Welcome to the Association of 16mm Narrow Gauge Modellers

It’s taken a long time for the 16mm scale MDLR to catch up with the 4mm scale version of 20 years plus ago. Then, I used the Parkside Dundas VoR bogie coach as my standard passenger stock, amongst some continental stock which also found a home on the line. Now, at long last, IP Engineering have come up with a reasonably-priced version in 16mm scale, so I put one on my Wish List for Christmas. Santa duly obliged and I finished it at the end of January.

Construction is relatively straightforward, but would be helped if Ivan provided some stripwood to glue to the sides and ends, 15mm up from the bottom (where the instructions tell you to draw a line). Then, you have somewhere to reference the floor when you assemble the body and it makes the whole job much easier. 4 more short pieces to locate the end seats on wouldn’t come amiss, either. I used coffee stirrers.....................

The only additions to the kit that I made was the interior lighting - no less than seven IKEA LED’s set into a strip of wood running the full length of the coach - a steady evening’s soldering, this - and a pair of lamp brackets.

Once the roof’s on, it’s all downhill. Fix and wire the battery box for the coach lighting, add the footboard brackets and paint them, add the footboards, paint the door and grab handles (drilling a succession of 1.5mm holes in a coffee stirrer to hold these whilst you paint them is a good plan, and mind you don’t drop a door handle - it’s easily done.....) and add them and the job’s done!

Brian Dominic