A set of photos illustrating some changes I have made to five of my Hatton's I.C.I. hopper models. Why would you want to take a scalpel and file to a lovely £25 model I hear you ask? Well it is simply to model a version that has not been produced by Hatton's. Essentially there were three batches of 23 tonne hopper wagons built by Charles Roberts for I.C.I., the first a batch of 84 wagons built between 1936 and 1939 with small I C I cast letters and fitted with diamond (aka Baldwin) frame bogies with oil pad bearings; the second batch of 36 built from 1945-47 with larger I C I cast letters but this time fitted with stronger plate-back frame bogies that allowed an extra tonne of limestone to be loaded. So the first 120 wagons were otherwise identical bar the letters and bogies as noted and this is what the Hatton's models represent. The third batch for I.C.I. started in 1951 and was only 32 wagons, however there was a slight change to the original design possibly to strengthen the wagons. Two of the side stanchions or ribs, gussets were switched around and in doing so the spacing was altered slightly. This is only on one-side of the wagons, the side with the hopper doors operating handles, the other side with the through vacuum pipe was unchanged. Secondly, the supporting member that sits under each end of the sloping body where it meets the chassis was beefed up considerably compared to the first 120 wagons. And it is these changes that I am modelling, by moving the ribs that are glued into the body molding with pips, removing and replacing the riveted strip and associated flanged edge (think of an L shape attached onto body along long edge of L and short edge sticking out - these strips secure the body panels together using rivets), then swapping the two ribs over to represent the correct pairing as per the real wagons. I am in two minds whether to see if I can get the supporting members made in 3d to save time and fiddly little bits of metal and plastic. I have done the rib and rivet strip changes without too much damage to the original brown weathered finish just needs a bit more touching in to complete. Then just the supporting members. I am going to do a bit more radical conversion to make the Summers/British Steel versions as these were nearly 7 inches lower in height and shorter in body length, but with the same rib/rivets/supporting member differences.. still on the decision plan stage for those and donor models awaiting the chop or two eekk. Cheers Paul

Posted by pharrc20 at 2021-05-16 15:57:56 UTC