Ruston's Industrial locomotive and wagon workshop thread.

[Barclay]

14 hours ago, Ruston said:

Hold your horses! I haven't built it yet.

 

Scott came over for to collect his Manning Wardle, and to have a play with the CVMR. Once all the DCC gear was fitted there wasn' much space left to add lead weight and so, although it's perfect for White Peak, it looked a bit silly with such a powerful prototype needing a banker with just 5 wagons and a break van. For my own build, whilst it will still use a Hornby B2 Peckett chassis, I am going to make the buffer beams and running plate from thick engraving brass in order to give it some extra weight.

 

The bodywork  has been rubbed down, primed, rubbed down again, primed with filler primer, rubbed down once more and then a final colour top coat. It is now almost entirely free of print lines and will have a varnish coat over any decals that may be applied.

I call the colour Calder Vale Maroon. I had half a jar of Railmatch EWS red and added BR wagon bauxite until I got a shade I was happy with.

 

I'm now thinking that as I'm making a brass running plate I may as well make some frame overlays. The reason being that I can solder brass brake parts to it. The Hornby Peckett chassis has the brake hangers/blocks at the front of the wheels and the cross beams would have been attached to pull rods underneath. On the Manning Wardle on which this kit is based, the blocks were at the rear of the wheels and were operated by push rods above the wheels.

 

But then I'm also thinking that if I'm going to all that trouble then why not buy some Gibson 3ft. 6in. wheels and build my own chassis? It will be a lot cheaper than buying a Hornby Peckett and the Gibson wheels are nicer than the steamroller wheels that Hornby put under the B2.

Yes - go for it !

[Ruston]

On 02/11/2021 at 08:29, Barclay said:

Yes - go for it !

It's a lot of work, which I've decided against and have taken the easy road by using a Hornby chassis.

 

As this one is my own model I decided to take a chance on some extra chopping for a little improvement in appearance. I've fitted balance weights to the wheels,  and filed the cylinder profile, as I did on the previous one. This time I hacked the front ends off the cylinders and extended the length by about 1.2mm. The parts were glued back together with plastic reinforcing the insides and a wrapper of 10 thou. plasticard around the outside to hide the join and to make the cylinders appear that little bit greater in diameter. After all the donor Peckett's cylinders are supposed to be only 14x20" as opposed to the Manning's 16x24".

 

The chassis with enlarged cylinders and a standard Hornby Peckett cylinder block for comparison.

 

P.S. The pizza cutter flanges have been made acceptable by turning the flange down by rubbing 320 grade wet and dry abrasive paper against them whilst they were rotated in a drill. The chassis can now run on all parts of both of my layouts, where previously the flanges bumped against ballast and inset track. The diameter at the flange has gone from 16.3mm to 15.6mm.

 

Edited April 2, 2022 by Ruston

[Ruston]

Not only am I making a new running plate I am making some changes to the overall set up. The 3D-printed running plate is out of necessity quite thick and so the underside has cut outs for the wheels and their enormous flanges. It looks OK but if I replicated it as is, it wouldn't leave space for the brake push rods between the wheels and underside of the running plate. There is actually quite a gap on the prototype, so I am adding spacers between the chassis and the running plate.

The lip where the plating overhangs the side valances isn't particularly prominent but is completely absent on the printed part, so I am adding this with a sheet of thin brass, overlaid on the main component.

 

All loosely sat but with nothing fixed or positively located yet.

The previous one weighed in at 130g when finished. This one already weighs 127g and there are no buffer beams or any added weight inside yet. That running plate will certainly not warp!

 

 

Edited April 2, 2022 by Ruston

[Ruston]

The boiler casting has been taken off for painting and I have milled out slots to locate the printed springs. Sharpie pen suffices as Engineer's Blue for marking out.

Edited April 2, 2022 by Ruston

[Ruston]

The chassis block has been prepared for the overlays.

Any rivets and brackets, except the ones immediately next to the slot for the motion bracket, have been filed down so the overlay can lay flat against the block. The rear end has been cut off. I could have kept this as it wouldn't get in the way, but removing it will allow a speaker to fit between the rear extension of the frame overlays. The cast spring detail has also been removed.

Edited April 2, 2022 by Ruston

[Ian Blenk]

3 hours ago, Ruston said:

The chassis block has been prepared for the overlays.

Any rivets and brackets, except the ones immediately next to the slot for the motion bracket, have been filed down so the overlay can lay flat against the block. The rear end has been cut off. I could have kept this as it wouldn't get in the way, but removing it will allow a speaker to fit between the rear extension of the frame overlays. The cast spring detail has also been removed.

Are you making the overlays out of plasticard, I did p.card ones for the back end of Tindale, seem to be OK once painted. I wish I had overlaid the whole chassis

 

[Ruston]

15 minutes ago, Ian Blenk said:

Are you making the overlays out of plasticard, I did p.card ones for the back end of Tindale, seem to be OK once painted. I wish I had overlaid the whole chassis

 

I'm going to make a test pair from plasticard to check the clearances between the backs of the wheels and around the pickups but the intention is for the proper ones to be in brass.

[John Besley]

Can I pick your brains... I am still at the early stages of layout build etc. And have modified a Wren R1 chassis with a HLK Road Runner motor and gearbox, at the moment I am still useing a very old H&M Safety Minor controller from the 1960's... still undecided on DCC will this work with the HLK motor.

 

Yes I know I'll need a real controller...

 

Be glad of some help, I am a bit green on DCC  having only just got back into building a model railway after 35 years

 

The locos I am working on will have loads of room being in 7/8ths on 16.5mm

[Ruston]

On 11/11/2021 at 23:08, John Besley said:

Can I pick your brains... I am still at the early stages of layout build etc. And have modified a Wren R1 chassis with a HLK Road Runner motor and gearbox, at the moment I am still useing a very old H&M Safety Minor controller from the 1960's... still undecided on DCC will this work with the HLK motor.

 

Yes I know I'll need a real controller...

 

Be glad of some help, I am a bit green on DCC  having only just got back into building a model railway after 35 years

 

The locos I am working on will have loads of room being in 7/8ths on 16.5mm

There's no reason why it won't work with DCC. There's an entire section of this forum dedicated to DCC where I'm sure plenty of people will be happy to answer all your questions on DCC.

https://www.rmweb.co.uk/community/index.php?/forum/178-dcc-help-questions/

 

Meanwhile...

 

I made the overlays and have just taken off the clamps that held them whilst the epoxy set.

I won't ever be able to get that access section to the gears off now, but I can't imagine they'll ever need replacing. I'll solder a stretcher between the plates at the bunker end of the chassis in order to add strength and help tp prevent damage whilst the chassis isn't fitted to the running plate.

 

The buffer beams were also added this evening. I've made the guard irons as part of the overlays and they need to be folded to shape.

The next step is to temporarily fit the wheels so that I can mark out for for the brake gear.

 

 

 

Edited April 2, 2022 by Ruston

[John Besley]

Many thanks Dave

[Ruston]

This thing has become a royal pain in the backside. I should have simply scratchbuilt everything, but using a Hornby chassis was supposed to save a lot of work and time.

 

I had previously turned the wheels down for the loco that they were originally in and they became surplus when I made that one into a C class Peckett. It should have been a simple swap, only Hornby have been changing things since the first batches of B2 Pecketts.

 

I made and fitted balance weights to the wheels on the previous MW, which used an unaltered recent Hornby chassis and it ran without any problem. When I ran this one the rods kept rubbing against the weights and even stopped it running altogether. It would seem that the crankpin, which is actually a screw, is broader on the new ones, but on the old ones it keeps the rods nearer to the wheels. It seemed simple to swap the old crank pins for the ones in the wheelsets out of this new chassis, but when I screwed a new crankpin into one of the old wheels it immediately felt tight in the threads so I stopped and tried to unscrew it, whereupon it snapped off. Two more snapped crankpins later and the only way to fix this was to take out the threaded inserts from the new wheels and fit them into the old wheels, along with a full set of new crank pins. I don't know what the thread is - they look the same but they're quite obviously not the same!

 

The next faff was attempting to get the motion bracket back in. I don't know how in the hell they'd got it in at the Hornby factory but it would not go back in and eventually snapped in two. Not a problem, I thought, I've got a spare. It turns out that the old ones are different to the new ones! I had to file it to fit and  apart from a trial-fit, I haven't put it or the cylinders back yet. I did have the idea of cutting the ends off the motion bracket, putting the crossheads into the slidebars and then soldering the ends of the bracket to the slidebars. I tried this but whatever the metal is that they are made from, it absolutely will not take solder!

 

I have made the cab floor from 1/16th brass. It is glued in to the cab and, being tapped 10 BA, allows the bodywork and running plate to be screwed to the chassis. A small 1/16th plate is also glued into the bottom of the smokebox to do the same job.

 

Hornby have also messed about with the keep plate and pickups. The new pickups are longer and rather than going almost vertically they now are horizontal. This wouldn't work with the frame overlays unless I cut parts out. Another change is that the parts of the keep that come into contact with the wheel bearings now has a crescent-shaped cut out that allows the wheelsets to wobble excessively. To save all hacking the overlays and to remove the wobble I made my own keep, which holds the axles firmly in place. I have also placed washers between the wheel bearings and the wheels in order to cut down on side play. I don't know why RTR designers put so much slop into everything. Either make it proper, or make it with actual compensation.

 

And for the ultimate in poor design...

 

I dug the abomination that is the DJM Austerity chassis out again. This thing is the height of unnecessary complexity! To transmit drive from the motor to the leading axle it goes through 10 gears! The wheels don't even run on proper axles! The axles are plastic, with square ends and the gear as part of the axle. The wheels are a push-fit onto the axle.

 

I have taken out all of the excess gears and the plan now is that I'll make my own rods to a thickness that can transmit the drive, add washers between the wheels and chassis to remove the excessive sideplay  and then, finally, this loco should run properly.

 

 

Edited April 2, 2022 by Ruston

[Barclay]

I have every faith in your ability to do this, but I still think you should chuck it away !

[Ruston]

2 hours ago, Barclay said:

I still think you should chuck it away !

I agree with you one hundred per cent. It's the Yorkshire genes that won't let me. I paid good money for this heap of crap and so I have to make it work. The alternative is an RT chassis kit, Gibson wheels and High Level gearbox at £60+. I don't like Austerities that much! Having said that, adding it to what I paid for the loco it would still work out cheaper than buying a brand new one of these that are sold under the EFE name. I assume they are still putting the same useless drivetrain in those?

[PenrithBeacon]

18 hours ago, Ruston said:

This thing has become a royal pain in the backside. 

...

 

I have taken out all of the excess gears and the plan now is that I'll make my own rods to a thickness that can transmit the drive, add washers between the wheels and chassis to remove the excessive sideplay  and then, finally, this loco should run properly.

I think you'd be better off starting from scratch with the RT & AGW option.

But having said that I'd be interested in how you get on with this. I have Beatty Well Tank in store and I've been pondering the feasibility of just using the reduction part of the drive train with coupling rods and deleting the idler gears. 

 

[Sandhole]

23 hours ago, Ruston said:

This thing has become a royal pain in the backside. I should have simply scratchbuilt everything, but using a Hornby chassis was supposed to save a lot of work and time.

 

I had previously turned the wheels down for the loco that they were originally in and they became surplus when I made that one into a C class Peckett. It should have been a simple swap, only Hornby have been changing things since the first batches of B2 Pecketts.

 

I made and fitted balance weights to the wheels on the previous MW, which used an unaltered recent Hornby chassis and it ran without any problem. When I ran this one the rods kept rubbing against the weights and even stopped it running altogether. It would seem that the crankpin, which is actually a screw, is broader on the new ones, but on the old ones it keeps the rods nearer to the wheels. It seemed simple to swap the old crank pins for the ones in the wheelsets out of this new chassis, but when I screwed a new crankpin into one of the old wheels it immediately felt tight in the threads so I stopped and tried to unscrew it, whereupon it snapped off. Two more snapped crankpins later and the only way to fix this was to take out the threaded inserts from the new wheels and fit them into the old wheels, along with a full set of new crank pins. I don't know what the thread is - they look the same but they're quite obviously not the same!

 

The next faff was attempting to get the motion bracket back in. I don't know how in the hell they'd got it in at the Hornby factory but it would not go back in and eventually snapped in two. Not a problem, I thought, I've got a spare. It turns out that the old ones are different to the new ones! I had to file it to fit and  apart from a trial-fit, I haven't put it or the cylinders back yet. I did have the idea of cutting the ends off the motion bracket, putting the crossheads into the slidebars and then soldering the ends of the bracket to the slidebars. I tried this but whatever the metal is that they are made from, it absolutely will not take solder!

 

I have made the cab floor from 1/16th brass. It is glued in to the cab and, being tapped 10 BA, allows the bodywork and running plate to be screwed to the chassis. A small 1/16th plate is also glued into the bottom of the smokebox to do the same job.

 

Hornby have also messed about with the keep plate and pickups. The new pickups are longer and rather than going almost vertically they now are horizontal. This wouldn't work with the frame overlays unless I cut parts out. Another change is that the parts of the keep that come into contact with the wheel bearings now has a crescent-shaped cut out that allows the wheelsets to wobble excessively. To save all hacking the overlays and to remove the wobble I made my own keep, which holds the axles firmly in place. I have also placed washers between the wheel bearings and the wheels in order to cut down on side play. I don't know why RTR designers put so much slop into everything. Either make it proper, or make it with actual compensation.

 

And for the ultimate in poor design...

 

I dug the abomination that is the DJM Austerity chassis out again. This thing is the height of unnecessary complexity! To transmit drive from the motor to the leading axle it goes through 10 gears! The wheels don't even run on proper axles! The axles are plastic, with square ends and the gear as part of the axle. The wheels are a push-fit onto the axle.

 

I have taken out all of the excess gears and the plan now is that I'll make my own rods to a thickness that can transmit the drive, add washers between the wheels and chassis to remove the excessive sideplay  and then, finally, this loco should run properly.

 

 

Dave, you are remarkable. As a stubborn sod myself, I completely understand why you are sticking with this.
Regards,
Chris.

[Ruston]

I've ordered a set of etched rods for the Austerity, from RT Models. It will save the hassle of making them from scratch.

 

I have made and fitted brakes to one wheel on the Manning. As per the prototype the brake block is sandwiched between two hangers.

The problem with the rods being so tight against the wheels is going to cause a further problem with the brake gear on the leading and centre wheels. If I put the edge of the blocks in line with the outer face of the wheel, the hangers and their bolt heads are going to foul the rods. I need to come up with something to stand the rods away from the wheels to prevent this. That will then mean that the cylinders and motion bracket have to move outwards too.

Edited April 2, 2022 by Ruston

[Mol_PMB]

5 minutes ago, Ruston said:

I've ordered a set of etched rods for the Austerity, from RT Models. It will save the hassle of making them from scratch.

 

I'll be taking bets on whether they will be the right wheelbase and/or crankpin size...

Best of luck with it!

 

[Ruston]

5 minutes ago, Mol_PMB said:

 

I'll be taking bets on whether they will be the right wheelbase and/or crankpin size...

Best of luck with it!

 

I think it's a safe bet that Robert made his rods to the right wheelbase. The real question is did DJM make their chassis wheelbase right?

Edited November 15, 2021 by Ruston

[Mol_PMB]

8 minutes ago, Ruston said:

I think it's a safe bet that Robert made his rods to the right wheelbase. The real question is did DJM make their chassis wheelbase right?

Indeed. I wouldn't be at all surprised if it was slightly compromised to suit gears of a standard module...

[Ruston]

On 15/11/2021 at 17:42, Ruston said:

I need to come up with something to stand the rods away from the wheels to prevent this. That will then mean that the cylinders and motion bracket have to move outwards too.

I have made my own motion brackets. Plural because rather than one piece I have made it in two parts so the entire cylinders/slide bars/rods assembly can be removed in once piece. Standing the con rods away from the wheels has been accomplished by adding washers that fit over the threaded part of the crank pin screws but not the shouldered part. With the screws tightened into the wheels the washer now provides 10thou. clearance between the rods the wheel. I didn't have any suitable washers and was going to order some from Eileen's Emporium but they wanted four quid for twenty piddling little washers, plus another four quid for postage! That's just taking the proverbial for something that can't weigh above a couple of grams. I made my own instead, which cost nothing but about 10 minutes of my time.

 

Pics, tomorrow, probably.

[Ruston]

I was going to take a pic of my home-made washers, but when you've seen one washer you've seen them all, right? They are on there, just behind the rods. The pic also shows the home-made motion bracket, slide bars and cylinder gland. My slidebars aren't as nice as the Hornby ones but at least I was able to solder things together. The Hornby castings are madeof a strange alloy that simply would not solder.

I have all the brakes fitted on this side, but two remain to be added on the other side. It has been tested by using another loco to push it all over the layout and everything runs freely, with no fouling. I've just been to my local model shop (late opening on Thursdays) and have purchased some nickel silver wire to make the pickups, so it can have a powered test run tomorrow evening. I'll tear it down again to put some etch primer on all the brass chassis parts.

I'm hoping to get it all finished, except for maybe the lining and weathering, over the weekend. To be honest, it's becoming tedious and I'll be glad to have done with it.

Edited April 2, 2022 by Ruston

[Mol_PMB]

1 hour ago, Ruston said:

I was going to take a pic of my home-made washers, but when you've seen one washer you've seen them all, right? They are on there, just behind the rods. The pic also shows the home-made motion bracket, slide bars and cylinder gland. My slidebars aren't as nice as the Hornby ones but at least I was able to solder things together. The Hornby castings are madeof a strange alloy that simply would not solder.

I have all the brakes fitted on this side, but two remain to be added on the other side. It has been tested by using another loco to push it all over the layout and everything runs freely, with no fouling. I've just been to my local model shop (late opening on Thursdays) and have purchased some nickel silver wire to make the pickups, so it can have a powered test run tomorrow evening. I'll tear it down again to put some etch primer on all the brass chassis parts.

I'm hoping to get it all finished, except for maybe the lining and weathering, over the weekend. To be honest, it's becoming tedious and I'll be glad to have done with it.

That looks great! Compared to me, you work so fast. Don’t let it feel tedious. 

[Ruston]

On 18/11/2021 at 19:04, Mol_PMB said:

Don’t let it feel tedious. 

It's because I want to get to the good bit of painting and weathering. And there's another one in the queue for works.

 

I bought this last Thursday. It was what you might call an impulse buy. It is second hand but as new and in the box. The little packet with couplers and the block to fill the buffer beam hadn't even been opened. It was £20 off the new price, so I couldn't resist.

It had those horrible advertising hoardings on the engine casing sides and they were like a scab that I had to scratch, so I voided the warranty on it PDQ. I don't think that blob of glue will come off, so it may exchange casings with the unpowered 48DS, or I may make it, as some were, with plain sheet metal replacement sides. It will certainly get a full repaint and weathering. I prefer Bourbon to Scotch, so I might just rename it Jim Beam.

Edited April 2, 2022 by Ruston

[Ruston]

The 16-inch Manning is getting there and I can see the light at the end of the tunnel now.

The bodywork isn't fixed down as yet. I made a big mistake in not putting holes in the running plate and footplate that would line up and allow for them to be fixed together with screws. The bodywork will have to be permanently glued to the running plate now and the whole be removed from the chassis as one piece. As you can see, there is a gap under the front part of the cab piece. I'm not sure if this is warpage in that piece or not. I'm hoping it can be sanded out once the cab and boiler/tank are glued together to make a single body assembly.

 

I have fitted pickups and it's had a test run on plain DCC. Because I will fit sound and a Stay Alive, I've only put pickups on 4 wheels and running it without a SA reveals that the pickups require adjustment.

 

The handrails, sandboxes, and other detail are yet to be added, plus an airbrushed coat of coloured lacquer to go over the rough brushed lacquer. I'll line it before the final clear coat and then will fit it all back together, with sound and SA inside, before weathering.

 

It hasn't had any weight fitted inside yet and I can't add any until I know exactly where the DCC gear will fit.

Edited April 2, 2022 by Ruston

[JIM 48DS]

Hello Ruston I am new to the forum and my interest lies in the UK standard gauge railway modelling.

I do like what you are doing to the Manning loco.