More details

 

A few more details to attend to on the Box Company. 

First, replace the point lever. These Springside whitemetal items are vulnerable to track cleaning with a rubber. Best buy plenty and accept they will be broken occasionally. A little paint, followed by some UHU (PVA didn't work) and this little feature is back in place. 

(I've just noticed, there is more from me on point levers on World of Railways) 

Next, a missing oil drum. This fell off when I opened the box up, and disappeared, leaving a PVA footprint. No problem, I've just picked up a pack of these Ratio items, so replacement is easy. Or it would be if I could find matching paint. Some nearly-the-same and a wash of rust over them looks OK. 

Finally, a figure had fallen off, leaving some superglue footprints. Once these were chipped away, a quick look in my painted figures box brought this model of Andy York out, and he's now glued in place (with PVA, hopefully more resilient), showing the "gaffer" his camera. 

Little jobs, but on a tiny layout that I hope will attract a few photos at the show, ones that make a difference. And a few pleasant little jobs for an evening. 

New elastic for the chimney

 

I can't remember how old The Melbridge Box Company is, but it must be at least 25 years. However, I'd said I'd take it along to Ally  Pally to act as a display stand for the World of Railways exclusive locos, so it was time to pull the model off the shelf, and make sure it was exhibition-ready. 

First - dust. Lots of it. While the boxfile might close up, there are holes in the ends to let trains out, and it seems, dust in. Much work was needed with a soft paintbrush to clean the model up. 

Then the main problem was the chimney. It has four stays holding it up, and as the tube splits for transport, these are made out of thin rubber thread. After all this time, this had perished and needed replacement. 

Once the old thread had been cleaned away, and the superglued knots where it attaches to the buildings (it's too smooth just to tie a knot) I was faced with trying to rethread the thing. Not as easy as you might think. The holes in the sides of the chimney are just big enough for the thread, and the rubber doesn't stay straight, so getting it into the chimney is fine, but finding the exit hole isn't. 

In the end, I passed a length of wire through the chimney, and superglued the thread onto the end, then pulled it back through. This worked a lot better than I expected it to!

After that, a bit of knot tying, some superglue and a kicker, and the job was done.  

Melbridge Box Company video

Four years ago, I made a couple of films for Modelrailway.tv It appears that one of these, The Melbridge Box Company, is still on-line and available for free viewing.

 

Update: Sorry. I didn't watch it all the way through when I wrote the post. Apparently you get the first half and then an offer to pay to see the rest - I'd assumed it was all free. Apologies to all the people who have been highly offended by this. All links have now been removed.

 



Corner

This is why I like building little layouts. You can spend time on the details. This little corner on the layout in a boxfile is a case in point. I've always thought it worked very well but would be lost in the context of a typical "dream" giant tail-chasing layout.

The elements are simple enough. An Airfix figure from the civilians set is engrossed in the letter he is reading. It's a nicely posed figure and because of this, one seen on many layouts. Used carefully though, he's as good as a whitemetal man costing as much as a bag of plastic people on a second hand stall.

The chair comes from Cooper Craft - part of their grounded van body kit. It's got 5 tiny parts to assemble but is delightfully airy and chair-like. Lent against the wall by someone who had snuck out of the office to enjoy the sunshine, we've all seen something similar in real life.

1970s shunting

Down at the Melbridge Box Company, 0-4-0 shunter 25550 drags a single plank wagon towards the machine shop where yet another once expensive bit of heavy engineering equipment is due to be loaded. From there, it will be shipped abroad to make boxes in Hong Kong or somewhere else where the locals will work for a pittance in conditions that would make a British worker cry.

Despite this, the gentlemen in the UK who will buy the products, usually model trains, that are encased in these boxes will complain that the price is too high and it really would be better if they weren't being made by johnny foreigner. At the same time the owners of the factory will peer at the ledgers and comment that it's a good job they are manufacturing abroad or the recommended retail price would need to be three times what it is now.

The 1970s are in full swing as you can see from the car park. The Ford Cortina could do with a wash but the Beetle owner seems prouder of his brand new bug. It replaces the 1965 model that he felt was still all right but his wife knew belied its age to anyone who knew that sloping headlights had disappeared 3 years after it was made, and didn't want the neighbours to think they weren't doing well.

On the tracks, the shunter is very well looked after by it's crew who have nicknamed it "Polly" but it too will soon be sold for scrap as the march of the lorry moves ever onwards. Luckily, it will be saved from the torch and find employment on a preserved line where it will be allowed to pull carriages to the delight of children who prefer red paint and chrome domes to the dull green GWR tank engines.

(With apologies to Chris Nevard, who does these made up histories better, or at least can make his camera to depth of field)

Superglue and sky

Looking for some information in old magazines a couple of weeks ago I tripped over an old article of mine in the late lamented Modelling Railways Illustrated. After getting over the shock of how long ago it was (late 90's since you ask) I reaslised that the model featured had stood up pretty well.

The locomotive kit is a Nonneminstre Models whitemetal Planet Diesel. Mine runs on a re-wheeled Tenshodo SPUD (another article a couple of months earlier) but most interestingly, is assembled with Superglue.

To many modellers, or at least many of the vocal ones at shows it seems, are suspicious of Superglue. It's too new fangled for them. Not strong enough. Will fall to pieces after a few minutes. You'd be better off with solder. Or nails. Or if you must use glue (looks to heavens at my stupidity) then something involving boiled bovines or fish is what you need.

These same people of course will extol the virtues of 1960's H&M controllers and deny that any form of technology has moved on in the last 50 year - a bit like their wardrobe or opinions on personal grooming.

The truth is that if you use a good glue, my oft stated preference being for Zap-a-Gap, then it will last. The loco in the photo is 15 years old and as good as it was when I built it . Use some rubbish from the pound shop and yes you can expect trouble. After all they aren't going to invest in lots of R&D when you are paying 10p a tube including the cost of tube, packaging, delivery and profit, are they ?

While digging out this photo I got a bit carried away with the Photoshopping (actually Paintshop Pro V7, but we'll stick with the genericised term) hence the sky "borrowed" from Flickr and the extended building (you can see how much here) as the micro layout didn't allow for a full depth building but this looks really odd from this angle in the photograph. I won't normally do this as it's (IMHO) cheating to improve modelling with electronic trickery but this is my Blog so I my rules apply.

Melbridge Box Company on ModelRailway.TV

It's live - 5 minutes or so of me talking without a script about the Box file layout. Actually, it's not quite as bad as it sounds, the filming is very impressive with lots of different angles and everything. The final sequence where the layout is packed away is the best bit but you'll need to log in (subscription required) to see this.

See a short excerpt of me waffling here.

ModelRailway.TV

This post was going to start with the lyrics from the theme of the TV series Fame. Then I took a look at them and realised just how rubbish they are, so nuts to that.

The reason for this trip into 80's nostalgia was that I have just made a bid for a bit of fame myself. Last Friday I visited the studios of Ashdown TV, home of several handicraft based Internet TV channels. With me was Melbridge Dock and The Melbridge Box Company as I was going to be filmed for ModelRailway.TV

The studios are in a business centre near Arundel. We parked up and met the crew, Jaspar and Tug who were camera, sound and studio engineers for the day. After a little discussion about the viability of getting the bulky Dock boards up a spiral staircase, the layout were taken upstairs by a straight run of steps and down a corridor. This was a bit of a surprise as downstairs is half a shed which normally acts as the set for programmes. Apparently this has been a bit over-exposed and the guys wanted to use the proper studio which allows for much better lighting.

Most of the Dock was set up. We didn't use the lighting or fascia - that later would have been in the way of the bank of ceiling lights that were carefully positioned. They felt these would be a better bet than a couple of Ikea spots ! Apart from a sticky point motor and a dry joint - both easily remedied - things were working well. That's more than can be said for the looks. We'd obviously put the model away with a touch of damp in it last time as mould spores were growning in the plastic cobbles ! These rubbed off OK with a bit of work from a damp handkerchief and stiff paint brush. I'll be taking a better look at this in the future. For now the layout is stored without any wrapping, it normally lives in a plastic bag, to let the air circulate.

Once set up there was another surprise. Previous films had involved the layout owner and an interviewer. No one had mentioned it but I didn't get someone asking questions, the plan was for me to do the piece single handed. After a little planning my hospital radio waffling experience combined with the practise afforded by giving a few conference presentations stood me in good stead. I was asked for ten minutes and didn't shut up for twenty. One take, mostly remembering to look into the correct camera and hopefully not sounding too stupid. The crew were nice and said it sounded good, but I expect that the editing process will involve a certain amount of turd polishing.

After I'd finished one of the cameras went on a boom, the other was augmented with a macro lens and lots more filming ensued. Trains ran back and forth so all the camera positions could be tried. Being a bit of a novice here, I was particularly impressed with the camera on the boom which swung along the frontage as well as giving helicopter views..

Lunch (sandwiches) was followed by filming for the box file. Again I gave it my spiel, mostly about micro layouts this time, and again this seemed to go OK. We've put a nice shot together for the end - me packing up the model and walking off.

The whole process took about 6 hours. I've no idea how long the finished product will be but will let you know once it's live. Unless I look like a complete idiot, in which case I'll be keeping quiet.