I've had a box of the original model Hornby MGR wagons for quite a while now, collecting them every now and then when they come up at a good price. Although not up to the spec of the later version of the Hornby model (which still seems to fetch a ridiculous price on a certain well known auction sites) in a decent rake and with a bit of 'fettling' and detailing they look pretty good to me. They're never going to win any awards for fine detail, but for the price and the fact there's nothing else out there at the moment to compete with, I figured I'd have a go at making a decent rake of them for Cradley Bridge. It also gives my Class 56 and Class 58 Railfreight locos something to haul.
I'm hoping to end up with a train consisting of around 18-24 MGR wagons. Probably a little short to accurately reflect a rake of the real things, but more than enough to run on a small to medium size layout. The plan is to finish most of them in Railfreight livery - all the models i currently own are of the later EWS variant - so a spot of repainting is in order. I also intend to bring the detail up a bit on them - mainly by changing the awfully tiny moulded Hornby buffers for more accurate cast ones. I'm also going to change the way the wagons couple to each other. In a change to my usual method of using scale instanter 3-link couplings (which I will still use on the end wagon) I have decided to build my own wire and loop coupling to not only make it cheaper to do but also to utilise Hornby's self centering bogie configuration that the early models are fitted with (I've also adapted this slightly too) and to cut down on the inherent 'wobble' that all the early models seem to suffer. The rake will also be run as a loaded train. I managed to find some cheap plastic 'coal load' inserts which I've adapted and when covered with real crushed coal they look pretty realistic.
The wagons were first all stripped down to their component parts. Starting with the frame the underscale buffers were all removed and replaced by these cast whitemetal Oleo buffers (Inter City models) which instantly makes a difference. Dummy plastic hooks (taken off other models when I've fitted scale couplings) were then fitted and also copper wire was fashioned to represent the air pipes. I normally go overboard on the detailing with pipes etc., but figured that in a close coupled rake you'd be hard pushed to see any of the 'lesser' detail going on between the wagons and so decided to just super detail the end wagon - complete with flashing light (Express Models).
Next to sort out was the actual cradle that supports the hopper. As I mentioned, all the examples I have are in EWS livery and for this particular rake I wanted to backdate it a bit to the Railfreight era so as to give some of my earlier models something to haul. This meant that all the cradles were going to be repainted in Railfreight red - with a couple of them finished in yellow to add a bit of variety. So first off all the cradles were given a quick spray with Halford's excellent plastic primer followed by a couple of coats of thinned paint.
My adaptation to Hornby's axle. Nothing more than a piece of wire glued across each axle which still allows for a bit of adjustment and flex, but seems to stop any unnecessary movement and make the whole wagon far more stable. The splatterring of paint on the wheels is from Hornby's original weathering and nothing to do with my sloppy painting!!
I decided to brush paint the cradles as i wanted them to look a bit patchy but also to try out some new synthetic brushes I'd bought from Expo tools and I must say I'm well impressed with both them and the result. I didn't paint the inside or underside of the cradles as you won't see any of that once the hopper is in position.
