Andy Siddalls Easy-Build Workbench

[pwr]

I am building an SK currently -see my Bkack Notley thread. I wished I read this first before I sprayed the coach. I never thought to spray the blue first. I followed conventional wisdom and sprayed the grey first and masking proved difficult due to hinges and vents to the point I have paint creep under the masking which I would not have got doing it the other way round!

 

So now I have to do some retouching before I can line it.

 

Oh well the next one I shall do differently!

 

Paul R

[Andy Siddall]

Thanks Lee, i am really happy with the outcome. Posting the builds on here is quite good fun, it's also nice being able to share my approach as much as seeing other peoples builds and getting ideas from their methods.

 

Paul, I have had finally had a chance to  look at your thread, your SK is coming along nicely after the earlier, issues that you had. I really like Shawn's kits but you do have to keep an eye on a couple of dimensions and the fit of parts, on the flip side, where else can you get a reasonably detailed MK1 for the price, especially if like me you require a dozen or so....

As for painting the Blue first, this is the first time that I have tried and I figure that it went ok. 

 

 

As for progress, things have slowed due to the bank holiday and now work is getting in the way, three weeks of nights and half of that away means that I may get overtaken by a few snails.

The ends are now primed and I may get a chance to Blue them this evening, as can be seen I have masked either side of the Corridor for the glue to hold the rubber and have run a little Maskol along the inner sides of the ends, where they meet the floor and sides.

 

 

 

Cheers

 

Andy

[MarshLane]

Hi Andy,

Im looking to go down the Easybuild route for Mk1 vehicles myself later this year, so am following this with interest!  Given your previous experience, for a beginner, how would you rate the Easybuild kits on a scale of 0 (eyes closed doddle!) to 10 (hard)?

 

Love how the BG came out.  Well done!

 

Rich

[cheesysmith]

Are you going to add the RCH jumper cables to the coach ends? The lack of them does stand out.

[Andy Siddall]

Hi Rich,

 

I would rate the Easybuild as a 2 or 3 but there are a few things to look out for. If you follow the instructions then you should be ok. I build mine in a slightly different way but then I have found that this works for me over a number of builds.

 

Mr Cheesysmith, I do intend to fit the jumpers to this coach, then using spares from new etches I shall start to fit them to the rest of the fleet too.

 

I have started my few weeks of nights now so progress is real slow, the ends have their blue paint drying as we speak.

 

 

Cheers

 

Andy

[Andy Siddall]

Afternoon all.

 

Just checking in with a little progress.

The ends are now Blue and ready to be added to the floor.

The under frame is coming together but as modelling time is scant at the moment this will take some time, pics will follow when there is something to show.

 

 

 

Cheers

 

Andy

[Andy Siddall]

Well it's quite a surprise to realise that my last post was in May! 

Still I have a little bit of time off now until my next contract starts, so hopefully in between holidays I may be able to complete the SK at least.

 

Carrying on from where we left off I was going to start work on the underframe, my notes for this are as follows.

 

The floor needs to be checked for width, this needs to be 58.5mm as due to the manufacturing they are sometimes a little over size, as was the one.

I had to remove about a millimetre in total.

 

Next the truss detail can be added, I have found it easier  to build if I  remove 2.5mm off of the centre U shaped moulding!

 

 

Next the Battery boxes, Dynamo, V-Hangers, Vac Cylinders etc are all added. I have not shown individual images as these are simply glued on. The Voltage regulator and fuse box are held in a simple fold up cradle.

 

The footsteps are then added, these have a folded brass angle for strength and the I personally use good old coffee shop stirrers for the treads although you could use plasticard or any other material that you wish to make these.

 

Finally all is ready for a coat of paint. I have masked a thin strip around the edge to aid with attaching the sides and ends, I have also used maskol to keep paint off of the sea for the bogie mounts.

 

 

 

Cheers

 

Andy

 

[Andy Siddall]

Just a wee update to show the painted under frame and the results of the masking for glueing.

 

The ends are on and the sides are now checked for length. I have also mounted the bogies and the buffer centre height came in at around 24mm, I believe that the prototype is around 3' 5" so I can live with that...

 

 

 

Cheers

 

Andy

[ozzyo]

Hello Andy, all,

 

I've just reread this thread from page one and noticed a large gap in post on page 6. Post No.137 was posted in November 2011 with the 108 build. Then the next post is in April 2016, have some post gone missing? What has happened to the 108? Am I now in a parallel universe?

 

OzzyO.

 

PS, like the idea of doing the blue first, have you tried adding some masking tape at 45deg. at the corners? It may save on the brush painting.

[boxbrownie]

Hello Andy, all,

 

I've just reread this thread from page one and noticed a large gap in post on page 6. Post No.137 was posted in November 2011 with the 108 build. Then the next post is in April 2016, have some post gone missing? What has happened to the 108? Am I now in a parallel universe?

 

OzzyO.

 

 

Whooo some bender that weekend eh? 

[Andy Siddall]

Nice thought Boxbrownie.

 

Hi OzzyO,

 

With head held low it is with great regret that i have to admit that no posts have gone missing and that the 108 sits in a forlorn state in it's box awaiting my attentions.

Sadly the bullld came at the time when due to circumstances that I could not change, my O gauge modelling mojo hit an all time low and I haven't had the heart to start it again yet. Although as I am comfortably building again I am feeling the urge to get it done, especially as I would like a 105 and one of Shawn's new 101's in the collection.

 

As to the SK I have put myself under a little pressure as there is a club running session on Sunday and I would like to at least get it runnable if not complete. One result of this is that the thread is no longer real time and is playing catch up a couple of days behind.

 

Moving onto the sides the first job is to deepen the scribe lines for the doors and to clean up the ridge that is left, I also give the sides a light going over with a fine paper.

 

The door bumpers are provided for using styrene rod. The holes for this need clearance drilling and at the same time the holes for the door handles, grabs and hinge can also be drilled but bear in ind the different diameters for each of the fittings. The door bumpers need to sit proud by around 1mm for which a piece of plasticard strip with a clearance hole drilled in it can be used to get them all the same.

 

 

After the bumpers, the hinges can be added, these are a 2 part fitting, the centre of the hinge passing through a butterfly to represent the hinge plates.

 

 

I do not at this point fit the door handles and grab rails as these tend to get in the way of painting and lining, also the paint on these parts often wore through exposing the brass beneath ,this can be achieved rather nicely be dry brushing the body colour on after.

 

Cheers

 

Andy

[boxbrownie]

Just a thought, is not black styrene rod available?

 

I know they will be painted black/grey regardless of material colour but if the material was black better for handling and staying black......as I said just a thought, and one I would not have had on my build until "after the fact"......great thing hindsight 

[Andy Siddall]

Afternoon all,

 

David, yes you can get the styrene rod in black and as a matter of fact, on some of my earlier coaches that is what I used, I have also used a brown styrene. However as you say it's going to get painted over so there really is no issue in using any colour.

 

The next job with the sides is to add the window frames. I put these through the rolling bars with very little pressure to give then enough curve to conform to that of the bodyside. The lavatory windows have the ventilator soldered on and then they are attached to the body side with superglue.

 

 

 

Finally the side is given a good clean ready for spraying,the last thing to do before priming was to bend the ventilator wings out.

 

 

Cheers

 

Andy

 

P.S. Looking at the prototype images, the lavatory windows are frosted and not just white, please feel free to express your thoughts or techniques to best achieve this. I believe that the windows provided are a polycarbonate type material.

 

[Andy Siddall]

Painting of the sides has been achieved using the same techniques as for the BG built earlier in this thread.

 

The sides were primed with Grey Halfords plastic primer, followed by painting with Phoenix Rail Blue. After masking for the grey, Phoenix Rail Grey was sprayed and then the whole left to dry for a couple of days.

 

 

At the same time I masked around the doors in the ends so that they too could be sprayed grey. It was here that the first whoops was reached as the masking tape lifted some of the blue on one end that had been painted earlier.

 

 

I gently feathered the edges of this with a bit of 800 grit paper before respraying the corner with the Blue, looking at the model now, if you did not know to look for it you would not notice.

 

Cue cruelly close up photo........ 

 

 

With the sides finally painted it was time for the white lining and numbering. For the lining I used the excellent lining transfers from Railtec (sheet 1093) which I used to get the corners from which I then drew in the long straights with a lining pen.

I also purchased sheet 3193 for the BR Mk1 SK, however for the numbering I have used an old Fox Transfers sheet as that just happened to have E24984 as a pre arranged number.

 

Cheers

 

Andy

[JeffP]

If it is polycarbonate, it can be welded with Dichloro-methane, (Methylene dichloride). This means that flooding the window with this liquid will cause it to frost. Allow to dry and stick in place.

 

Dichloro-methane can be had off ebay.

[HealeyMills]

Hi Andy,

 

Great build info as always 

 

The repair that you've made is just about seamless and once varnished will be undetectable.... unless you're into more cruel ultra close-up photography

 

Keep posting as it always makes for good, interesting reading.

 

Cheers

Lee

[Andy Siddall]

Thanks Jeff, I may well have to give that a try.

 

You are right Lee, if it wasn't for the extreme close up to show the point then it is virtually undetectable.

 

Since my last post the Roof has been marked out for the vents and toilet filler, these are then drilled and the vents glued in, I have decided not to fix the filler in as I intend to make the water pipework as a removable item.

 

I have also added the rainstrips at the Lavvy end from styrene rod. The whole is now sitting in the sunshine while its paint dries such is the weather here at the moment....

 

 

Cheers

 

Andy

[boxbrownie]

To be perfectly honest it'll look more prototypical with that "repair"........better than most depots would do if the set had a slight whoopsie 

 

As for the windows, I always used a jewellers wet & dry paper (Matador trade name) as it comes in grades up to 2500 grit, no marks left using that grade and a very fine "frosting" can be had.

[Andy Siddall]

Hi David.

No time to post pictures now but great minds, kind of think alike.
I got back from a little walk at lunch time and as it sat at the workbench I saw a small amount of 1000 grit wet and dry, suffice to say a quick Once over was all that was needed.

The basic shell is now complete and ready for a test run on Sunday, then it's on with interior after a weeks holiday.

Cheers

Andy

[Andy Siddall]

Just a little update today. The coach is now a complete shell and they focus willow turn to the interior.

 

Here is the roof when drying, showing the rainstrips for the filler overflow.

 

 

 

Secondly we have, just for Cheesysmith, the RCH jumpers as I have built them and as he said, they really do make a difference.

They are a small etch that is folded up and then has a bit of wire soldered into it.

I now want to fit similar to my other coaches and so shall have to fabricate some out of microstrip.

 

 

As I intend to run the coach on Sunday I shall try and get a few images of it on a layout to post.

 

Cheers

 

Andy

[HealeyMills]

Hi Andy,

 

What diameter is the wire that you have used on the RCH jumpers?

 

Cheers

Lee

[Andy Siddall]

Hi Lee,

 

The wire that I used is approximately 0.5mm outside diameter, I cannot recall where I got it but it is a very fine stranded cable that I use for wiring lights in locos.

 

Cheers

 

 

Andy

[HealeyMills]

Hi Lee,

 

The wire that I used is approximately 0.5mm outside diameter, I cannot recall where I got it but it is a very fine stranded cable that I use for wiring lights in locos.

 

Cheers

 

 

Andy

 

I think that is what I should start using for the MU jumper cables on the 40s.  I've been using 1.2mm and it's still too thick really.  If you remember where you got it then either post here or PM me, in the meantime I shall start looking on T'interweb

[ozzyo]

Nice thought Boxbrownie.

 

Hi OzzyO,

 

With head held low it is with great regret that i have to admit that no posts have gone missing and that the 108 sits in a forlorn state in it's box awaiting my attentions.

Sadly the bullld came at the time when due to circumstances that I could not change, my O gauge modelling mojo hit an all time low and I haven't had the heart to start it again yet. Although as I am comfortably building again I am feeling the urge to get it done, especially as I would like a 105 and one of Shawn's new 101's in the collection.

 

Cheers

 

Andy

 

Hello Andy,

 

thanks for the update, I know that sort of feeling.

 

One of my mates bought a 108 from Easy Build at Telford and this build thread could help him a lot. One thing at a few of us (at the club) have noticed with the EzB Mk1s is that the body ends and the roof don't always fit that well, Is this a problem with the roof profile or the ends?

 

TFAH

 

OzzyO.

[Andy Siddall]

Hi Ozzy,

 

I too have noticed the fit of the roof to the ends, not sure which part or whether both are out of kilter but I tend to bring the roof inner edge into line with the end as I think this is less noticeable when attached. I would also say do not be afraid to tighten the roof down well which helps the roof conform to the ends better.

 

Cheers

 

Andy