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Friday, 8 May 2015

Bachmann James - Makeover!

Hi everyone.

Recently I've been tied up with a lot of different personal life stuff, but, finally got back into doing a bit of modelling.  Recently decided to give James a little bit of work, by making his cab open and detailed.



James' inner cab was basically a chunk of moulded plastic which I carefully cut out with a sharp craft knife. Inside the cab is the curcuitboard chip, which was unscrewed and placed further inside the body, making sure not to damage any of the wiring attatched to the motor.
The cab roof gently comes away, which made it easier to paint and add the inner cab detail, which i got from a spare Hornby Thomas body.


The holes pictured here, were filled in with blu tac and then painted over with humbrol acrylic matt black. This was given two layers of matt black and left to dry one after the other, until the inner cab looked like this.


Once the paint had dried, I then looked at picking out the copper pipe detail, which considering the limited space inside the James model, was a little tricky to pick out, but, using a thin tip brush, managed to apply the sopper paint to make the inside of the cab look more realistic.




Quite happy with how the effect looks now, just a shame that the Bachmann model has an enclosed cab, whereas Bachmann's Edward loco, has an open cab, but no detail, but being a fairly new model in the range, it makes doing the conversion yourself, more enjoyable, and with careful time and patience, the results will often be what you expect it to be if you keep an open mind. :)

Wednesday, 14 January 2015

The Adventure Begins - How Thomas became Sodor's #1 Engine!



All new animated special coming to DVD this year, telling the story of how Thomas became Sodor's number one blue tank engine, with a few Railway Series references added in,

Thomas in his LBSC livery when he first arrives on Sodor from the Mainland, James in his original black livery with red stripes. With a noticeable effect being that Thomas's cab number is 70, indicating the 70th Birthday of Thomas & Friends since 1945 when the Three Railway Engines book was first published by The Rev .W. Awdry.

It sounds and looks very promising, it will certainly be worth adding to a collectors DVD collection.



Hornby Thomas & Friends Revival for 2015

Our friend Chris Thomson has informed us that Hornby, as part of Thomas's 70th Birthday, will be releasing a new range of products this year, it had been thought for some time that Thomas & Friends had been discontinued from the Hornby catalogue, but, this is some real wonderful news, with hopes that it will as good as it used to be.




More details to come very soon, once we know more about the release dates and what is to be announced.

Monday, 12 January 2015

Logan is now more than a 'promotional' character.



Recent news has come about that Logan, is now more than just a promo model from the wooden railway book and model feature 'Logan and the Big Blue Engines'.
A recent video by Arc Productions has given fans great expectations that Logan will possibly be part of the Thomas and Friends television stories, with hopes that he will get featured when Season 19 airs in the fall of 2015.


Close up of Logan's chassis and wheel details


There had been a lot of speculation regarding Logan's character, being just a 'one-off' like many of the other previous characters that had come and gone in the television stories between 2009 and 2012, however, this video, with it's little back story detailing Logan's shape and characteristics, gives the indication he will probably be more than just a simple promo character, all we can do is wait for further confirmation from best sources, to whether Logan will remain a permanent addition to the Sodor fleet.

Thomas with Logan at the Shunting Yard