I don't believe it but its been 7 months since the last post. That's not very good is it but to tell the truth things have been slow and have been creeping along at a snails pace. There's been a few things going on around the house like a major bathroom reconstruction and Granny flat re-roofing that's eaten into my time as well as finances. Also work and ageing relatives also kept me away from the modelling bench but today, I actually made it out to the bench for a few hours. I normally get an hour or so per night in the cave so since the last post, I've finished making all of the upper level track and its ready to install. I've installed 6 out of the 12 required point motors and all 8 of the electro-magnetic uncouplers. I'm going to install the rest of the point motors before laying the track but this will take a while as I need to save up the money. Doing the work on the house has certainly drained the finances!!
Here's one of the points
Here's one of the points
And there's 11 others
So for the last 2 weeks and today, I've been working on some 36ft MLV's and BLV's and some 18ft LV's. At last years Early Days, Ian D presented his research on the Thow BLV's and this work included GA drawings for the cantilevered underframe version as well as 2 door, 36ft MLV. I'd previously spoken to Andrew from ANDIAN Models about this project and he had some spare BLV van bodies that he was willing to part with. These arrived and with a bit of modification and a scratchbuilt underframe, here they are.
Still a bit to go on the cantilever version
The bogies are not quite right so I'll have to add some detail around the axleboxes and bolster to make them look more like the originals. Here's a 3 door MLV also from the BLV Discussion.
Still a fair way to go on this one
I'd also previously made a couple of 18ft LV's and had 3 more to go which left a whole bunch of 21ft LV sides lying around. These were made from some old Lima HO scale louvre vans that I picked up at various 2nd hand stalls.
These were made based on an article in Australian Journal of Railway Modelling
So what to do with all of the left over sides? We'll turn them into 36ft MLV's, that's what we'll do. And after a bit of cutting and shutting I ended up with some 36ft sides. Well not quite 36ft as the side ended up being about 1ft short. I'll just have to live with it I guess until some manufacturer makes a more accurate one. I won't hold my breath.
35ft MLV's
Seeing as the Early Days convention is on again next week, I was hoping to take some of these models along but I suspect I won't get them finished in time. Anyway, we'll see what happens.
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