Reach for the Sky

Well they keep coming. This weeks locomotives turned out to be the NSWGR 46 class electrics by Auscision. A long time coming but not as long as my 40 class ordered back in 1929 or something like that it seems.

  Again another after dinner excursion to the shed and this weeks loco came out of the box easily following the practice I had on the Victorian L class last week.
Auscision have done themselves proud with this one, well done. They were placed at various scenically finished sections of the layout for their official photos. When placing the second unit on the tracks I noticed that one of the horns was bent and the second one missing. Bugger. But looking back in the box I found it there. It was bent so I am not sure whether employee Wun Tun had used excessive force to get it into its box or it was a rough sea trip out here. Good news is they are made of brass and a little judicial force with a pair of pliers had them straightened up and both back into their holes ready for doing a bit of blasting. One feature I noticed when they were coupled together was that the buffers were sprung and touched each other. So on the curves they just compress, looks great.
They haven't had much of a run yet as the layout is in a no go period at the moment which hopefully will change soon. It looks strange to see them operating without overhead but that will come in good time. One thing is for sure that before overhead is put up the layout needs to complete and finished, one slight swing in the wrong direction and down the O/H will come.
When I came inside to view the shots on the computer screen I couldn't get over how vivid the colours were. I got two of the original as delivered liveries and the red banding seemed to be wrong to me going from old memories seeing these many moons ago. Thinking it might be wrong I went down to the shed again and grabbed a photo book on the 46 class. Yep they sure got it right. I always thought that the band in the middle was more to the pinkish toning. But this may have been due to fading or just the presence of dirt. Hopefully when the units are weathered up this bright colouring will fade a little. One thing for sure is that the roofs were never ever clean. There was always this oxide dribble from the overhead that coloured the roof and sides. I also thought it was a strange choice to do the pantographs in silver and not black. The L class had the pantos in black. O well I suppose that they can be weathered up as well.
So with the recent rush of 48, 45, L and now 46 class my fleet for now has arrived. I shall await the 40 class maybe this year sometime?
Any how here is a selection of the 46 class photos.