Drought Relief

It's been a while since I last assembled an etched brass kit. The Rail Tractor was probably the last. In the last few days I have assembled Steam Era Models excellent 4-wheel WT water tank wagon kit. This kit is a good beginner kit for those who wish to learn how to solder etched brass kits. The only really tricky bits are getting the tank wrapper the right shape and forming the angled brackets on each end. As I had trouble bending the later I opted to use styrene strip which were the only parts I super glued. Show below are progress pics of the construction and the finished product ready for paint:

Next step is to give the model a good clean and then painting will get underway.

The wanderer..errr...Walker

The arrival of the Auscision Models Victorian Railways 280HP Walker railcar last week has provided another excellent RTR model for Victorian modellers. All versions except the 1970s livery with the dayglo orange stripes are represented. The detail is just superb as the photos below of the one I have just purchased show:

So what does the model have to do with this blog you may ask? Well as supplied the model is fitted with non-prototypical bogies under the trailer units so that the model can be operated on 18 inch radius curves. These bogies have no sideframes to provide more clearance with the body when operating on these curves. However Auscision do supply a set of bogies with sideframes in the box. One simply unclips the bogies from the undeframe, unsolder the wires for the pickups, then fit the replacement bogies and solder the pickup wires.

A photo of how much this lifts the look of the model:

Eventually this model will also be fitted with some passengers (and a driver, plus maybe a railfan in the seat at the front next to the driver) and also DCC sound. So expect the model to appear on this blog again when those projects happen.

Departmental Stock 2

The weather has been less than ideal (something to do with the season I'm told) so things pretty much ground to a halt waiting for some better weather to get these wagons painted. Thankfully some unusually warm weather for later July allowed me to get the wagons painted and decaled. Shown below are the results:

As luck would have it, just as I took the photo of the second it started raining!

With these wagons now finally finished, attention can now turn to an item of passenger stock: a SEM AW car.