Birmingham New Street and Brettell Road in P4

[Phred]

aleopardstail wrote:
if Dapol made lamp posts

[Jim S-W]

Those who kindly stopped by for a chat at Scalefour Crewe will have seen me fiddling with a set of loco frames.  Above is the progress I made over 2 days which to be honest isn't a lot but that's a good thing. I always feel that if you get a decent amount of stuff done demoing at a show you've kind of missed the point of why you were there!

The Johnson 2f minefield.

The frames are an old Alan Gibson kit for the Johnson 2f or 1142 class, sometimes referred to as 'mineral engines'.  These and the similar 1357 class are often lumped together as 2Fs but there are a whole ton of differences between locos regardless of the actual class.  I recommend a couple of books if you want to go into a lot of detail  These being Stephen Summerson's 'Midland Railway Locomotives' Volume 4 and Bob Essery and David Jenkinson's 'An Illustrated History of LMS locomotives' volume 4.

The 1142 class 2fs were built by 4 builders over a 2 year period. Those being Kitson, Dubs, Beyer Peacock and finally Neilson.  Initially they were very handsome locos and had a family resemblance with the 700 class Kirtley goods, if you put the laters outside frames to one side. As with all things Midland they were modified over their lives with Belpaire fireboxes and 2 different types of Deeley cab.  The lower roof one being the better proportioned of the 2.  The class had so many modifications that it's definitely a case of pick a prototype and model what you see. Some had sandboxes at the outer end of the frames. Some either side of the middle driving wheels.  Chimneys were all sorts of different heights too.  The main oft' quoted difference between the 1142 and 1357 classes is the wheel size.  the former having 4ft 10in drivers and the latter 5ft 3in.  An easy way to tell them apart is the 1142's had brake linkages outside of the wheels while the 1357's had them inside.  Well most of them did anyway but there are some exceptions to that as well.




So my intended victim. Pictured here at Harbourne station in 1957.  Ive long like the first image due to its run down nature.  The station having been closed to passengers in 1934. At the time the picture was taken it was beign used as a wood store for the nearby Chad Valley toy factory.  Note also the LMS open stil with its LMS lettering.  Both images © 2015 - 53A Models of Hull Collection and used with kind permission.

58185 was one of the Neilson builds being constructed in 1876 and lasting until 1962 (86 years!).  It was originally numbered 1245, then 3013 followed by 23014 before receiving the BR number in 1948.

The Kit

It would be fair to say the Alan Gibson kit is of its time and was probably towards the higher end of kit design when it was released. It doesn't have any of the slot and tab style niceties we are accustomed to these days though.  You can see from the top picture that I used some Alan Gibson frame spacers and drilled the frames for CSB suspension using the info on the CLAG site as a guide http://www.clag.org.uk/beam-annex3.html


Progress so far handrails and details next.  I found using a High Level Kits road runner plus gearbox with their D1 drive stretcher and a smallish motor I can get the gearbox into the boiler without having to cut into the boiler itself (which was just a bit of brass tube).  It's worth noting that if you want to do the original version London Road models do a kit for it.

The Johnson tender

Yes another minefield. These come in a multitude of different sizes. those being 2,350 gallons, 2750, 2950, 3250 and 3500 gallons.  Some of the early ones came with springs above or below the footplate and there were were different inner face designs too. My kit came with the 2,350 gallon version but my prototype has the 2,950 gallon version.  As the kit as clearly too small a Bachman spare body for the 3,250 gallon one was brought from their spares site.  Im far from put off by a bit of plastic bashing.

The Bachmann model is pretty accurate for what it represents. A comparison of the key tank dimensions are (Bachmann/3,250) length - 77mm, width - 28.3mm, height - 16mm.  The 2,950 gallon tank is length - 76.3mm, width - 26.1mm, height - 15.6mm.  So that differences of 0.7mm, 2.2mm and 0.4mm respectively. I often think it's a good exercise to think of these number in 2 ways - percentages and relationships. Dealing with percentages first the differences are 0.9%in the length, 8% in the width and 2 and a half% in the height. Its fair to say that the difference in length is all but impossible to see.  The height probably not but the width is probably pretty noticeable. That brings me on to relationships.  The tender and cab width are the same. If the tender was over a mm wider each side that would definitely look odd. The height as a number is harder to tell but the bottom of the beading lines up with the top of the cabside beading and this relationship is kinda obvious.  Some of the class had the larger 3,250 gallon tender and this height is pretty obvious once you are aware of it.

Modellers licence

Some quick measurements showed that dropping the height of the tender by half a mm wouldn't give the relationship to the cab I was after so I reduced the heigh by 1mm. Yes it means the tender is now a bit too low but the relationship to the cab is better.


The Bachmann tender cut into manageable chunks.  The new lower beading is 10x60 though evergreen strip.


A rough mock up.  The inner chassis is Brassmasters from their 3f easychas and the outer frames, brakes and springs are from the Gibson kit.  The bufferbeams are also Brassmasters and the buffers are from Lanarkshire models.


Progress so far.

[Phred]

Love the black & white photos.
In that second one, I wonder what the large building with the chimney stack is, adjacent to the tracks. It seems to be only accessible from the back yards of the houses.

[manna]

Love the black & white photos.
In that second one, I wonder what the large building with the chimney stack is, adjacent to the tracks. It seems to be only accessible from the back yards of the houses.

G'Day Phred

Probably a small backyard workshop/factory, seen these in North London, they would be making things like the backs of swivel chairs, small sub contractors.

manna

[Phred]

manna wrote:
Probably a small backyard workshop/factory, seen these in North London, they would be making things like the backs of swivel chairs, small sub contractors.

Aha! Cheers, Manna.

[Jim S-W]

Love the black & white photos.
In that second one, I wonder what the large building with the chimney stack is, adjacent to the tracks. It seems to be only accessible from the back yards of the houses.

Map here https://www.warwickshirerailways.com/lms/lnwrh4072.htm

[Phred]

Jim S-W wrote:
Map here https://www.warwickshirerailways.com/lms/lnwrh4072.htm

Thanks, Jim.
That map shows what I think is the shed to the left hand side near the turntable. Looks like it has separate access via an alleyway.

[Jim S-W]

Concluding my 2F project by starting with the tender The coal rails were from the kit as was the tool box.


Lamp irons from Stenson Models - Vac pipe from Lanarkshire Models.


On the inside I made a representation of the coal space from thin plasticard - I wasn't too fussed about blending this into the existing space as it will be covered in coal.


On to the loco then, with details fitted.


The washout plugs are kind of loco specific so as always - check your prototype. Also check the date. I found another picture of 58185 at Harbourne, so the same loco, at the same place, even under the same bridge, but as it was a little later the smokebox door was different.  Alan Gibson do some nice lost wax washout plugs (I used them on my flatiron) but he hadn't got any so i knocked some up from bits of brass.


The kit includes a casting for the injectors but its the later combined type.  I previously made the version I needed for my 2441 tank from bits of wire and tube so I just copied what i did last time.


Some rudimentary cab details - I tend not to go too mad on this stuff as there will be a crew in the way.  The floor is a bit of lead as any weight helps.  The inside of the firebox is also lined with lead.


Inside motion modified from the Brassmasters etch. (This is the fifth time I've done this now - does it count as an addiction at this point I wonder?)  I soldered some small tubes of brass on the chassis side face of the CSB springing plates to give me as much room as i could otherwise the tabs would have been in the way.


Next stage - - couple of light coats of etching primer. Check for any gaps or rough bits and add any needed rivets -Luckily theres not a lot of them on this class of loco.


The end result.








These locos really are diminutive - pictured here alongside a 3f


A comparison of the 2 tender sizes.


Not by any kind of deliberate design I have ended up with quite a little family of Johnson designs now.

[Bigmet]

Small 0-6-0's of late C19th design are uniformly charming; quite remarkable considering that they were the 'maids of all work' on the railway; and the model so well captures that.

Your final 'downpour' scene is very effective, but a cab tarp is surely necessary? I have taken to using the plastic of the cheapest black wheely bin liners, as these are a generous size, and a little piece that can be snipped off is thus always to hand! A little double sided gel tape that secures and releases with no marks (that I found by chance in Cornwall) allows ready alteration.

[Jim S-W]

I use latex from a black surgical glove. It's also good for wagon sheets as well



I need to add them to my 3f as well but can't find any pictures of how the framing was arranged. I don't want to guess

[Phred]

Bigmetblack wrote:
wheely bin liners

Jim S-W wrote:
latex from a black surgical glove

Freezer bags for me. Crinkles up to a nice tarp-like appearance and easy to work with.

Love the rainy scene as well!

[Dad-1]

Just fantastic.
3D art of the highest order.

Geoff T.

[Bigmet]

I need to add them to my 3f as well but can't find any pictures of how the framing was arranged. I don't want to guess

Would this be a case of 'locally made and installed' by the shed blacksmith, rather than a standard item from the main works?

[Jim S-W]

Perhaps for some companies but the Midland were more than obsessive about standardising things so I would doubt it

[Mountain]

Your locos are amazingly intricate. Some of them puzzle me where you found room for the motor.