Mr Craven's engines - LBSCR 1870s

[burgundy]

Now complete, subject to any horrors becoming evident from close up photos.

The crew, courtesy of ModelU @Modelu Chris .

At the risk of upsetting some readers, the ex-works appearance has been given a little light weathering, to give an in-service look - mainly darkening of the underframes, with some matt to vary from the overall satin finish. 

Ooops - rear brake block in need of adjustment!

A more comprehensive write up will appear in LB&SCR Modellers' Digest 18, which should appear shortly before Christmas. 

Best wishes 

Eric 

[burgundy]

This one was last seen back in March, when the 3D printed body from @Killian keane got a basic coat of green at the same time as the 2-4-0 described above.

This prototype actually predates J C Craven, as it was ordered as a 2-2-2 tender loco by the Joint Committee, before the LBSCR came into existence. Six were delivered by Jones and Potts in 1845 as long boiler, outside cylinder singles, with flangeless driving wheels, but, by that time, the Joint Committee had been dissolved and the locos were shared, with four going to the London and Brighton and two to the South Eastern.

No 115 was rebuilt by J C Craven in 1858 as a 0-4-2 tender loco, and again, in 1863, converting it into a tank engine. Withdrawal came in 1879. On the basis that it had been completely rebuilt twice by Craven, it is perhaps not entirely unfair to describe it as one of his engines. To complete the story, one of the other members of the class was converted in 1855 to a 2-4-0 and scrapped in 1869, while the other pair became 2-2-2 well tanks in 1852 and lasted until 1859/60.

If you wish to see a completely scratch built model of this engine, there is an article in LB&SCR Modellers’ Digest 18 by Ian White, in which he documents both his research and construction of the loco. By comparison, mine feels like a cop out, relying entirely on Killian’s research of the design and resorting to his 3D print to do all the difficult bits of the model (that firebox!).

The print comes with printed frames, but I decided to fret out my own set in brass. This allows for 3 point compensation and brass bearings, which, in my view, are essential for a working model. By laminating together six layers of brass and then drilling through them all together, you should get a pair of coupling rods, a pair of compensating beams and a pair of frames, all with the axle holes and the pivot for the compensating beams in the same place. The coupling rods were then reamed out for the crank pins and the beams and frames were reamed out to take brass bearings. I have not widened out the holes in the frames by very much more, as the axles already rattle and only need a little vertical movement to allow for uneven track, rather than to climb stairs. The photos show the frames, with the wheels and motor installed, to check for clearance inside the body.

This is also the opportunity to add some lead, as the print on its own would blow away in a stiff breeze. There was a nice hollow boiler, lots of space in the side tanks and an empty bunker all of which are now filled with lead. There is even some in the dome.

So far, the side tanks needed a little reinforcement to straighten out some bowing. L section strip was araldited into the inside of the tanks and clamped in place. Other than that, the body has not had any attention beyond the basic paintwork and lining (there needs to be another boiler band by the smokebox). I had already put Salter balances and handrails on the list, but Ian White’s article raises some interesting points. He suggests a handrail that is continuous from the smokebox, round the front of the tanks and back to the cab. My first thought had been to make it in two sections, with a gap across the front of the tanks. He also includes a photo that shows a rear weatherboard to the cab, which does not appear on the drawing! I shall have to figure out how to deal with these points.

Best wishes

Eric

Edited December 18, 2023 by burgundy
Link to Digest 18 amended

[Northroader]

That is a really lovely little model, looks great, and very neat lining out.

[Coal Tank]

Superb model.

[burgundy]

1 minute ago, Coal Tank said:

Superb model.

That is largely down to the 3D print by @Killian keane

Best wishes 

Eric 

[burgundy]

When I parked this project before Christmas, it was at the stage where the basic body shell had had a coat of paint and the chassis had the wheels and motor in place.

A mild dose of Covid, both for me and Mrs B, resulted in a week’s downtime and I set about this project as therapy – particularly while looking after Mrs B, who was still testing positive sometime after I was clear. I have a work tray for small projects, which can be used on the dining room table, and I only retired to the workshop when a session of soldering was required. As always happens, the tray progressively filled up with tools, as more and more migrated out of the workshop!

Soldering included fitting the motor connections and pickups, adding brake gear and some guard irons, made up from the surplus bits and fret from other etched kits. Fitting the Salter balances, made up from Branchlines balances and scrap fret levers, is always fun, especially trying to work out how the one on the firebox was fitted. From the drawing, I have concluded that it was set diagonally, on the driver’s side of the footplate (note – it appears that this loco was right hand drive, unlike the standard Brighton layout). The brake gear is also idiosyncratic and a full description of its workings can be found in LB&SCR Modellers’ Digest 18, in which Ian White has scratch built the same loco. In essence a horizontal screw on the footplate pulled a vertical rod, that pushed apart the brake shoes on the rear of the rear driving wheel and the front of the trailing wheel. These were connected by rods to the rear of the trailing wheel and the front of the rear driving wheel respectively, so that you have a sort of scissor action. From the location of the rodding, it seems to be impossible for this arrangement to be on both sides of the loco, so, fortunately, I only needed to make this up once.

Body detailing included lamp irons, handrails and cab footsteps, which were another soldering job to fabricate. I also took the opportunity to glue a nut under the boiler to provide an anchor to secure the body to the chassis, rather than rely on a friction fit to secure the two together.

Ian White’s article includes a much enlarged image of this loco in operation at Hailsham station. Helpfully, although an oblique view of the bunker, it shows details that do not match the drawing that is published in Burtt’s book on Brighton locos. For example, it appears to show a solid rear and leading side to the cab steps. And, quite unmistakeably, there is a weatherboard between the cab and the rear of the bunker.

Photo courtesy of the Lens of Sutton Association and John Minnis and enlarged by Ian White

To some extent, choices are constrained by the features that are already designed into the print. For example, there are some neatly printed toolboxes on top of the bunker, which would make fitting a weatherboard problematic. I have anchored the cab steps into holes in the footplate, which was simpler than if I were trying to secure a more solid structure. I have therefore ended up building the loco as it was intended to leave Brighton works in 1863, rather than as it was actually in service very shortly afterwards.

Another feature of the print, that builders should note, is the weak point across the cab. @Killian keane has deliberately left a printed bar across the cab entrance, which is there for a very good reason. Leave it there until the very last minute, as it provides some much needed rigidity to the bunker section of the loco. In the course of fiddling with the chassis and body after I had removed the bar, I noticed a crack appearing on one side of the cab area. My worst fear was that the material could have been more brittle and the crack could have become catastrophic very quickly. In fact, it has remained flexible and I have flooded the area with superglue, which seems to have solved the problem. However, it has confirmed my reservations about the long term durability and stability of the material.

The only feature to note about the paintwork is the metallic finish on the dome and safety valve cover, which is from the AMMO range and very effective.

Would I recommend this as a beginner's project, for someone wanting to test out an early loco? You certainly get a complete loco body and printed chassis, which could form the basis for a perfectly good model, but you would still need to make up the coupling rods. I am sure that it is possible to fabricate a set of rods on their own from scratch but, at that point, I start to go off down the slippery slope. For me, the easiest way to get the coupling rod holes in the right place is to drill them as one with the axle holes. And to do that, you are pretty much committed to building a new chassis – which you might as well compensate! If anyone has a reliable way to cut rods to the exactly correct dimensions, I should be interested to hear about it. And then, would you be comfortable to rely on resin bearings for the axles – or would you start reaming them out to insert brass ones?

And whatever you do, do NOT remove that little bar across the cab entrance until the last possible moment!

Given the unaccustomed sunny day, I took the chance to take some photos of the unfinished loco, providing an opportunity to see what I have missed. The handrails by the cab have been installed since the photos and other outstanding jobs include touching in the axle ends, cleaning the masking off the tyres, fitting the coupling rods, lamp irons, couplings, the boiler band by the smokebox and numbers. I shall have a long look at the photos to see what else jumps out (the list grows each time I look at the photos, but that is why they were taken!). Varnishing and weathering will complete the project.

Finally, the designated crew are castings from Andrew Stadden, to give the maximum weight. There has been a fascinating discussion on another group, about early footplate crew clothing. The suggestion is that it was normal to wear overalls of white fustian, as the cheapest, most suitable material, before company supplied uniforms became common. I find it hard to imagine that being impregnated with coal dust and oil, then beaten on a washboard with carbolic soap would have kept clothing white for very long, and so I intend to experiment with some “weathering”, I guess to an uneven pale grey colour. This rather Captain Birdseye character will be the driver (if he fits on the footplate).

Best wishes

Eric

Edited February 13 by burgundy
Including link

[Northroader]

I do like it! As to the coupling rods, the centres of the axles are quite get attable, could you not just gauge it from them? (Taking the picture I had to have the gauge slightly away, so it doesn’t line up looking at it)

Hope you and your wife are fully recovered from the lurgy, best wishes.

 

Edited February 13 by Northroader

[burgundy]

3 hours ago, Northroader said:

I do like it! As to the coupling rods, the centres of the axles are quite get attable, could you not just gauge it from them?

 

Thank you for your good wishes. I am afraid that Mrs B is recovering rather more slowly than I did - but getting waited on, hand and foot. 

I am sure that modellers with better skills and workshops than me could pull this off. However, I am afraid that, with my kitchen table engineering techniques. I have never achieved an adequate level of precision!

Best wishes 

Eric  

[Asterix2012]

5 hours ago, burgundy said:

When I parked this project before Christmas, it was at the stage where the basic body shell had had a coat of paint and the chassis had the wheels and motor in place.

A mild dose of Covid, both for me and Mrs B, resulted in a week’s downtime and I set about this project as therapy – particularly while looking after Mrs B, who was still testing positive sometime after I was clear. I have a work tray for small projects, which can be used on the dining room table, and I only retired to the workshop when a session of soldering was required. As always happens, the tray progressively filled up with tools, as more and more migrated out of the workshop!

Soldering included fitting the motor connections and pickups, adding brake gear and some guard irons, made up from the surplus bits and fret from other etched kits. Fitting the Salter balances, made up from Branchlines balances and scrap fret levers, is always fun, especially trying to work out how the one on the firebox was fitted. From the drawing, I have concluded that it was set diagonally, on the driver’s side of the footplate (note – it appears that this loco was right hand drive, unlike the standard Brighton layout). The brake gear is also idiosyncratic and a full description of its workings can be found in LB&SCR Modellers’ Digest 18, in which Ian White has scratch built the same loco. In essence a horizontal screw on the footplate pulled a vertical rod, that pushed apart the brake shoes on the rear of the rear driving wheel and the front of the trailing wheel. These were connected by rods to the rear of the trailing wheel and the front of the rear driving wheel respectively, so that you have a sort of scissor action. From the location of the rodding, it seems to be impossible for this arrangement to be on both sides of the loco, so, fortunately, I only needed to make this up once.

Body detailing included lamp irons, handrails and cab footsteps, which were another soldering job to fabricate. I also took the opportunity to glue a nut under the boiler to provide an anchor to secure the body to the chassis, rather than rely on a friction fit to secure the two together.

Ian White’s article includes a much enlarged image of this loco in operation at Hailsham station. Helpfully, although an oblique view of the bunker, it shows details that do not match the drawing that is published in Burtt’s book on Brighton locos. For example, it appears to show a solid rear and leading side to the cab steps. And, quite unmistakeably, there is a weatherboard between the cab and the rear of the bunker.

Photo courtesy of the Lens of Sutton Association and John Minnis and enlarged by Ian White

To some extent, choices are constrained by the features that are already designed into the print. For example, there are some neatly printed toolboxes on top of the bunker, which would make fitting a weatherboard problematic. I have anchored the cab steps into holes in the footplate, which was simpler than if I were trying to secure a more solid structure. I have therefore ended up building the loco as it was intended to leave Brighton works in 1863, rather than as it was actually in service very shortly afterwards.

Another feature of the print, that builders should note, is the weak point across the cab. @Killian keane has deliberately left a printed bar across the cab entrance, which is there for a very good reason. Leave it there until the very last minute, as it provides some much needed rigidity to the bunker section of the loco. In the course of fiddling with the chassis and body after I had removed the bar, I noticed a crack appearing on one side of the cab area. My worst fear was that the material could have been more brittle and the crack could have become catastrophic very quickly. In fact, it has remained flexible and I have flooded the area with superglue, which seems to have solved the problem. However, it has confirmed my reservations about the long term durability and stability of the material.

The only feature to note about the paintwork is the metallic finish on the dome and safety valve cover, which is from the AMMO range and very effective.

Would I recommend this as a beginner's project, for someone wanting to test out an early loco? You certainly get a complete loco body and printed chassis, which could form the basis for a perfectly good model, but you would still need to make up the coupling rods. I am sure that it is possible to fabricate a set of rods on their own from scratch but, at that point, I start to go off down the slippery slope. For me, the easiest way to get the coupling rod holes in the right place is to drill them as one with the axle holes. And to do that, you are pretty much committed to building a new chassis – which you might as well compensate! If anyone has a reliable way to cut rods to the exactly correct dimensions, I should be interested to hear about it. And then, would you be comfortable to rely on resin bearings for the axles – or would you start reaming them out to insert brass ones?

And whatever you do, do NOT remove that little bar across the cab entrance until the last possible moment!

Given the unaccustomed sunny day, I took the chance to take some photos of the unfinished loco, providing an opportunity to see what I have missed. The handrails by the cab have been installed since the photos and other outstanding jobs include touching in the axle ends, cleaning the masking off the tyres, fitting the coupling rods, lamp irons, couplings, the boiler band by the smokebox and numbers. I shall have a long look at the photos to see what else jumps out (the list grows each time I look at the photos, but that is why they were taken!). Varnishing and weathering will complete the project.

Finally, the designated crew are castings from Andrew Stadden, to give the maximum weight. There has been a fascinating discussion on another group, about early footplate crew clothing. The suggestion is that it was normal to wear overalls of white fustian, as the cheapest, most suitable material, before company supplied uniforms became common. I find it hard to imagine that being impregnated with coal dust and oil, then beaten on a washboard with carbolic soap would have kept clothing white for very long, and so I intend to experiment with some “weathering”, I guess to an uneven pale grey colour. This rather Captain Birdseye character will be the driver (if he fits on the footplate).

Best wishes

Eric

Dad was a railwayman for 47 1/2 years starting on the footplate in the 1930’s.  He once described to me how they would wash Jean jacket and dungarees on the footplate in a tin bucket with washing soda crystals.

 

 The manner was demonstrated to me not long after when visiting dads depot where one of the old fitters was washing his overalls in the same way,

 

He also said one of the old top link drivers when he started wore a white shirt and collar and tie.

[apl31]

I was admiring  the finish on your brass dome. I assume from earlier photos it is resin painted brass, Do you have a particular method ? what make of paint did you use? When Ive tried I didnt seem to achieve that realistic finish . Thanks.

Aidan

[burgundy]

6 hours ago, apl31 said:

 what make of paint did you use? When Ive tried I didnt seem to achieve that realistic finish .

The paint is branded AMMO and is advertised at AMMO Metallic Colors (migjimenez.com). I think it came from Antics, but worth trying any reasonable hobbyshop. It really does work very well.

I hope that this helps.

Best wishes 

Eric 

[burgundy]

Rather brutal close ups.

Captain Birdseye 

and his crew. 

Evidently in need of a bucket of washing soda.

And for those who like brass boiler fittings

Best wishes 

Eric 

 

[Mikkel]

Thanks for the tip on the Ammo brass paint. I've been looking for a long time for brass paint that actually looked right, this seems to do the trick!

 

On the subject of white fustian, photos from the GWR (sorry) appear to show very white in the early days. I have been wondering if (1) there was something particular done to the clothing at that time to make this possible (if so, probably highly toxic!), or (2) it is an effect of early film/cameras simply making the fustian look more white than it is. Or whether (3) the white fustian was only used for particular purposes/occassions. 

 

Regarding the latter, take for example this shot from Presteign in 1875 (round about your time). The chap on the right is white as snow, but the footplate crew are not!

 

 

Edited February 17 by Mikkel
Typos

[RodneyS]

 

On 13/02/2024 at 14:58, burgundy said:

If anyone has a reliable way to cut rods to the exactly correct dimensions, I should be interested to hear about it.

Many years ago a fellow club member showed me how he made coupling rods to fit a chassis.

As he was by trade a tool designer, it was always worth listening to what he had to say.

 

He would not drill the coupling rods and frames together.  He explained that it would not be possible to enlarge the axle holes accurately without the drill wandering off centre.

 

Instead he assembled the chassis with wheels as you have done.  He then measured the axle centres using a pair of spring dividers - with sharp points of course !

 

He placed one end of the dividers against the tread at 9 o'clock (or 3 o'clock).  He then adjusted the dividers so that the point was against the adjacent wheel tread.

The dividers were then used to mark the centres for the rods.

 

As he measured on the wheel tread it was easy to get the dividers to 3 or 9 o'clock.

Any slight discrepancy in this would have a minimal effect on the length of the rods.

 

I have tried this method and it worked for me.

 

In those days we only had the choice of Romford or Hamblings wheels.

Neither had a centre on the axle end to measure from.

 

He generally used Romford wheels and did (naturally !) machine them all to exactly the same diameter first.

Rodney