Wednesday 25th July

Worklist:

Review latest coal yard details
Coal yard staithes
Headshunt fencing
Platform seats

Back to the usual Wednesday, but Laurence was absent on grandfather duties.

Stephen displayed his latest pieces for the coal yard - bags of 'Homefire' smokeless fuel. These started out as Tamiya, 1/35 sand bags. After research, the width of the bags was within acceptable tolerance for 1/43 coal bags, but 5mm had to be cut from the centre of each bag, the ends glued together and joints sanded. Further research indicated that 'Homefire' was just available in our models time frame and so the bags were sprayed the recognisable yellow. New labels were created from scratch using Photoshop and the images printed onto transfer paper. After spraying with satin sealer, the transfers were applied to the 12 bags that had been prepared. Finally, a pair of long pallet frames were made.




Stephen prepared and glued more sections of sleeper to raise the rear of the coal storage area. Pieces of code 70 flat-bottom rail were cut to length and painted. These will be fixed to the faces of the sleepers as vertical structural supports. A piece of laser-cut card strapping, left over from the wagon building, was stuck on the top and painted.


Geoff had assembled the additional length of fencing to separate the head-shunt from the coal yard. The gate at the road end was made 'slightly open', but this left the new panel without rigidity. Thin metal strips were formed into diagonal braces and fixed to the end posts. The whole assembly was now painted.


It was dry enough at the end of the session to see what it looked like - excellent.


Geoff had rummaged through his castings box and found some bench seats, but was reluctant to use them due to their GWR roots. However, after a brief discussion, the G and R were cut and filed away leaving the W of Worton Court. But then, he prepared and laser-cut some C's making them far more acceptable - bespoke seats!




The yard with all features in place, including a hand barrow with a scratch wooden frame on a small metal cannon limber kit and an S&D wheel barrow.






It has been a stressful time for Stephen and Geoff, but the haven of the workshop to work on the layout and to engage with old friends has been a welcome and highly beneficial escape.


Friday 13th July

Worklist:
Coal yard detailing
Additional railings
Water tower roof

A switch to Friday this week as Wednesdays had become very busy.

Stephen had brought along some scratch-built items for the coal yard sales area - a set of scales with a 56lb weight, a pile of sacks with a club hammer weight, a sign board and some full sacks of coal.


The scales are all plasticard and the sacks squares of old shirt material coloured with a large permanent marker. The polyester content in the shirt meant that creases kept disappearing, so some experiments with other materials might be undertaken. We discussed pre-bagged smokeless coal and decided that the modelling period of approx. 1963 would make them feasible.

The sleeper wall design for the staithes had been agreed previously, but on being laid out, the possibility of adding more and higher sleeper walls to the rear, for extra storage was agreed. The idea being that the low front wall (to suit the wagon doors) wouldn't contain much coal without spreading a long way, whereas a higher back wall would allow coal to be shovelled up there for storing. Two layers of sleepers were glued down and left to set.



With all the details in place, the proximity of the head shunt track and moving loco's, led to the decision to add a railing fence between the track and the 'public' coal area, which Geoff started to assemble.

Laurence continued with the water tower roof.