I have now repainted the B1 (ex 61059) in its livery while acting as a carriage heating unit at Ipswich. Stripping the original paint was a real pain, but we got there in the end. It was then undercoated twice and top coated twice. All transfers are Fox and paints are Railmatch. The most important job next – weathering, I have two photos to get it as near as I can to the condition it served in. I will add the tender coal after weathering.

This was certainly a challenging job as the donor Loco left an awful lot to be desired, however I now have my O Gauge Carriage Heating B1 and that’s worth a lot to me.

This my latest purchase from Steamline. It is a very nice O Gauge Bachmann Brass Loco with an excellent finish. It is so good all I have to do is add the coal in the tender and give it a light weathering. I usually buy cheaper Locos that need a lot of TLC, but I really liked this Loco.

Having already made this Loco in OO – it was always my ambition to do one in O Gauge. After selling most of my OO early Green Diesels and purchasing replacement O Gauge Locos it became a must for me.

I never wanted to pay a lot of money on a Loco to distress it the condition Departmentals were at the end of their lives. I guess I have been looking at Exhibitions and on Ebay for over five years and everything was way out of my max budget of approx £400. Well last week a ‘The Right Price Loco Co’ came up on Ebay, the starting price was £280 for this very average loco build, but it suited my purpose. At the end of the day I did not want to wait any longer for this project – so I bid and got it for just over my target price. It was duly delivered after three days, but although packaged well, it had shed several bits during transit and it had become very poor quality.

Strangely enough it was quite a good runner! Especially as when completed it will sit at the end of a carriage siding. Since its arrival I have fashioned some missing parts, re-attached the loose parts and added some detail items that probably were not included in the original kit.

I have now undercoated and top coated the Loco and tender, with lining next. Below are some photos of the Loco so far and the OO one I did before. The OO one will be available to purchase once I have finished the O Gauge one. It is suitable for 1964-67 in this condition in East Anglia, but not with other Steam as the region was dieselised by 1964.

This is the last of the batch I recently weathered. This is a standard Heljan O Gauge release, but I have added Protoneo plates.

Again ‘Croft’ was a visitor to East Anglia on Aggregate trains and was seen several times. It has received a medium weathering to the frame and bogies, with the bodyside having a light dusting.

Heljan O Gauge 56063 – now weathered. Medium Bogies and frames and light sides, I chose this Loco as it was a regular visitor into East Anglia. The Railfreight livery application by Heljan was excellent and took the weathering very well.

This is a conversion of an O Gauge Class 31/4 back to a Class 31/1. 31128 is currently the only Class 31 with a mainline certificate. I stripped all the ETH equipment off the Loco, filled the holes, masked off the area and undercoated and top coated as necessary.

I have now given the Loco a light to medium weathering. Sadly the Heljan 31/4 does not come with snowploughs, so the Loco remains plough-less until I can source some.

Here we have an O Gauge Class 37 in ‘as delivered’ livery, about six months into service. It has received a medium weathering on the roof, frames and bogies but the bodyside has only received a light dusting. This assumes that some form of cleaning took place even when shedded alongside the disappearing steam locos. All detailing accessories were added and missing parts sourced and added.

My O Gauge Macintosh Tank Engine has now been weathered. It has received a medium coating of grime and a little highlighting. I used my airbrush and a few weathering powders,

This is my first first attempt to post on my new Computer – I think I have fathomed it all out – fingers crossed.

I have spent the last two days preparing and weathering ten pieces of O Gauge Stock – here is the first to be finished. This 08 was based at Eastfield and is in 1987 – 89 livery. This is a light to medium weathering.