Lancaster Green Ayre - The Barn Owls have returned.

[supersonic]

Jamie remember what I taught you; measure, at least. twice. go from known to unknown only in single steps and a trial fit or two worth their weight.  Looking good any way, the litteis look just great but you could havre given the some steps or taller stools, craning their necks over the top but wonderful to see them taking an interest.  Now who is Hippo whith whom I appear to be friendly??  Oh and when tapping use a square to get the tap properly squareas you start.  uncleT

[Dave Hunt]

20 minutes ago, supersonic said:

Jamie, Dave Hunt and everyone else hi; long time no see.   Jamie Phil's layout has gone and cheque to club funds is on the way to the correct indivdual.

 

Hi Dave, great to see you back. Richard (Happy Hippo) passed on your greeting (even the unprintable bits) when he visited to pick up the American layout.

 

Hope you are well and that someday we can indulge in the sort of chinwag that aircrew are notably good at.

 

Dave

Edited September 12, 2020 by Dave Hunt

[jamie92208]

18 minutes ago, supersonic said:

Jamie remember what I taught you; measure, at least. twice. go from known to unknown only in single steps and a trial fit or two worth their weight.  Looking good any way, the litteis look just great but you could havre given the some steps or taller stools, craning their necks over the top but wonderful to see them taking an interest.  Now who is Hippo whith whom I appear to be friendly??  Oh and when tapping use a square to get the tap properly squareas you start.  uncleT

As Dave has said, The Hippo is Richard. He has doneca lot with South Greenfield already. He's lifted the track and scenery and is going to re use the baseboards and track. The full story is being told, amongst other things in a thread called ThecNightvMail that is hidden away in Modelling musings and Miscellany.  Good to hear from you Dave. I've made much use of my 14 and 12BA taps recently  but only to repair pairs of glasses that someone seems to keep sitting on. Not me.

 

Jamie

[supersonic]

Dave, hi great to hear from you, I hope youe are well bud.

[supersonic]

Remember TLAR works always

[jamie92208]

Some modelling mojo has returned and I've just had a productive hour in the shed.  A couple of days ago I started to re-assemble the crank axle for the 4F.  Lot of filing involved as the bearings had to be reduced in size to fit now that the cranks are on the axle.  Anyway I got both wheels fitted with the bearing tonight and trial fitted the wheelset in the frames.  I went in well.  I have also removed the two front frame stretchers so the frames are a little wobbly.  Quite a bit of heat was needed and the araldite holding the front set of hornblocks on came adrift. 

 

Tonight the hornblocks got cleaned up.  I worked out and marked where the dummy cylinder block is going to go and then put the frames back on the chassis jog and glued the hornblocks back in place.   Small steps but at least a bit of progress.  

 

Jamie

[jamie92208]

In another topic the subject of relay interlockings has come up.  As some of you know I like relays as you can usually see what's happening and fault finding is easier than with semi conductors.   I thought that I'd post a photo of the relays that control the entrance and exits from the Castle Branch and loco shed to the main line in the station.   They are housed under the panel on the Castle Branch fiddle yard.

As you can see most are in sets of three. The sets consist of 2 relays that latch when buttons are pressed and a third that resets the system and drops the latches when a movement had taken place. Each set  control a series of LED's and traction power to a section of track that allows the handover of trains from the outer panel to/from the main panel. The two in the middle control the added complication that the loco shed and goods yard both feed out to the main line through one set of points.   They transfer control of the shared section to either the Loco shed operator or the Good yard operator depending on the lie of the set of points.  It does all work and I have enjoyed designing and building the logic.

 

Jamie

 

Edited July 31, 2022 by jamie92208

[Dave Hunt]

Jamie, a tip on using glued-in horn blocks. After I've checked that everything works OK I drill and tap through each of the horn guides and the frames 14BA and fit screws so that they can't shift, which saves an awful lot of potential grief should one break off. How do I know about such grief..............?

 

Dave

[Regularity]

2 hours ago, Dave Hunt said:

Jamie, a tip on using glued-in horn blocks. After I've checked that everything works OK I drill and tap through each of the horn guides and the frames 14BA and fit screws so that they can't shift, which saves an awful lot of potential grief should one break off. How do I know about such grief..............?

 

Dave

So, bolted-on hornblocks, temporarily held in place with glue?

[Happy Hippo]

4 hours ago, Regularity said:

So, bolted-on hornblocks, temporarily held in place with glue?

The glue would probably work on it's own, but the bolts prevent any shearing off.  I've used soldered in rivets to perform a similar function on frame spacers.

[Dave Hunt]

5 hours ago, Regularity said:

So, bolted-on hornblocks, temporarily held in place with glue?

 

 I suppose that about sums it up. I cut the slots in the frames as a snug fit for the hornblocks of one axle but make the others about ten thou oversize to allow for a bit of adjustment. After gluing the hornblocks into the snug fit slots with cyanoacrylate I drill, tap and screw them then set up the others using a jig with the side rods to locate them and fix them, again using cyanoacrylate. After checking that all is square and the mechanism runs OK I then drill and tap through the frames and hornguides and screw them together. 

 

Dave

[SteamAle]

Jamie

Has the storm affected you at all?

Philip

[jamie92208]

7 hours ago, SteamAle said:

Jamie

Has the storm affected you at all?

Philip

Thanfully no. We are about 60 miles inland and so far are fine. The shed is doing well. Thanks for asking.

 

Jamie

[jamie92208]

Some productive time was spent in the shed last night and I achieved something.   For some weeks I have wimped out of fitting the slide bars to the motion bracket but got stuck in last night. I measured and filed the necessary slots in the motion bar and then soldered things together.   This produced a unit that could be tried between the frames.

The plan is to make the whole motion and crank axle as a removable unit. This will be held by 12 or 14BA bolts at the motion bracket and smokebox, plus of course the hornblocks securing the crank axle.  As you can see the dummy cylinder block come some way above the frames.  I now need to work out where the valve chest goes and then make modifications to the underside of the smokebox so that everything fits together.

And here is the crank axle.

Still needs the con rods fitting but at least there is some progress.

 

Jamie

Edited July 31, 2022 by jamie92208

[lezz01]

It's looking good Jamie. It's great to see how well you are progressing with this.

Regards Lez.

[jamie92208]

46 minutes ago, lezz01 said:

It's looking good Jamie. It's great to see how well you are progressing with this.

Regards Lez.

It's been snails pace over the last few months but my modelling mojo seems to be returning.

 

Jamie

[lezz01]

Ha I wish mine was mate.

Regards Lez.

[jamie92208]

Not a lot to report over the past few days as I couldn't find the other bracket that fits on the front of the motion bracket. I looked everywhere but it was nowhere to be seen. However tonight it turned up in a packet with the other specialist  castings for the valve gear.  I filed the leaders off it and it fitted. Hopefully I'll be able to do some soldering tomorrow.

 

Jamie

[Regularity]

20 minutes ago, jamie92208 said:

I looked everywhere but it was nowhere to be seen. However tonight it turned up in a packet with the other specialist  castings for the valve gear.

I think, maybe, just maybe, you didn’t look quite everywhere...

[Dave Hunt]

He probably did look everywhere in the dimensions in which we live whereas the bit he was looking for had escaped via the wormhole that exists in every modeller's workshop into some parallel universe whence it later reappeared of its own volition. This is a phenomenon with which I, for one, am well acquainted and is closely related to the 'ping' factor when making small components as well as the black hole that lives under most modelling workbenches.

 

Dave 

[PeterBB]

Like everything that goes missing its always in the last place you'd look for it.  Followed topic but currently way beyond my knowledge - apologies.

[MrWolf]

Somewhere in this house there's a big heap of coupling links, brake shoes, buffer collars, handrail knobs etc etc. 

I think it's a conspiracy. 

[jamie92208]

I also found where some 4 legged mouse shaped things have made a nest so those will have to be dealt with tomorrow, they were too quick for me tonight. Hopefully they can be recycled as takeaways for the owls.  At leastvit's not Oz where the fauna can be rather dangerous.  I don't think that the local wild boars can get into the shed.

 

Jamie

[lezz01]

That's not something you really want to find out the hard way Jamie. Wild boars can get a bit tricky. Firstly they are a big lump of pig, bigger than most people think they are, and secondly they are very bad tempered. You really don't want to surprise one and find yourself between it and the door mate.

I got between the door and an angry badger once.........he went straight through me like I was a 7 st weakling. I woke up in the back of an ambulance, and everything and I do mean everything, hurt!!! The bits that were not bleeding were bruised and the bits that wern't bruised were bleeding. Wild boars are considerably bigger than a badger and they have great big sharp tusks.

Regards Lez.   

[Regularity]

2 hours ago, PeterBB said:

Like everything that goes missing its always in the last place you'd look for it.

Obviously.

I mean, what kind of idiot would carry on looking for something after they had found it?