Some thought was now given to the kind of work the model would do. As the prototype was only a banking engine and only ever pulled a handful of trains, we agreed that the motor only needed to be strong enough to propel the model itself. An exchange of emails and several telephone calls to Brian Clapperton of ABC resulted in a suitable design for a gearbox and motor. A mock up of the assembly was constructed in card to check that the finished job would fit the models and two were ordered. I was assured that the chosen motor would be sufficient for the models to pull 60 wagons.

Motors and gearboxes

Card mock up for motor and gearbox Gearbox installed

Chassis construction (4 off) The chassis is quite an easy construction, but since there are two on each model this would be the part of the job with the most number of repeat items. The chassis frames (8 in total) were removed from the fret and etching cusps filed away. I used Martin Finney hornblocks and guides for their high level of detail, so 32 were constructed. It is important that hornblocks are a nice sliding fit in the cheeks of the guides, with no lateral movement, if a model is to run smoothly. These hornblocks were not quite square so I marked each bottom face was identified a centre punch mark and used colour coding to ensure each block was returned to the correct guide.

Holes of the appropriate size were cut in the chassis frames to accept Motors and gearboxes the hornguides, and the 4 chassis were assembled. The kit provided chassis etches with all the frame spacers in their prototypical positions which greatly aided their construction.

Four pairs of coupling rods were made, each jointed with Laurie Griffin’s pins and castellated nuts. These were used in conjunction with my trusty dummy axles (invaluable tools for any modeller) to locate and attach the axle box assemblies in the correct position The Alan Harris wheelsets provided had to be quartered by eye and secured with Loctite. I am quite happy to use this method of wheel assembly but it does mean that the hornblocks and any shims to control end float have to be positioned before the adhesive is applied. It does also mean that all the springs, brake rigging and sanding gear has to be detachable. Painting wheelsets after assembly is a little more challenging too, but least only one colour was needed! Four nice free running chassis were the reward for my patience, and I moved on to the chassis detail.

Frame and brakegear

One of four rolling chassis

Valve gear and cylinder

The laminated springs and hangers supplied in the kit were a little two dimensional, so I made my own pattern and 32 of them were cast in whitemetal. Syphons for the axlebox lubrication system were cast at the same time from another pattern I made. All these details would be added after painting. The pony trucks were assembled and attention turned to the brake system.

The kit includes very usable brake blocks and hangers and lozenge shaped stretchers, but nothing to represent the operating mechanism. A considerable amount of time and effort was spent scratchbuilding the brake rigging, from brake cylinders to pull shackles on the brake stretchers. Again I was aided with the use of many castings from the Laurie Griffin range.

The rest of the water tanks and coal spaces were a joy to construct as the etchings are very accurate. The only fault being the front unit upper tank being a little higher on the front than the sides, but that was easily corrected. Lots of rivet detail was added using the strips mentioned earlier. The vent pipes for the water tanks (different on each model) were scratchbuilt as the castings supplied were a little too large. The water treatment tanks on the front unit of the BR era model were added. The prototype has a ‘prop’ structure that sits on a chassis frame stretcher and supports the front (inner end) of the coal space. This is not in the kit and was scratchbuilt from brass sheet and the rivet strips. The mechanical lubricators supplied in the kit differed from those on the GA, so the correct Wakefield type (No. 7) were sourced from Hobbyhorse Developments and fitted. These had the potential to work, so, not wanting to miss a trick, I fabricated all the linkages. They achieve their movement from a crank on the inside of the expansion link, inboard of the motion bracket.

Tank under construction Tank installed on chassis.
I now had all the outer units finished and turned my attention towards the cradles that hold the cab and boiler structures.

The cradles themselves presented no problems in construction, aside from the fact that the models were getting quite large and unwieldy now. I worried that the centre portion of the finished models may not pivot properly on the chassis using the cast sockets and pins supplied in the kit. The cast sockets were difficult to bore out accurately and the pins were slightly oval. So replacement sockets were made in Tufnol, for insulation purposes, and the pins made in brass (all turned by Steve Ross). The completed cradles were fitted up to the chassis and the heights adjusted with shims until all sat well. A slight amount of tolerance was made in one of the Tufnol sockets on each model using a taper pin reamer to allow smooth passage over slightly uneven track.

Fireboxes

Boiler

Tufnol pivot Pivot Point

The cradles were detailed with water pipe connections that stick out of the front and rear. These would be connected up to the water tanks with a flexible connection after painting. The water balance pipes that run down the right hand side of the models were fashioned from the white-metal and brass castings supplied in the kit. Next the reversing rods were added down the left hand side of the cradle. Some brass Westinghouse pump castings were bought from Laurie Griffin and modified to represent the air operating tanks that work the reversing gear behind the left hand cradle frame.

The fireboxes, boilers and smokeboxes were made next. All were straightforward to make and fitted together very well using brass dowels to locate. Representations of the cladding joins and screws were made along the top of the fireboxes and boilers, and all the boiler bands and tightening cleats added. The smokebox saddles, whitemetal castings supplied in the kit, were cleaned up and added to the front spacers on the cradles.

The window frame sliders were made from U-section brass and soldered to the inside of the cab side windows. The cabs were then folded up and fitted to the cradles. When the boiler assemblies were offered up to the cabs they sat too low and had to be raised very slightly. Next, L-section brass was annealed and bent round the join between the spectacle plates and fireboxes.

Finally, all the detail on the cradles was completed, including the steps, remaining water pipes and the balance pipe vents that go up the rear of the cab and round the front of the smokebox.

I was unable to locate any photographs of the inside of the cab of this locomotive, so accurate modelling of the cab interior would be difficult. However, a picture exists of the engine during construction in Gorton Works erecting shop, and another showing the engine partly dismantled in Doncaster Works. A pattern for a backhead was made with references to these photographs using dimensions lifted from the GA. It was also based on a South African Garratt with the same boiler. Two copies were cast in whitemetal.

Backhead

The cab roof underside Lockers and cab doors

Richard Hardy, the President of the Great Central Railway Society, kindly drew me a layout of a typical Gresley backhead based on a P1 locomotive. Standard LNER fittings known to be used on this engine were specified and all the functions needed to operate the Garratt were fulfilled using this arrangement. All the castings needed to detail the backhead in this way were bought from Laurie Griffin and David Andrews. Two sets of fittings and associated pipe work were assembled and made detachable so that their metallic finish could be preserved through the painting process.

The rest of the fittings were added and included chimneys, domes, smokebox doors and handrails. Smokebox for 69999

In the paint shop

The models were dismantled and cleaned. This took a while as the models had been in construction for over a year and oxidation had begun to show. A liberal spraying of Viakal magically removed most of the deposits (thanks to Bob Alderman for this advice), a fibreglass pencil and scrubbing with Shiny Sinks removed the rest. The engines were masked where appropriate, then primed with Hycote aerosol acrylic paint.

The frame inners and bufferbeams were sprayed red, and the cab interior upper portions painted a stone colour. These areas were then masked up and the whole lot including the wheels airbrushed in Humbrol 85 black. Plates were added from Diane Carney, who produced the Beyer- Peacock maker’s plate from a picture of the original snapped in the NRM. I know these plates take a bit of time to cut out but they are the best available.

The extremely talented Diane also drew artwork for the BR model’s decals. These were the correct 69999 numbers (with curly tails) and BRITISH RAILWAYS for the cradle, all in the correct cream colour and outlined with a black pinstripe. She also produced artwork for the legends on the buffer beams. All this artwork was despatched to John Peck at Precision Labels, who produced very usable waterslide transfers on his ALPS printer. Finally the BR version was varnished and lightly weathered.

Painting the frames

The LNER version was more problematic. No commercial lining is available for blacklined- red LNER locomotives (as far as I am aware), so I had to spend quite some time producing artwork in CorelDraw for the thin red lines (they are 0.14mm, a scale 0.25in). This was very time consuming but did result in all the correct compound curves, especially round the cab front, which made them much easier to apply. John Peck of Precision Labels again printed the artwork on waterslide transfer paper. The lining transfers took about 35 hours to apply (it’s a big engine), but I think a very professional finish was achieved after varnishing. The lettering and numbers came from Fox Transfers. The BR version was fitted with a DCC chip and both models were adorned with coal.

In conclusion
I liked this kit, especially the etchings, and it produced two excellent representations of the real thing which were a lot of fun to build. The white-metal castings were of good quality, the lost-wax brass castings less so, which was disappointing, especially in a kit costing so much, and quite a lot of time and money was spent scratchbuilding or replacing these items.