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About this blog

Industrial locos and other malarkey.

Entries in this blog

Dapol Austerity - smokebox door and handrails.

The smokebox door, like the rest of the loco, needs a bit of work. The first job was to carve away the numberplate, not really needed on an industrial loco..., and the moulded dart. The moulded hinge is huge and ugly so that came off as well, leaving a couple of small pads to mount a length of .025" Evergreen rod on, and for some reason there are rivets on the hinge straps which the prototype lacked so they came off as well. The front handrail is set too high so I filled the moulded holes and

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Dapol Austerity - cab modifications.

I've been working on the cab these past few days. An RT Models body detailing etch has been aquired which includes spectacle plates and a new cab rear.   The first job was to hack out the cab rear and bunker top with a piercing saw;     Ready for etched replacements;     The back sheet has had its spectacle plates soldered in place and the cab interior back sheet has been folded to shape and had the coal door soldered on. Before I fitted them I epoxied the replacement spectacle plat

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Judith Edge Ruston 48DS - ready for painting.

I've fitted the derail beams (easier than it looks), side window surrounds (filigree thin but again easier than I thought), steps and resin filler caps. I didn't use the supplied sandboxes as they were too wide and would interfere with the tails of the sprung buffers so I knocked up some from plastic. The loco now weighs 55 grams, I might try and fit a few more grams of lead in yet. Still to fit are the brakes, but I'll do that while I'm giving the body a coat of primer.   A final look at the

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Austerity Update.

Inspired by recent posts from 46444 I've dug out my Dapol Austerity and done a little more work on it.   The undersize dome and silly little water filler have been replaced by RT Models castings, as has the chimney as my model came with the fibreglass type that was used on underfeed stoker fitted locos. Other RT Models parts fitted so far are replacement etched bufferbeam overlays, which help reduce the overscale width of the bufferbeams, and coupling rods which complement the Gibson wheels ni

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A1 Models Freelance OO9 Diesel - part 6 a little more progress.

A quick update on this project.   This loco has been sitting forgotten whilst I've been working on the Rustons, but I dug it out yesterday to do a bit more work on it whilst one of the Rustons was being run in on the rolling road. All I did was to paint the exhaust, paint and fit the buffers and pick out the window frames in Tamiya flat aluminium;     The roof beacon isn't glued on yet, I haven't decided whether to fix it in place before or after weathering.   Paul.

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Judith Edge Ruston 48DS - now running.

I now have a running chassis. I've put my own loco to one side for the time being to get my friends one finished.   Pick-ups are 1mm x .15mm phospher bronze strip soldered to copper clad sleeper material;     It took me ages to decide on the best way to arrange them, and then I tried different widths and thicknesses of phospher bronze before I was happy. The pick-up wires aren't soldered to the motor yet as this one may end up being fitted with a DCC chip.   Here it is bolted together

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Judith Edge Ruston 48DS - cab 2.

Work has slowed down again on these two. I ordered some phospher bronze strip over Christmas to make up the pick-ups, however it was out of stock. I'm hoping to find some at the Stafford exhibition and then get these two running.   In the meantime I've done a bit more work to the bodies. The kit is supplied with a couple of small etches for the cab floor, obviously not the whole floor as the motor and gearbox sit inside the cab. These pieces sit either side and are only used for the open cabbe

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High Level RSH 'Husky' - Wheels.

A long time ago I started a High Level Kits RSH 'Husky' (click on the tags above for the relevent entries). The project stalled through a lack of wheels, the kit is designed to use 10mm Sharman wheels which are no longer available. I've decided that its time that this one was finished, so today I've taken a brief break from building Rustons to sort out an alternative wheelset.   I'm using Gibson Lowmac discs, slightly oversize but I can live with that, which of course need holes drilling for c

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Judith Edge Ruston 48DS - Pick up brackets.

I've been putting much thought into the pick up arrangement on these locos. My usual method is to glue a copper-clad strip across the frames underneath the loco to solder phospher bronze wire to. But there's the gear stretcher bar in the way so I looked at other methods. The method that I've chosen is to solder brackets on either side of the frame, epoxy short lenghts of copper clad sleeper strip underneath the brackets and solder phospher bronze strips in place to act on the edge of the wheel f

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Judith Edge Ruston 48DS - Inner frame repairs.

Regular visitors to this blog might remember how I made a mess of bending up one set of inner frames (if not, or you need to be reminded of my stupidity its all here).   Tonight, after a great deal of thought, I decided that I really ought to do something about it. So I first of all ran a fillet of solder down the good edge for strength, then bent a piece of scrap etch to a 90 degree angle and soldered it across the broken front part of the frame (closest to camera). A piece of 1mm square bras

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Judith Edge Ruston 48DS - Wheels.

Judith Edge provide wheels with the kit - you need to specify gauge when ordering- as I'm building these to EM the wheels supplied are Gibson 2'3", which are slightly underscale (the prototype had 2'6" dia. wheels).   The Gibson wheels are plain discs whereas the prototype wheels had 4 holes cast into them. So to drill the 4 holes I made up a simple jig from a short length of 2mm axle material, polished so that the wheels are a sliding fit, and an offcut of brass etch;     As you can see

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Judith Edge Ruston 48DS - Bonnet.

I started the bonnet by rolling the top part around a broom handle;     Then I filed a radius on a piece of wood strip to fold the smaller edge radius;     Held in a vice;     I coudn't use the vice to form the other edge so I used my Bug;     Ready to be soldered up;     Bonnet tacked in place;     I bolted the body to the footplate to keep everything square whilst I tacked the assembly together. I then removed the body from the chassis for final soldering.   Wit

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Judith Edge Ruston 48DS - Cab 1.

After an extended absence(!) from my workbench I'm now back working on these two.   My own loco is having an open cab, the owner of the second loco has requested the closed version. The body baseplate is first bolted to the main frames, a thin layer of grease between the two stops any embarassing solder accidents. Then I tacked the cab front in place, followed by one side;       I left the etched detail parts inside the baseplate in place while I made up the cab, to give the baseplate

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Judith Edge Ruston 48DS - Main frames 1.

Assembling the main frames was very straightforward. Everything fitted as it should with no fettling required, apart from cleaning up the cusp.   In the flat on the left, and folded up on the right;     I left the detail etch inside the frame cut-out until the frame sides were folded down for strength reasons, in hindsight this was unnecessary.   Both locos are being fitted with the early 'channel' bufferbeams. The buffer mounting bushes are fitted at this stage, note that they have a f

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Judith Edge Ruston 48DS - Inner frames 1.

The inner frames are etched in one piece and form the working heart of the loco, holding the axles and gearbox in place. They can be built rigid or compensated. Compensating this loco is so easy that there's little point in building it rigid. The instructions suggest fitting the lead axle bearings in place before folding up, I chose to fit the bearings after folding to make holding the frame sides secure for bending easier;     Not everything goes as planned... Note the section above the b

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Judith Edge Ruston 48DS - Gearbox 1.

I've made up the High Level 'Rustler' gearboxes for these two locos. They are etched in nickel silver and come complete with 2mm axle material, brass bearings and plastic spur gears and a brass worm. Instructions cover two sides of A4, including some very clear exploded diagrams. Reduction is 97:1.   The gearbox is made up of two main parts, the main part that holds the motor and a swing arm that transmits power to the rear axle.   Here is the main part, in the flat on the left, and folded o

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Judith Edge Ruston 48DS - First look.

I have a pair of Judith Edge Ruston 48DSs on my workbench, one for myself and one for another RMWeb member.   The kit comes complete apart from paint and pick-ups, something unusual for a loco kit but very welcome in my mind.   The main etch is shown below;     This covers all of the main variations of the class, apart from n.g. versions, having alternative cab sides and bufferbeams as well as windows, early locos had square framed widows, on later locos the corners were rounded off.  

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Paint Shop Progress 5.

I've started painting my A1 Models freelance diesel. First of all I treated the bare brass with Carrs Metal Black, which didn't take very well, then gave it a coat of Phoenix Precision aerosol etch primer (I prefer not to put etch primer through my airbrush). After that had dried thoroughly I undercoated the model with Revel acrylic white;     Note that the base for the orange beacon has been glued to the roof, after the etch primer and before the white undercoat. Etch primer can affect so

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A1 Models Freelance 009 Diesel - part 5 footsteps and couplings.

Footsteps now added;     These are made from 5mm x .3mm brass strip, folded up using a scrawker and a square needle file to make some fold lines. I thought about open steps backed with mesh but went for solid steps, partly for simplicity and partly for ruggedness.   Couplings are RT Models 'Harrogate Gasworks' type. These have a nice heavy fabricated base, not unlike those used on some NCB underground locos. The back face of the coupling base needs to be filed flat before use. The buffer

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A1 Models Freelance 009 Diesel - part 4 roof and exhaust.

The roof and exhaust are now soldered in place. Before rolling the roof to shape I annealed it by holding it over a gas flame (cooker) until it turned straw coloured then rolled it using a couple of round pieces of metal (the handle of a scraper and a piece of 5mm bar) using a copy of the Yellow Pages as a soft pad. Then the roof was taped in place before being tacked using a small amount of solder in two places;     Once I was happy with the positioning, which took two attempts, I solder

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A1 Models Freelance 009 Diesel - part 3 bonnet.

The bonnet is now in place. First of all I soldered the grills, top panel and doors in place whilst the front panel and bonnet were still flat;     (Flat brass sheet is a pig to photograph!) The backs of the doors etc. were tinned with 188 then soldered in place with my RSU using the probe to hold the component in place whilst the joint is made. This kind of work is where the RSU excells. I drilled an extra hole in the bonnet top, for the exhaust pipe. The etched hole is at the front, pa

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A1 Models Freelance 009 Diesel - part 2 cab.

I've been working on the cab. This comes etched in one piece;       I've drilled holes for handrails and door handles. Strangely the left hand side door has the handle at the front and the right hand side door has the handle at the rear.   Folded up and soldered together;     All bends are re-inforced with a fillet of solder, not strictly necessary perhaps. I used a Bill Bedford handrail jig to bend up the handrails, which are made from .45mm diameter brass wire. Door handles are

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A1 Models Freelance 009 Diesel - part 1 footplate.

On the workbench at the moment is an A1 Models etched brass body kit which I'm going to mount on a Farish 03 mechanism.   The kit is designed for the Bachmann 6w switcher chassis, however I feel that using the inside framed jackshaft driven 03 chassis will give the loco a more British feel. The body kit is designed to fit straight onto the Bachmann chassis with the body removed so I've made up a brass footplate to marry the etched body and Farish chassis together.   The footplate is made fr

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Coopercraft AEC Lorries

These two were built at least 18 years ago. I recently rediscovered them in Mum's attic and now they reside in my display case. I think that the kits need no introduction, there must be thousands of these on layouts up and down the country!         Despite their shortcomings I'm still rather pleased with them, otherwise they'd have been sold on as part of one of my semi-regular purges. The blue one was built first and the red dropside came later, its interesting to see how my modelli

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Paint Stirring.

Here's a few tools that I use when painting;     At the top is a Badger battery powered paint stirrer, with the paddle underneath. I use this when stirring paint for spraying. Originally bought as a bit of an indulgence, I previously used a bit of bent wire in a mini-drill which was a faff to set up, I now view this as an essential piece of kit.   Below is a 'Nuffield style' laboratory spatula, used for transferring paint from the pot to a colour cup for spraying. It's stainless steel, wh

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