Mr Craven's engines - LBSCR 1870s

[burgundy]

As my third attempt at an etched brass loco, I had a look at the unmade kit mountain to figure out what might be the best one to tackle next. I quite fancy a large express engine but I am not sure that I am quite ready for an outside framed coupled loco and there are one or two particular favourites in the heap that I want to leave until I am a bit more confident. After some thought, the choice is for an outside framed 2-2-2 (so no problem with coupling rods) from the EBM range.

Construction of the first two loco kits was recorded as I went along, but the story was put up on RMWeb after completion, when I knew that I had managed to solve all the problems. This time, feeling brave, I plan to record progress and maintain a thread here as I go. If I invent some new mistakes to learn from, I may live to regret this. Additions to the thread are likely to be intermittent, as it will be the project for the coming winter, but the first steps began at Expo EM, which provided the retail therapy opportunity for sorting out the necessary extra bits.
And so to the prototype. In April 1862, J C Craven, the Locomotive Superintendent of the Brighton, advised the Locomotive Committee of the need for a dozen new singles to cope with the growing system. He was turned down flat, but, 18 months later, the situation had reached the point where the Committee were desperate to buy not only a dozen singles, but a dozen 2-4-0s as well! The order for singles went to Stephenson’s, who were able to offer early delivery and a £50 price reduction (to £2,525) per loco on the strength of a recently cancelled order from the Egyptian Government Railways. All were delivered in the second half of 1864 and in December Craven reported that they had all successfully completed the trial thousand miles. However, he noted that “the frames were of lighter construction than he would have wished and the fuel consumption heavier than expected because they had been designed on the ‘foolproof’ principle” – meaning that full steam pressure could be maintained when working hard by opening everything wide and shovelling hard. “If the fireman lasted the pace, then unlimited steam was available.” Just as remedial work was begun, the agents for the Egyptian State Railways asked whether four low mileage express locos might be available, allowing the Brighton to sell four of the Stephensons and turn in a profit of £2000. Five of the remainder had been modified by the time that Stroudley replaced Craven in 1870 and the final three were given complete rebuilds by Stroudley to form the first pair of the Belgravia class 2-4-0s and the unique single Sussex. The five modified locos were given a much lighter makeover by Stroudley and form the basis for this kit. They form a fascinating turning point between the Craven regime and that of Stroudley and all three variants are available in the EBM range. Despite the title to this thread, I shall actually be modelling the locos that were retained by the Brighton.
As a first step, apart from reading the copious instructions, Expo EM provided the opportunity for a shopping expedition for wheels (Alan Gibson), hornblocks, motor and gearbox (High Level). I was also looking out for a suitable footplate crew but all the figures that I saw looked a bit “modern image”.
“Copious” in the context of the instructions means 10 pages of text (including photos and historical notes) and 4 of drawings for the loco and 3 pages of text and 1 of drawings for the tender. Any supplementary information is also added to the EBM website and it is worth checking to pick up on any debates that take place within the Brighton Circle. The hardware in the box consists of a bag of whitemetal castings, nickel silver frets for the chassis, brass frets for the body and some assorted brass rod and tube. From the instructions, the “interesting bits” appear to relate to

- the elegant wavy footplate with inside and outside frames and
- the noticeably raised firebox, which has to contain much of the drive train (given that there is no fall back option to hide anything in a non-existent cab).
At the time, I was unlikely to make any progress for some months, as there was a small matter of a layout to get on with and Alex Jackson couplings to beat into submission. However, I think I have all the bits that are needed for the kit and its turn has now come. But please do not hold your breath for progress..................
Best wishes
Eric

Edited December 18, 2018 by burgundy

[Dave Searle]

Hi Eric,

 

I shall watch your progress with interest as I have 3 of these to build sometime (two in 4mm and one in 7mm).

 

Ian White has used Aidan Campbell (http://www.aidan-cam...76catalogue.htm) loco crews

 

Good luck.

 

Cheers,

 

Dave

[burgundy]

The first steps have been to do any annealing and the setting up of the frames.

One of the features of the kit is a simple jig that is designed to locate the frame components (four on each side). There are the main inside and outside frames, to which there are additionally an overlay for the outside frame and a spacer against the inside frame. The basic jig is designed for P4, with a bolt-on extension for EM and OO.

The bits that need to be annealed are the boiler, firebox and smokebox, which come as flat etched components. There is also an interesting reverse curve in the splasher top, which is easier to form when the brass has been warmed up a bit. But, most entertaining, there is an elegant double reverse curve in the footplate where it rises and falls over the driving axle. These have been formed with the aid of a blow torch and some gentle rolling.

I have also borrowed an Avonside chassis jig from a friend in order to understand how it works (and therefore decide whether I can no longer manage without one). It may sound perverse to assemble the chassis of a “Single” on a jig that is designed to sort out coupling rods, but, save for the business of matching coupling rods, it was worth using the jig to try out the rest of the process of producing a square chassis. It has gone on the list to Father Christmas.

The keen eyed will spot that the centre axle is fixed. After a lot of thought (and suggestions in this thread), I have chosen to follow the instructions with the kit. These suggest a rigid driving axle, centre pivot on the leading axle (to provide a three point suspension) and a lightly sprung trailing axle. There are certainly more elegantly engineered solutions, but this satisfies the KISS principle.

So far so good.

Best wishes

Eric

[burgundy]

As a minor diversion at this stage, I had a look at the variations between members of the class, for which the kit provides. Of the five locos that survived in mildly rebuilt form from the original twelve, only three appear to have been caught on camera – which is not bad when you consider that they all disappeared in the early 1890s. Drayton had three sets of boiler bands, Salter balances on the dome, a cutout in the front footplate under the smokebox door (showing off the cylinders) and boiler feeds at 3 o’clock and 9 o’clock, with the pipe turning immediately along the boiler to disappear behind the splashers. Dieppe had only two boiler bands, Salter balances on the firebox backhead, no cutout on the front footplate, boiler feeds at 4 and 8 o’clock and pipework dropping vertically downwards. Portsmouth appears to have resembled Drayton while Paris (later Newport) and Cavendish (later Chichester) are the pair that escaped the camera. Curiously, when the four original locos were sold to Egypt, Brighton Works promptly set about building some replacements. The dimensions of two were very similar to the Stephensons but they appear to have had boilers with only two boiler bands. I infer that the number of boiler bands reflects the number of rings in which the boiler was constructed so I wonder whether some boiler replacement or exchange went on, which left Dieppe with a Brighton built boiler. If so, it is not recorded in Bradley, whose book is normally the gospel in such matters.

 

Next step after squaring up the chassis was to add some valve gear. In this case, you are not dealing with some complex Belgian stuff, but the visible bits of the reversing gear. In essence, this amounts to a non-working reversing rod, running visibly below the inside frames from the footplate to the weighshaft, which runs across the frames between the leading and driving wheels. I reckon that there were 14 individual parts, but, working logically through it, it all seemed to fit together quite well.

 

Turning to the brass body fret, the first bits to tackle are the outside frames. I know that in designing the kit, Mike Waldron was concerned to reinforce the footplate area, which seems to have more than its share of cut out area – and no nice solid cab to give it substance. He has therefore gone to town on the frames, which have no less than four layers. The first layer is located with a tab at the front which becomes the datum point for everything else. Slightly disconcertingly, the footplate comes out slightly shorter than the frame component at this stage, once you have bent it up and over the curve over the driving axle. There are a number of slots in the footplate and holes in the frames for the springs, which line up nicely and reassured me that most of the footplate was in the right place; all the problem seems to be at the “cab” end. On this basis, I soldered it all down, taking particular care to get the curve that I had annealed into the footplate to match the curve on the frame. Inside this frame component is a spacer, which is then followed by the splasher – both with longish “tails” that run down the rear half of the footplate. In fact they extend slightly beyond the first frame component, so that you now have three possible places for the rear of the loco, which is a bit worrying……

My recollection is that a small but vocal minority of Brighton Circle members “persuaded” Mike that, having done the Stroudley rebuilds (the single Sussex and the 2-4-0 Kensington class), he really ought to do the original Stephensons. It is therefore just conceivable that certain parts have been copied across from those frets, with a test build for just the bits that are different. The final frame layer is a half etched overlay that goes on the front to add some relief around the edges. By this stage, you are adding to quite a substantial thickness of metal and, unless you are reasonably quick, there is a chance of melting some of the joins that you have carefully positioned previously. Reassuringly, this one matches the length of the first frame component! I admit that I heaved a sigh of relief when I had the whole lot as good as it was going to get and cleaned up.

 

The smokebox came next and also contained an unexpected surprise. It consists of a fold up piece that provides for each end, with a base plate in-between. This is then braced longitudinally with two further pieces which each have an L shaped fold, so that the whole assembly should be bomb proof. Fiddling around with it, the wrapper seemed to be almost exactly the length of the gap – and not quite long enough to form a bridge between the two uprights. Reference to the footplate etch suggested that it was the wrapper that was correct, rather than the internal framework and so the frame was dismantled back into its component parts. The original fold up part of the frame was reduced to three separate pieces and reassembled so that it matched the length of the wrapper. The wrapper was then soldered round the revised frame – which now lacks the longitudinal reinforcements. However, having soldered all around the seam at the edge, it seems unlikely to wobble longitudinally. The only problem is that, in the general excitement, I forgot to solder in a captive nut on the baseplate to provide an anchor point between the body and the chassis (and I am not about to unsolder the wrapper just for the fun of it!.). Instead, I was able to tin the neck of a bolt, drop it into the smokebox assembly so that it protruded through the base and then solder it from outside the smokebox.

With the boiler already rolled, soldering in the pair of internal shapes/spacers was straightforward. The firebox is also made up with a series of shaping pieces, with the rear ones fitting to the front of the weatherboard to act as a shoulder to locate the wrapper. The front of the firebox has a similar series of shaping pieces, which are intended to help create the elegant brass band that joined the firebox to the boiler. There is a similar series of shapers to go on the back of the weatherboard to form the firebox backhead – but since there is also a nice whitemetal casting as an alternative, this seemed like a much simpler solution.

Sticking this lot together, however, turned out to be rather less straightforward. The instructions suggest that a piece of rod should be inserted through the centre-holes that are etched into all the shaping pieces. Possibly my mistake was to infer that the bit of 0.3mm rod provided was intended to fit the etched holes. I threaded the rod through, starting at the weatherboard, via the firebox, boiler and smokebox to the wingplate at the front. The rod sort of lined it all up, but was not really rigid enough to give a precise alignment. Stupidly, I pressed on, starting at the front by soldering the wingplate to the smokebox, which looked OK, then adding the boiler and then the firebox. I had been taking great care to check the alignment to ensure that the top of the boiler was horizontal and that the two ends were vertical – which all seemed to be OK. My second mistake was to convert the tack soldering into seams before looking down at the whole lot from above – at which point, it became clear that the wingplate was slightly skew across the footplate. Measuring it all up, it became clear that one side was all of ½mm in front of the other, which may not sound much, but, having spotted it, it was always going to stick out a mile whenever I looked at it. I don’t think I have ever seen a demonstration at an exhibition of unsoldering something, but it might be a good idea. One of the things about soldered construction is that it is reversible but it is tedious and frustrating, particularly with something that you have just painstakingly stuck together. I also learned quite a lot about cleaning up my own soldering with the iron before it would all come apart. In the end, the smokebox went on twice and the wingplate three times before I felt that it all looked right. Along the way, I reamed out the centre holes to 0.9mm and used a rather thicker piece of brass rod to make the whole alignment process a bit more stable.

The other “challenge” in this part of the assembly was the compound curve on the front of the firebox. I tried this before fitting the firebox to the boiler. The instructions suggest “ample solder should form a meniscus” to fill in the recess in the front formers and create a neat convex curve and, to my considerable surprise, it did - and did not need a whole lot of cleaning up. However, joining the boiler to the firebox, which creates the reverse part of the curve was a bit less successful and needed quite a lot of tidying up: something of an exercise in sculpture!

Best wishes

Eric

[burgundy]

Before attaching the body to the footplate and frames, it seemed the right moment to think about bringing together the body assembly and the running gear. This involved a slitting disc to remove a chunk of firebox front and boiler underside to leave space for the motor and gearbox; the large driving wheel splashers cover this area pretty effectively. The slitting disc exposed the weakness of a couple of bits of soldering of the various firebox formers, but fortunately nothing critical and the stray pieces have been tacked back in place – most importantly, out of sight!

Since the chassis was now coming in for some attention, I took the chance of a couple of brief sunny intervals to give both the loco and tender frames a coat of paint – Halfords red oxide primer first and then satin black. I know that I shall have to scrape a bit off when it comes to the brake gear, but at least it means that the bits behind the wheels will have a solid colour and I shall not have to start taking them off and putting them back on just to paint that area.

Whilst on the tender chassis, I started thinking about the simplest way to give it some suspension, so that all the wheels stay in contact with the track. The design allows for three point suspension, with one end axle fixed and a location between the other two axles where there is an etched hole for a transverse rod. The rod is soldered in place with a sleeve on the section between the frames. The two axles each have a small bearing in the centre of the axle, to which is soldered at right angles a short section of brass tube. This is a sliding fit onto a piece of rod that is attached to the sleeve and runs longitudinally between the frames. This piece of rod is likely to need to be bent slightly so that the third point of suspension – where it is soldered to the transverse sleeve – leaves the footplate of the tender absolutely level. The bits are all there; the next job is just to put it all in place!

Working out the arrangement for the tender has allowed time to reflect on the suspension arrangements for the loco. For the leading axle, I intend to use a similar arrangement, with a centre bearing on a longitudinal pivot. Locating the longitudinal rod in this case means securing it to one of the cross members between the frames. Last time I did this on a previous loco, I adopted the “hit and hope” approach to soldering it into position and was lucky in that it produced a level footplate at the second attempt. I can't help feeling that there must be a more elegant way to do this that would allow the height of the leading axle (or more precisely, the central pivot point) to be adjusted in a slightly less brutal way. At the moment I am thinking along the lines of a vertical bolt, a loop on the end of the longitudinal rod and a couple of nuts to hold it in place, but if anyone has some better suggestions I should be very grateful.

Best wishes

Eric

Edited December 31, 2012 by burgundy

[burgundy]

Whilst pondering the solution to the question about mounting the front axle of the loco (and suggestions are still welcome), I made some more progress with the tender. The basic body was pretty straightforward – a box structure with overlays and the outside frames were similarly overlaid. The instructions suggest leaving the body as a screw-on item to the outside frames, so that it is possible to paint the area behind the springs. Slightly counter-intuitively, this means that the footplate has to be part of the outside frame assembly with the springs on top of it, but attached to the frames below it. Although the footplate is currently held in place by the bolts that secure the body to the two sets of frames, I think it might as well be soldered to the outside frames when the springs actually get fitted.

Most recent progress has been the tool box to the rear of the body and the mysterious boxes on the tank top. History does not record whether these were further toolboxes (making a total of three) or actually tank fillers (although why would you need two?). Victorian photographers seem shamefully to have neglected loco tender tops and drawing offices seem to have been pretty economical as well. The most relevant drawing, quoted in the instructions, suggests a pair of toolboxes with a round tank filler between them, with a sort of partition front and back, in line with the sides of the toolboxes. I find it quite hard to make sense of an arrangement that seems to make access unnecessarily difficult and leave a recess that would fill up with water any time there was an overflow, so I have split the toolboxes off and attached them as two separate items.

The springs have been assembled; each one comes as a single etch to be folded into a Z shape to give some depth, and then soldered.

The brake hangers/blocks, on the other hand, come in 18 pieces; 6 brake sets, each made up of 2 filler pieces to give depth to the blocks and a hanger/block piece that folds twice to provide front back and hanger. Fiddly, but not difficult and quite effective.

The next job is to work out how the brake gear all comes together.

Best wishes

Eric

[ianmaccormac]

Hi Eric

I have only just come across this! Excellent work so far! You do seem to be working hard in your retirement! You may want to look at Barry Lucks' early MRJ article for fixing the front axle of the single. I have one of these to build as well!

I will see if I can find any NRM plans for the boxes on the tender tops, I am sure I have something.

Hope it all continues to go well,

Regards

Ian in Blackpool

[34theletterbetweenB&D]

Me too! Occasionally this yearning occurs for modelling a period when the steam railway was the bleeding edge tech for going fast...

[burgundy]

You may want to look at Barry Lucks' early MRJ article for fixing the front axle of the single. I have one of these to build as well!

I will see if I can find any NRM plans for the boxes on the tender tops, I am sure I have something.

Hope it all continues to go well,

Regards

Ian in Blackpool

Ian

Many thanks for the copies of the drawings. I would not mind betting that they are the ones from which the tender kit is designed - although I can read them to confirm my solution (there is a white metal cast "dustbin" for the tank filler still to go between the two tool boxes) as easily as the solution provided by the etches. The drawings are also extremely useful in showing how all the brake gear should go, which is the next challenge!

I have also been back to Barry Luck's website at

http://www.lbscrmodels.co.uk/index.html

which is a brilliant source. Unfortunately, he illustrates nothing so crude as the arrangment that I am proposing with a fixed centre driving axle on a single. His solutions are all elegantly compensated!

Best wishes

Eric

[burgundy]

Bringing the various sub-assemblies of the tender together (inside and outside frames, footplate, body, springs and brakes) turned into something like a Chinese puzzle – and all the possible options seem to have a downside. The design aim is to keep the body as a separate unit from the footplate, so that it is possible to paint behind the springs. Since the body is pretty much of an interference fit between the springs already, I suspect that the couple of coats of paint and lining transfers that need to be applied are likely to get interfered with a fair amount before it is finished.

The springs protrude through the footplate and were soldered to the outside frame unit, effectively locking the footplate to the frames.

The brakes are assembled as part of the inside frame unit – except that, if you complete all the linkages of the brakegear, it will end up soldered to the tender body where the brake standard forms part of the rather elegant handrails. In the end I simply built all the bits that hang around the wheels and left the upward linkages to worry about later. The drawing, kindly supplied by Ian MacCormac, suggests that the rodding between the brakes should run both sides of the wheels, with no rods across the vehicle except right at the front where it is actuated by the brake handle. I am afraid that I copped out and included cross rods to give the structure a bit more rigidity and keep it apart from the wheels. While I was on the frames, I added some wheel scrapers on the rear axle, which explains the lengths of wire sticking out of the front in the photos.

The need to do something about the upper part of the brake gear caught up with me sooner rather than later – actually as soon as I turned to the tender body. There is a cross rod, which fits between two etched holes, to which some angle cranks are threaded. In this case, the etched angle cranks do not quite line up with the brake pillar and I may have to come back to this. The brake pillar forms part of the handrail assembly on the fireman’s side. The handrails are formed from an etched top and brass vertical rods – and since the body has to stay separate from the footplate, I ended up soldering the top and leaving the bottom end fitted, but not secured to the footplate. Putting it all together to take the photo, it was a lot easier to fit than I had expected. There was, of course, a catch, which was that the bolts that hold the whole thing together were now virtually impossible to locate because of the brake rigging. And this demonstrated that I may also have to have another go at the handle on top of the brake pillar as it seems a bit too flimsy and unlikely to survive this sort of treatment for very long.

And that completes all the etched bits of the tender, leaving only the white metal bits - which include a three part assembly for the Stroudley and Rusbridge communication system; I don’t think I will be soldering that bit……

Now, back to sorting out the suspension on the loco.

Best wishes

Eric

PS In case anyone is worrying about the shade of the wheels, they have been primed with Halfords red oxide and the centres and spokes have been done with Improved Engine Green (aka Desert Sand). The rims need a coat of olive green.

[Adam]

That's very nice indeed Eric and I empathise, there comes a point where doing things the prototype way has to be sacrificed to producing a model that will survive in service. What you've done there is nicely subtle and will be all but invisible in service - it's certainly hard to see one and a half times full size on the laptop screen. Perhaps it's worth considering whether you need more than one fixing screw? Iain Rice, I recall, advocates only using one to avoid distortion in one of his books.

 

Adam

Edited January 12, 2013 by Adam

[ianmaccormac]

Looking good Eric!

Once my workshop refurb is completed in a couple of weeks I shall get on with the Craven Goods for you! Inspiration indeed!

Sent from my wife's sewing room whilst my freezing cold workshop is getting insulated!

Cheers

Ian

[burgundy]

Having spent some time sorting out the tender chassis, I have moved on to the loco running gear.

The first step has been to mount the bearings into the hornguides. The rear ones were the simpler, with a length of spring wire soldered to the tops, both for springing and to keep the blocks from rattling in the hornguides. This should allow a small amount of vertical movement without taking too much weight off the driving wheels. I also intend to add a similar wire pickup to the top of the wheel and I may need to revisit the strength of the springs when it has all come together.

The front ones are pivoted in the centre to give three point suspension with the fixed driving axle. I followed the plan of soldering a bolt onto one of the frame spacers and then threading a couple of nuts onto it. I used one of the components from a HighLevel gearbox, that is designed for holding an extended drive shaft, as a washer, with one of the lugs on the end used to take a piece of rod, bent into an L shape, and soldered in (and “yes”, it does currently foul the front bolt to secure the body to the chassis! The leading axle now pivots around this rod. The movement is not extensive, but then I hope that my tracklaying is not that bad. Once the wheels are on, I should now be able to adjust the height of the front axle.

Note that my attempt to paint the frames was evidently premature, as shown by the paint removed to allow the rear dragbox to be added together with other shiny patches where things have needed to be soldered on. The pointed axles are spares which will not be used on this model; with pointed ends, they are much easier to find if you drop them down the back of a chair...........

Next step is to glue some bits of PCB on the outside of the inner frames to mount pickups. With the outside frames, this area is pretty well concealed as it was on the tender.

Best wishes

Eric

[burgundy]

Another couple of weeks work, in perfect modelling weather with snow on the ground for much of the time, seems to have remarkably little to show for it. Soldering the body together produces a quick result where you can see what you have achieved. Putting all the bits together, to get a working system, always seems to require endless fiddling and fixing to get it all to fit. Adding some PCB between the frames and, in this case, on the outside of the frames was straightforward. I chose to anchor the pickups on the outside of the inside frames as they are pretty well concealed by the outside frames and because it seemed to provide easier access to the wheel rims, without having to reach around the frames from the inside. I shall find out if this idea works shortly. There is also provision for wires to the tender pickups and I was able to find a two pin miniature connector during a timely visit to the Bristol O gauge show.

The motor is a 1015, attached to a HighLevel 2 stage gearbox, which is folded over so that the final drive sits aft of the intermediate shaft. Even in this position, the rear shaft of the motor has had to be cropped and there is no space for a flywheel. A bit of fiddling established that the motor/gearbox would fit, with just a little bit more metal removed from the lower section of the boiler. The white goo in the picture is some bath sealant, which attaches the frames to a chunk of lead and then to the motor.

Next, having exhausted anything else that could be done to the chassis, the wheels were fitted to the axles – hopefully for the one and only time. Sitting the chassis on some track then revealed that the weight was being carried on the leading and trailing axles, with the driving wheels turning gently in the breeze – which seemed likely to result in rather poor tractive effort. Consultation with the kit designer established that this was probably the result of a slight difference between the prototype and the model wheels, so the next step was to find a way to give the outer axles a little more vertical travel. The pivoted axle at the front was easy enough to unbolt and drop out. The rear axle needed the springs to be unsoldered and also the reversing gear rod, which otherwise stopped one of the rear axleboxes from dropping out. I therefore ended up with two axles, complete with axleboxes and no need to remove the wheels from the axles. Removal of some more metal has allowed the axles a bit more vertical travel, which got me back to where I had been some time before.

Then, of course, came the fitting of the body to the chassis and guess what? There was something else that did not quite allow it to sit exactly in place. Am I the only person to struggle with peering into the innards of a loco body to see where there is something that does not quite fit? Then scraping away at some metal to discover that I have been hacking at the wrong bit? The trial and error phase came to an end after three goes, when it was all in place, but if anyone has a cunning way that makes this process simple, then I should be delighted to hear about it.

At this point, various domestic calls caused me to put it on one side for a couple of days. When I came back, surprise, surprise; it would still not quite sit in place! This time it was the front carrying wheels which were scraping on the opening in the footplate. A bit more grinding away, location of the whitemetal cast splashers, followed by still more grinding away and finally, I think I have the body sitting on the chassis with everything moving!

Today, the faint apology for a sunny interval allowed me to take a couple of pictures.

Inevitably, having got this far, I was quite unable to resist sitting some of the boiler fittings in place to get an impression of what it will look like. Who on earth designed that dome!

Best wishes

Eric

[N15class]

That is becoming a very nice looking loco. The wheels look great painted.

[burgundy]

The wheels look great painted.

Thanks Peter. They have just been primed and then had Improved Engine Green applied to cover the fiddly bits around the spokes. I had not thought about the balance weights when I did the painting, so those will need to be touched in: mainly olive green like the wheel rims, but with "spokes" painted in IEG. No point in making it too simple!

Best wishes

Eric

[burgundy]

After about a month's diversion from this project, I came back to it and had a fresh look at the dome. I thought about trying to take a section out of the middle and sticking it back together, but, in the end, simply attacked it with a large file, removed a couple of millemeters from the top and resculpted the profile. It now stands roughly level with the bottom of the chimney cap rather than the top!   

The springs and the beading along the top of the fender have also been added.

Best wishes

Eric

[burgundy]

I am down to the last few bits to solder to the loco body before fitting the whitemetal castings. Needless to say, the last bits are also some of the fiddliest and I had been wondering how to tackle a couple of them. Last weekend's visit to the Nailsea show offered a solution, when I found some 0.5mm outside diameter brass tube on sale.

The first use was for the handrail along the left hand side of the boiler. A standard Stroudley practice was to use the handrails to convey a rod which was operated from the footplate and actuated something in the smokebox. Precisely what it actuates is not important here, but, for modelling purposes, it means that the handrail stops roughly in line with the front of the boiler, a thinner rod continues half way along the smokebox and at that point disappears into something like an elongated handrail knob. With a proper cab, the other end can simply disappear into the front of the cab: in this case, with a weatherboard and nothing else, I have extended the other end of the rod into a simple handle next to the boiler backhead on the driver's side.

The second use was for the fallplate. The instructions for this item read

“....this fits on the rear of the loco footplate and covers the gap between the loco and tender. Theoretically it should be hinged though that is a tall order. Soldering in place may be preferred.”

I am afraid that I took this as something of a challenge. I cut off three pieces of tube which together more or less matched the width of the fall plate. With a piece of rod threaded through the three pieces, I soldered the centre one to the back edge of the footplate and the two outer ones to the underside of the fallplate. It is one of those rare moments when something seems to have worked first time and I now have an elegantly hinged fallplate.

My apologies for the quality of the pictures, but they were taken in the moment of euphoria, following completion of these two rather fiddly exercises! 

Best wishes

Eric

Edited March 24, 2013 by burgundy

[Oldddudders]

Are you happy with the shape of the safety valve, Eric? While it matches the Burtt drawing, the photo in Fig 89 of Bradley Vol 1 shows a somewhat slimmer shape - or were these altered later?

[burgundy]

Are you happy with the shape of the safety valve, Eric? While it matches the Burtt drawing, the photo in Fig 89 of Bradley Vol 1 shows a somewhat slimmer shape - or were these altered later?

 

Ian

Thanks for that comment! I have been looking at the casting, the drawing and the photos and putting off a decision!

There are a number of photos of these locos in the EBM instructions at

http://www.mjwsjw.co.uk/Dieppe%20Instructions.pdf

These certainly seem to confirm the suspicion that the casting is not quite like that on the prototypes.

The drawing in Burtt (actually by H T Buckle who, I believe, worked in the Brighton Drawing Office before moving to Stratford) opens up a can of worms as far as Brighton drawings are concerned. There are a number of examples where the official drawings seem to have been taken as merely a polite suggestion by those in the Works – who were particularly adept at recycling scrap material onto new locos. I doubt that that would be the case in this instance but the order with Stephenson's seems simply to have specified 6' 6” drivers and 17” cylinders – leaving the rest up to the manufacturer to deliver according to his current practice. Whether the drawing office ever received or needed a full set of drawings is an interesting question and Buckle may not have had detail drawings to refer to.

Even then, I am not sure that the casting does actually match the drawing. Looking at the skirts, I think they will extend into the lining around the front and back of the firebox – which is not quite how it appears in the drawing. And slimming down the rather voluminous skirts would change the proportions without reducing the height, which looks about right in relation to the top of the weatherboard. So I wonder if there is a way to reduce the width of the base in some way? Sculpting it freehand with a file sounds like fun! Plan B might involve investigating the safety valve casings that are available for another railway that liked big shiny boiler fittings; are there any in the Alan Gibson range or could any GWR modellers suggest other sources that produce something suitable? Grateful for any suggestions.

Best wishes

Eric

[Oldddudders]

I hope I haven't rained on your parade, but it does seem exactly as you say, perhaps the provided item is just not quite right. I am considerably less than expert on such components, and my only thought on re-profiling the existing casting would involve somehow chucking it in a very, very slow-speed drill and applying a file - crude and probably terminal!

 

I hope others may spot something closer to the original. Stephensons must have been building for others, after all. If it were not Craven & Stroudley but Billinton,one might think Midland!

[burgundy]

I hope I haven't rained on your parade,

Ian

No problem - merely another of those "interesting challenges".   

Best wishes

Eric

[burgundy]

First attempt at the safety valve cover this evening, while watching Foyles War.

Probably a bit more to go to narrow the skirt to the casting and give it a straighter profile.

Don't digital images help to make errors stand out more..................

Best wishes

Eric   

[ianmaccormac]

Hi Eric

That's coming along nicely!

Alan Gibson 4M759 would look about right for the safety valve, in cast brass.

HTH
Cheers

Ian in Blackpool

Edited March 25, 2013 by ianmaccormac

[burgundy]

A quiet(ish) weekend has allowed a bit of time to finish off some of the remaining bits that needed to be stuck on. The safety valve cover is still just plonked and follows Ian Mac's suggestion of resorting to cast brass from Alan Gibson (supplied by immediate return of post - brilliant service). Thanks for the suggestion Ian. It polishes up beautifully and will be better off out of the way until the paintwork is complete. Other bits and pieces included the brake gear, which was a clasp arrangement around the driving wheels. I have simplified it slightly, as the etch is designed to wrap around the driving wheel, but I have also added a vague representation of the actuating cylinder at the front.

With a bit more cleaning up (and some warmer weather so that I can spray outside), it will be ready for painting.

One small fitting that remains to be attached to the tender is the Stroudley and Rusbridge alarm mechanism. This was an early electrically operated "communication cord" - in the days when most other railways were using long lengths of string. It is the rather small device at the right hand side of the tender with the bell clearly visible.

The kit includes a representation of this device, which is made up of three parts - including one that appears to be a casting of a very small dead spider. To give some idea of scale, the rectangular panel Is about 7mm long; in all, a very neat piece of work. Since this will be located across some of the lining and panelling, this will also be attached once the painting is complete. And "no"; I have no intention of trying to solder it together......

Best wishes

Eric