A crafting challenge linked to home
My passion is railway modelling. At least once a week, I fiddle about in my hobby room and create something new for my model railway landscape. In a specialist magazine, I recently found this beautiful kit made by RST Eisenbahnmodellbau for building the freight wagon Vh14, M.F.F.E., epoch I. The abbreviation M.F.F.E. stands for Mecklenburgische Friedrich-Franz-Eisenbahn, which means it is a cattle wagon of the railway company of Mecklenburg-Schwerin. I grew up in Mecklenburg – which is why I am always very happy to find railway models linked to my home. I had never put together a wagon made of plastic before and was happy to take on this railway modelling challenge.
Wagons according to federal state designs
I enjoy railway modelling so much not only for creating small worlds, but also for learning a lot about the history of German technology in the process.
My cattle wagon is a so-called freight wagon with Verbandsbauart (‘association design‘). All of the freight wagons built in Germany between 1910 and 1924 were called this way. With the name of the construction design, a standardization of freight wagon construction was pursued by the German State Railway Wagon Association (Deutscher Staatsbahnwagenverband – DWV). All eight state railway companies (Länderbahnen) belonged to the DWV, the railway company of Mecklenburg Schwerin, too.
The freight wagons with Verbandsbauart were divided into different types, e.g. open wagons, four-axle wagons or freight wagons with roof, like the one in my example. Between 1913 and 1927, 2134 of these freight wagons with roof were built in Germany and used for the transportation of fowl, sheep and pigs. After the First and Second World War, many freight wagons with roof were acquired by other European railway companies.
The right adhesive for the construction kit
The construction kit, which is true to scale, contains several plastic injection moulding and metal pieces. The construction manual suggests that all components should be checked before they are bonded together, as the tolerances are very small and corrections later on are very difficult.
The pieces made of ABS plastic should only be bonded using solvent. That way, the components are bonded together or rather welded almost inseperably. It is also recommended to bond the POM moulding (RST-VH14-03) as well as the metal pieces with super glue. As super glue, our Contact WEICON VA 8406 Cyanacrylate Adhesive can be used very well. The advantages of this adhesive: It shows very good and fast instant adhesion, is suitable for plastics difficult to bond and is extremely thin (a general rule is: the smaller the adherends, the thinner the adhesive should be.). I attached different small accessories, like handlebars, end signal holders and brake linkage using WEICON VA 8406. If you like, you can additionally use the WEICON CA-Primer for Polyolefines, depending on the size of the components.
Once I had finished it, I loaded my cattle wagon with pigs cast in tin. They weigh the wagon down and, that way, improve its rolling characteristics. I glued the pigs to the wagon with our WEICON Contact Gel.
More about railway modelling you find here:
Railway fascination
