2019 Hudson Hunslet's is being weathered. The first wash of dirt has been applied (and removed). More washes and detail painting to follow... 

It's been good to hear from so many of you in the past week or so, and thank you to all for the support. I hope you're all well. Take care, stay safe wherever you are. More soon...