Little Known NZ120 Products

(provided by ECMT)


(provided by ECMT.)
Promodel made a card kit of an NZR Class A No.2 Station a few years ago.
While card kits aren't to everyone's taste, these particular kits were quite well done, especially from a 2 foot viewing distance !
A nice kit, but a little bit fiddly if you haven't a steady hand while wielding a sharp scalpel !


I pimped my kit with added extras like gutters, down pipes, louvres in the toilet windows, screen mesh, chimney flashing, and a poster and blackboard copied from the back of a Journal.
Unfortunately the range was never expanded, and the current range is no longer available as far as I'm aware.
Contact with the manufacturer may yield results.
http://homepages.ihug.co.nz/~procter/CAT997.HTM

( this is the first of what will hopefully be a sizable collection of reviews on Nz120 kits that are/were avaliable.)

And its Friday again

Its been a while since we had some layout ideas around here. unfortunately thats going to continue for a wee bit yet.
On the plus side, I've had a number of E-mails across my inbox, that while sworn to secrecy, I can reveal promise an interesting time in the scale in the next few months.
As to what they are, well, you'll just have to wait won't you...

Woodsworks

I've added a link to Woodworks, who while mostly involved with those other funny large scales, also sells rail and sleepers that can be used for NZ120 if you are not quite right in the head and want to make your own track.
check at your own peril.

God bless America

(hmm, that will get me a stack of hits from the loony right I think..)

I arrived home tonight to find a package from the states, only 8 days after I placed the order.
for ~$100 ( I have not seen the credit card bill yet, but nor has my wife), I have in my sweaty palms the mechanism for a Kato Mikado (minus the cylinders and trucks). In the first of what should be a more definitive series, heres the low down on it. The main drivers are 9mm in diameter and 10.5mm over the flanges. The wheelbase is approximately 11mm + 11mm + 11mm. Holding it up to the plan, the outer wheels match ( the Ed had an unequal setup) which is good enough for this 2 foot modeler.

So, how does it run? Putting it on the track, and it shorts. Hmmm, it appears that one of the insulators is on backwards. Quickly sorted, and away it goes, off up the steep grade to show it can haul itself around unlike the pathetic Bachmann offerings. Might buy another one next month, and get started on making a couple of tops.

History update

I'm informed by a Mr Woods that $10 in 1972 is $115 in todays peso's. It does add a bit of perspective to the whole thing, as the 8'6" sole bars and 4'10 passenger bogie side frames would be $14 without wheels.

Anyone now have a hankering for the good old days?

Where did we come from?

I've been in a position to do a bit of research on the origins of the scale in the last week or so. This has involved locating a collection of the local rag from the early 70's. Fortunately, the local group does have such a collection, and locating the info I wanted was only a 40km round trip on the bike.

Prior to 1972 there were fragments of information printed in the local rag with lone photo's and brief descriptions of a layout in Auckland by A C Upton, possibly to 1/8 th scale or about 1:100( I have not yet sited the original so will wait to confirm it) although the notes I have suggest he was the first to construct a large NZR based N gauge layout. Another question would be whether or not it was genuine NZ120 or remodeled foreign gear. The first mention I can confirm is of an Ian Lauchland of Stokes valley, who was listed in the August/September 71 issue as working in TT on n scale track, and having built an Mc on a Peco underframe (wow, we have not moved far in 40 years) as well as having other wagons awaiting suitable underframes.

The Catalyst for the Scale appears to have been at the 1972 Convention in Hamilton, with much discussion on the scale. The major players seem to have been Don Lawrence, Paul Berntsen and a young dashing Kevin Crosado (sporting a beard that made Grizzly Adams seem clean shaven). The then editor the late Maurie Dunston started a column in the August/Sep 72 issue called N'zr for eNthusiasts. it was pointed out at the time that the absolute correct scale should be 1:118, but 1:120 made the measurements much simpler at 1' equals 1/10", which makes a hell of a lot of sense in the pre-electronic calculator age (I doubt if the state of the art Odner adding machines would have been up to the task). Just don't tell any of the finescalers and we'll be fine. An Ab plan was included and Maurie was very keen to support the new scale.

The next issue (Oct/Nov 72 brought news of Lost wax brass castings for an 8'6" underframe and a 4'10" coach bogie at $1.20 a set( believe these plus a selection of other detail parts are in the possession of Don Clements at present) from Scalecraft AKA Mr Berntsen. Colin McHarg also offered a scaled down version of his Zinc Ab etch for the then princely sum of $10 (I can't find anywhere to convert this, but the first loco kit on the market, an F, sold for $48 with a motor, so maybe equivalent to $75-80 today).

In the Dec72/Jan73 issue, a 2 page spread reported more doings, and the naming of the scale (yes its that old) That appears to have been suggested by Garry Whincop and Crossado about the same time, although there may have been a frantic spate of letter writing. Maurie suggested that he preferred Nz120 vs other suggestions, and this seems to have become the standard in the journal after this time. Kevin Crosado also suggested that mechanisms should be scratch built as commercial N scale stuff was not overly accurate and had larger flanges than the then equally new 9mm scale. At this point 3/32" to the foot was also suggested (to make the conversion of plans easier) but appeared to die quietly without much support.

It was pointed out that at the end of 1972 the Guild register indicated that 7 people claimed to have layouts modeling NZR on N scale. Again the question is if they were genuine NZ120

There was enough interest to sustain at least page per journal (and often 2) in the issues at a time when other modeling fodder was hard to come by ( again, not much has changed). Paul Berntsen reported the creation of a 4'6" driver for an Ab to be cast in Nickel silver, as well as the fabrication of other wagons. Microtrains (then still Kadee) couplers were chosen as being the most desirable. Sources of wheels were discussed, and Maurie asked repeatedly if anyone was building a layout in the scale rather than just making models to see what they looked like. The last 2 issues from 1973 are missing from the collection I have, but apparently there were pictures of a layout and tables of NZR loco wheelbases and N scale models equivalents.

At the Hastings convention in 1974, Paul Berntsen displayed a Da hauled train and a scratchbuilt Ab chassis.

I'd love to know where the Ab wound up, but I believe that the Da is with Don Clements as well.

While it was obvious that Paul was keen on the scale, another new scale was consuming more and more of his time. Back in late 1971 the 9mm association had been formed by Bob McCully. This group had over 10 members that had started building wagons, and Scalecraft started receiving orders for locomotives. I can imagine Paul was happier working in the larger scale as it would showcase his modeling talent's to a far greater extent, and more importantly, pay the bills, as it does not appear that large numbers of Nz120 loco's were being ordered at this time.

Well, thats it for today. this section will have to wait till I can get my hands on another couple of volumes of journals.

Container Wagons - Adventures in Casting

(Kiwibonds springs to the rescue again)

Container wagons are an important component of the modern era, so back in October when my better half was off overseas for a few weeks, I dug up the casting supplies I’d been hoarding since last century with a view to making some.

A few masters were whipped up from plasticard - they are far less ugly from a nominal two foot viewing distance than close up, so I’m going to be generous and score myself seven out of 10 for these. The proliferation of styrene strips of all sizes and shapes certainly makes scratchbuilding easier than it used to be for those of us whose surname isn’t Boul. That man is a black belt plastic wizard.

OK, so that’s the easy bit, but then it was time to tentatively make my first molds since some pretty mediocre efforts in the early 1990s. With a bit of well timed advice from Rhys about brushing the master with rubber before doing the main pour, I was rewarded next morning with these nice blue bubble-free wobbly jobs…


On to casting…. Although the rubber exceeded my low expectations, the resin (which I later discovered had “Use by 8/99” stamped on the bottom of it) wasn’t really up to the task with at least a 50% failure rate. The stuff just wouldn’t cure consistently, but I did get a few reasonable successes by early November.


The first wagons weren’t too stiff, so I placed some strip brass in with the resin which helped a little, but the real coup occurred when I was ordering new resin and found that my pusher of materials and tools has not only a “quick” resin with a short mix time that sets in about 15 minutes; but also a 16-48 hour cure “high strength” resin. This has turned out to be perfect for the wagons but I’ve also been using it for a few containers as well as the high strength stuff is only a little thicker than water so it flows into all the nooks and crannies and the long cure time lets most of the air bubbles escape. I’ve also found that by filling the container molds about 2/3rds full and then squeezing it from all sides stretches the rubber which allows the resin get into all the details such as the rodding on the green side opening containers which you can see more clearly on the later 10 footers than in my early experiments with the 20s above.


Over the last week or so I’ve made a few UKs as well (that’s lens warp rather than a bent UK before you ask!). The containers provide rigidity over the thinnest part of the wagon chassis, but the high strength resin alone seems stiff enough to run empty flat wagons and a rake of these looks pretty neat actually. Insert Tranz Rail Beard Era joke here. The addition of a little weight helps them track nicely as the resin, even with a couple of containers on board, is pretty light. I have been using both shotgun pellets (thanks to the Blogmeister for that idea) and thin lead squares (I assume its lead) from dental Xrays folded up. You can just see these in the following pic.


For the PKs, I’m using bogie mounted MT trucks but have cut the couplers off to be body mounted on the UKs to keep the bogies about where they should be. I do like the PKs - the shorter wagons look better on curves and trains seem longer if they have more vehicles in them. Something a little different:


I only got four and a half of these HCCs out before the mold became unusable – too many nooks and crannies!