rowanj

BLENHEIM has the Queen of Scots today, Unlike nearly all the numbers underlined in my ABC, I actually remember seeing her at Newcastle, as I was always fascinated by the history of the Duke of Marlborough and Blenheim Palace. Nothing unusual about this one- simply renumbered Hornby, Emerging from under Scottie Bridhe, D20 62383 with its're-sided tender heads home to Alnmouth/Alnwick, ArthurK/NorthEastern Kits with a modified semi-scratchbuild tender. The NCB, wholly unprototypically, gets occasional running powers on my layout- otherwise my small stock of NCB locos would never turn a wheel, This is a modified Hornby J94, representing a loco which was at Ashington. It came as a present from my daughter as a non-runner, resolved when a DCC blanking plate was fitted.

" Next stage, roll a boiler....." Although I had practiced a bit on the G W Roller, the boiler on the photo is my 3rd attempt at one for the J24 and I still need to ensure I get the cuts for the firebox right, So what went wrong? The boiler is the same 4ft 3in as the J21, J25, but shorter. On the first roll, the diamater looked right- i.e 17mm- but when compared with the LRM kit, was obviusly too narrow, research showed I should have added another 2 or 2-5 mm to account for the boiler cladding, which added 8 inches or so. On the second one, the boiler was too long, and I messed it up trying to cut it back. So this is number 3, Getting the blank as near as possible to the right size is pretty critical, I think, The formula is Pi x the diameter of the boiler. As for the mess- up, as Mark Antony said to Cleopatra after the Battle of Alexandria ."Stercus accidit"- S**t happens"

Here are are a couple of photos of the J24, Just to give credit where it is due, I'm only building this (or trying to), because the LRM J21/J25 kit includes etches for the cab and front splasher for both locos, so I had an "interesting" set of spares The chassis is almost complete and I'll start to assemble the Highlevel motor/gearbox next, i decided I could not put up with the look of the original coupling rods, so have managed to fabricate replacements. They still are not perfect, so I found a couple of sets on Wizard Models which should cut and shut to fit, It will be a test of my original marking out when I come to try and fit them. Talking of wheels, I got in contact with Markits, who have a set of J27.26.25 in their catalogue, It turns out they also do a set for the J24, so I ordered those, If this build goes sideways, I'll use the wheels on another J25 from LRM. But what can go wrong? The footplate has been cut out and buffer beam, drag beam and side valances fitted. The buffer beam was in the spares box, and had etched folds to represent the wooden slab behind the steel plate, The drag beams were also in the spares, i doubt if they are prototypical, but who sees them anyway, which is a pity as one was a lovely rivetted overlay, I soldered it to a blank piece of brass to give it the necessary strength, The valances were cut from brass offcuts, and I admit I cut about 6 to get the 2 that I could live with. Cutting out the footplate was a slow job. I read Bolton;s book, and he suggested taking lots of measurements and marking things out, scribing lines, cutting around them in one piece and Bob's your uncle, If only I had done Technical Drawing and Metalwork at school instead of Latin.! I used the chassis to mark out where the centre piece should be removed, checking to see how LRM had done it on the J25, then drilled 4 hoes to take the piercing saw plade, I scribed a line between them and cut away, knowing the rectanglar hole would be slightly too small, which is better than the alternative, The same basic method was used to cut out the areas where the wheeels pass through the footplate, I always found I needed to remove a bit more metal at every turn,,But better that than having to start again on the whole thing, One thing I did do was, on the advice, I think, ff Tony Gee, was to invest in good quality precion blades for the piercing saw, I have unpleasant memories of blades breaking very readily when using blades from hobby shops. To get to this stage with body and chassis, only 1 blade has broken, Next stage- complete the chassis,, roll a boiler, and hopefully, we will have something that doesnt look like it's in North Road Scrapyard.

Looking forward to seeing the house in situ. 2 new houses with one stone....

The chassis has been "shaped" using the LRM J25 as a sort of proxy, I thought I had some Romford/Markits 18mm wheels, but no such luck, so have used Scalelink ones for testing purposes, Spacers were from a Mainly Trains/Wizard fret, supplemented by cut down EM?P4 ones from previous builds. All seems nice and square. I want to add springs, but can't find a source as yet, Equally, 18mm Romfords seem to be in short supply. I had a bit of a "fettling fest" to get the wheels to revolve with the coupling rods fitted,, but have manged. Part of the problem was the plastic centred wheels shifting on the axles, ifitted larger Romfords just to check, and that showed they will work when the correct wheels are fitted, I'm not happy with the look of them, however, so I'll go back and see what I either have, or can source,

Hi John, Oxford Rail have only produced the one variety as far as I know, though there were certainly plans for others, as well as a J26. I believe demonstration models of the J26 were at Warley, with a scheduled release Q4 2024, How the merger with Hornby has affected things, i couldnt say, I modified a NuCast kit to represent one of the locos you mention- superheater removed, but extended smokebox left on, and continuous handrails around the boiler/smokebos/smokebox front. It makes a nice visual change. The same thing happened to some J21's which lost their superheater, The j27 must be among the best value for money among recent RTR releases, and hopefuully another batch will arrive soner rather than later. John

Goodness knows how the J24 will turn out. I've never scratchbuilt a loco, and the only chassis I built was nearly 50 years ago, when I managed to get something to run under a modified Wills A2 running as an A1. Hopefully, my experience with etched kits will help. To roll out the cliches, "nothing ventured, nothing gained", and if it doesnt work, all I've lost is some brass sheet. This adventure came about when I saw what was left over from building a pair of LRM J21 kits, In the kits are cab fronts and sides and the front splashers for the J25, These looked similar to the J24, and,in fact, when I checked them against the Isinglass J24 drawing, they seem identical. Both these parts would have tested my skill level, so that was a relief. I was always going to need to cut out a footplate and roll a boiler, and thought I might be able to pick up a chassis from LRM, but the J24 is shorter and has a different wheelbase, so a scratchbuilt chassis is needed, If the chassis and body work, I;ll probablysource a tender kit rather than scratchbuild one, But that is somewhere in the distant future. A very tentative start has been made on the chassis, The wheelebase is 7 ft 9in x 8 ft (so 31mmx 32mm.), and by chance, I found some suitable coupling rods amongst the spares. I have no memory where they came from. I'm using Simon Bolton's book on scratchbuilding as a sort of bible, and I'm going to use the LRM J25 I have as a guide for the various shapes and curves, My chassis fabrication is pretty crude, The 2 brass sides of K & S brass were soldered together at 3 points along the top edge, the centre line for the wheels scribed using the Isinglass plan, then, again from the plan I marked out and pilot drilled the centre axle hole, using the diameter of the coupling rod as a guide,. I then pinned the coupling rods through that hole, and used them to drill the outer axle holes, If it works, this would be an alternative to soldering the coupling rods to the chassis blank, I have begun to gradually open the holes ready for bearings, I've also cut out the blank for the footplate, No doubt to the disgust of true engineers, I simply photocopied the Isinglass drawing, cut out the footplate from the drawing, sellotaped it to the brass sheet and using some fantastic scissors which my wife got from QVC to cut meat, cut out the metal, very slightly oversized just in case. ( In case she reads this, i mean the extra pair she bought me -not the ones she uses for culinary work),

So here is the D20 in action, on its 'regular turn- an Alnwick-Newcastle stopper, This was the last haunt of the Class, based at the Tweedmouth sub-shed at Alnmouth, The kit itself is superb, and actually easier to build and get right than the DJH model. I'm glad I had a go at the rebuilt tender, though, like most things, I would make a better job second-time round, especially with the join around the top panel. Next stop, the semi-scratchbuild J24- in the words of John Lennon, "Some may say I'm a dreamer" - and there is a PDK D49 Hunt in the pile.

Finally released from the sidings, Dave Alexander J21 65070 takes its' short rake of open wagons to Heaton, and then , in a few cases, probably off for scrap, The majority of them were bought cheaply at Tynemouth Market, boxed and mint PO wagons , whose value I proceeded to worsen by my practice weathering, The newly completed Northeastern Kits D20 has also been parked up with a SO Alnwick-Newcastle, but can now complete its' journey, This was a lovely kit to build, but I modified the tender to represent one of the several which got new sides and tanks, This was not wholly succesful but, from normal viewing , a man with a white stick and golden retriever would be happy.

This, among others, is the photo which got me thinking about the splasher tops. I think they were, usually, unpainted in BR days, and the various B&W photos do show a much brighter colour, The ex-works photo of 62383 at Darlington at the link below is pretty convincing. highly polished brass, then? 62383 Darlington shed April 1955 - W.Worsdell Class D20 (NER Class R) 4-4-0 Locomotives - Railway-Photography (smugmug.com)

Any suggestions for the colour of the loco splasher rims? Colour photos suggest they are almost white, but perhaps they should be steel? DJH seem to think brass or copper.

I mentioned a couple of posts ago that my Dave Alexander Q7 was running a little "lumpily" so it has gone int Works. Turned out it was nothing major, so with a bit of TLC it is now back in service, It may be just on a running-in turn to get it , unusually,to Little Benton on a rake of hoppers, but it could possibly be a train of coking coal from Weetslade Disposal Point to Consett Steelworks, and the Tyne Dock loco just happened to be somewhere -probably Heaton- and was used instead of the more usual Q6. the loco, as I said, is one of the late lamented models produced by Alexander Models, Their loss is a real shame, as was the loss of Dave, a lovely, helpful man, There was talk of his kits being taken over, but nothing seems to have come of it.

I seem to be getting there, The loco is just back from a layout test, and it is found to be capable of easily handling the 6-coach Alnwick service and, more importantly, going round bends, The rear of the boiler/firebox keft plenty room for a roll of lead, and I added a bit more to the underside of the cab roof and the ashpan. I actually had much less bother balancing this kit than the DJH one, There are a few places where I need to tidy up,- I see that splasher rim has become partly detached= but otherwise... Paint the buffers and the splasher tops, glaze the windows and add numbers, then do some lightish weathering, and she is ready to go.

All vintage ex-NER today, J21 65070 is still waiting a path out of the sidings, while J77 68392 has brought a couple of empty tank wagons down from Blyth. Poking its' nose in, J25 65697 has a freight for the Riverside Branch, This was the electrified loop off the North Tyneside Line, and ran from Percy Main to Byker and then on to Central, predominantly serving the Tyneside shipyards and engineering works, Services from Heaton Yards could only access it from Percy Main, so that meant a trip up the ECML, the south-east curve at Benton Quarry Junction onto the North Tyneside line, a run along the Coast. then off onto the Riverside Line at Percy Main- a long way round but useful for me as it passes Little Benton. The Riverside Branch , by the time I was spotting, had next to no passenger services, catering only for the start and end of the day-shifts, There was a Saturday lunchtime service from Central, which I managed to use only once, getting off at Carville, next to Swan Hunters, and only a few hundred yards from Wallsend Station, which was my usual stop, This was probably in 1963 or '64, and I can still recall how run-down the stations were on the Branch,

Thanks to David and Jonathan (sorry, couldn't resist) for the posts. I think my copper wire may have been a bit larger than 1mm, but I certainly didnt like the "look", In the event, I couldnt find a source for 0.9mm rod, so will get some 1mm and see how it looks. Re the build, although I take proving photos to check , as all I'm doing is follow the instructions, there is nothing to post about here. I have reached the detailing stage, so it looks like 62383 will pull a train before too long. One thing I have been doing is practicing rolling boilers using the G W Watts roller. It does take a bit of practice, but I'm getting there. Building a J24 from scratchbuilt parts- chassis, boiler, footplate should be feasable, The J25 cab sides and front look usable, and boiler fittings are either already in the spares box or can be sourced, If the loco looks to be coming together OK, I'll get a tender kit from either ArthurK or LRM, I 've never built a scratchbuild loco in brass, so this will be a great adventure.

Stupid question of the day. What dia, rod should I be using for the vacuum steam pipe along the boiler? I had a go with 1mm copper earth wire , but thinks it looks too bulky.

Always a pleasure to trainspot at Longdrem, Eric.

The D20 is progressing. While I'm waiting for the GW Models Mini Roller, I had a go at rolling the boiler, with my usual way of using fingers, marker pens of various diameters and a mouse mat,, It turned out well, using the smokebox etch to get the diameter right, I was a bit surprised that there was no butt joint at the boiler bottom, Checking constantly against the smokebox and cab front got me there without a mishap. All I have done is follow the instructions with the kit to get to this point, with the excepttion of the cab roof and interior, On the roof, I prefer to have them demountable, and on other of Arthurs kit, they are designed that way, In this case, the instructions indicate the roof should be soldered to the cab, but I just used a couple of crossbraces of 0,7 mm wire to hold it in place by slidng it on.This also makes it easier to paint the cab, then slide in the detailed whitemetal backhead, The photo shows it needs a bit of fettling, but should be OK> I found the cab interior, which is a fold up one-piece etch, was causing a short on the live wheel, so I cut the RH and LH splashers from the floor and soldered them in, making sure the RH live side cleared the live insulated wheel, I needed to file a fair bit off the fronts to get the backhead to pass through, and als nip the bottom sides of the backhead itself, but I think it all works. I'll solder in a new floor from srap etch, them use a trick I think I got from Mikemeg to scribe a piece of paper to represent the planks, then harden it with thin PVA, No-one will ever see it, but it's a bit of fun, I'll take a photo later to show what I mean.

The spotters would not have expected to see a Tyne Dock Q7 emerging with a Class B freight ,After the 9F's arrived for the Consett traffic, the Q7's were regularly used on ordinary freights, By 1960, they were often overpowered for the loads they were hauling, as is the case here, The loco doesnt get out much, and didnt run too well, so it is obviously due a "General",

I managed to get a half-hour running some trains so thought I may as well get the Alexander Q7 out. It actually ran a little "lumpily" so I'll give it some TLC, I tried to get a photo "in action" to show my attempt at filling the void between the frames. It wasn't easy, which, I suppose, shows that for "in service " purposes, strict accuracy is not essential, For personal satisfaction or fidelity to the prototype is, of course, another story.

No need whatsoever to apologise, Mike, The more comments the merrier, I was actually on an SLS Special hauled by the Q7 in 1964, A3 Blink Bonny Newcastle-York, via the ECML. York -Whitby- Middlesbrough by a B1, then Middlesbrough-Newcastle by the Q7. I have a couple of photos, but on transparencies, so someday will sort them out.

Thanks are due to Mike for sharing the last posts. They show what can be done with these kits by a good modeller, but the kits themselves are so well thought out that even a duffer can make a good stab at them. I had forgotten that Mike had built a Q7 test, and it looks excellent. I accept that something needs to be between the frames..I even knocked something up with Dave Alexander's kit..and in a perfect world you would have a representation of the 3 cylinder Stephenson gear. However, I can only speak personally, but I would buy the kit knowing I could cobble something together to make people think that something was happening, Am I just not sufficiently purist? Am I alone in settling for a fictional bodge, even if it did look a little bit like the real thing? I will interested to see how Mike gets on. Back to the D20 cab.. John

As I understand it, Arthur had most of the etchwork completed, but was determined to have appropriate castings for the inside motion. I believe that was the point he had reached before his last stroke. I don't know whether he actually commissioned the etches, or if a test kit was built . Mikemeg would be the one to ask. Though he has never done this, and depending on how far things have got with the design and production, I wonder if there is any merit in suggesting that he offers what he has got as a sort of scratchbuilding aid, in the way that Mike Edge does with some of his kits. Certainly a modern kit of a Q7 would be worth having.

John. I think the DJH Q7 is one of the poorest of their models, and I wouldnt recommend it unless there is a very major upgrade, Dave Alexander did a very nice whitemetal kit, and that's the one I built.. Arthur was very close to producing an etched kit, but I suspect that won't happen now. So if you spot an Alexander kit, that would be the way to go, John

After a succesful test run around the layout, I can start addimg the details to the body, At the moment, Most is just tack soldered and the cab roof is simply perched on the sides for the photo. As can be seen, I comfortably got away with the DJH AM9 motor/gearbox. I'm not sure what to make of these, They are well engineereed, and make fitting a breeze, But they are, in my view, horribly overpriced, and even the smaller one is only going to fit into something no smaller than, say, a K3 unless you want to compromise the cab interior, I wonder what the sale of DJH to Squires means for future production, If the cost could be got down to the £50-£60 mark, I would suspect they would be top-sellers (assuming they are not, already),