Just recently I continued on a project that has layed dormant for sometime. A few years ago I began scratchbuilding a Caledonian Railway class 439 0-4-4T in S Scale but due to an impending house move the project got put away in a box. The model at that point was still in a very early state of construction with only the bogie being built.

Over the last few weeks I have manged to turn my attention to the chassis with the frames, coupling rods and compasation beams being cut out on the profile milling machine. A Plasticard template, either three or six times bigger than the original, was used to cut out the profiled parts.

On this particular locomotive the frames were joggled towards the rear to allow a greater swing on the bogie. To represent this the frames were made in two halves with the rear portion being solderd to the inside of the front portion. The rear portion also includes the profile of the ashpan. It is my intention to make the chassis with split frames so brass U channel has been soldered to the inside of the frames to which double sided PCB will be secured. Brass U channel still needs to be positioned at the front end of the frames before the chassis can be erected.

Scott