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LSWR/SE H15 little brother first


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A few weeks back I was looking for a SR tender loco to build and an Ace H15 came up and was within the budget I set. This is to be a longer term project, too big for the 0 gauge layout I am about to start, but I wanted a nice size loco. Earlier this week a part built DJH 4 mm scale H15 loco was on eBay and as it was a complete kit which in the end cost me under £50, I thought it would be a lot easier to cut my teeth on building a chassis with Walschaerts valve gear.

 

The seller had good photos and an honest description as some parts had come off and needed reassembling. It seems superglue was used and needs to be redone

 

post-1131-0-84395200-1535228812.jpeg

 

The tender is nicely finished, all be it in the wrong colour and era for me. But that's easily fixed, the loco had a base coat of paint presumably waiting for the chassis prior to finishing.

 

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The builder included a Model Rail article about building this loco and the author had issues with the chassis. The owner stated that in the end he felt the chassis would be too difficult

 

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I took the wheels off to clean the axles, the chassis is quite basic, which is fine as I have never built a loco with valve gear as difficult as this, The top hat bearings have been superglued to the chassis. After checking with some axle alignment jigs (London Road Models) I found the front set of drivers were 0.12mm out of square. I have no idea if this is an etching issue or the fitting of the top hat bearings. I will take the chassis apart and remove the glue

 

Owing to the design of the chassis where the centre drivers are 0.5mm higher than the other two I will order a set of Alan Gibson jointed coupling rods, as the DJH ones are one piece, so this will cause a delay

 

The kit had a DS10 motor, this might be strong enough but I have a D11 spare and think it may be stronger and these is also a motor mount for it on the chassis etch. If this fails I will buy a High Level Slimliner.

 

In the mean time I will get some decent quality superglue and re-attach the parts which have come loose

 

Also look into getting some Sage green as the kit is based on one of the 10 locos delivered after the grouping but delivered in sage green

 

 

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Looks good. Going to be a B to fit the brakes. Not much room anywhere.

 

 

Peter

 

Thankfully as the chassis is of an early etched design there are no brakes, unlike the 7mm scale Ace kit. I am not too upset at this as the requirement is ti get the Walschaerts valve gear working. I could whilst I have the chassis apart drill the brake gear holes if I can find a plan with the positions marked

 

The other compromise is 23mm wheels rather than 24 mm ones which due to the Romford/Market flanges would not fit

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There is an issue with the frames and coupling rods, in the Model Rail article I said the builder reported and issue when building her model which she put down to one of the holes in a coupling ros being wrong, my coupling rods seem to have the same issue, initially I put it down to the chassis but its the rods. I was going to buy a set of Gibson rods anyway, this is now a must. As for the crossheads markits online catalog is off line so I may have to go the Comet route

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There is an issue with the frames and coupling rods, in the Model Rail article I said the builder reported and issue when building her model which she put down to one of the holes in a coupling ros being wrong, my coupling rods seem to have the same issue, initially I put it down to the chassis but its the rods. I was going to buy a set of Gibson rods anyway, this is now a must. As for the crossheads markits online catalog is off line so I may have to go the Comet route

Both are available from Wizard Models

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Coupling rods ordered from Alan Gibson today along with a set of frames for the langley Baltic

 

So with the wheels on hold thought on the motor surfaced, Fitted the D11 motor mount to the chassis, found a set of gears with the correct diameter worm hole and set up a set of wheels. Very slight binding at slow speeds so a couple layers of masking tape at the front end of the motor mount (acting as a piece of shim) and the motor is running sa sweet as can be

 

post-1131-0-31124800-1535485764.jpeg

 

Next as I said I found a few crossheads in my spares box

 

post-1131-0-00044200-1535486186.jpeg

 

Very top  is a set of Cotswold GWR, bottom both I think are Eames GWR which I will try first

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I saw this on ebay and "ummed and aahed" as to whether to bid - glad it's gone to a good home! I think you did well as the wheels and axles would cover your purchase price if bought new.

 

Interesting that it can't take 24mm wheels, I'd like to build one a some point and that's a issue to consider.

 

Looking forward to seeing how your build progresses.

 

John.

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I saw this on ebay and "ummed and aahed" as to whether to bid - glad it's gone to a good home! I think you did well as the wheels and axles would cover your purchase price if bought new.

 

Interesting that it can't take 24mm wheels, I'd like to build one a some point and that's a issue to consider.

 

Looking forward to seeing how your build progresses.

 

John.

 

 

John

 

For just over the price of a set of Markit wheels, I got the kit. The chap had it for £20+ years and I guess paid less for it, Also not currently in their online list, Swapped the motor over for a slightly bigger one and ordered a set of Gibson coupling rods. Thanks for not bidding

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Waiting for the coupling rods, then realised I could make a start on the cylinders

 

post-1131-0-33715800-1535555045.jpeg

 

Soldered the Cylinders up after filling the joints, Then got a pair of Eames crossheads and modified them as per the DJH ones I am replacing then fitted the connecting rods and had a dry run. All worked fine with the exception of a little tight spot caused by the slide rods needing fine tuning 

 

Another job which has been waiting a Wills Finecast 02 with a Wills whitemetal cast chassis, it was missing a chimney and came without a chassis and with something else, also had  worn paint work with a few chips to the paintwork

 

post-1131-0-01432400-1535555051.jpeg

 

Added some etched rear window grills and got out the airbrush this morning

 

post-1131-0-43149600-1535555501.jpeg

 

As it happens I bought this chassis with a MRRC 5 pole motor the week before, at least the paint nearly matches, runs well though, will let the paint dry a day or so then finish the paintwork

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Dave

 

Thanks, but the hard work follows. Have company this weekend + working so time is very limited. Just been looking at what needs painting black and brass. To be quite honest this one is surplus as its in 00 gauge and has a cast not brass chassis, just getting my hand in painting and lettering.

 

Runs nicely as has the MW005 5 pole motor and Romford wheels, would actually be an easy conversion to EM by swapping the axles and adding plastic side frames to the chassis sides, also the plastic sides would lend themselves to easily accepting brake gear

 

What colour were the boiler hand rails please, some photos I have seen suggest Steel colour?

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Dave

 

Thanks, but the hard work follows. Have company this weekend + working so time is very limited. Just been looking at what needs painting black and brass. To be quite honest this one is surplus as its in 00 gauge and has a cast not brass chassis, just getting my hand in painting and lettering.

 

Runs nicely as has the MW005 5 pole motor and Romford wheels, would actually be an easy conversion to EM by swapping the axles and adding plastic side frames to the chassis sides, also the plastic sides would lend themselves to easily accepting brake gear

 

What colour were the boiler hand rails please, some photos I have seen suggest Steel colour?

 

SEFinecast do a better etched chassis kit for the O2, a big improvement on the cast version, and includes brakegear.  Some photos my workbench here:  http://www.rmweb.co.uk/community/index.php?/topic/2359-dlts-sr-locos/  and here: http://www.rmweb.co.uk/community/index.php?/topic/2359-dlts-sr-locos/page-30    although I added some extra detail.

 

For boiler handrails I use brass rod chemically blackened.

 

Cheers, Dave.

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SEFinecast do a better etched chassis kit for the O2, a big improvement on the cast version, and includes brakegear.  Some photos my workbench here:  http://www.rmweb.co.uk/community/index.php?/topic/2359-dlts-sr-locos/  and here: http://www.rmweb.co.uk/community/index.php?/topic/2359-dlts-sr-locos/page-30    although I added some extra detail.

 

For boiler handrails I use brass rod chemically blackened.

 

Cheers, Dave.

 

 

Dave

 

Thanks, I have 2 to build. Using this one just to shake off the cobwebs of both airbrushing and doing the transfers, plus mine will be in EM gauge. The H15 initially is to work on the valve gear, if successful I may widen the frames and change the axles and perhaps use a High Level gear box and a slightly bigger motor. Depends on how good the paint job comes up

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post-1131-0-29341800-1536069444.jpeg

 

Bought another paint brush (set) not much better than the last, still getting there just a few bits around the wheels to finish, then lettering and numbers.

 

Was running fine, just need to clean the wheels again after painting, a nice little runner as has the MW005 5 pole motor and will if required be fine for DCC as all the wheels are insulated

 

Waiting for the coupling rods for the H15 and I guess its the frames for the Langley Baltic tank which is holding things up

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post-1131-0-54103400-1536165855.jpeg

 

What a nightmare the transfers are, seem to have either no skill in using them or have a duff batch. They are Methfix and I followed the instructions but the decals don't seem to want to come off the carrier. One thought is it may be the meths which is years old, but never seemed to have had this amount of trouble before

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Peter

 

Post war Malachite and I guess I have used the wrong letters. I had a look on google photos and it looked OK and had a quick glance at the SR livery book, but I guess I needed a Mansell green for the lettering I have. The thing is the paint matched the paint on the wheels.

 

Its a case of using the paint I had and buying the wrong transfers. I have looked again and see it should have the black shading letters not plain yellow. One thing I am not going to do is the lining. The loco is a test bed to mainly brush away the cobwebs and ensure I understand the painting processes.

 

In a day or so I may relent and go and get another decal sheet (which may be a good idea to see if I bought a dodgy sheet) especially if the lettering comes loose . But I wont be keeping the loco as it has an 00 gauge chassis and I do like the plain yellow lettering

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Back to the H15, i decided to make a start on the valve gear even though I have not received the valve gear yet. I have dodged building a loco with valve gear for years, plus I have never used rivets

 

post-1131-0-44616100-1536430944.jpeg

 

In the end I did more than I expected as you can see there is one part left on the fret, namely the return crank, I lost the other one when trying to round off the head of the rivet, it went flying off the bench and I could not find it, so I looked at a spare Jamieson LNER fret, whilst being of a slightly different design, it had the correct size distance between the holes. Also some of the rivets were missing, I found some Alan Gibson ones and they are so much easier to use than solid ones

 

post-1131-0-79492600-1536430951.jpeg

 

The rod on the spindle under the valve rod which goes ti the piston is only on the left hand side as there were only one on the fret. I looked on the Jamieson fret and a Nucast T14 fret and they have two (one each side). Should it have one each side?

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  • 3 weeks later...
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John

 

For just over the price of a set of Markit wheels, I got the kit. The chap had it for £20+ years and I guess paid less for it, Also not currently in their online list, Swapped the motor over for a slightly bigger one and ordered a set of Gibson coupling rods. Thanks for not bidding

Hi,

 

Hope I am not interrupting the flow! I have built a couple of H15's from the DJH kit (SR H15) and from a hybrid PDK kit. I noticed too that the centre and leading wheel flanges foul slightly, I solved this by very carefully easing the flange ( fix wheel to axle, pillar drill on lowish speed and emery paper) on both wheels. There is room to fit all the brake gear, the hangers and blocks are fairly small on the prototype. 

 

I four H15s (30475, 30335, 30333 and 30489) and will shortly build 30491 the loco fitted with a taper boiler to release a spare boiler to reduce works turnaround time for the parallel boilered loco's. 

 

Kind regards and good luck,

 

Richardpost-34606-0-87452300-1538309978_thumb.jpg

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