Sunstar OB Bedford bus: From road to rail

K

KandNWLR

Live steam on the indoor K&NWLR
It looks the part! Is it motorised? how did you do it ? I have the Southern Vectis version they are lovely models, but I would consider getting another to covert to motorised rail use.
 
Yup, it´s motorised with a battery pack (badly) hidden inside the coach at the back at the moment. I´ll post some pics of the underside once I get back home from the Alps. After some experimentation, it didn´t even need to have a bogie to get round corners.
 
She'd kill me if I did that to one of her buses!
 
I have never even seen a BR version. For ages I have been looking for the Yelloway's one but I either miss them or the price is astronomic, sometimes both! :o
 
That looks fantastic, as if it were meant to be. Love it. I wish a brave manufacturer would do some commercial stock in 1:20 or 1:18 to give a closer match to 15 and 16mm scales. Ok, it would be a bit of a monster in size and price. Suppose I could always take the "Father Ted" stance on perspective "those cows far away.....that cow near" to get over the reletive size problem.
Max
 
oww very nice.. more details please..
 
I was a bit worried about the scale at first, because my 1:24 vehicles look a little on the tichy side next to locomotives. But to be honest 1:18 tends to look too big on my NG layout. I let the size of the vehicle as a whole be my guide, and as you can see from the front on shot, it does "fill the space" and is more or less the same width as typical carriages. Combine this with wheels which make it sit higher than on the road, and I think it looks plausible in a Goldilocks kind of way (not too small, not too big ....). As requested, I´ll take some shots of the wiring, battery pack and the underneath, but I promise that there´s no magic involved!
 
OK. There is one problem with the Bedford OB, and that´s how to get it to fit 45mm gauge without engaging in major surgery between the wheels - there´s not much room for swiveling at the front. hence, no bogie or similar. This explains the positioning of the motor in a tube which can rotate a few mm either way, giving sufficient wobble room to get round (my) curves. The good thing however is the retractable sun roof, which allow room for inserting a battery pack with an on-off switch and a speed controller.


K&NWLR: OB Bedford railbus top view by kandnwlr, on Flickr


007 by kandnwlr, on Flickr
 
I reckon a brave man with a saw could also cut up an RM to make a nice Half Cab with a Trailer. Would look very County Donegal ish. If you look at the price of some kits, the conversions actually make some kind of fiscal sense.

Lovely Job.
JonD
 
dunnyrail said:
I reckon a brave man with a saw could also cut up an RM to make a nice Half Cab with a Trailer. Would look very County Donegal ish. If you look at the price of some kits, the conversions actually make some kind of fiscal sense.

Lovely Job.
JonD
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Have to check the height of the bridges, but I reckon that a double decker RM (in London Country livery) is doable. ;)
 
What a brilliant idea. Just had a look on evilbay and the cheapest buy it now for an RM is £110. I've got a couple in my garage somewhere -mint and boxed Vernon's pools and silver jubilee. Ifvanyones interested please pm me. I've also got a HUGE dual entrance single deck Mercedes ex remote control in non working mode with damaged wheels but great bodyshell for conversion scratch build. I guess the scale must be around 1/16th. Again please pm and I'll look out and photo at the weekend when my next day off.
 
KandNWLR said:
Have to check the height of the bridges, but I reckon that a double decker RM (in London Country livery) is doable. ;)
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May not have been very clear on this, I meant to slice the Roof Off to be the Trailer. Hence my Brave Man
JonD
 
That´s an interesting idea ..... now if only I could get hold of a second roof, then I could have two matching units. I did think about doing back to back Bedford OB buses (push-me-pull-you), as I would only have to have put in power to one, but in the end the price of the die-cast model is a little on the high side .... :-\
 
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