Progress has continued on the chassis, first up I drill holes for the mounting points for the springy beam. I had to move these later on as I got them too high on the frames which meant the ride height was too low.

I opted to solder the cosmetic springs back onto the square bearings so that they move with the axle springing. This also avoided making some kind of keeper plate or preventing the wheels from being removed.

The High Level Loadhauler+ was built up and matched to a coreless motor, also from High Level. There was a period of praying to the carpet monster after dropping the grub screw, amazing I found it with the use of a lamp and strong magnet.

Wheels were assembled using the GW wheel quartering press and for once I remembered to thread all the parts on the axles (bearings, additional spacing washers, and gearbox) before pressing them together. Having got the bearings and hornguides all assembled by using the coupling rods and the jigs everything rolled smooth and the motor was refitted and powered via some long leads. As the chassis moved under power the next step was making some pick-ups. These are made from phosphor-bronze wire, wrapped to give a little spring around a length of brass rod. These give a very flexible pickup but with quite a rigid mounting method and no very long lengths of wire to get distorted in use.

Next up was starting on the footplate, this comes in two parts, the bottom part of which includes the valence and buffer beam. The instructions told me precisely which way up the parts hard to go but I still managed to get it wrong and had to unsolder, clean up and resolder. Thank goodness for unsoldering wick.

I think I'm going to jump back to the chassis now and start on the cosmetic bits like the brakes.

Satisfying progress to have  a running chassis though..

David