422 Models 4-wheel coach kit
Purchased and reviewed by Mike Baker
In need of a grounded coach body to act as a mess room, I looked around the internet to see what was available.
This resin 4-wheel freelance coach kit by 422 models seemed ideal, and at £23.00 plus £3.50 P&P, I thought this would fit the bill without having to throw away too much underframe detail. The kit comprises resin castings for sides, ends, buffer beams and solebars with W irons and axleboxes, a preformed plastic card roof, and an A4 instruction sheet.
The builder is left to provide interior partitions, seating, floor and any other details required. The rears of the axleboxes are cast blind, so to complete a running coach either the rear of each axlebox will need to be drilled to fit a brass bearing, or an inside bearing type compensation unit could be used. The roof was accurately formed to the end profile, and just needed trimming to length. The resin components naturally needed a little cleaning up.
The parts as supplied
Removing the raised mouldings on the doors
Close up of spring and axlebox
A slight disappointment was that below the waist the door shuts were represented as a raised moulding rather than a groove. This is not difficult to rectify using a flat blade in a craft knife to remove the raised detail, and a scrawker to add the grooves. Whilst doing this I ran the scrawker up to the tops of the doors as above the waistline there are grooves, but not so welldefined. I took care to preserve the moulded hinges. Assembly was quite straightforward using fiveminute epoxy.
I measured and cut a floor from balsa which kept the coach square during assembly. The mouldings are designed for the ends of the coach to fit over the sides, rather than between them. The thickness of the ends means that the panelling is set a little further from the end of the coach than perhaps it should be, but with careful sanding and a little filling it looks fine.
As I was building the kit as a grounded coach, which was to be a mess room and store, I did a little research to find a few examples, which of course are many and varied. The main difference seems to be in the solebars. Some examples retained them, whilst others seem to be planted without them. I am not sure how the body held together without them, but it seems they did. I decided to use the solebars as, being prudent, I could see little point in throwing them away.
I therefore removed the W irons from the solebars, along with some of the plates and boltheads holding them on.
I only fitted one interior partition, cut from 1mm plastic card. The buffer beams needed trimming to length and I filled the indents, which can be drilled through to locate the buffers.
I added some interior detail, consisting of a table, a couple of benches and a stove, with a fluepipe from brass tube. One of the droplights was boarded over by cutting up a coffee stirrer. The door handles came from the spares box, and only fitted to two doors each side. The body was mounted on C&L sleepers.
The resulting model is quite pleasing, and although the mouldings are not as crisp as an etching or an injection moulding, I think it gives the model a rather rustic appearance, which just what I was looking for. For anyone who is prepared to source some extra details and make up the footboards, these could be a very economical way of providing a rake of coaches for a light railway etc. A range of kits is available from this manufacturer, and their website is definitely worth a visit.
