Scratch building a class 50 from card

[sleeper]

Some time ago I purchased a Silhouette Portrait cutter, up until now I haven't used it much. I started learning how to use Inkscape but due to house renovations and protracted periods back in Blighty I stopped my studies.

 

I'm now determined to get on with something and thought a Diesel might be a fairly uncomplicated project to begin with. I once did a cardboard model of a metro-vick, primarily to put into a small diorama for a competition so it was very basic as it was to create a replica of a photgraph, that was the brief of the competition.

 

Since then I've had this urge to model something a little more complex but still from cardboard. when scratch building with plastic sheet it entails a bit of sculpture along with the other things like measuring and cutting etc. I'm convinced those skills can be put to use using cardboard instead of plastic sheet, so I'm going to have a go. I might fall flat on my face but at least I won't exit this world still wondering! 

 

I've been doing a little experimentation with regards to methods of construction. My Idea is to make the sides and ends quite thick something like 3mm so the corners can be profiled with fine sandpaper so to this end, using some nice grey cardboard that came as a stiffener with a shirt I bought. It seemed quite compact and sure enough once 6 - 4.45mm layers were stuck together it became quite stiff and responded well to being filed with an emery board to a nice smooth radius. I've given it several coats of acrylic paint (Rolls Royce style) and is beginning to develop a nice smooth surface

I've taken a couple of photos to show what I've done so far

I cut three strips, I folded one in half and used it as a gusset to attach the other two together, but leaving an overlap 3mm long which would have 5 other 0.5mm strips put in place to fill the overlap. On the other part I glued another 5 strips, but stepped them back each time by 0.5mm to create a sort of chamfer. This corner was surprisingly rigid once dry.

Here's a photo with the various layers in different colours to give you a better idea, (hopefully).

I mixed some filler using the dust from the sanding, mixed with PVA it proved quite good, but shrunk back a fair bit once dry. I glued a strip on top of the angled piece and sanded a radius on the edges and rounded the corner so it's sort of similar in shape to the front wing of a land rover, this was then painted with Railmatch acrylic paint. 

This has now been sanded and painted several times and is quite smooth

So it's now on to designing the parts to cut out with the Silhouette.

 

More later

[sleeper]

So that's the faffing around all done now down to making the model. Despite a long lay off from Inkscape I managed to produce a workable drawing and cut the first sides which were entirely wrong but proved I could produce something here's the result

 

 

I hadn't got the scale right it was too high and too short but eventualy it came back to me and I got the hang of altering the measurements and cut the first sides, 5 in total. I stuck these together to form a side 2.5mm thick together with the complete end panels including windscreens.

 

 

Then the brain begun to engage and I started thinking about the chassis. I had a rummage through my bits and pieces and came up with a Lima chassis complete with motor bogie for a class 50, how clever is that? Not that clever because I had had visions of etched bogies with a nice little machima motor, dream on sunshine!

Anyhow I compared the side I'd fabricated with the chassis and it was surprisingly compatible it just needed about 1.5mm removing from the middle so out with the razor saw and with a square for guidance hacked it in half.

I chose to cut it just aft of the box thingy underneath. There is a 1mm gap between that and another box thingy beside it, if anyone knows what these two boxes are for sing out I'd like to know.

here's where I cut it

 

 

After filing out approximately 1.5mm the two halves were re-united but it was still too long! too late it was stuck together, so my thoughts turned to the alternative, lengthen the body but that would be out of scale, what to do?

I measured the chassis and then realised that the side I'd produced was a mite too short anyway. So back to the drawing on the computer and resized it by 2mm and re-cut the sides. When I laminated them together I clamped the layers together thus

 

 

The Lima body is held to the chassis by small slots that coincide with the step below the doors slotting over small nibs cast into the plastic chassis, these lined up perfectly with my sides and so, a possible method of holding the two parts together  

So I took this shot to give you an idea of how it might look  like

 

 

I then made up some new ends deleting the windscreens, these will be added later, possibly from etched brass as the laminated card ones were too thick, these next shots show work  to date 

 

 

 

 

More later

 

Roly

[edcayton]

Have you seen Mirmic's thread on making steam loco's from card? Can'tdo links, but a search for duchess card went straight to it.

 

Ed

[sleeper]

well that's it then, I might as well pack it in now!  That standard of work is just not from this planet, that guy's a genius.

I don't feel I can go on with this post now. Ed that was a very, very low punch, thanks!

[Jim Martin]

So each side is five laminations thick, yes?

 

Would you expect any warping as it dries out, or does the clamping take care of that? I was wondering because your first photo shows all five pieces oriented the same way on the sheet. Does the card have a grain?

 

Interesting project. You can never have too many class 50s.

 

Jim

[sleeper]

Jim,

 

I'm hoping to 'sculpt' the shape of the body by sanding it to shape, so it has to be quite thick to start with, hence the 5 layers.

I'm hoping there won't be any warping using this medium as opposed to plastic card. I clamped the layers together because I thought it might help them bond better, modern wooden beams are laminated using the same methods

There's five bodies to a sheet because thats all the space there is on the sheet, no other special reason.

Some of the sheets have bodies facing alternate ways, it just depended how I felt when I drew them up.

Being fibrous I imagine the card would have some grain to it but no the surface isn't grained. The card I used for the initial trials was perfect but I can't get it here in France. The first side was cut from a type of card that resembled and behaved like thick cartridge paper. I washed the surface with a mix of water and PVA hoping to stiffen it up the layers separated and rucked up when they got wet, not good! The modified sides were laminated from a different type of card with promising results so far.

One advantage of using the Silhouette cutter is that it's easy to re-cut more parts if needed.

I'm currently making enquiries about commercially available card, that is to say card used by professionals here in France. By that I mean, here in France you are either a consumer (particulier) or a professional and if you're the former you can't officially buy certain things because that might do someone out of a job, it's all part of the annoying politics of this country too complex to go into here. Suffice to say it might be available 'under the counter'

[edcayton]

Really no offence meant, just wondered if you'd seen it. 

 

Ed

[Jamiel]

Here is a quick link to save people searching, I just found the Mirmic's Duchess and Polish locos.

http://www.rmweb.co.uk/community/index.php?/topic/97762-duchess-of-sutherland-of-cardboard/

Seeing Mirmic and Sleeper's work above, I feel embarrassed to say I am going to but some Hornby coaches tomorrow.

I know model making isn't a competition (except when someone sets a competition), and everyone has their strengths. Sometimes you just see something so inspiring, wonderful and surprising on this forum. I really think that Sleeper and Mirmic have shown something quite lovely, and unexpected. Thank you for sharing.

Jamie

[sleeper]

Sorry Ed but that guy's work just left me speechless.

I've been looking through his work on the German site with a mate and analysing it, there's no doubt about his skill but my mate who's a designer pointed out that if he uses a top notch 3D program it's possible to break down the drawing into its constituent parts, With his limited English he doesn't go into detail but I suspect that the parts are then laser cut for him and sent in kit form and he then assembles that part of the model. I'm not trying to take anything away from the guy because after all he's the one designing it in the first place, and he's obviously very highly skilled?

He is I think, working to detailed drawings and taking the design from them, It's difficult to know how he goes about it as he gives no info on the day to day workings, which as I'm finding out is difficult to do when most of the work is on computer, screen shots would be the thing I suppose but I haven't got round to finding out how yet. Any explanations folks? post them here if you know?

Jamiel, the work I'm doing here is nothing to compare with Mirec's, doesn't even come up to his kneecaps    .  I might also be driving up a blind alley here too, it might yet all fold up like a pack of cards! get it? cards

[Andrew F]

However it turns out, I'll be following your build. You can't compare your 4mm 50 to his stuff anyway, it's totally different.

 

Keep going with it, even if it turns pear shaped as your work will be interesting to many.

[46444]

Hi Roly,

 

Please keep this project going.

 

It will interesting to see how things progress and I would see it has a learning curve.  One of the great things about your projects is you keep persevering and there's some good work come from it in the past.

 

At the end of the day you are modelling and that's where the fun is in this wonderful hobby.

 

Cheers,

 

Mark 

[Mirmic]

Hello,

I read your discussion about my work. I'm a little surprised by your findings.

The software, which I use to draw elements you can find as a free NanoCad 5.

All elements I slashed with a knife Olfa.

I think there is a difference in the approach to the final result. My model has become in a glass case while your have to ride the rails. I also mapped to the construction of invisible devices while your priorities are different.

I'll be glad when you ask me about various details. When I present something on a forum I do not know what someone will be interested and so my comments are laconic.

 

Best regards

Mirek

[sleeper]

Hi Mirec,

Your work is so exact that it looks  like it has been cut by machine. I'm very surprised that you have cut every piece with a knife, it must have taken you many hours of patient work to make these models.

They are beautiful pieces of craftsmanship

I have downloaded Nanocad to see what it is like to use, it looks like it is a more powerful tool than Inkscape, thank you for showing it to me..

[sleeper]

I've finished cutting all the sides, side 2 was very easy, I brought up the file for side 1, copied and pasted one of the sides into a new document and then just deleted the openings that aren't on that side and added the extra 'window'.  Then it was just a matter of duplicating it four times then saving it as a DXF file ready for the cutter.

The sides and ends, after cutting out, were then glued up, I cut two spacers by hand and stuck those in so the inside was now three compartments roughly equal in size.

When it was all dry the next day the whole thing had really stiffened up and is quite sturdy.

At this stage I was itching to start shaping the body but not knowing how the card I'd used would react to sanding as this is the first time I used this type of card. I resisted the urge and mixed up some PVA with water and a smidgen of acrylic paint just so I would know which bits had been primed. The added benefit is that I can see just how much has been taken off by sanding, which is difficult to see when it's all white.

The thing with this particular project is that it's all purely experimental, I'm learning as I go along. It could have been that applying water to it could have separated the laminations, I'd experienced that with the first side I made, but for these sides I'd used UHU which seemed quite rubbery, like the old puncture repair kits used to contain, and sure enough everything was ok the next morning

 

 

Next day I couldn't resist it and started sanding one end with the emery boards and luckily it seems as if it will sand quite well. Here's a pic of the body, The left arrow points to the join which will need filling, the right arrow points to the start of forming the tumblehome

 

 

Next I turned my attention to the construction of the roof. I thought this might be formed as I'd seen previously in other posts by layers. The alternative would have been by cutting cross sectional slices and stick those together. The roof is 9mm deep but 37mm wide and as the card is only 0.5mm thick it was a no brainer to choose horizontal layers. The sections I drew and cut are shown below

 

 

at the top is the first five layers with a void in the middle to giveextra headroom for the Lima pancake motor, the second one down is the first of the solid layers this is 1mm smaller all round than the voided layers  the layers reduce by approximately 1mm each time. The third one down is the uppermost layer (top of the roof), below that are two templates that I will use to shape the roof to the correct profile. I used that method to shape the roof in Balsa for my Metro Vick in a previous blog. The sections have all been laminated but are still in the press si I'll show you those in the next installment

 

cheers 

Roly

 

[BG John]

I think being able to improve and re-cut parts as many times as necessary is one of the huge advantages of this method. I'm aiming to start small and simple with my loco building attempts. I hope to start off with a dimensionally accurate basic drawing, and maybe produce quite a basic model first time round. If I'm happy with it, I'll add more detail, and spend a fortune on 7mm scale Slaters wheels and a proper motor and gearbox, but if not, I'll bung some extended axles on an old OO gauge chassis and turn it into something fairly freelance. Then I'll improve the drawings, and try again, and again, until I'm happy.

[sleeper]

yeah that's what I've done although this wasn't posted on here, but I've done quite a bit of revision as I've gone along, I've got thousands of little bits if you need any

[sleeper]

Mark,

thanks for your kind words of encouragement the other day, you're my one constant follower and I really appreciate your support and comments, thanks

 

 

Roly

[RuthlessRob]

Some time ago I purchased a Silhouette Portrait cutter, up until now I haven't used it much. I started learning how to use Inkscape but due to house renovations and protracted periods back in Blighty I stopped my studies.

 

I'm now determined to get on with something and thought a Diesel might be a fairly uncomplicated project to begin with. I once did a cardboard model of a metro-vick, primarily to put into a small diorama for a competition so it was very basic as it was to create a replica of a photgraph, that was the brief of the competition.

 

Since then I've had this urge to model something a little more complex but still from cardboard. when scratch building with plastic sheet it entails a bit of sculpture along with the other things like measuring and cutting etc. I'm convinced those skills can be put to use using cardboard instead of plastic sheet, so I'm going to have a go. I might fall flat on my face but at least I won't exit this world still wondering! 

 

I've been doing a little experimentation with regards to methods of construction. My Idea is to make the sides and ends quite thick something like 3mm so the corners can be profiled with fine sandpaper so to this end, using some nice grey cardboard that came as a stiffener with a shirt I bought. It seemed quite compact and sure enough once 6 - 4.45mm layers were stuck together it became quite stiff and responded well to being filed with an emery board to a nice smooth radius. I've given it several coats of acrylic paint (Rolls Royce style) and is beginning to develop a nice smooth surface

I've taken a couple of photos to show what I've done so far

IMG_1712.JPG

I cut three strips, I folded one in half and used it as a gusset to attach the other two together, but leaving an overlap 3mm long which would have 5 other 0.5mm strips put in place to fill the overlap. On the other part I glued another 5 strips, but stepped them back each time by 0.5mm to create a sort of chamfer. This corner was surprisingly rigid once dry.

Here's a photo with the various layers in different colours to give you a better idea, (hopefully).

IMG_1719.JPG

I mixed some filler using the dust from the sanding, mixed with PVA it proved quite good, but shrunk back a fair bit once dry. I glued a strip on top of the angled piece and sanded a radius on the edges and rounded the corner so it's sort of similar in shape to the front wing of a land rover, this was then painted with Railmatch acrylic paint. 

IMG_1721.JPG

This has now been sanded and painted several times and is quite smooth

IMG_1729.JPG

So it's now on to designing the parts to cut out with the Silhouette.

 

More later

When I have used card, I have found that spreading thin super glue over the surface makes it really strong.

[sleeper]

Thanks for the tip Rob, I'm sure it would work well as it's pretty runny so would soak in well. The only thing I have against that is how much cyano would you have to use, I've used two A3 sheets of card so far on this project, mind you a lot has been scrapped in the development stages, so I guess half that is in the model and half in the bin. Super glue is very expensive here in France, around £5 a bottle of the precision stuff.

[laurenceb]

Do you have pound(eqv) shops the cheapo stuff is adequate for this job. But be carefull it gets hot!

[sleeper]

There are no cheap (£) shops here, big brother gov doesn't allow undercutting because (they say) eventually it does someone out of a living . You can buy cheaper cyano but it's quite thick, so would only stay on the surface and how to spread it? a brush would go hard after the first application.

One thing I have thought about and some of the older members here will know what I am referring to, that is the stuff called 'dope' that was used years ago, to paint over the tissue paper of the Balsa wood framed aeroplanes, to tighten it up ready for a coat of paint.

I don't know what it was made from or what was used to bind it, was it some kind of shellac in a spirit base maybe? Is it still available? does anyone know?

[KalKat]

Dope is still available. Also balsa cement can be very useful for use in card modelling. Both will create a hard surface you can sand back, indeed dope mixed with talc produces a VERY fine surface filler.

 

Thinners would be acetone or cellulose thinners

[sleeper]

I've glued all the roof layers together now and started shaping the roof. I made up a new concave template as the previous convex one would have been quite useless. here's the new one

 

 

I started cutting the roof with a craft knife and the card cut  almost like soft wood quite surprisingly, part of me was saying it was cardboard yet physically it was like carving wood, a strange feeling somehow.

 

 

The process of shaping the roof was a bit messy, producing a lot of dust and shavings. I thought the dust might come in handy for making a filler by combining it with PVA (shown previously) in this next photo you can also see where I marked up the roof with centre lines, lines where the end curves started and two lines 7mm each side of the centre line as a control to stop me sanding too much from the top of the roof. (oops sanded those out)

 

 

I hadn't made the top section small enough, it could have done with one more layer on, because to get the curve to meet at the top would have meant sanding off another millimetre from the curves and as I'd been sanding away for a couple of hours,didn't appeal to me, that sounds nuts as it's only card but it's surprising how tough it is when bonded into a large chunk.

I have now added another layer which when the glue has dried thoroughly will be sanded to complete the profile. I might add at this stage that I want to try to keep it as a card model, with as little other materials as possible. The only other materials will be in the etched brass detailing. Oh yes! I've enough confidence in the model now to splash out a few quid on extras. Here's a pic of the roof to date with the added layer

 

 

The little 'flags' beside it are the louvred panels, which after some catastrophic attempts at making by hand, I drew up in Inkscape.

To do this I copied one of each size of panel and pasted them into a new page. I created a 'block' 1mm thick (just a short line really) and used this to space the horizontal lines within the panel as a guide for the louvres, these guide lines were drawn in a different colour (green) to the outline the panels (red) these were then grouped. I then drew an oblong about 200mm long by 2mm wide, duplicated it several times and coloured this different again (blue).

When I came to cut the parts in the Silhouette I first ticked the green box in the Silhouette Studio cut control menu and scored these lines, I then un-ticked the green box and ticked the red box cutting all the red lines, finally un-ticking and then ticking the blue box cutting these lines only. That way I can produce only the parts I need.

I used the horizontal score lines as a guide to stick the 2mm strips to, overlapping each other by 1mm (using the spacer block ) ,to make the louvres, a very intricate fiddly job I might add. That's what the little flags are, part completed louvres.

I've made a start on fitting the doors these were cut in two widths, one fits inside the opening and one larger one behind it to stick to the inside. Successive layers were then applied to bring the face of the door to somewhere near the face of the side.

 

 

 

So there you have it up to date, now on with the sanding and louvre making

 

 

 

more soon

 

Roly

[sleeper]

The roof has been shaped now, the next stage was to make the box section at either end which I believe contains the horns and headlights. My original plan was to construct these as a box from flat card, that was just a fantasy, it didn't work well due to difficulties in shaping it to the profile of the roof, in 7mm? yes probably, but in 4mm just too fiddly? After some thought I decided to make a solid box and let it into the roof. This meant carving a chunk out of either end, so out with the scalpel and get to it.

It went much better than i'd thought it would, here's how it looked when done.

 

 

The darker part is where I had to extend the length of the roof which for some strange reason had come out 3mm too short. I made up some filler by mixing card dust from the sanding with PVA adhesive, it proved very tough to cut through.

Next I cut the rectangular pieces for the box and laminated them together until I had a slab 4.5mm thick, this I inserted into the slot and secured with glue. I then filed the chamfers on the corners.

i had drawn up the various access panels, fan housing, exhaust ports etc, I cut these from some scrap card and working from the drawing attached them all to the roof.

This next picture shows the results of that and the box sections on the ends of the roof.

 

 

The body in that photo had been given several brush coats of acrylic paint to fill in the grain of the cardboard, I used different colours for different coats so when I rubbed down I could determine where the high and low spots were, here it's carrying the colour it will be when finished.

I've taken delivery of the etched brass detailing parts, from Peter's Spares, they carry a full range of shawplan's extreme etchings parts, seen here.

 

 

Once the roof panelling was dry I gave the whole thing a coat of Tamya light grey matt acrylic, I departed slightly from my original spec and used some plastic strip for the hinges on the panels because the ones I cut from card just weren't rigid enough to stay straight.The etched fan proved tricky, I merely soldered it on to a short length of brass wire, pushed that through a hole drilled in the roof and then bent it over underneath.

I cut the round duct the fan sits in by hand, having forgotten it in the original drawing, here's the result.

 

 

That brings us up to date, I'm working on fitting the windscreens at present, I'll post that part up later.

 

more later.

 

Roly

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

[sleeper]

I've fitted the Shawplan etched brass window frames, these are a replacement for the ones on the Lima version which I gather are a little on the thick side, Some of you may have encountered this at some time!

Surprisingly these fitted almost exactly into the space between the corner stanchions, I guess the drawing I worked from must have been replicated from a Lima model because the chassis I've used is a Lima one and that fitted, or rather the sides cut from the drawing fitted the Lima chassis too.

 

 

So I've spent some time fettling various bits, one mistake I made right at the start but which didn't become obvious until now is that one end was attached to the sides lower down than the other end, by some 1.5mm, the resultant gap under the windscreen frames has had to be built up with strips of card and then reshaped.

It wasn't possible to remove a corresponding amount of material from the bottom of the panel as that would have made the lights too low, so it has had to remain, it's not like anyone would view it from both ends, it's just that I know it's there.

I have attached the roof to the body, after careful consideration to make sure I wasn't restricting my access anywhere. I used a contact adhesive for this to make sure it was firmly bonded because the joint between has to be filled as the sides and roof on this loco are all in one and I didn't want any cracks appearing in the future.

Some way back in this post there was some discussion as to what treatment to give the card to firm it up, well I was somewhat concerned that the Halfords red primer I intended to use might act on the various glues I'd used and soften them to the point where the whole thing fell apart. I used one of the sides I'd previously stuck together and painted to test for reactions. The layers separated!  I'd used a pritt stick type of glue to bond these and consequently it broke down when in contact with the Halfords paint, which I suspect might be water bound as there's no real solvent fumes when sprayed. So I coated the painted side of the test piece with a hair lacquer spray, no reaction, then I sprayed it with primer, no reaction, bingo! that's the way to go.

A few coats of hair lacquer and a good coat of primer, produced this.

 

 

I'm now filling and rubbing down ready for the top coat. Sorry this post has been all gabble and few photos but this stage is a lot of labour with little to show for it.

 

More soon

 

Roly