Author

James Petts

Date

10th March 2023

Reading Time

2 minutes

Since John completed work on EM gauge converting my class 16 (thank you, John), I have been working on weathering/detailing it and two more class 15s whose weathering I had not previously completed for our layout Orchard Wharf. The class 16 (D8405) was factory weathered, so there was not much weathering to do, but I did have to weather the route discs after fitting them (showing in both directions a local freight working): see here, here and here. I also fitted couplings, which can be seen in the latter photographs. These had to be drilled and glued into the chassis (still allowing the body to be removable), as there was no space underneath for a brass plate, unlike on the class 15s.

A class 15 that I had started weathering some time ago (D8229) I weathered further and repaired some missing details (unfortunately entirely losing one of the plastic steps in the process). See here, here, here, here and here for pictures of the locomotive as weathered. This is what the real D8229 looked like in 1968 and this in 1969. I am not sure how best to get the staining patterning on the front end as I struggle with freehand painting of specific shapes.

Another class 15 that had not previously been weathered at all, D8208 (which I had renumbered myself using custom transfers from Railtec) I have now weathered. This weathering is intended to be a little more subtle than that of the other locomotives, as this represents the class earlier in its career, with the full green ends with no yellow. However, even in their earlier days, they could get quite grimy, as shown by this photograph of the real D8208 in 1960. My weathering can be seen here, here, here, here, here and here.

The whole grimy lineup can be seen here and in the header picture. I have also applied some very light weathering to my Bachmann class 20 (see here), although I am not sure that I have got the pattern of dirt around the exhaust right and would appreciate any guidance on this.