Locomotive
Gallery -
Page 2
Model railway locomotive and rolling stock construction in gauges 4mm / 00 and 3.5mm /. HO, plus 7mm, 1/4 inch and 1/45 scale Gauge O. Work also undertaken in Gauge 1 10mm and 3/8 inch scales. Special expertise in the narrower gauges and in outside frame prototypes.


LBSCR E2 class
LBSCR class "E2" 0-6-0(scale 1/76), 16.5mm OO gauge. Model featured in British Railway Modelling magazine.

Early Work .....

Some of these models here date back to the late-1980s if not earlier, well before the advent of digital photography, so the images have had to be scanned from old-fashioned prints. Colour film was an expensive commodity then, and besides, if you submitted a picture to the model railway press, they would want in it black and white anyway....

Over the years, I've lost track of the engines that passed through my hands. There were a number of K's (Keyser) kits including the evergreen 14xx, and even that rarity the outside-framed 'Aberdare' mogul. Also models from Nu-Cast, Bristol Models, GEM (George E. Mellor), and even several of the Craftsman locomotives with their then-innovative etched brass fold-up chassis' and valve gear frets.

Wills - a range still with us under the Southeastern Finecast banner - and BEC (of Tooting Broadway..) are other names that come to mind, not to mention a solitary BEMO narrow gauge example from Germany, and a series of Tyco and Model Die Casting 'screw-together' kits from the USA that I was asked to assemble and re-detail. From the more obscurer side of the tracks there was stuff from the smaller suppliers - some of which I was good-naturedly prodded into making up by Model Railway Journal - including Nonneminstre and Wrightlines.

NWNG  0-6-4 Hunslet
NWNG 0-6-4 Hunslet "Beddgelert" (scale 1/76), 9mm OOn9 gauge Model in OO9. Chivers (UK) kit on Minitrix N chassis with outside frames. Rear bogie is sprung and also arranged for additional current pick up.

NWNG 0-6-4 single Fairlie
NWNG 0-6-4 single Fairlie (scale 1/76), 9mm OOn9 gauge. Model in OO9, Chivers (UK) kit on Lilliput U HOe 0-6-2. The front 'bogie' is in fact fixed and does not pivot, but the subterfuge is not noticable when the model is in motion. Photgraphed in 'works grey'.

NWNG 0-6-4 single Fairlie
Bowaters Bagnell 0-6-2 "Triumph" (scale 1/76), 9mm OOn9 gauge Model in OO9, Chivers (UK) kit with outside frames, Japanese flat can motor and flywheel. Currently in the care of the OO9 Society and to be seen in their showcase of landmark models in this scale. The late Bob Barlow of MRJ and more recently Narrow Gauge and Industrial Railway Review, noted of this locomotive back in the late 1980s that it was 'One of the nicest examples of an industrial narrow gauge locomotive' he had seen.

Metropolitan Water Board, Kew, London, 0-4-2
Metropolitan Water Board, Kew, London, 0-4-2 (scale 1/76), 9mm OOn9 gauge. Model in OO9 from Roxey Mouldings (UK) kit, outside frames and walschaerts valve gear, Bachmann (US) chassis. From memory, I spent the best part of a week filing up trhe various rods and links to make up the valve gear from small bits of nickle-silver sheet and fusewire rivets

Porter 0-4-0 standard saddle tank, class BS
Porter 0-4-0 standard saddle tank, class BS, 18 ton (scale 1/48), 16.5mm On30 Model for On30 (American 1/48 scale), Grandt Line plastic kit, Faulhaber motor, Kadee couplers. Spark ararrestor is turned brass and fine gauze, all soldered together as a unit and then located into kit's injection moulded stack.

TR Fletcher-Jennings 'Tal-y-Llyn' 0-4-2
TR Fletcher-Jennings 'Tal-y-Llyn' 0-4-2, (scale 1/76), 9mm OOn9 gauge Model for OO9 from Parkside-Dundas kit, Japanese open frame 5-pole with flywheel. Sharman wheels were used on these instead of the Ibertrain ones - which were the right size for the protoype - necessitating the boiler and tank to be lowered by about 2mm to compensate. Featured in Model Railway Journal, and now in the posession of a Japanese collector.

VoR No. 8 'Llywelyn'
VoR No. 8 'Llywelyn' (above) and No. 9 'Prince of Wales' (below) Great Western (Swindon) built 2-6-2 tanks (scale 1/76), 9mm OOn9 gauge. Both models for OO9 from Backwoods Miniatures kit, etched brass construction, flywheel motors.

VoR No. 8 'Llywelyn'
Actually, there was a third locomotive in this series 'built for stock', and which remained incomplete, requiring only the valve gear and cylinders to be assembled. This had a much higher level of detailing (as if that were possible...) to its two earlier siblings. For some reason I disposed of the model via eBay some time ago, and I don't now know its whereabouts, except that it went to a very gifted individual who was developing CAD models of some of the Ffestiniog locomotives back in 2005 or 2006.


VoR No. 8 and 9 together
........And here are the same pair reunited 20 years or so later at Devils Bridge, on the layout of Rachel & Eddie Fields. Still apparently running as sweet as the day I packed each one away in their boxes for the last time prior to delivery to their new owners. ....(Picture copyright Steve Mann, taken at the Warely National Model Railway Exhibition in November 2016)