Project Vulcan Part 1

Progress on painting the AW is proceeding well, with the carriage likely to be finished in the next week or so.

In the meantime I have finally started a project that has been waiting 5 years for me to begin. That project is a Steam Era Models oil-burning J-class steam locomotive kit. As I require a oil fired J-class for my VGR roster (J549) I purchased the kit 5 years ago so that when the time was right I would already have the kit ready to start building. That time has finally come.

The kit itself is very well designed as most of the soldering thus far has been done from the inside. The etched brass components fit together very well. Anyway here are a couple of photos of the tender currently under construction:

The next step will be to construct and fit the oil tank and detail the rear of the tender.

The little red box....and H20 to go

Painting of the B van and WT tank wagon took a couple of days, thanks to some warm weather. The B van got Testors dullcote a mere 2 hours before it's maiden run at the Bendigo Clubrooms:

As you can see I have opted to number both wagons as those preserved by the VGR. Now that they are completed I can now focus on getting the AW car painted. This will also represent an item of VGR stock: carriage 23AW and is being painted in the crimson livery with light coloured roof that the VGR have adopted in the past. One can see this livery at the railway on carriage 41BU which is undergoing restoration. More in the next blog update.

Little red box

Well at least it will be when it's painted!

With the WT now in the paint shop and the AW car not far behind I decided to slot in a Steam Era Models B van to replace an earlier one I had constructed when I first got serious about building kits:

Since I want this van to represent the B van currently preserved at Maldon I needed the later type mesh tred shunter's steps. For this I decided to try out the Model Etch shunter's steps (ME12). In the past I have used the Auscision steps but I've found they are slightly thicker than the etched brass offerings. This van will now join the line in the paint shop.