Airfix Chops

[relaxinghobby]

Cut saw, saw, saw, cut and I've turned a perfectly good Airfix prairie kit into a...? I hope it will become a little Beyer Peacock  2-4-0 tank. Cutting and adjusting the old pieces to the new shape.

This sort of captures all the details on the original Airfix pieces especialy the rivets.

The boiler is some copper plumber pipe opened out a bit in diameter with an Airfix 0-4-2 14xx smoke box. The cab sides need reducing.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Motorised tender.

Trying to wrap a City of Truro tender around a Hornby Eurostar power bogie. Using 1 mm plastic-card to finish off the front.

A sheet of 1 mm card with a motor and gear-shaped hole cut into it to form a footplate, a paper template was made first and when adjusted to fit it was traced onto the plastic. I'll trim the sides later.

[Londontram]

Great work I love a bit of kit bashing, I'll follow this with interest. Any chance of a photo of an original loco?

[relaxinghobby]

The loco was a type used on the East and West Junction Rly and the Swindonand and Marlborough Rly.

https://ewjr.org/locomotives-of-the-ewjr/numbers-5-and-6/

 

 

Some progress made on the plastic tender, building up the front and designing side frames to cover up the wheels.

There is going to be a problem with weight at 51 grams or just 2 ounces its not going to be pulling much.

Maybe the frames can be cut from some thick brass sheet I have. To that end before I try to cut metal I've been drawing out patterns in Inkscape a computer drawing application programme, this allows me to be much neater than doing it by hand and trying them out for a good fit. They are printed on some thick paper about twice as heavy as normal grade 80 printer paper.

 

A bit fuzzy but you get the idea.

 

The end piece can have the entramce to the coal bunker cut out when the glue is set. I've been using up some UHU it takes a good 24 hours to go hard and is difficult to apply without a little blobbyness but seems to work.

 

[relaxinghobby]

So how well does solder flow between two flat pieces of metal

Before cleaning up, these two brass tender frame sides, the picture shows how well the solder had spread between them just by quickly running the iron around the edges, no flux just what ever was in the odd bit of electrical solder I used.

In an attempt to add adhesive weight to the  tender drive I thought that a bit of brass would help achieve that.

So in the old fashioned way, I soldered two bits of brass together, stuck on the paper pattern and hacked out the shape with drilling, sawing and filing. Took about 4 times longer than if I've I made them from plastic and at the  end there is so little material it has made little difference over the plastic option.

[relaxinghobby]

 

 

 

 

So progress so far on the 2-4-0 tank.

Grey = Ratio footplate sides from there old Midland 2-4-0, I have half a kit.

Green and black = the original Airfix Prairie tank kit, seeing the rounded front edges of the tanks triggered this kit mod for me. They seemed to indicate the round edges of the Beyer Peacock made prototype.

Black = chassis from a Hornby Schools 4-4-0, a loco way to big and modern for me, I fitted Hornby 9F wheels which are 20mm across and share the same spline fixing system as the larger Schools wheels, so a swap was done and I also moved the rear axle to the forward slot for a shorter wheel base, this chassis is adaptable to go under several of the different Hornby models.

I've not yet found matching coupling rods so have not tested the chassis and so will all my wheel swapping let it run smoothly or jam?

The front pony truck is just a temporary plastic place holder from the Airfix Prairie, Ideally metal wheels with pick-ups would be best, what can be hidden behind those outside axle boxes?

 

 

 

At what stage is it easier just to build new bits out of plasticard sheet?

The cab sides are from multiple cuttings of the original Airfix, the openings are sort of about right but a are new front and back needed, here being marked out and cut on white 20 thou- 0.5 mm styrene sheet my favourite thickness.

[34theletterbetweenB&D]

14 hours ago, relaxinghobby said:

...Black = chassis from a Hornby Schools 4-4-0, a loco way to big and modern for me, I fitted Hornby 9F wheels which are 20mm across and share the same spline fixing system as the larger Schools wheels, so a swap was done and I also moved the rear axle to the forward slot for a shorter wheel base, this chassis is adaptable to go under several of the different Hornby models.

I've not yet found matching coupling rods so have not tested the chassis and so will all my wheel swapping let it run smoothly or jam?

Did you take the Schools and 9F wheels off their axles, and then refit the 9F wheels onto the Schools axles? (That is the implication I read from the mention of 'the same spline fixing system'.) If so, you may well need to adjust the quartering of these wheelsets so that both are the same, ideally with the crankpins at the most tolerant ninety degree setting.

 

Also, do you know which model(s) use the shorter wheelbase provided for in the Schools chassis, to assist the search for the correct coupling rod length? I would also check for fit at purchase, ideally directly with the mechanism.

[manna]

G'Day Folks

 

If the chassis is from a Schools class, the coupling rods from a Schools should fit.

 

manna

[Hesperus]

Not now he has shortened the wheelbase.

 

Really interesting project RH

[relaxinghobby]

Yes Hesperus, the front axle can be moved to the second axle slot in the chassis nearer the rear gear driven wheel.

I've found if I steal the couple rods from my Nellie loco they fit OK but it has shown that the wheels are not quartered properly so some work to do there pulling a wheel off and replacing it at the correct position.

If I can get the chassis running it will encourage me to finish the body.

 

34theletterbetweenB&D I can't remember exactly what I did to swap the large schools wheels for the smaller 9F one. I used a puller to take them off, I think I used the 9F wheels with there original 9F axles. More to come.

[relaxinghobby]

 

 

A distraction from the loco, This time a Tri-ang chop.

This Tri-ang van, R 11/14 matches very closely the diagram in the http://www.lnwrs.org.uk website.

So I've swap the wheels for more modern ones and used the PECO plastic wheel bearing in the original axle holes.

This van had lost its roof so a new one was made from plasticard with a lower profile to match the diagram. The ends where filed down to a lower arc so there are about 2mm lower at the top.

 

Next thing to do is to add brake gear and couplings.

 

 

[Hesperus]

On 17/02/2020 at 20:07, relaxinghobby said:

Yes Hesperus, the front axle can be moved to the second axle slot in the chassis nearer the rear gear driven wheel.

I've found if I steal the couple rods from my Nellie loco they fit OK but it has shown that the wheels are not quartered properly so some work to do there pulling a wheel off and replacing it at the correct position.

If I can get the chassis running it will encourage me to finish the body.

 

It seemed such an unlikely coincidence that the rods from Nellie would fit the 4-4-0 chassis until I read on another thread that Triang made the 2-6-2T chassis massively inaccurate in order to use the rods from the Jinty.

 

Which company is the van diagram?    edit,  Learnt to read now, its LNWR

Edited February 21, 2020 by Hesperus

[relaxinghobby]

After many corona china virus hours of fiddling about pulling the wheels off and turning them to the next position on the  axle knurls It seems that it does not have the same wheel base as a Nellie, that's a Nellie coupling rod there. The red thing is a cheap G-clap filed down to make a wheel puller.

This view shows the two options of where to put the front axle on the Hornby chassis, log or short wheelbase, SR Schools class or GWR County 4-4-0

[relaxinghobby]

 

 

 

 

LNWR van

This build has finally rolled into the terminal. Sort of dark grey paint, Humbrol 67 kept the metal chassis for weight rather than make up a new wooden style one from plastic kit parts.

So the sliding door roof is to a lower profile and makes the van look of an older age.

Transfer diamonds are from an HMRS sheet that is loosing it's sticky so I kept the original Triang numbers, rather than fiddle around with tiny transfer numbers and just painted around them the van body is dark green plastic and blends well with the dark grey paint. New plastic break gear from a kit except the V of the metal chassis is retained to give a strong foundation for the plastic bits. Because I can never get a very strong bond between tiny bits of plastic the metal. A false plastic floor across the middle is added to support the rest of the brake gear.

The extra detail of the door locking mechanism whilst obvious in raw white plastic when first glued on has disappeared under a coat of paint because it no longer stands out.

 

[relaxinghobby]

 

So with more time at home you would think it would be a good opportunity to finish a few things off.

Instead a whole new one was started.

A Spanish style long boiler 2-4-0 type all because it was something to do with that little chassis with a 24mm wheel base I had lying around for years. I think it was intended originally for motorising the Airfix pug.

All because I was idly looking through a web site called Spanishrailways.com and found some weight diagrams of old types built in Britain.

 

I hacksawed up some bodies from the scrap box and made a footplate from 1 mm plasticard. Glued it all together as quick as possible, I must get this project done be for the first flush of enthusiasm subsides..

 

The parts are a Hornby cab sawn down from a continental Nelly, boiler from a Lima H0 4F with a section of Dapol Truro boiler grafted in to lengthen it. Wrenn tank front buffer. Some old style Romford 22 mm wheels from a club sales junk box.

Now to the details the mechanical bits the front pony is from some RTR chassis ? And the coupling rods need to be marked out and cut.

Tricky bits are the splashers, I've tried gluing strips to disc, see the green ones, but every time they are slightly different in shape and size,, all I've got is trial and error any suggestions.

 

 

 

Converting the Hornby Schools chassis to a tiny 2-4-0. I finally got it to roll smoothly without jamming up it's coupling rods after endless attempt as quartering and requartering the wheels, no improvement. Dog barking up wrong tree. I was using the wrong rods, some ex Nelly ones. Only slightly too long but too long enough when I tried these etched ones perfect. Perfect is always better than not quite enough. They are two layers soldered together from an Alan Gibson set I think.

 

 

Back to Spain

 

The spashers are becoming a stumbling block I need 4 and they have to fit up against the boiler and smoke box sides also the back edges of the splasher tops will have to be cut to an complicated shape to fit there. The only way it seems is trial and error, so far I've made three and they have all come out different sizes. This can be a stumbling block that can stop a project dead in it's track.

I must get this project done.

 

The motorised tender on a Hornby Euro star bogie has not got very far, the body is not much bigger than the motor it just covers it. There is no metal to speak of in the bogie so no weight to get any form of decent traction it will need careful stuffing with lead in any space available.

 

 

 

[relaxinghobby]

Corona China virus lock down has somehow locked down the old brain cells and modelling has slowed down.

So here is the little progress that has happened.

I can get the splashers going on the Spanish style long boilered 2-4-0 so I've cheated and used some from the footplate of an old and scrapped Airfix prairie tank. You only get two so I've cut them in half and I've now got 4 half splashers. They were rescued from the foot plate by cutting down the sides and incorporating the depth of the footplate into the sides of the splashers.

 

 

Now they are not so wide and you can see the tops of the wheels, perhaps a thin strip of plastic ocurved over the top and

meeting the sides of the boiler will do the job.

 

 

 

The top of the pony truck could be built up to block that daylight, the tender has turned out a bit big for a 4 wheeler but that sort of follows the prototype. Underneath it hides the massive metal weight of an early Brawa shunter model.

A hook and loop coupling has been made up from paper clip wire. So now the loco runs and with that pony should be able to get around train set curves.

 

[relaxinghobby]

 

 

 

 

Who can tell what this is. You will have to have high nerd model railway ability to know. It's some sort of chassis block, cut down waiting for some more sawing and hacking.

No prizes for knowing.

 

 

This illustrates the danger of looking for some detailing stuff chimneys and domes or a safty valve turnings you rummage through boxes for stuff and find old half done and forgotten project.

For example this half done long boilered 0-6-0, a plastic shell sitting on top of a US model chassis. As the plastic solvent dried out the footplate went banana. Seems OK now I had broken the sections apart and reglued with Super Glue which does not seem to have caused distortion even after a few years.

The cab is not fixed yet.

 

 

 

 

Spanish style loco ready for cleaning and painting, the tender still needs some work. It hides a heavy metal Brawa shunter underneath. Not many Hornby chops here except the cab which came from one of the USA versions of a Polly or Nelly type,

 

Edited May 25, 2020 by relaxinghobby
Spelling and gramma

[relaxinghobby]

Hack saw and file time, the process of fitting a body to a chassis

Watching the development of 3D printing bodies seem pricey compared with buying old plastic bodies or white-metal ones, what ever turns up 2nd hand at shows and swap-meets.

 

 

So I've got this tank body, guess it's a Ks bodyline kit for a SR/LSWR G6 shunting engine. Seems to fit quiet well around this old Hornby/Wren chassis which also came a bit worse for ware from a swap-meet with no motor but 20mm Romford wheels and broken coupling rods. Hence the hack saw and big file treatment to get it to fit up inside the body snugly with the buffers at the correct height.

Fit mark and file, try the fit and file again.

 

 

I've got a narrow Branchlines gear box and motor I will try to fit that as it will only require a little bit of bodging and filling to make room for the narrow gearbox in the chassis? This particular set up was for motorising a Airfix Stirling single riding on a Tri-ang Caley single chassis, it sort of fits but never worked so has sat neglected in it's boxes for ages.

 

Edited June 30, 2020 by relaxinghobby
speelling chek

[relaxinghobby]

 

All is revealed, that cast mazak-metal lump shown a few entries above. Did anyone recognise it?

It's a cut and bashed Airfix 2P 4-4-0, I'm slowley making it into a small 4-4-0.

[BernardTPM]

3 hours ago, relaxinghobby said:

So I've got this tank body, guess it's a Ks bodyline kit for a SR/LSWR G6 shunting engine.

That's probably the Wills Finecast body kit.

[relaxinghobby]

Not so much a chop as a steady nibbling away of plastic body parts and filling down metal parts until they all come together as one whole. The resulting loco will be of the sort of size of a an early 4-4-0 of about 1880.

 

I'm sort of after a Furness Railway Seagull 4-4-0 or LCDR Kirtley M type both examples of successful early 4-4-0 much smaller than later types like the LMS 2P. I have posted a drawing somewhere on Rmweb but can't find it.

This Airfix 2P was in a bad condition when I got it. It was blue with a face and missing the sides to the splashers. I've cut new ones using those compasses as circle cutters and super-glued them in place.

 

 

 

 

Nearly got the new boiler to sit level.

[relaxinghobby]

 

More chops, one from the back burner a sort of Highland Railway 4-4-0 tank built by Hudswell Clark ?

Midland and Great Northern Junction Railway number 10. The Highland railway also had one and there was one on the Isle of Wight network in it's heyday.

Not an Airfix chop but in the same spirit, this is a fusion between Tri-ang and a USA Bachmann that comes with nice cylinder representation. So the blue Triang has an extended footplate and I'll try to fit a smaller boiler.

 

[relaxinghobby]

 

Trying to fit the parts together has proven to be more difficult, got to the stage when this project is beginning to drag.

The new photographs show only small changes but that represents a lot of work of the "fit and cut and try the fit again", slow work and little to show for it. the boiler piece of plastic tube has got smaller and smaller, death by a thousand cuts.

 

The body off course is an old Tri-ang Polly one piece body shell, I've cut off the front buffer beam so I can extend the front footplate, removed the boiler by drilling around it loads of little holes and cutting between them with a pointed craft-knife. The new boiler is a tube of rolled up plasticard sheet but it is difficult to get it to cover the tall motor area and have enough material left to hold it down with.

 

The Bachmann chassis is very tall so to use it under a low boilered has proved to be difficult there is not much material left of the boiler to attach it to the sides of the body shell in it's tank area.

 

 

The chassis is a recent Bachmann design with two stage gearing and was for a late 19th century USA 4-4-0 type model in H0 so a promising start for a small British outline model. There is nicely done outside valve gear the wheel base is 26 mm very short for a Brit and the dinky bogie has no side control springing and slops around on the end of a short strip of metal just pushed along for the ride.

 

 

This is a model based on this tank photo found on flicker posted by Historical Railway Images. A little branch line type, apart from this one the Highland railway had one and there was a similar type on the Isle of Wight. About the same size as many small 2-4-0 tanks the front bogie here must have been for railways with more uneven track rather than to support the extra weight of a big boiler.

 

 

Edited July 30, 2020 by relaxinghobby
Typos and spells

[BernardTPM]

No valve gear there, unless it fell off. Neat little chassis though.

[relaxinghobby]

 

 

Some small steps made, the boiler assembly is finally fixed in place or in space, it sort of floats between the tanks without touching anything.

The main problem being to get it high enough to clear the top of the motor and the gearbox gubbins. It's only supported at the front by the smoke box door and at the rear by the transparent sliver against the cab.

Various sources of tubes were tried, in the end the firebox top, of raised type just happened to be transparent and was once a pen, it is a hard polystyrene type of plastic so easily glued. The shot from the rear shows how high and big the motor is, there in the cab and the type of valve gear with a slide bar arrangement above the piston rod just like on Bulleid pacific type locos.

 

 

Now hunting through my bits box looking for domes and chimneys and some figures to ride in the cab to hide the motor.

 

 

[relaxinghobby]

A very frustrating time looking for my box of chimneys and domes, seems to be nowhere around the desk where I usually do modelling, it's about 6 inches long or a hand-span, it's one of those see through boxes you get take aways in, big enough to make it difficult to disappear. Nowhere to be found or has my work area become so untidy it's hidden amongst the junk?

 

 

As you can see the body is now complete and adding chimney and dome would be the next step

 

 

The upside down interior shot shows how little plastic is there, hardly any boiler, it's really just a plastic shell to hide the motor, there are a few bits of plastic angle to reinforce the separate bits so when a hand picks it up it won't be crushed.

 

I can add handrails and couplings, and some sort of internal cab floor to stand the driver and fireman figures on and the windows on the front spectacle plate.

 

A front chassis frame shape above the front foot plate has already broken when I picked it up to photograph it. The pieces is lying above the front buffer and the other buffer body needs repairing.

 

Some sort of body attachment is needed?