S7 scratch building

[Regularity]

2 hours ago, airnimal said:

 

I don't ever think for one moment my work comes close to these  masters of the model world

You might not think that, but please allow the rest of us to make up our own minds on this, Mike!

[Dave John]

Heh, I keep looking. If anything would push me to scale up is is this thread. I am by nature a maker of models, whether I am good at it doesn't matter , it is the pleasure of starting with materials and ending up with something solid that matters. 

 

Really airnimal it is top class work, and we tend to all be our own worst critics. Close photos are very harsh, but the detail you manage to create is stunning. 

 

 

[Dave Hunt]

Mike,

 

Geoff Holt was a very good friend of mine and we used to visit each others' workshops often when we both lived in Boston. He wouldn't mind me telling you that he made as many mistakes and threw away as many bits that didn't satisfy him as any other modeller. Between us we once rebuilt one of David Jenkinson's locomotives and Geoff was so dissatisfied with his first go at the bits he was doing that he took it all apart and started again. I think that was the main secret of his success - he wasn't averse to doing somethingseveral times until he was happy with it.

 

As an aside, I have happy memories of evenings at Geoff's up in his attic where he had a 7mm tail chasing layout based on Greyrigg. We would set a couple of trains running then sit with glasses of port or mugs of coffee and a packet of fags (very non-pc days) watching them circulate and setting the world to rights. Happy days.

 

Dave

[airnimal]

Gentlmem,  you are very kind and you comments mean a great deal to me. I belive we need to be our own worst critics otherwise our standards would stand still. 

 

Talking of the master builders,  my friend whom I am building this brake van for bought a Beeson loco body of E bay for a Stanier 2-6-4 tank of all places. He then asked Geoff Holt to rebuild it and add a fully working chassis to complete it. 

This appeared in Geoff's book and in M.R.J. and I had the pleasure of viewing it. It is a wonderful work of art. One small aspect was missing from the loco and I reluctantly mention it to my friend hoping not to upset him. After all he had spent a lot of money getting this loco to this stage and it may have been seen as bad manners to point this small omission out.

But he took it in good heart and asked me if I could rectify this small omission. What was missing was the small end stops on the handrails on the smoke box door. 

So I had a look at how Stanley Beeson did his on his models and it appeared he soldered small washers on the ends of the handrails. Not wanting to go near this beautiful model with my soldering iron I asked my friend if he could extract the handrail from the model and slide it out from the handrail knobs without disturbing the beautiful paint. 

I had being pondering over how make the ends when I was still working at my last employment when I was taught how to make a thermocouple by tig welding a non magnetic and a magnetic wire  together. I don't have any idear what they are used for but watching the wires melt in to a small ball gave me the idear. 

So I took a small length of nickel wire and place it in a vice and shot a small charge from the tig welder at it. It instantly burnt to a small ball like a lollipop. I then put this in a mini drill and shaped the ends with a needle file. We used lots of small bore stainless steel tube that matched the size of the handrails on the model so a length was cut to the right size. 

My friend was then able to replace the handrail and slip in the new ends all without disturbing the magical paintwork.

[airnimal]

All the plans this year now look to be scrapped but at least we have a hobby we can do at home. Now we are all locked down and nowhere to go we will have to make the most of it while we can. I don't have a top draw of unbuilt kits like most modellers, only boxes of parts. 

So out with the bits to see what we have and prepare the parts for a couple of Dia 13 bolster wagons. 

Cleaning the cusp of the etches and modifying and preparing  the wheels still took a good few hours. 

I have included  some photos of the modified Slaters S7 wheels and some Slaters unmodified finescale wheels. 

All those propaganda photos by the P4 society many years ago worked for me. Remember those big chunky wheels falling off the track......

[ian@stenochs]

6 hours ago, airnimal said:

All the plans this year now look to be scrapped but at least we have a hobby we can do at home. Now we are all locked down and nowhere to go we will have to make the most of it while we can. I don't have a top draw of unbuilt kits like most modellers, only boxes of parts. 

So out with the bits to see what we have and prepare the parts for a couple of Dia 13 bolster wagons. 

Cleaning the cusp of the etches and modifying and preparing  the wheels still took a good few hours. 

I have included  some photos of the modified Slaters S7 wheels and some Slaters unmodified finescale wheels. 

All those propaganda photos by the P4 society many years ago worked for me. Remember those big chunky wheels falling off the track......

Agree with you completely Mike, the P4 wheel thing got me too!  
I don’t have a stash of kits either but I do have quite a stock of wheels, motors, metal sheet and sections.  I won’t weary for something to keep me occupied plus it is good to have a legitimate excuse to get at the workbench!

 

Keep safe and sane,

 

Ian.

[ScottW]

@airnimal, You may have mentioned this previously in your thread but can I ask what you use to blacken your wheels? Just to save me searching back through 55 pages.

 

Thanks.

[airnimal]

ScottW, I have used the Kold Blak on this occasion but I have also used the Super Blue as well. I cleaned the wheels with Meths before I leave the wheels in the liquid for a few minutes. I cleaned them with a paper towel and then polished with a fibre brush in a mini drill before repeating for a second time. 

 

The solebars on these wagons did not have the standard cutout but ones with a less pronounced shape. So I have made these by filing by hand using my small hand vice so they  are all the same.

[airnimal]

After making the 4 headstocks I drilled them all for the white metal buffers from A.B.S on my home made headstock jig. 

I had one of my blond moments and drilled them all when only 2 wanted drilling ! So the 2 redundant ones were plugged with Evergreen rod. The 2 headstocks didn't need drilling because the 2 wagons  were permantly coupled together without buffers in the middle. 

After drilling I opened the holes using different broaches to the required size and then countersunk them with my home made de-burring tool given to me many years ago by a old tool maker.

[Caley Jim]

The head of that de-burring tool is remarkably similar to a rose-head dental bur, which is what I use for that sort of job!

 

Jim

 

[airnimal]

Sometimes things just don't go according to plan, not in my life anyway.

When I had the etched number plates done I forgot to record which numbers went with which wagons. Some were easy to find out about using the 3 volumes of the L.N.W.R. wagons books, but some were obtained from photographs / books and other sources. As I get older I now can't remember where some of this information was located.

I did have a set of numbers done for these Dia 13 timber wagons even though I had not built them. Half way through I checked the numbers against the drawing only to find out that the numbers I have were for the early wagons which were a shorter length. You quess it I had made a later pair of wagons.

Do I scrap these and start again or have some new number plates made ?

I could saw the ends of both wagons and and reduce the length which would make more sense.

[Coal Tank]

Just make them and give them to me ☺ 

[Caley Jim]

If it was me, I'd get new number plates made and build the shorter wagons for the number plates you have.  Why waste a perfectly good pair of wagons?

 

Jim

[Chrisbr]

You ony need to ask Mike......

[airnimal]

To continue with this saga  I decided in the end to start again. This has been a struggle from the start but I was not going to  admit defeat. First problem is I am running out of 60 thou plasticard and some sizes of Evergreen strip. I had to use some old scraps of  plasticard and even broke down some reject wagons to source material. 

Another problem was I have been struggling with accuracy when marking out. I decided to check my Moore & Wright square by using a straight edge along both sides and was shocked to find it was way out of true. This explains some of my many failures over the last few years !

I shouldn't be surprised because I have been using it for 53 years and even good tools wear out over time.

So after many attempts and more than a fair share of rejects I am now at a reasonable stage and may complete them. I even remember that the wheels and bolsters are off set having fallen in that trap last time when I made the dumb buffer version.

 

Chris, many thanks for you kind offer regarding the number plates. I will be in touch in a few days time.

[airnimal]

I am fortunate that I had in stock the correct longer buffers and the single brake shoes fitted to these wagons.

I had them from Adrain Swain about 20 years ago  and they fitted the bill perfectly. To fit the brake shoes I cut a couple of bits of brass angle to the required size and then soldered the shoes to these after first tinning with low melt solder. 

I then cut a couple of bits of Evergreen strip and sunk a 12BA nut with the soldering iron the way I mount my wheels.

This makes for removable of brake shoes easy for painting and allows adjustment to position them close to the wheels.

One of my pet hates is brake shoes with a gap that you could drive a bus between. Sorry rant over.

One problem I have with these wagons is that the works drawings has end stanchions but the photos don't have any fitted. Were different batches built with them and others without ? 

 

Edited April 9, 2020 by airnimal

[airnimal]

One small problem I had was with the buffers. These are a lot longer than the standard buffers on most L.N.W.R. wagons and Adrain Swain uses brass tube which you have to cut to the correct length and drawing pins for the heads. 

I tend to use turned steel  buffer heads with PB coil springs but I could not find any long enough. So I tried the heads out of Peco G.W.R. kits because I have plenty in stock. They would work if I shortened the body at the back where it goes through the headstock which I did. Unfortunately after I filed the backs down there was insufficient clearance for the buffers to compress. Scratch head and mutter and curse ...........

The only thing I could do was try to recess the backs to to accept the small turned collars to shorten the distance required. 

The next problem was the collars were nearly the same size as the buffer bodies. 

How was I going to turn down somethings so tiny ? Solution was to solder them to a small length of brass rod to hold them    

and reduce them with needle files in the mini drill.  Once they were a good fit I unsolder them, and cleaned them up.

Everything went back together and was a complete success. 

I find these little solutions to small problems one of the most rewarding aspects of our hobby. It makes up for the many disappointments when I drop one of my normal bloomers.

[airnimal]

Slowly building up the details but still plenty more to do. I should crack on with these and take advantage of this fine weather to finish and paint them while we are in lock down. 

[airnimal]

While my better half is having a lie in, I got up early and made the joining fixtures from some scrap etch and a small piece of brass tube. This matches the prototype way of fixing the pair of wagons together. I have used 14BA screws and nuts to screw them together but as yet I haven't dress them with a file to loose the slot in the screw head or shortened them to the correct length.

[Compound2632]

Oh dear - now I'm remembering the places my 4 mm D13 Ratio bash got stuck at - the fixed coupling, bolster D-shackles... Just as well I'm doing the dumb-buffered version - I'd not noticed the non-standard headstocks and long buffer guides.

 

I'll have to give the box another shake.

[airnimal]

I did some more work detailing the solebars yesterday, so I am getting near the end now. I am glad I went back and started again with the smaller length wagons, I don't think I would have been happy building the longer version. I think the shorter ones are better balanced in the looks department. 

[Coal Tank]

Nice work Mike 

[airnimal]

Finished at last. I was lucky yesterday l found a couple of brake levers from Ambis that I don't remember buying and the came in useful because the end part of the handle is half etched. I removed this part which shortened the handle but was a perfect size for these small wagons. 

The last rivets and bolts have now gone on including a couple on the ends with very large washers. I punched out some washers from 5 thou black plasticard which is way over scale but what else could I use. This black plastic in 5 thou I bought from Slaters in about 1983 or 1984  and I have very little left. When I ask David White from Slaters about buying some more he say's they have never sold black 5 thou plasticard. I beg to differ because I only bought plasticard from them and no where else. I think I bought it at Blackburn exhibition when it use to be in the town hall there. I would like another sheet because I am running very short. 

 

[Compound2632]

55 minutes ago, airnimal said:

When I ask David White from Slaters about buying some more he say's they have never sold black 5 thou plasticard. I beg to differ because I only bought plasticard from them and no where else. I think I bought it at Blackburn exhibition when it use to be in the town hall there. I would like another sheet because I am running very short. 

 

Thanks to a tip-off from @ScottW, I recently bought some (white) 5 thou - Evergreen not Slaters - from Eileen's Emporium.

[Caley Jim]

Have you thought of using black polythene, e. g. bin bags? It would probably need cyano to fix it. 

 

Just a thought, 

 

Jim