Ruston's Industrial locomotive and wagon workshop thread.

[Ruston 21,024]

I am always putting bits of builds into my layout thread, even if the builds are sometimes done for other people, or aren't specifically for the layout, so I have decided to put them all in one place from now on. I have tried a blog but they are difficult to keep track of and there's never much feedback on them, so here we are...

 

At the moment I am just finishing off a repaint/weather of a Heljan Class 05, which has been industrialised. It will be going on the layout that I sold a few months ago - White Peak Limestone & Tarmacadam.

 

 

 

 

My own current project is this:

It does look a bit of a mess at the moment but fingers crossed...

 

[Barclay 1,679]

Looks interesting.....

[Mick Bonwick 7,493]

I agree  with your sentiments about blogs. If you don't post something everey day, it's a devil to find your last contribution.

 

Seeing all of the details of how you go about your builds will provide plenty of inspiration to some of us on here . . . . . .

[Barnaby 2,033]

EEEEEEEK that is frightening Dave but I'm sure with your skills it will appear resplendent if not a little smoky and greasy from its hard working environment. 

 

Best

[Sandhole 736]

I owe you an apology Dave.
I still can't find my shots of the Buxton Lime 07 loco.
I'll keep on looking.
Regards,
Chris.

[Wrenn 1,498]

Dave it's great that you are keeping it in one place. I'm certain your build project will be just as good as your previous ones.

[Ruston 21,024]

Thanks for the interest, chaps.

 

I have made some progress on the lump of filler.

Can you tell what it's going to be yet?

[Barclay 1,679]

Ship Canal Hudswell?

[Barclay 1,679]

Brush/Bagnall?

[Ruston 21,024]

3 hours ago, Barclay said:

Brush/Bagnall?

Yes. I'm not sure if it's going to be like the NCB pair, or the Stewarts & Lloyds pair yet.

[Wrenn 1,498]

I will admit I do like the shape of the NCB brush/bagnall.

[Ruston 21,024]

This Ruston & Hornsby 165DE has really kicked my arse. It's now up and running, requiring only a few small details to be added but is on its fourth motor and second gearbox.

 

The first motor was a Chinese copy of a Mashima 10/15, which failed and seemed to have too much end float. I replaced it with one in the photo, below, which seemed to run well enough but whilst on the rolling road it too started to make a grating noise and then stopped dead. I don't know what went wrong but turning the gearbox by hand seemed to be more difficult in one direction than the other, which led me to think that I had somehow assembled it wrongly.  This gearbox was a High Level Lo-loader, which when I got it out of the loco, I could find nothing wrong at all.

 

Gearbox back in and on to the third motor, this time a coreless thing. Again, it ran fine in one direction but made a horrendous noise in the other. This time I swapped the gearbox for a 90:1 Humpshunter, which I took out of an abandoned project but I knew that it worked perfectly. The same thing happened again and I decided that it must be the motor.

 

Off with the coreless and on with a Mitsumi - this time it ran well and quietly in both directions. I must have just been unlucky to have three motors in a row that were no good. I have never used the coreless type before but I have used the others with no problems.

 

 

 

It is now fitted with DCC, a Zimo MX648, with Ruston 165DS sound project, by Paul Chetter, a Kunfgu stay alive and a Youchoos 15x11x6mm speaker.

 

The block buffers were milled from brass and are based on those fitted to the 165 that worked at Hebburn shipyard. I have never seen any others like them and as they aren't simply lumps of wood I wonder if they are an original Ruston fitting. The photo I used was in colour and it seemed that they weren't rusty or scratched, so could have been made from rubber or some similar shock-absorbing material.

 

 

The loco weighs in at 171g, thanks to the brass buffers and lots of lead. I managed to get the stay alive and speaker within the frames, so the under-bonnet space was free for weighting. The cab also has a lead lined floor and walls, below window level.

 

I am really not sure about my colour choice. The Hebburn loco was a dark brown and I would have painted it something similar but I don't have any brown and can't get any. I may repaint it in green.

 

It now needs grab handles above the front steps, rear sand boxes, fuel and water fillers and lamps. I lost the fillers that came with the kit, so I'll have to improvise. It also needs a Ruston plate for the front and Ruston/AEI plates for the cab. Ruston plates are provided in the kit but they are brass. As the prototypes were aluminim alloy, I need nickel silver plates.