The Wonder - Stage Coach London Shrewsbury

The Wonder

Whilst work continues with the station building (which was always going to be a long process owing to the lack of concrete evidence for so many of the details), I have started to build the Wonder stage coach. Tom has carried out some excellent research to provide context for this coach, and although we are exercising a little modellers licence by presenting the Wonder outside Coventry station c.1839, for my money it’s a no-brainer as they say. My interest in modelling road carriages began with my Bricklayers Arms project, knowing I would need a good few to populate the forecourt at Swan Street. However, it goes back further owing to my fascination with William Bridges Adams who certainly knew a thing or two about carriages. Positioning a stage coach, and a well known one at that, outside the station speaks of the transition from road to rail that was so important in the late 1830s, a commercial and social Rubicon was crossed with the coming of the railways and peoples attitude towards long distance travel changed forever.

I started out with a cast Mail coach kit but really didn’t get on with it, far too crude for my liking so it was sidelined and work started, measuring, cutting and sticking bits of styrene from the off-cuts box. I love this way of modelling as it’s basically free and keeps me amused for hours. The amount I have learned about road coach construction, the different types, the nomenclature of all the parts, has made it well worth the effort. The 1:10 plans I followed were drawn by Keith Martin back in 1976 and sold by Barrie Voisey of Stoke-on-Trent. I also referenced the better known John Thompson Mail coach drawings created in 1977 from the example in the Science Museum collection, and numerous photographs and illustrations.

The body was completed with doors closed and an intention to create a rubber mould and a series of one-piece castings to duplicate the body in case I fancy making another in the future, after all, I still have a Mail coach to build. After running off a few resin castings I thought a little more about how I would like to present the Wonder. Parked up, waiting for passengers alighting at Coventry and heading to the Lion in Wyle Cop, Shrewsbury seemed to be a sound excuse. Therefore, I took a scalpel to the styrene master and cut out the offside door, messy but with a bit of filing, not too bad. I had to make a new door as the old one was butchered and the new one required internal detail as it would be modelled open. I’ve never seen anyone model a road coach in 4mm scale with a door open so this might actually be a first?

Once I had the door sorted I ploughed on with the drivers seat and foot board and the rumble or boot seat. At this point I felt inspired to make an underframe for it but wanted it to be sturdy enough to support the body plus a few figures (driver, passengers, etc). Opting for brass rod I soldered up a perch, a transom with futchel, splinter bar, telegraph springs, and so on. Wheels presented a problem as I didn’t have any the correct size, nor could I source any that didn’t look like they belonged on a farm wagon. Therefore, I fired up the lathe and sliced some fine tyres from brass tube of the appropriate diameter. Using a casting mould for some other coach wheels as a jig, I soldered brass wire spokes in place. This was immensely fiddly and an absolute thief of time, but at least it resulted in four half-decent looking wheels with a single extended spoke each to plug the Wonder into the baseboard and prevent it from going walkies during transportation to exhibitions etc.

So far, so good. I need to continue adding plenty of detail before painting the individual components and assembling them. A driver and passengers will follow, not forgetting four horses of course