Modelling in the Public Eye

It all started with an electrical problem on my van. I had just had it back after having some work carried out and every time I put the lights on, a fuse blew. Normally this wouldn't be a problem, but we were booked to take "Melbridge Dock" to the Sutton Coldfield exhibition the next day and it won't go in the back of my Beetle. Anyway a series of "We're not coming", "We are coming" phone calls to the exhibition organiser ensued. Once we had reached the final decision that travel was impossible, it occurred to me that we could offer to demonstrate some modelling to fill the space. "Give us a couple of four foot tables and we'll entertain the crowds" I suggested, an offer that was eagerly accepted.

Once you are booked to do a demo, then you really need to decide what to do. Some people are experts in one area of modelling and so find this easy. Me, I build anything "reasonably" but am an expert in nothing. In the past though, this has been an advantage as the average modeller can relate much better to someone able to talk about lots of things than, for example the man who has made a life study of the lining on GWR carriages and can reproduce it with a blunt bow pen and a pot of paint collected from Swindon sixty years ago. I usually set off with examples of most types of kit (etched brass, whitemetal, plastic etc) of both wagons and loco's and various materials. I take my modelling board which incorporates a OO gauge test track and sit and build things while people ask me questions. To try and help I have some signs that make it clear that I here to be asked questions and not just looking to spend a couple of days modelling.

I delved into the cupboard full of things to do (every modeller has got one of these, even if it is only a couple of kits in a box, strange how these things need to "mature") and pulled out some kits including a Vulcan kit for an 04 diesel and a Centre Models kit for an Avonside 0-4-0. Both were complete and apart from a little work on the Avonside, untouched. My plan was to start to build one of these. Always try to agree with the other demonstrators, if there are any, what you will be working on as a line of people building the same wagon kit would be a little monotonous for most people. Fortunately we were the only ones demonstrating so while I built loco's, my father planned to build track or buildings as the mood took him.

On arrival at the show, we found our tables and brought the goodies in. All the stuff we needed (or thought we might need) fitted in the car nicely. We had both brought too much but then that is the penalty of trying to cover everything it always helps to have an example, which means a lot of bits. We set-up our "stall" and had a few minutes to wander round before opening. It is a good idea to know which traders are present as people want to know how to do something and then where to buy it from, and they don't appreciate it much if you don't know. For this reason, anything that requires access to a commodious "scrapbox" is a bad thing to demonstrate to my way of thinking.

As the doors were flung open, we sat down and started work. I decided to look at the Avonside first as it was an old style white metal kit and could, I thought be put together with superglue rather than the soldering (with associated fumes and the presence of a hot iron) the 04 kit would require for its chassis. The box was opened and parts examined. I had bought this kit new a couple of years earlier but it was old stock and I had never heard of the manufacturer. The only reason I had it was that it was cheap and I liked the prototype. When I say "old style kit" I mean that it had a solid whitemetal chassis and a K's motor (Arrrggghh !! I hear many a modeller cry, we remember K's motors, and not with affection). The instructions centred around an exploded diagram of the model and I brought some books with prototype photo's in. I had stopped work on the kit first time round, because the motor would not fit in the hole intended for it and at the time I wasn't motivated to find a solution. This time, I was a little more committed and besides, had an audience to play to so thought I had better do something. This was ten minutes from the start of the first day so we were suprised to have people in front so quickly. Most seemed happy to just watch someone work although I was already having to bluff some answers to questions about what I was about to do. It is a good idea to have a couple of chairs in front of the table so that anyone wanting to chat can sit down and doesn't have to tower over you and get buffeted by the crowd roaming in search of a bargain/another GWR branch line to watch.

Since I had bought the kit I had acquired a triangular scraper and some "lemonade damaged" needle files (Moral, soft drinks and metal objects don't mix, don't spill soft drinks on your tools unless you want them very rusty very fast) that I use for whitemetal filing. The scraper was used to dig out enough metal to get the motor in fairly quickly. I then fitted the bearings and wheels (Romford). The motor was screwed in and the Romford gears fitted. A little power and the wheels went round first time ! I must admit that this impressed some onlookers but was more down to luck and the manufacturer, still it was more interesting than me looking puzzled at some brass bits with solder on them. Coupling rods went on next and seemed to fit nicely. I tack soldered the retaining nuts on to hold them in place and ran my chassis up and down the test track holding on to its fly leads. It looked nice and generated some interest. "Is that a K's motor ?" was a popular question, although I had to keep explaining that I would not normally use one and preferred a Mashima. I had brought some finished loco's and used these as visual aids to explain how the different chassis went together. By this time it was apparent that there were a lot of locomotive kits in drawers which people were a little scared of. At least one visitor had a Bayer Garret which he had owned for a while and not started. I suggested starting with a simpler kit and working up to this.

The cylinders needed drilling for slide bars and piston rod. At this point I should say I jigged the whole lot up on a pillar drill and did it properly. Well as you might expect, there wasn't one handy so I used slightly oversize drills in pin chuck. As assembly was to be with "Zap-a-Gap" superglue (only available from FourTrack models as far as I know), the small gaps left would be filled and allow me a little leeway as far as precision working was concerned. I worked on a side at a time and stuck the cylinder in position then the slide bars and finally the motion brackets. Now I made new brackets as the kit ones had too much flash around them and I had some plasticard handy ("What's that stuff" I was asked) A couple of people were interested in the idea that you didn't have to use all the kit parts and could substitute better ones if you wanted, although at least one had read this in magazines and books and had formed the impression that when you bought a kit you then replaced most of the bits you had paid for, this is a little unfair as most are pretty good and I don't often have to replace things for duff quality reasons. The cross heads attached to the con rod with a small bolt, the nut of which was glued to the cross head and the hole in the rod was opened up enough to allow free movement. At this point it is important to remember to make sure there is not too much piston rod so the whole lot can travel as far as the crank throw wishes to push it. Obviously too little rod will cause an embarrassing failure here so care is required. My oversize holes allowed the piston to move freely enough so the whole lot was glued together. I like to use as little glue as possible and so was putting some on the corner of the modelling board and picking it up with an old tiny screwdriver. This isn't a new trick but was news to one visitor who had had problems with glue not setting and getting the works stuck together. We also discussed types of glues and suppliers, he was of the opinion that the glue you can buy on most markets for 50p a tube was as good as the stuff in the shops but cheaper, and I have to admit I agree but think Zap-a-Gap is cheaper still (you get a big bottle) and the nozzle doesn't block up so easily. Anyway, on the loco I had one working side of waggly bits and so proceeded to do the other side, which as usual took half the time it had taken to do the first ones. Most of the castings were nice and clean but I had managed to get one cylinder on slightly wonky so broke it off (doesn't superglue break cleanly !) an put it back on again properly adjusted. By the middle of the afternoon I had a running chassis (albeit with fly leads) trundling up and down the test track. The next job was to pinch a PCB sleeper from next doors ever popular "Build a Point" demo and stick some of it to the bottom of the chassis. A length of phosphor bronze wire (I did remember to bring this - it's the best stuff for pickups) was bent up for one side and a wire run to the motor for it. The other side's pick up was through the chassis and the wire to the motor was just melted into the chassis block. A little tweaking and it ran ! This is something of a record for me as apart from some tinkering and cleaning of the motion, everything worked first time. No brake gear was supplied so I left it for later. The naked chassis was certainly popular. A couple of children were fascinated by it. They were obviously with exhibitors as they kept returning to see how I was getting on and chastised me for slow progress !

With a couple of hours to go before the end of the first day I couldn't stop so the foot plate was cleaned up and the fixing nuts were glued on. I checked it sat on the chassis properly - it was at this point I noticed the cylinder mentioned above. The buffer beams seemed a good bet next so the buffers came out for cleaning. They are a distinctive shape and I doubted that even if anyone did a sprung replacement it would be available at the show (although I was amazed what was) but as the springing effect is negated by me sticking a bar across the buffer heads for the couplings anyway I didn't worry. I just sometimes prefer sprung buffers for the sharpness of the heads. One buffer beam didn't seem to want to go on straight and took me three goes to get right. I would prefer to solder these in place for strength, but didn't have a 12V iron so the glue had to do. In practice it hasn't mattered. I did check that the foot plate was flat before all this as whitemetal is notorious for twisting. Cab front and sides quickly appeared and then the terrible discovery happened, THERE WAS NO SADDLE TANK IN THE KIT !!! I suddenly thought that this must be the reason that the kit was cheap and I hadn't spotted this earlier as I didn't check all the parts against the list. Now the crowds were still with us so I had to think fast, fortunately were are not involved in rocket science so all I needed to do was build half a cylinder of the right diameter. An Airfix "Pug" kit had been brought along and so I looked at that - the saddle tank would be just the right size if I used a plasticard wrapper, no problem. Now this was a kit in it's original box and although it might seem stupid, I didn't want to cannibalise it for this so I searched the stands to find a Dapol one, guess what, the last one had been sold earlier in the day ! A couple of people offered to look overnight and one even volunteered an old built model that he thought he had. I knew I had one at home as well so this looked the way things were going. Anyway it was time to go home.

Day two, and I arrived with an unsuspecting old pug model and was presented with a motorised pug that had a Triang TT mechanism in it as another candidate, fortunately one trader had found his last Dapol kit which I bought and was delighted not to have to break up any models. The saddle tank was taken out and assembled. Chimney and dome were cut off and the rivets were filed off. Next a drop hammer riveter was used to put rivets on three strips of the thinnest plastic I had available. If you have not seen one of these tools, it is a length of studding with a point on the end with some nuts on it and a weight that is lifted up and dropped to force the point into whatever is below it. The nuts allow you to produce rivets of regular size by ensuring the weight is lifted to a consistent height. I bought mine from Eileens Emporium but London Road Models also do one. The riveting process was explained several times to interested viewers but eventually I had done enough and the plastic was stuck to the tank, I overdid it a little with the solvent and faced some interesting filing later but pressed on with adding the tank and smokebox. I think it took five goes to get this arrangement to sit right but was eventually satisfied.

At this point a visitor sat on the chairs in front and asked if I would have a look at a loco he had, I agreed and he produced a Wrenn GWR loco (a King I think but they all look the same to me) in reasonable condition. He said it had not run for a long while and when he had tried it , it was juddery. Now I am a little nervous around Wrenn loco's due to their value and was a little cautious with the model. It was placed in a PECO loco cradle and the fly leads were used to turn the wheels under power. It needed it's wheels cleaning but this wasn't the only problem . With the owners permission (I also made sure he knew I was no expert on the things) I separated body and chassis and everything looked OK. Wrenn models are very well built so I didn't expect to find much wrong. All the motor and gear bearings were oiled and everything gradually freed up until the re-assembled loco was trundling up and down the track like a good 'un. Off went a happy owner well pleased with his visit.

One thing with demonstrating is that you need to keep your work area tidy. Apart from giving a good impression to the public, you need to bear in mind that they are liable to pick things up and if these things are sharp or hot they invariably get hurt. No amount of "Do not touch" signs stop this so better safe than sorry. With this in mind I had kept the packing from the kit out of the way as soon as I opened the box. A couple of the operators from a layout turned up and started chatting and I was showing something that caused me to knock some small parts on the floor which I had to scrabble around to find (this is a modelling demo so might as well show the whole gammit of the modellers art !) and I had to move one of the bits of packing tissue. This tissue seemed heavy and somewhat solid so it came onto the bench and was properly examined. Inside was the saddle tank for the loco ! I was not impressed, told the operators to go away and play trains and went and got a cup of tea while considering my next move. Now while I liked my home brewed effort, It still wasn't quite right and the kit parts were heavier, which I felt was important in a small loco. To this end the kit tank was assembled and replaced the plastic one. I intend to turn this into a wagon load so the effort will not be entirely wasted.

Now with the loco looking more and more complete, small fittings went on. The instructions were vague about exactly how the safety valve/dome assembly went together so I made an educated guess with the aid of photographs. Handrails knobs replaced the split pins supplied and three link chain on etched hooks finished the buffer beams. Chassis detailing amounted to some plastic brake shoes on scratch built hangers. An expensive (well £1 seems a lot for something so small although the quality is excellent) smokebox dart replaced the laughable kit part and the "finished" model was run up and down the track for the rest of the day. As we were nearly at closing time I thought I had done pretty well, a new loco built in a weekend.

All through the show we had an audience, indeed the novelty of seeing people work was almost better than layouts for some visitors. One gentlemen was suprised that I didn't have a spring for a Hornby loco he asked me to have a look at but at least I could point him in the right direction to find it. The exhibition manager was pleased as he hadn't been able to get near us for most of the show for the crowd. Many of the club members had been in to ask questions. Whilst neither of us can be considered an authority on anything, if we had an example we were happy to show what we had done and explain why we did it like that. The rest is up to the individual, learn by our mistakes is the attitude. I had to decline the offer by one gentleman, to make up a kit proffesionaly for him as I think my methods don't stand comparison to the real experts in our hobby. I learned quite a bit about Centre Models, they went out of business years ago but made several industrial prototypes including the 0-6-0 version of the kit I built, so I shall be looking out for those. I can recommend building things at a show because you can go and get most of the bits that should be in the kit, or that you have forgotten or broken trying to assemble. The time went surprisingly quickly, the only downside is that with a layout you get to look around during breaks, but you can't take breaks so easily when modelling as no one can just take over - mind you it would be tempting to take a break when you get to a difficult bit if they could ! The most important thing is not to get too engrossed as the modelling is secondary to the talking. Finally to those who say "I would love a couple of days modelling like that", remember that you can't chuck the kit back in a box when you get stuck and leave it until another day, there are PEOPLE watching !

Postscript

The loco was sprayed with car primer and brush painted Humbrol "Grass Green" with red buffer beams and lightly weathered. A Langley castings crew and a few Springside bits were added to give a bit more detail and hide the minimal cab interior. Jackson Evans plates were repainted with a red background (strip the old paint off, paint red and when dry rub on fine emery paper to clean up the letters and border), I chose the name "Green Arrow" as it was available at the show, the loco was green and it was built fast

Ó Copyrite Philip Parker 2000 - If you are interested in publishing this, or any other article I have written, please get in touch.