Iced T(ea)

Yep there has been another pause in work. Mainly due to other things taking priority. With the weather getting better (well...sort of) for painting and a couple of projects that require finishing still this blog will start to get busy again.

Now having said that some projects need to be finished, I have snuck in a couple of extra ones. This post will focus on the first of these. A week ago I attended the Sunbury Model Railway Exhibition to help run the layout 'Town and Country' over the weekend. It was a good exhibition with at least a couple of new layouts making their exhibition debut. I was intending not to make many purchases unless it was something that I could put together reasonably quick. So what did I buy?

Yep I got myself a Steam Era Models 15ft T-van kit. This kit has recently been updated with mitered corners to join the body together, separate roof battens so you can replace the molded on ones if desired, plus a brass etch with all the bits to make up the handbrake details and the handrails.It is a big step up from the older version of the kit which dates back to the days of David Foulkes producing them as part of the Broad Gauge Models brand in the 1980s.

Seeing it came with all the extra bits I decided to make this one more detailed than one of my previous builds of the older version of this kit. Those details can be seen in the following photo of the model now almost ready for paint:

So I replaced the roof batterns with the separately supplied moldings, added chain that secured the ice hatches on the prototype and added the extra iron details to the ends as suggested in the kit instructions. The only thing still missing are the safety loops for the brake rigging which I will add before the paint goes on.

Now it would be simple to paint this wagon in the traditional VR wagon red. But that isn't on the cards for this one. I have something a bit more interesting planned for it.

The next blog post will be about the other project I've started working on and by the time that post comes around I should have something more to show of it.