Wright writes.....

[gr.king]

The other issue is the amount of slop in RTR chassis. Any appreciable weight behind the drawbar and they waddle about like a drunken duck. All that slop makes for comparatively rapid wear and tear, only increased the more weight that is added to the locomotive. Best to keep them to light duties and even then they benefit from a bag full of washers.

 

Simple additions such as shaped springy wires to create side-spring control, especially on pony trucks and bogies, can of course steady locos considerably so that they don't wag, but if you also expect your loco to cope with varied check rail settings on different layouts of the same nominal scale / gauge, it can be better to use lightly sprung rubbing strips of some sort to simultaneously transfer a little weight to a bogie or pony truck and to steady its lateral movements. Side spring control can push the wheel flanges quite firmly against the outer rail on a curve and thus strongly increase the desire of fine flanges to go the wrong way at crossing gaps and bad rail joints, whereas a loaded rubbing strip can have a more neutral effect, simply helping to keep the truck and its wheels on the course they were already following...

Edited August 18, 2018 by gr.king

[Theakerr]

Tony et al.,  I had understood from the thread that the RTR front bogie wheels on both the Hornby A4 and A3 were undersize as well as having somewhat oversize flanges that make them look a bit crude (but run well on Code 100 track).  Am I mistaken re the size issue?  I am in the process of upgrading my locos with Brassmaster kits and as part of the upgrade I was going to replace the bogie wheels so i measured the diameter and counted the spokes.  Both the A4 and the A3 I checked have diameters of 12.8mm and 10 spokes.  4' 3' works out at 13mm so that is pretty close.  

FYI, went to the Markits site today because I want to upgrade some B1 bogies.  Bachmann are very defiantly undersize.   Catalog is not available but should shortly.  

[landscapes]

Tony et al.,  I had understood from the thread that the RTR front bogie wheels on both the Hornby A4 and A3 were undersize as well as having somewhat oversize flanges that make them look a bit crude (but run well on Code 100 track).  Am I mistaken re the size issue?  I am in the process of upgrading my locos with Brassmaster kits and as part of the upgrade I was going to replace the bogie wheels so i measured the diameter and counted the spokes.  Both the A4 and the A3 I checked have diameters of 12.8mm and 10 spokes.  4' 3' works out at 13mm so that is pretty close.  

FYI, went to the Markits site today because I want to upgrade some B1 bogies.  Bachmann are very defiantly undersize.   Catalog is not available but should shortly.  

 

Hi 

 

I am glad you asked this question it is something I have been trying to work out as well for the last few days.

 

Can anyone confirm the diameter of the front bogie wheels to the Hornby A3's and A4's and also those on the Bachmann A2, either the wheel size excluding or including the flange and what is the diameter of the Markits 3'`2" replacement front bogie wheels.?

 

Are Markits front bogie wheels larger than Hornby or Bachmann's?

 

Regards

 

David

Edited August 17, 2018 by landscapes

[60027Merlin]

Regarding the Hornby A4/A3 bogie wheels.

 

I attach a photo taken some time ago of an A4 fitted out with the Brassmasters etch parts and the Markits bogie wheels.

 

Both make an improvement to the front end.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

[landscapes]

Regarding the Hornby A4/A3 bogie wheels.

 

I attach a photo taken some time ago of an A4 fitted out with the Brassmasters etch parts and the Markits bogie wheels.

 

Both make an improvement to the front end.

 

A4 60023 Golden Eagle (9).JPG

 

Thank you Eric

 

That is a very big improvement to the A4 front end, it removes the horrible gap over the front bogie wheels.

 

Would you happen to know if the Markit's bogie wheels are larger or small than the Hornby ones?

 

Regards

 

David 

Edited August 18, 2018 by landscapes

[60027Merlin]

David,

 

I have no idea about the Hornby bogie wheel size as after purchasing and checking that the loco runs OK I automatically remove the couplings and bogie wheels and chuck them away!

 

Eric

[Headstock]

Tony et al.,  I had understood from the thread that the RTR front bogie wheels on both the Hornby A4 and A3 were undersize as well as having somewhat oversize flanges that make them look a bit crude (but run well on Code 100 track).  Am I mistaken re the size issue?  I am in the process of upgrading my locos with Brassmaster kits and as part of the upgrade I was going to replace the bogie wheels so i measured the diameter and counted the spokes.  Both the A4 and the A3 I checked have diameters of 12.8mm and 10 spokes.  4' 3' works out at 13mm so that is pretty close.  

FYI, went to the Markits site today because I want to upgrade some B1 bogies.  Bachmann are very defiantly undersize.   Catalog is not available but should shortly.  

 

I don't know much about Hornby bogie wheels but the real A4 bogie wheels are 3' 2''. I don't think that it is the diameter of the wheel that is the issue, more the thickness of the tread and flanges. In addition, the LNER bogie wheel has a rather distinctive boss, I'm led to believe this not present in the Hornby version. In other words, it is a clunky, chunky generic wheel of no particular prototype.

[ikks]

Regarding the Hornby A4/A3 bogie wheels.

 

I attach a photo taken some time ago of an A4 fitted out with the Brassmasters etch parts and the Markits bogie wheels.

 

Both make an improvement to the front end.

 

A4 60023 Golden Eagle (9).JPG

That is brilliant.........Mike

[thegreenhowards]

Thank you Eric

 

That is a very big improvement to the A4 front end, it removes the horrible gap over the front bogie wheels.

 

Would you happen to know if the Markit's bogie wheels are larger or small than the Hornby ones?

 

Regards

 

David

 

David,

 

I can’t help on the Markit’s wheels as I have used Gibson’s (3’2” 10 spoke ref 4838) when I’ve changed mine over. If it helps I’ve just got the digital calipers out and the Gibson’s measure 12.49 mm vs the Hornby’s 12.84 mm. This is measured across the wheel excluding the flange.

 

Regards

 

Andy

 

Edited to correct measurements after zeroing calipers. Doh!

Edited August 18, 2018 by thegreenhowards

[Barry Ten]

Here's the Britannia, with just the balance weights still to be fitted from the Comet parts. I've posed it next to its old tender-drive unit, which I'll

eventually be re-using with a Comet sub-chassis.

 

 

I'm more than a little pleased with this as it's my first Pacific, or at least Pacific chassis. I was expecting some problems from the tight clearance

between the bogie wheels and the front brakes, but (presumably because the chassis is electrically dead?) it's not caused any difficulties. The only

minor snag now is a tendency for the rear pony to derail occasionally when reversing, which I hope will be cured by adding some weight to the

truck itself, as it's very light as it stands. I've started adding weight to the body, but I'll take it a bit at a time once I've got a tender and some means

of testing it under load. Compared to the last photo, I shaved a bit off the top of the cylinders to get the chimney sitting about 52mm above

rail height, which I think is more or less right. Being an old Hornby Brit, it's got that high buffer beam which spoils the look of the front-end

a bit, but I can live with that given the model's significance to me.

 

Apologies for the less than sharp photo; my tripod's in the shed and I couldn't be bothered going out for it so this was shot free-hand at 1/25.

 

Al

[Clem]

I hope everyone is having a great summer. Congratulations Tony and everyone involved on the Little Bytham 30's weekend. What a fantastic effort and what eye-watering modelling! I'm certainly looking forward to the video footage. I was interested in Jonathan's discussion of the make up of his various trains from Grantham including the use of Mailcoach and Ian Kirk kits. With reference to the Ian kirk kits, I have just managed to complete this Ian Kirk diagram 261 Gresley 4-compartment BTK. Yes I know that the depth of beading is over scale and one or two other dimensions are slightly out but they really do reflect that Gresley look (certainly better than Hornby RTR examples) and I think they're well worth the effort. I particularly like them in crimson and cream as they ooze 1950s atmosphere in that livery (do I hear that word 'sacrilege'?). However, as one of the reoccurring themes of this thread is the inability of RTR locos to pull non-RTR stock, I decided to weigh the coach just to see what it came out at..... 311grams!!. The weight mainly lies in the MJT components (many are white metal) used to enhance the kit. Phew!

Luckily my line isn't the ECML and vestibuled coaches are used only for excursions and 2 trains a day which had through coaches from Kings Cross. 

[queensquare]

I know you folks like to see things people have made and also that most of you rarely visit the remote reaches of the 2mm area so I thought I would repeat this recent post from my Bath Queensquare thread. The layout is the sort of thing that is often discussed here, a model of a prototype which, due to its being pre-group and 2FS, is almost entirely hand built - the thread I use as a sort of diary of its Sloth like progress.

 

 

  

 

I thought I had seen all of the pictures H C Casserley took at Bath but at last weekends excellent Wells show I came across this shot of 1667. I new she was a regular at Bath as the late Rev Alan Newman noted her as such but I only had a picture of her at Barrow Road - Bath's parent shed. The picture is dated 1932 but she is still carrying her pre-1928 LMS livery. My model is in the all but identical late Midland livery.

 

The Barrow road picture has her in a line of engines so I took a guess as to whether she was vacume fitted or not - wrong choice! The other interesting thing to note is the tarpaulin curtain in the cab, presumably to prevent drafts - perfect for hiding a motor if necessary!!

 

Jerry

 

Edit to say that the loco has been in service for a couple of years now and I will get round to removing the vac pipes at some point - and fitting a lamp!!

Edited August 20, 2018 by queensquare

[jamie92208]

I know you folks like to see things people have made and also that most of you rarely visit the remote reaches of the 2mm area so I thought I would repeat this recent post from my Bath Queensquare thread. The layout is the sort of thing that is often discussed here, a model of a prototype which, due to its being pre-group and 2FS, is almost entirely hand built - the thread I use as a sort of diary of its Sloth like progress.

 

 

  1667 Bath.jpg

 

I thought I had seen all of the pictures H C Casserley took at Bath but at last weekends excellent Wells show I came across this shot of 1667. I new she was a regular at Bath as the late Rev Alan Newman noted her as such but I only had a picture of her at Barrow Road - Bath's parent shed. The picture is dated 1932 but she is still carrying her pre-1928 LMS livery. My model is in the all but identical late Midland livery.

 

The Barrow road picture has her in a line of engines so I took a guess as to whether she was vacume fitted or not - wrong choice! The other interesting thing to note is the tarpaulin curtain in the cab, presumably to prevent drafts - perfect for hiding a motor if necessary!!

 

Jerry

 

Edit to say that the loco has been in service for a couple of years now and I will get round to removing the vac pipes at some point - and fitting a lamp!!

Hi Jerry, that's a fabulous model. If you ever need to know whether or not an ex Midland loco was fitted I've got the complete set of Summerson and Jenkinson and Essery books and can look that sort of thing up very easily. Just drop me a PM. I'm doing three 1F's for Green Aye, one is unfitted, one vacuum fitted and the other is vacuum and train heating fitted to enable it to warm coaches parked in the bay platform.

 

Jamie

[Fat Controller]

Here's the Britannia, with just the balance weights still to be fitted from the Comet parts. I've posed it next to its old tender-drive unit, which I'll

eventually be re-using with a Comet sub-chassis.

 

brit3.jpg

 

I'm more than a little pleased with this as it's my first Pacific, or at least Pacific chassis. I was expecting some problems from the tight clearance

between the bogie wheels and the front brakes, but (presumably because the chassis is electrically dead?) it's not caused any difficulties. The only

minor snag now is a tendency for the rear pony to derail occasionally when reversing, which I hope will be cured by adding some weight to the

truck itself, as it's very light as it stands. I've started adding weight to the body, but I'll take it a bit at a time once I've got a tender and some means

of testing it under load. Compared to the last photo, I shaved a bit off the top of the cylinders to get the chimney sitting about 52mm above

rail height, which I think is more or less right. Being an old Hornby Brit, it's got that high buffer beam which spoils the look of the front-end

a bit, but I can live with that given the model's significance to me.

 

Apologies for the less than sharp photo; my tripod's in the shed and I couldn't be bothered going out for it so this was shot free-hand at 1/25.

 

Al

Would it be better to somehow fit a spring between loco and pony-truck, rather than to weight the latter?

[Barry Ten]

Would it be better to somehow fit a spring between loco and pony-truck, rather than to weight the latter?

 

Hi Brian

 

I tried adding a very small amount of weight (which can't be seen) and that's done the trick, it seems. I always find my efforts with springing to be a bit hit and miss, alas.

 

Al

[queensquare]

Hi Jerry, that's a fabulous model. If you ever need to know whether or not an ex Midland loco was fitted I've got the complete set of Summerson and Jenkinson and Essery books and can look that sort of thing up very easily. Just drop me a PM. I'm doing three 1F's for Green Aye, one is unfitted, one vacuum fitted and the other is vacuum and train heating fitted to enable it to warm coaches parked in the bay platform.

 

Jamie

 

Many thanks Jamie that's very kind. I have copies of all those books and it was simply laziness on my part that I didn't look up if it was fitted or not. I worked to the photo I had of the loco at Barrow road which didnt show the buffer beam and guessed - incorrectly as it turned out. Lesson learnt!

 

I'm now working on another pair - one for me and one for a customer - though this time they are half cabs. Getting the mechanism in and out of sight has been fun!

 

 

Jerry

[Tony Wright]

Tony et al.,  I had understood from the thread that the RTR front bogie wheels on both the Hornby A4 and A3 were undersize as well as having somewhat oversize flanges that make them look a bit crude (but run well on Code 100 track).  Am I mistaken re the size issue?  I am in the process of upgrading my locos with Brassmaster kits and as part of the upgrade I was going to replace the bogie wheels so i measured the diameter and counted the spokes.  Both the A4 and the A3 I checked have diameters of 12.8mm and 10 spokes.  4' 3' works out at 13mm so that is pretty close.  

FYI, went to the Markits site today because I want to upgrade some B1 bogies.  Bachmann are very defiantly undersize.   Catalog is not available but should shortly.  

The LNER Pacific bogie wheels should be a scale 3' 2" - just over 12mm in OO 

[Tony Wright]

 

Are Markits front bogie wheels larger than Hornby or Bachmann's?

 

Regards

 

David

David,

 

I think so, but not over the flange (which is gross over the Hornby wheel). Like Eric, I've chucked any proprietary bogie wheels away. They don't even make good scrap loads in wagons!

 

Regards,

 

Tony. 

Edited August 20, 2018 by Tony Wright

[Tony Wright]

Having just returned today from a rather splendid weekend at the Pickering Show, I've spent the afternoon processing the pictures I took of Paul Gallon's delightfully-atmospheric Rosedale, in EM. 

 

 

 

 

 

 

This is wonderful modelling -self-reliant, fine personal craftsmanship, with just about everything having to made (much from scratch!) and entirely-convincing. Look out for it in a future issue of BRM. 

 

For Mo's and my part, we managed to raise nearly £50.00 for CRUK through my fiddling and sales of items donated. May I please than all those who donated so generously and those with whom I spoke? May I also thank all the members of the Scarborough Club for putting on such a lovely event? 

[Mike J]

It was once again our pleasure to host you and Mo, Tony. I'm sorry I didn't get more chance to chat as this show seemed to take a lot of my not so spare time.

I have to agree with your observations above. Paul has become a good friend of SDRM and many of his creations have deservedly graced our exhibitions. What I particularly admire is his 'can't buy it, so I'll make it' attitude, as well as his undoubted skills, and unassumingly helpful attitude when imparting the 'this is how I did it' information.

Best wishes,

Mike

[Tony Wright]

It was once again our pleasure to host you and Mo, Tony. I'm sorry I didn't get more chance to chat as this show seemed to take a lot of my not so spare time.

I have to agree with your observations above. Paul has become a good friend of SDRM and many of his creations have deservedly graced our exhibitions. What I particularly admire is his 'can't buy it, so I'll make it' attitude, as well as his undoubted skills, and unassumingly helpful attitude when imparting the 'this is how I did it' information.

Best wishes,

Mike

 

 

As usual, I hardly stopped talking.

 

I think what I like about your show is how it's just big enough to satisfy a wide range of interests, yet 'small' enough to be extremely personal (and very, very friendly). Friendly enough to let a chap in from Scarborough FOC on the Sunday. He'd visited the show on Saturday with his wife, not knowing I'd be there as a loco doctor. He mentioned a 'dead' Hornby-Dublo 8F he had, and he'd wished he'd brought it for me to examine. I suggested he returned the next day, bringing it with him. 

 

Since, from their conversation, it would appear that he and his wife were involved with a church, it being Sunday, I wasn't sure whether he'd make it. However, later in the afternoon, he returned, bringing the said 8F; 60 years old if it were a day - in its original box, in lovely condition and still with its original (solid) tube of oil! A quick investigation, adjust a brush spring, tweak a pick-up, clean and oil and away it went - sweet as could be. I rather got the impression he was thanking God (though not directly to me), but I felt no divine hand guiding mine! His donation to CRUK was not parsimonious at all. 

 

Another loco I fixed had a Romford power unit (70 years old if it were a day). Its owner (older than the unit!) had tried to alter the polarity of the motor and just got a dead short. No matter - lie about it being an impossible task, put the insulated sleeve on the right side, turn the magnet through 180 degrees and 'pray' for success. He went away extremely happy, and donated to the cause most-generously. 

 

Thanks again for a great weekend.

 

Regards,

 

Tony. 

Edited August 21, 2018 by Tony Wright

[Atso]

It was good to see both Mike, Tony and Mo on Sunday and I also think that Rosedale was the best layout at this year's show. I think this year was the third Pickering show that I have attended while on holiday as it is the same week as Kate's birthday (and we both love North Yorkshire!).

 

My apologies to Tony though as we did have a lengthy conversation, which possibly prevented him doing more productive things! Thank you for taking some photographs for me again.

 

Tony, if you're interested, below is my progress so far on my 'holiday project' that I showed you the etches of on Sunday. It is the 2mm Association etch for an LNER Toad E brake van.

 

[Tony Wright]

It was good to see both Mike, Tony and Mo on Sunday and I also think that Rosedale was the best layout at this year's show. I think this year was the third Pickering show that I have attended while on holiday as it is the same week as Kate's birthday (and we both love North Yorkshire!).

 

My apologies to Tony though as we did have a lengthy conversation, which possibly prevented him doing more productive things! Thank you for taking some photographs for me again.

 

Tony, if you're interested, below is my progress so far on my 'holiday project' that I showed you the etches of on Sunday. It is the 2mm Association etch for an LNER Toad E brake van.

 

image.jpg

Steve,

 

It was good to see you and Kate as well. Lengthy conversations are what I enjoy.

 

Thanks for the opportunity of taking pictures of your work. Could you explain to readers how you built these, please? 

 

 

 

 

 

Lovely work.

 

Regards,

 

Tony. 

[Chamby]

Having just returned today from a rather splendid weekend at the Pickering Show, I've spent the afternoon processing the pictures I took of Paul Gallon's delightfully-atmospheric Rosedale, in EM.

 

 

Rosedale 03.jpg

 

Rosedale 10.jpg

 

Rosedale 15.jpg

 

Rosedale 17.jpg

 

This is wonderful modelling -self-reliant, fine personal craftsmanship, with just about everything having to made (much from scratch!) and entirely-convincing. Look out for it in a future issue of BRM.

 

For Mo's and my part, we managed to raise nearly £50.00 for CRUK through my fiddling and sales of items donated. May I please than all those who donated so generously and those with whom I spoke? May I also thank all the members of the Scarborough Club for putting on such a lovely event?

 

This is a lovely model, rather different from the usual fare and very atmospheric... the sort of layout I could linger at, at an exhibition. Is the layout still incomplete though? It does leave me a little concerned about animal welfare. A gate or stile on the footpath would help prevent the sheep from wandering onto the railway line and coming into harms way, and similarly the chickens would seem to be free to wander on the road or railway, if they were to go exploring. Or is it just my application of modern values, inappropriate in the historical context?

 

Funny what your mind fixes on, when presented with such modelling excellence!

 

Phil

Edited August 21, 2018 by Chamby

[Atso]

Hello Tony,

 

Those photographs are stunning, thank you for taking them.

 

The V1 is a 3D print designed to fit a modified Farish N Class chassis. This was one of the prints that appeared in May's BRM as part of an article about cleaning up 3D prints - thanks again for taking the photographs for this also. The loco was lined using a bow pen and I also made up the boiler bands out of decal paper (shamelessly stealing Tim Watson's method for making these!). The prints for this and the V3 are now available via Shapeways and I'm very happy to see that there are a couple being built by others elsewhere on this forum.

 

The GCR fish van and GNR brake van are BHE etched kits mounted on Peco chassis. The other two fish vans are test castings of the early and late LNER designs which use 3D printed masters and 2mm Association chassis - edit: I've just noticed that one is on the original 3D printed chassis. I hope to do a run of kits of these two but I've had to do a bit of a resign as my initial ideas didn't translate well during the casting process and I only got a few good castings as a result. The modified masters (complete with the missing chalk board in the early van) are now in my procession and are awaiting their turn in my to do pile. The early (dia. 23?) vans are not quite finished as I need to add the chalk boards and 'FISH' legend to the sides.

 

As these will run in a fixed rake (and I'm not a fan of the Rapido coupling), the couplings are simply bits of wire formed into hooks and loops which are very reliable and unobtrusive.

Edited August 21, 2018 by Atso