S160s WEATHERED FOR WARTIME: Fresh Out of The Studio, Rapido Workhorses Thrash Through Neville Grove

The Rapido S160 is a fantastic bit of kit. Its brimming with detail and, unlike the real USATC Austerity's that were built for only 90 days of service, are high quality, silky smooth thoroughbreds. The only way to improve these models is to give them some careful, but generous weathering of soots, dusts, streaks and grimes. This is essential to give a Rapido S160 that authentic wartime appearance. When looking through dozens of period reference photos of the class operating in the UK during World War 2, it quickly became apparent how dirty they became within only a few months of operation. With scant resources and little time, keeping lowly freight locomotives clean was not a priority for anyone. The grey locos became darker and the black ones became greyer. It seems that by the time they arrived in mainland Europe after D Day it would have been difficult to tell which livery was underneath the filth. Here we have 1604 in Black that worked on the GWR, and 2415 in wartime grey which worked on the LMS. This video explores what it would have been like to witness them in service in Britain and are seen here rubbing shoulders with starkly contrasting designs such as GWR Hall's and an LNER J52. The S160’s operated with the GWR, LMS, LNER and Southern Railway. 0:00 - Four Train Intro Sequence 1:49 - Black S160 Powers Mixed Goods 5:00 - GWR Hall Class on Fast Freight 6:30 - GWR Express overtakes Grey S160 7:40 - Grey S160 Departs with Oil Tankers 9:40 - Grey S160 slogs uphill with Oil Train 11:17 - LNER J52 on Bolster Wagons 11:45 - Oil Train Crosses Bridge above MPD 12:10 - Speedy S160 Gallops through Countryside Celebrity 1604 as featured here was specially prepared in glossy black for a ceremony at Paddington station in December 1942. My customer who owns the model wanted to create the appearance of that very loco but after a few hard weeks work and several hundreds of miles working heavy wartime goods trains on the GWR. Thus, the sheen is still visible on the model, but complimented by plenty of dirty grimes in all the right areas to really bring out the detail and these excellent models to life. Classic British outline locos are also in this video which has been edited with real world sounds. The audio used in this video is therefore not of the DCC Sounds. Some was recorded by Peter Handford and is used with kind permission from Old Thundridge Records. Other sound effects are more recent recordings made on heritage railways and are provided by Sharpthorne Steam whilst others I made myself. Many thanks for watching, I hope you enjoy.