The locomotive shop - 4321
Right, 4321 was supposed to be a quicky. But...
The BR black body was repainted proper green, and made ready for lining. A replacement tender (with the correct unstrengthened underframe obtained - it was a Hornby 3500 gallon spare, the type used on their 28xx or a Star) was obtained.
The Perseverance chassis went together without any problem, the cylinders were rolled up, everything fitted where it should. I was busy feeling pleased with myself and loudly announcing my chassis building prowess to all that would listen (the Gosport Guru, no one else was interested).
The wheels were then fitted, rear driven, middle and then the front. The cylinders and motion bracket assembly fitted (Comet 28xx chassis please note and copy) and then it was gently turned by hand.
Disaster!
No movement. The front wheel was jammed fast by the crossheads and slide bars. Even turning the nut around didn't free up enough room, nor did putting the slide bars on a slight outward pointing V. There was noting for it but out razor saw and cut the cylinders off the stretcher, fit some brass shims and resolder. Only the mod had the strength of very warm chocolate and wouldn't hope its shape. And it was out of gauge...
So after wondering how anyone manged to build the kit in EM gauge let alone P4 as the designer intended and imploring the gods of modelling to smite mightily the objects of my despair, I realized that the only option was to, glup, use the Comet GWR 2 cylinder kit.
Now I have said some rather damming things about the Comet 28xx chassis in another blog and the 2 cylinder kit is one of those items I noted was a standard item that was pretending to have been designed to fit the kit and the Hornby 28xx body. Now the 2 cylinder kit is rather nice - its just not part of a chassis setup that was designed as one item - and offering up the bare bones of it showed it would work on the 43xx and that its slide bars (from the Comet 43xx motion kit) were appreciably narrower than the Perseverance ones - and even had location points for the motion support brackets - result!
But it wasn't designed for the Perseverance chassis and the Perseverance chassis wasn't designed for it either.
Cue lots of filing, adjustment and a short introduction to a piercing saw.
Thankfully it looks like the Perseverance motion bracket can be reused.
Next job will be to finished the cylinders by adding the whitemetal covers and odds and ends, reassemble the chassis and hopefully it will work this time. Another update beckons at some point...
D
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