Friday Update: Twenty-two Seven Twenty-two...

A busy week as a fair number of commissions have left for new homes this week but still more to report, despite the heat wave. Read on to find out what's been happening...

I've been putting together an Impetus kit for the Manning Wardle I, a diminutive 0-6-0 saddle tank. This week has seen it turn a wheel, as a heavily modified High Level Road-Runner Compact Plus has been shoe-horned into a lightly modified firebox, with the motor largely hidden in the saddle tank. A tiny bit of the boiler had to be cut away for the motor clearance, but it all screws together and seems to work, so next up are some pickups and then the brake gear - once I've regained my composure! It was slightly hair-raising taking a slitting disc to parts of the gearbox to get enough clearance, but it still works as smoothly as one expects of a High Level offering, great design and material choices from Chris.

The Motor Rail 14T standard gauge shunter is coming along quite quickly too - and the prototype 3D printed core has arrived and fits, first time, on the chassis. The etch artwork is away, so I should have a little more to share in a few weeks when that comes back, I'm really excited about having a new kit in the range, and one that uses the Ruston chassis so neatly.

I shared my preferred version of Renfreigstadt earlier in the week, well after a final adjustment of the loop as requested by the customer we've got the finalised version. This puts a second industry on stage, and ups the operation at a slight cost to prototype realism. I think the composition still works ok though, and look forward to seeing where it is taken next.

I've had a Grafar 08 chassis in my 009 box for a while, so picked up one of the 'NSE 'IVOR' bodies from Rails this week - rather than strip the paint I decided to preserve the wasp strips so very lightly primed the body and sprayed on faded BR blue. I've got a number in mind, which matches the door arrangement, but not the small cab side window! These Grafar models are such a pain with the variation in tooling really limiting what you can model. Anyhow, this one should be a quick 'and cheap' addition to Paxton Road 2, as I've said before, everyone needs an 08!

We end this week's update with a hint of a project to come... behind the Halifax South Western GP9RM (a Kaslo kit) is a new project that has nearly crossed the finish line - a New Brunswick Southern GP38-3 (ex GP35) I've been working on - which is almost ready for weathering now and will a little green variety to Beaverbrook in the near future. I should manage a little more on this in the coming days so expect more soon, but for now, enjoy the weekend and until next time...