Lockdown - The First Six Months

I’ve worked on a number of modelling projects this past six months on average for maybe an hour a day, more or less. My main project continues to be the diorama and the egg-box ground cover is now almost ready for its paper and scrim. I will report on that separately.

On the loco front, I continued making progress with the Peckett, that is until I realised the kit was for the wrong variant. My loco is to be 1151 and this has entailed making a new scratch front end, including a laboriously hand-filed smoke box door. It’s strange I didn’t notice the discrepancy earlier.

Meanwhile, I’ve continued to work on the two separate chassis: the standard kit one and a split-frame chassis, now in P4 (see "Peckett progress, 6th March 2019"). Both frames are now assembled, but I decided to take a break when it came to shorting the wheels.

I then moved on to 5961 Toynbee Hall: having built the footplate and cab way back in 2009, I thought it was about time I tackled the boiler. After making the smokebox and firebox I ran out of 8 thou nickel. At this stage I also realised that I would need to make a new cab front. I made the current one similar to that on my Brassmasters Black Five, which had a cut-out allowing the resin boiler to fit just inside the cab. In the Hall, the firebox will bolt in the normal model fashion to the surface of the new cab front.

Along the way I also added further detail to the pannier 1649, which is still not quite finished.

And that’s the first six months of my lockdown.