S7 scratch building

[kitpw]

...spectacular!

 

KitPW

Swan Hill - https://www.rmweb.co.uk/community/index.php?/blogs/blog/2502-swan-hill

[Caley Jim]

Wonderful stuff as always, Mike.

 

The CR had a similar vehicle, also with four bearings per axle.  Dia.34 30T trolley No.1.  Special wagons like this had their own number series.  It too is slightly bowed upwards in the centre.

 

 

One day I would like to model it and some other unusual trolley wagons the CR had.  That. however, will be by drawing up the artwork for etches.  Perhaps that is cheating a bit and not true scratch building as you are doing.

 

Jim

[airnimal]

Jim, that's a fine looking wagon. With the open framework you will not be able to fudge hiding the second pair of springs as I am doing on my build.

 

I don't think it matters how we build our models as long we enjoy our hobby. There has always been more than one way to skin a cat. It's just that I don't have the skills to do the modern way to do drawings for etching. I could do the old fashion way with pen and ink but the modern world left me behind long ago.

Mike

[Compound2632]

@Caley Jim, on this Caledonian trolley, do you know if there is a single axle with four bearings or is each wheel on its own stub axle? I'm just wondering how the bearing was accessed for maintenance. A stub axle would mean that standard axleboxes could be used inside and outside, rather than special inside bearing boxes being made.

[Caley Jim]

56 minutes ago, Compound2632 said:

@Caley Jim, on this Caledonian trolley, do you know if there is a single axle with four bearings or is each wheel on its own stub axle? I'm just wondering how the bearing was accessed for maintenance. A stub axle would mean that standard axleboxes could be used inside and outside, rather than special inside bearing boxes being made.

Mike Williams' book states that it is thought to date from 1868 when three drawings appear in the drawings register relating to boiler wagon, trolley number 1, but none of them have survived.  The diagram shows the axle as being continuous, but I suppose that doesn't signify anything.  It survived until 1917.  Mike states 'In comparison the the buffer height, the wheels were probably 4ft in diameter.'

 

In 1876 a 40T trolley (No.2) was built with totally enclosed bogies of 3'6"wheelbase and inside bearings. so I suppose that it is possible that No.1 had inside bearings too.

 

Jim

[Northroader]

I would think having stub axles would create more problems, particularly keeping the wheels to gauge. The wagon bearings are semi circular, and rest on top of the axle, so could be changed by taking the weight of the spring, and the lubrication would be grease trickling down from above, so all that’s really needed under the axle is some kind of cover to keep the journal clean.

[Compound2632]

Just now, Northroader said:

keeping the wheels to gauge. 

 

That seems to me to be the killer argument against.

[Dave Hunt]

Even if an item of rolling stock had both outside and inside bearings it very probably had through axles. Quite a few early locomotives had four or even five bearings on an axle to spread the load; the main drawback was that the near impossibility of aligning them accurately when the frames were likely to move, even if ever so slightly, resulted in strains being set up that led to axle failures, the elimination of which was, of course, the primary aim of multiple bearings....

 

Dave 

[airnimal]

Very little progress to report because I've had my grandad hat on replacing floor tiles in my youngest daughters kitchen. 

This is her first house and we have uncovered so many things wrong with it but we are working our way through them. 

 

I have made a bracket to mount the hand wheel on. I have drilled a hole in the framework to accept a brass rod because I didn't want to rely on glue with the wheel being in such a vulnerable position. 

[Dave John]

That handwheel is quite superb. 

[airnimal]

Dave, the hand wheel is from this etch. I don't have any idea where it came from but I have had these a few years in my bits box. As they stand they are a bit flat so I wound some .7 mm nickel wire around a former before cutting one from the loop. I then filed a flat on one side reducing the thickness by about a quarter before soldering on to the etch. I then spun it in the mini drill and cleaned it with a bit of wet and dry. 

[airnimal]

After 2 days replacing floor tiles at my daughters house I have managed to get back to the workbench .

The plate at the back of the well was drilled to accept 2 different sizes of MasterClub bolts. I drilled the plates away from the wagon before loading the bolts with a dab of superglue on the stem before pushing them home.

Once dry the stems were filed off and the plates were glued to the wagon. Still a long way to go. 

[Schooner]

Well, blow me @airnimal! All your builds are educational and enjoyable to follow, but this really is shaping up to be something special. Thank you so much for taking the time to lead us through them, and to demystify the process a bit. As with anything, it is not magic but skill and dilligence that makes your wagons (and loco!) so brilliant...but bug***ed if I can tell the difference sometimes!

[airnimal]

Schooner, you are very kind and I am glad you enjoy my ramblings.  A couple of photos showing the method of glueing the boltheads in the plates. The bolt heads are picked up with tweezers and just touched in the superglue before pushing in the holes. Once dry the stems are cut off and the back filed smooth. 

[airnimal]

I'm getting now to the intresting detail parts even though I haven't finished all the bolts / nuts. 

So i have made the lashing rings for the well back plate. These are made from brass strip 1.5 mm X .5 mm cut and filed to shape and drilled to accept the rings made from .6 mm nickel wire. The carpet monster has quite a few of these bits this morning. The ones on the side of the well are a bit different because the bracket is made from a strip of brass T section 2.5 mm X 2 mm that needed a bit more work to form the right shape. 

 

Edited August 19, 2020 by airnimal
Added another photo.

[DerbyLNWR]

This is always pretty advanced stuff - made to look effortless  by a master craftsman - but this latest build is really PhD level !

Blooming amazing.

All best 

Jonathan

[Dave Hunt]

I was going to make some erudite comments on this build but have now decide on a simple WOW,

 

Dave

[airnimal]

It's funny how other people see your work and what you see yourself. I see myself as a bodger who can't make kits so just blunders on scratch building. I make so many mistakes when building something like this wagon but I try to carry on and overcome problems as they arise. I also only notice details after I am half way through that would have been easier had I noticed earlier on.  A case in point are a pair of tie rods behind the headstock that would have been better had I not clad the outside with the riveted plates. I didn't see these until recently but how to reto fit them ?

 

First I drilled a couple of holes through the headstock to take some .6 mm wire and pushed it all the way through till it touched the back wall. I then very carefully placed the tip of my soldering iron on the wire as close to the end and melted the wire in the back plate. This leaves a raised bead around the wire which was withdrawn and the bead filled flat. I will add the cosmetic bolts to the outside when I do all the bolts on the ends of the wagon. 

I have used this method before when I made my tank wagon. I drilled a hole through the tank end restraining bar at 45 degrees before pushing the wire through until it hits the tank cradle where I place the soldering iron and melt it all the way through until it comes out at the correct angle. This does produce a large burr, but that's easy to remove once the wire is removed.

[Regularity]

3 hours ago, airnimal said:

I see myself as a bodger who can't make kits so just blunders on scratch building.

I long ago realised that (generally speaking) I can’t make kits.

Whether that’s down to being pig-headed enough to think that I can see a better/easier way, have acquired sufficient knowledge of the prototype to have higher standards of dimensional accuracy than some of the kits that I have tried, or am too set in my own ways of working, I don’t know.

 

I decided on S scale when I was a teenager, because I liked the size. When asked at my local club, I brazenly commented that 4mm was too easy. I meant that in the sense of their being too many kits covering a wide range of prototypes. Having attempted a few kits in 4mm and 7mm scales, I think I got it wrong: 4mm scale is far too difficult!

[Dave Hunt]

6 hours ago, airnimal said:

It's funny how other people see your work and what you see yourself. I see myself as a bodger who can't make kits so just blunders on scratch building. I make so many mistakes when building something like this wagon but I try to carry on and overcome problems as they arise. I also only notice details after I am half way through that would have been easier had I noticed earlier on.

 

This has uses of the terms bodger and blunders that I should think apply to the vast majority of scratch builders; it certainly does to me. I can't think of a locomotive I've built when overcoming problems as they arise and having to go back to rectify earlier mistakes or omissions hasn't featured but the ingenuity you show when making your models leaves me full of admiration. For bodger and blunders in your case it is my opinion that the better terms would be skilled model maker and excellent problem solver. 

 

3 hours ago, Regularity said:

I long ago realised that (generally speaking) I can’t make kits.

Whether that’s down to being pig-headed enough to think that I can see a better/easier way, have acquired sufficient knowledge of the prototype to have higher standards of dimensional accuracy than some of the kits that I have tried, or am too set in my own ways of working, I don’t know.

 

This chimes with me perfectly. I am currently part way through making a steam crane from a 7mm kit that several other modellers of my acquaintance have successfully finished, seemingly without too much trouble, but I'm finding it a trial. The first kit I have made in several decades was one of a turntable for my layout that I bought just over a year ago and although I've now finished it satisfactorily that too caused me more grief than any scratch building project. I have now realised once again why I don't generally make things from kits and admire those who can do so without resorting to language that would shame a Liverpool docker of the old school.

 

Dave

[Regularity]

The only time I ever corresponded with Bob Essey I asked him why he switched from O finescale to S7. He told me that he realised that cutting holes in boilers to accommodate driving wheels set too closely together struck him as a pointless exercise and waste of time. 
That’s an interesting parallel with eschewing kits: of made to suit certain standards, they may not work well with others...

[Dave Hunt]

Bob Essery and I were the objects of a campaign by the late John Horton and Adrian Tester to switch to S7. One of the arguments they used was that of cutting holes in boilers but there was also the far better appearance of pointwork and the much better running through it that Ken Cottle showed us to be the case.

 

Dave   

[Regularity]

3 hours ago, Dave Hunt said:

Bob Essery and I were the objects of a campaign by the late John Horton and Adrian Tester to switch to S7. One of the arguments they used was that of cutting holes in boilers but there was also the far better appearance of pointwork and the much better running through it that Ken Cottle showed us to be the case.

You can improve the running and the appearances without going to S7, by tightening up the clearances and narrowing the gauge: but you still have the holes in the boiler to contend with, as well as the look of the wheels. (Something rather clunky about the O “fine” wheel profile, to my mind.) 

It’s all part of a bigger picture, simply put by stating that as far as things are practicable, reduce the prototype by your scale ration. In the long run, this is usually easier - so long as you make adjustments when you deviate from prototype practice. (The most noticeable of which is the need for slightly more side play on steam loco drivers as we use a single tyre profile, unlike the prototype. That’s why Geoff Holt’s 4-4-0 had trouble on the Dewsbury crossover, per the report in whichever MRJ Compendium it was. At least, that was my reading of his article.)

[Dave Hunt]

I'm not sure that we ever really got to the bottom of the trouble with Geoff's 4-4-0. At the time my Compound had just entered service and didn't have the same problem on Dewsbury despite very limited side play on both drivers and bogie and since Geoff has used my profile tool to turn the tyres, Bob and I largely discounted the tyre profiles as the  cause. To be honest I can't remember exactly what happened except to say that Geoff did all sorts of tweaks and modifications and I didn't read the article to which you refer.

 

As far as I am concerned, apart from the 'holes in the boiler' situation, the other major reasons for using S7 standards include the appearance of the wheel sets (as you say) and the ability to employ scale frame spacing. There isn't the obvious mismatch between frame spacing above and below the platform and it's a lot easier to fit inside motion between S7 frames - I wouldn't like to build another Compound in 0F as it was bad enough squeezing everything in as it was. I don't really understand why people actually narrow the gauge further to get better running rather than using S7 standards.

 

Dave

[Coal Tank]

4ft 81/2 inches That's it really 

Edited August 23, 2020 by Coal Tank