Commission: Ashington Number 52…

I've been working on a pair of Austerities in OO scale, based upon the EFE Rail version for customer, as a follow on to the RSH and Barclay that were completed earlier...

I have a soft spot for Austerities, their work man like appearance and long lives that extend from wartime through industrial use and into preservation, mean, as I've said previously, that everyone should own at least one for their layout! One thing in particular I've enjoyed about this commission, apart from taking the generic EFE/DJM/Kernow model and personalising it to a specific engine, is the personal recollections of my customer, in his words:

"52 was the regular engine working the Woodhorn leading turn running coals for washing to Ashington. The engineer at Ashington liked the livery on the real loco so much he ordered the Central Workshops not to paint it on arrival from USC Ore Mining Branch at Frodingham on 11/4/1964. She was made redundant in August 1966 when Woodhorn was linked underground to Ashington. Moved to Whittle Colliery in August 1966 she was eventually returned to Ashington for boiler repairs which were never carried out. Condemned in 1968 a trip to Hughes Bolckows at Blyth in the company of 3/6/24/25 in August 1968 was the final journey and they were broken up very quickly".

The model is fitted with sound, and I have replaced the buffers, removed two lamp irons and smoothed the recess in the rear of the cab as well as adding the pipework down from the dome to the lubricator, pair also added to the footplate, finished off with Smith's 3 links cut down to fit.

The prototype wore the United Steel lined maroon livery of her former owner, and you can see the dark patch on the tank side where a name plate had been fitted, and the NCB simply painted their number and markings over the old paint scheme. I've tried to reflect this in the finish, the lining was custom drawn specifically for this prototype and carefully applied in panels. The weathering reflects photos of the period, which show a faded glory that was still relatively well cared for, the maroon lined paint seems to be cleaned up in a few photographs, and the results here are a mix of washes, dry brushing, detail painting and airbrush. 

If you have memories you'd like to recreate in miniature then perhaps I can bring a model to life for you? From renumbering and weathering to creating a specific model from a kit or even scratchbuilt, get in touch for a personal proposal using the contact form on the home page menu, Facebook or the forum messaging systems. Until next time, more soon...