Claptowte Railway - Passenger Coach No 4

[David1226]

The practice of kit bashing a bogie passenger coach out of a pair of LGB Toytrain 4-wheel coaches is well documented and illustrated. It is intended to build a pair to run on the Claptowte Railway. I decided to go one further and construct a couple of Brake/Third coaches out of one 4-wheel coach and one balcony van. I have never seen that done before, and having started the conversion, I can see why. There are two main pitfalls to overcome. For starters the heights of the vehicles are different , necessitating a plasticard infill along part of the bottom edge of the van, which then has to be scribed to match the planking. The other problem is that roof profile radii are different, necessitating further plasticard infill with much carving, filing and sanding to make them match up. As the roof designs are dissimilar a new full length roof had to be fabricated from plasticard. This turned the conversion into a real labour of love.

The photos below show the donor vehicles before any modification. LGB Toytrain 4-wheel coach and van with balcony.











Interior views







David

 

[PhilP]

I guess this one is one you will not repeat David?

I may well start asking awkward questions as this one goes on..

 

[David1226]

The next set of photos show the conversion of the underframes into one bogies mounted frame

A pair of un modified Toytrain frames



Close-up of an un-modified frame



The first stage is to saw off the dummy W irons and axel boxes



Next cut out the unwanted bits either side of the centreline, keep and clean up the tank for re-use later.





Now cut out the centre buffer, from the non-balcony end, and clean off any raised mouldings so that the two frames can be glued/bolted together at this end. I keep the salvaged buffers and vacuum pipes to use when modifying my LGB US outline coaches.





David

 

[David1226]

The next stage is to construct the mounting points for the bogies. This was done using plasticard sheet of appropriate thickness to form a mounting plate and bearing surfaces. The pivot is a short length of plastic tube.




The bogies are fixed using a washer and self taping screw. I am using LGB US Passenger Trucks for the bogies. They are fitted with Al Kramer nickel plated solid turned brass wheels, which are the standard wheel across all Claptowte Railway stock.



The salvaged tank can then be cemented into the centre of the newly formed bogie frame.



David

 

[Paul M]

Looks good, looking forward to reading more

 

[David1226]

The two 4-wheel vehicle bodies are glued and bolted together to form one unit. The window openings have frame of 2x1mm plastic strip added in an attempt to Anglicise the appearance. The end railings have mesh added using expanded aluminium mesh as used with filler on damaged areas of motor vehicles. A GRS brass lamp iron is mounted atop of a plastic strip stanchion. A one piece roof was constructed from 2mm platicard. The roof is fitted out with GRS lamp tops and ventilation cowls. GRS guards duckets are glued over the side windows of the van. Plasticard strips are glued on at appropriate places to take various decals. The long side steps on the van have been replace with short ones from the spares box, to avoid fouling the rotation of the bogie.









David

 

[David1226]

Moving on to the interior, I disliked the height of the seat backrests, they were too high for my taste. To remedy this I made two saw cuts through the backs to cut out the board section, then re-glued the upholstered sections to make a seat of reduced height.





Below are some interior views of the modified seating.







David

 

[Paul M]

Looks great, from your opening comments you make it look easy

 

[playmofire]

Awesome is the word that comes to mind.

 

[ge_rik]

Very nice. Well up to your usual standard, David.

Rik

 

[Lobethalbahn2]

David, it is always a pleasure to see your reinterpretations of existing models into something unique. However, your construction posts are exemplary in the way you clearly document the process of how you create your models.

 

[simon@mgr]

Amazing build, the way you look at things is inspirational.

 

[dunnyrail]

Very nice job, would never have thought about cutting up underframes to fit the bogies. Great lateral thinking. Looking forward to the Paint Job and weathering.

 

[David1226]

Here are some photographs of the finished model having been painted, glazed and decals applied.






















David

 

[playmofire]

Excellent work. Thanks for sharing the stages of work.

 

[David1226]

I forgot to add that there will be another identical coach to this, No 3. Having thought out the construction of the first one, and having overcome several problems by trial and error, the second should be much easier and quicker to build. However, the premise behind No 3 is that it has been taken out of passenger revenue service, re-liveried in Engineering Green and transferred to the lines Engineering Department for use as a Tool/Mess van for use with the line's travelling crane.



David

 

[Paul M]

Well you certainly can't see the join now! Fantastic piece of modelling there

 

[PhilP]

Very nice, but I is confuddled???

Why have you started with numbers 6 and 4?

 

[David1226]

Very nice, but I is confuddled???

Why have you started with numbers 6 and 4?

Phil

Anyone can start at number one, starting at number six is obviously much more of a challenge. After that numbers 1 to 5 will be a piece of p**s.

David

 

[PhilP]

And at least with 6 and 4..
You have ended up with a perfect ten!