Over the weekend I finally fitted the motor and some pick-ups to the driving wheels. After an initial problem as I hadn't fastened together the High-Level gear-box with its extension and some insulation tape to avoid any shorts between the pick-ups and the foot-plate the locomotive now moves under its own power around the layout! The wheels actually stay on the track and the quartering and wheel fitting worked well so it is nice and smooth. The speed is about right too which looks as if I chose the right gear ratio. Cosmetically not a lot more has gone on, but here are a couple more pictures which probably show it better than those previously posted.

Thanks to rmweb I now have a good idea of what to put between the frames and will be making a suitable representation of the slide-bars just to fill the gap a little. (thanks Buckjumper)

I also felt it was about time I bit the bullet and considered how to do the job I was least looking forward to on the loco, the flared sides of the tender. I was expecting this to be a complete ######### (didn't even bother typing a expletive there, I knew rmweb would hash it out!). However sometimes, just sometimes, things work out easier than you were expecting.

First up I made a jig consisting of a length of timber with a piece of the brass rod the inside diameter of the flare araldited to the top and a further length of mdf stuck behind the brass rod to secure it. This gave me a hard edge to bend the tender side against. Next up I stuck a length of metal the same thickness as the etched side along the bottom of the jig parallel with the top and at the right distance so that the bottom edge of the etch would rest on it as it was clamped into a vice.

The etched side has a half-etched line on it for the up-stand on the top of flare and I know it was important to only bend this once as repeated bending would make it break off. Clamping the jig and the side in a big vice (first I tried with some scrap!) I was able to bend the etch over the brass rod knowing that I would have a bend in the right place in terms of height and being parallel. I found pushing the brass over wasn't possible as it was too thick and hard and I really didn't want to try annealing the brass first as I thought this would make it too soft. In the end however working along the side with a piece of steel, a small hammer and a bit of patience and I got the curve made to my satisfaction.

You can see the resulting side and end below. The end has an etched tab which is why my length of nickel-silver used as the base-line has a gap midway along.

Finally I bent the straight part of the flare (is that contradiction in terms?) back up to parallel in a bending bar and cleaned up the piece with a file. The result is pretty good I think and I actually managed to make both sides as a handed pair which seem to match well.

Putting the three pieces together shows that I should be able to solder them together, there will be a little bit of solder to fill the back corners but not so much that I think it will be a problem.

So now I'm thinking about the tender chassis, do I try to put pin-points and use the outside frames, do I try to make the inside frames take 2mm bearing and try to make some kind of horn block. May be something with continuous springy beams?

All ideas gratefully received!

David