Nick Dunhill's Workbench - Scratchbuilding a Reid NBR Atlantic from an ACE Kit.

[nickd]

So this week began with rebuilding the tender having taken a slice out of it.  I reattached the diagonal flares and fashioned some corner pieces.  The corner pieces were made out of the jigs for setting the angles of the flares.  I just mucked about folding and cutting until I got someting that fitted the gap and had the correct curvature.  The first one took a while but the second was easy!  The next job was to reattach the tender top and make good.  I also added beading round the top edge of the flares and down the front.  This was bent from half round 1 x 0.5 mm rod.  There's also a thin strip that goes round the top of the tender sides along the bottom of the flare.  I found an undersized boiler band in the bit-box for that.

 

 

There were no parts in the box for the beading, and the etches for the division plates at the front and rear were comically wrong but at least they were too big so could be repurposed.

 

 

You can see that I have also added the coal rails.  The kit parts reside in my scrap box together with all the parts for steps and treads.  All the wrong shape and/or size, and there were no backing plates for the cab steps.  The coal rails are attached to uprights made from scrap and are bent from half round with the same dimensions as above.  They're quite tricky to get right, but I used 1.2 mm rods and drills as spacers to get them all parallel.

 

 

The designer played a trick of the eye with the steps on the front of the tender and beneith the cab (loco designer that is, the kit designer didn't even bother with most of the parts!)  The tender footplate and body is significantly narrower than those of the cab.  The step backing plates are subtly different such that the treads of both co-incide.  This took a lot of working out and scratchbuilding.

 

 

Another job this week involved filling the pre etched handrail holes for the tender and redrilling new ones.  I added the handrails for good measure too.  The next bit then involved filling the pre etched handrail holes in the cab and redrilling for new ones also in the correct place.

 

 

These are the tender sand boxes I quicky made earlier.  There were no etches for these in the kit and, surprise surprise, the tender decking was the wrong size and shape!

 

Now maybe I'm being a bit over critical here but, surely, if you're drawing a rectangle and you have got out your best pen, set square and ruler you might as well draw the rectangle the correct size?  That way the interconnecting rectangle will fit nicely too, and the dimensions are all there on the drawing.  The kit might as well have been a box of sticking plasters and fishing weights, at least they'd have been useful.

 

The scrap bin gets fuller and fuller.  Anyone wanting to see more of the horror show can have a peep from behind the settee here;

 

https://www.flickr.com/photos/144381574@N05/with/52551279914/

 

[Blandford1969]

Great work on the tender, your on the home straight . What drawing have you used to help you?

[nickd]

I have GAs.

 

[nickd]

Aiscough clearly did not!

[nickd]

Has a week passed already?  

 

This week I nearly completed the tender.  I'm waiting for some castings to come from LGM for lamp irons, water filler and handbrake staunchion.  when they arrive it'll be finished quickly.  I had to modify the tender platform floor and make a new fall plate as the one in the kit was a) too small, and b) designed to be attached to the loco cab floor and not the tender as it should have been.  I also had to make water valves and fire iron stands as there were no parts in the kit for those either.  I made a coupling bar for the tender and loco as the one supplied on the chassis etch was laughably short.

 

 

 

The cab doors in the kit were the wrong shape and size and blah, blah, blah.....

 

I focussed my attention on the cab and fished the supplied backhead casting from the box.  I must have fallen down a worm-hole and emerged in 1975 as the white metal casting was too small and had some blobs cast on it that were supposed to be backhead fittings.  On my return from 1975 I made a backhead of the correct size and shape, and some cab lockers and platforms to go with it.

 

 

 

The backhead was made by cutting out the correct shape from brass sheet, soldering a strip round the perimeter and soldering some stout copper wire round the inside of the join.  In this way I could radius the corners with a file.  I made the angle iron strip round the backhead from 2 pieces.  An old bit of boiler band and some brass sheet cut to slightly bigger than the front of the backhead.

 

 

 

I made some side sheets for the rear of the cab and some runners for the sliding cab side window.  The job that pissed me off most this week was the etching in the kit for the sliding window frame.  Now the designer had drawn appertures on the cab side etches for windows.  He'd also drawn beading etches to surround the window openings, so you might expect the sliding window frames to have a similar, if slightly smaller dimensions wouldn't you?  Well no, no they were not.  It took me an hour to cut out a pair of sliding window frames of the correct size.

 

 

 

FFS!

 

I am also waiting for castings from LGM for backhead fittings etc and to preserve my sanity I decided to move on to the boiler assy.  Now I'd already seen that Graham had had a go at building the firebox.  He'd obviously realised that using the kit parts was a futile waste of time and had pulled it apart and flattened the wrapper, presumably to draw around it and cut another.  This alerted me to the idea that the firebox, boiler and smoke box parts would be useless, and I wasn't disappointed.  The firebox wrapper was to be commended for it's outstanding crapness.  The dreaded fold lines again.......and the amazing inability to measure accurately.

 

 

 

 

Subbuteo anyone?

 

The rest of the week would be spent measuring and cutting out formers and wrappers for new boiler parts.  To be fair to the kit the circular boiler former was useable....by chance.  If you used it inside the preformed tube (0.45 mm wall thickness) supplied for the boiler it would fit but the boiler would be too big in diameter.  If you made your own boiler skin from 0.3 mm thick NS.....bingo.  I joyfully used the boiler former as it raised my spirits thinking that not all the £225 my client had spent on the kit had been wasted.

 

It is much easier to make wrappers from 0.3 mm thick NS.  They're much easier to manipulate by rolling bars or hand.  0.45 mm material is just too thick in my view.  I can hear you say that 0.3 mm NS will make boilers that aren't stiff enough, but I say you should never use your boiler as a meat tenderiser.

 

 

 

 

 

If you think you can stomach more pictures of the 'Nightmare on ACE Street' they're here;

 

https://www.flickr.com/photos/144381574@N05/with/52565936995/

Edited December 15, 2022 by nickd

[nickd]

So I took some steps to finish the boiler assy. yesterday.  I made a boiler (using the ACE former) and used 0.3 mm NS sheet for the wrapper.  I also made the bits that are often forgotten between the front of boiler and rear of smokebox.  The smokebox rear is a forged or cast (?) piece with the wrapper riveted to it.  It sticks out slightly at the rear of the smokebox and has a radiused edge.  This was cut from 0.8 mm thickness brass sheet, as was the polished cover between rear of smokebox and boiler.  I think it covers the fasteners that hold both together?

 

Here it is mocked up on the loco.  The firebox has been relieved to fit the cab front and rear drivers.  I'm happy with that.

 

 

 

 

Next week I guess I'll be grumbling about the splasher etch bits in the kit.

Edited December 17, 2022 by nickd

[Camperdown]

Not a great deal of kit left in that.  How did you attach the 0.8mm brass to the back of the smokebox?

[nickd]

It's soldered in place with 90°C solder.  The smokebox is soldered together with 180°C solder so is unaffected.  The brass is getting a bit thick but the low melt will give good penetrative between the layers so will be strong enough.  There's another 0.8 mm circle to solder in top of that and I'll probably use low melt for that too.  The boiler will ultimately be screwed to the footplate so the joins won't be able to peel.  It'll have enough sheer strength.

 

It's difficult to know when to stop with the scratchbuilding.  The kit is lacking in many areas.  I used about half if the tender parts and very little of the loco.  The loco footplate looked OK but the cut outs for the splashers don't line up with the wheels, so I'll regret not replacing that when I sort out the splashers next week.  The cab is slightly out in pretty much every dimension so I might have to replace that too.  Where did you stop though?

Edited December 17, 2022 by nickd

[nickd]

I had a bit of computer drama this week which is mercifully resolved.  The work on the boiler continued and I was able nail it all together and add the boiler bands and the boiler fittings.  That nice Mr Davies printed me a lovely dome to replace the dome-like white metal lump in the kit.

 

 

The painter got in touch and sent me a picture of a Reid Allantic with a star symbol under the smoke box door handles.  I descovered that lots of these locos had such a feature and it was a Masonic thing, reflecting the membership of lots of railwaymen at that time.  Anyway I accepted his challenge and made one.

 

 

 

 

Apparently its a Masonic Blazing Star.  The kit had two smokebox door castings (one decent one would have done) but I modified the casting to make it a bit more acceptable.

 

 

Mick sent me a much higher resolution picture of one of the locos in works grey and I spent a lot of the week adding details to the footplate and some further pipework to the chassis that I hadn't previously noticed.  I think this was just a strategy to avoid building the splashers.  Finally I ran out of diversionary stuff and had to make them.  

 

The etchings in the kit weren't a total loss.  The holes in the footplate for the wheels were in the wrong place and fouled the tyres, this also meant that the foldy up splasher sides etched into the footplate were also in the wrong place.  I removed them from the footplate but in any event they were too small.  The kit contained some parts to make the splasher inside and top (or maybe alternative splasher outsides and tops, we'll never know.)  The curved top section was too narrow and long but the front (or rear) was spot on.  Further unconfined pleasure that some more of the cost of the kit had been value for money.  I made 4 splashers using some of the kit and that's where work for 2022 ended.  I have got a bit lucky as the new splashers disguise the fact that the appertures in the footplate for the wheels are in the wrong place, or maybe they were designed like that.

 

 

 

So the scrap bin did get a little fuller this week. Here's the state of play as of this morning.

 

 

Here's the new splashers, the fixing plates with the rivets is a little longer than required to cover the holes in the footplate, but I'll trim as required.  

 

 

 

 

I hope to get them finished in early in January, but I'm pleased that there are mo more structures to be scratchbuilt.

 

https://www.flickr.com/photos/144381574@N05/with/52582423412/

[DOCJACOB]

I also seem to recall that being an NBR Atlantic driver came with kudos and a higher wage. 

 

Star was popular embellishment and other personalization tweaks  I recall include burnishing edge smoke box wing plates & thistles on smoke box front. 

 

Unique they are only Scottish Atlantics and had a torrid birth with NBR Civil Engineer (James Bell) concerned with potential track damage. They were also initially too big for currently installed NBR turntables. 

 

I think they even considered re-building at one point to 4-6-0 

 

Midlothian 9875 was supposed to be part of the LNER Historic Collection at York and after being just saved at 11th hour from scrapping it was re-built and kept working for further few months more.  

 

Onset of 2nd World War & drive for metal finally did for her & she was scrapped uniquely for a 2nd time. 

 

Wonder who has a soft spot for them?? 

[nickd]

I have grown to like them.  They have an interesting hstory and look very chunky.

[DOCJACOB]

FYI 

[nickd]

This is my next project. Has anyone built one, and on a scale of 1 to 10 where 1 is ACE and 10 is F7 or MOK, where does it lie?

Season's Greetings.

[jwealleans]

Ken (Jazz) is probably your best bet to ask - I don't know whether he reads this thread?

[nickd]

So here we are after a restful holiday back on the tools.  During the holiday a nice bag of parts arrived from LGM so it seemed appropriate to finish the tender.  I added the lamp irons, a shortened water filler casting and the reverser handle, the picture might not show all the castings in place!

 

 

Laurie's bag of delights for the cab did not include a firehole door or a few of the other fittings.  Can't imagine why NBR fittings aren't the top of everyone's wish list!  You won't find any in the kit either.  

 

So here's the backhead detail as it was made.  The water gauges are made from the top and bottom valve castings and some 2 x 2 mm perspex tube drilled down the middle.  It is all detachable for painting.

 

 

 

 

 

This is a picture of the backhead with the offering in the kit.

 

 

And here's that backhead with the rest of the whitemetal parts supplied in the kit.

 

 

But I did find a use for them....

 

 

......as ballast.  More comfort from the knowledge that some of the kit came to good use.

 

Here's the finished cab.  Pretty much everything is either scratchbuilt or castings bought in.....except the cab floor.  I used the cab floor!

 

 

 

 

The last job of the week was the Westinghouse pump.  The kit had 2 identical castings for this item but both were wrong.  Why supply 2 wrong ones?  One correct one would have been better, am I asking too much?

 

Anyway I modified one left over from the LSWR 02 builds I did last year.  The pump is mounted on a stand and of course there's nothing in the kit for that either, or the regulator casting.  So a happy friday afternoon was spent with the piercing saw out of it's box again.

 

 

 

The ACE box is now mercifully empty of the items that are, laughably, described collectively as a kit.  I used about 10% of it, or to be more accurate Graham did before he gave up building it.  The description 'Misrepresentation' springs to my mind.  I have enjoyed my scratchbuilding adventure so far, whether my client will enjoy paying my builder's fee remains to be seen.  

 

Should finish the thing next week.

 

[nickd]

I didn't quite finish the loco this week for reasons I will expand on below.  The first task was fitting up the splashers.

 

 

This was quite tricky round the firebox and boiler and less so on the front drivers.  Bits of the top inside edges have to be ground away to clear the boiler, and the real thing has angle iron sitting between the splashers and boiler clothing this was made from annealed 0.8 x 0.8 mm brass angle.

 

The next job was to add the pipes not yet fitted to the Westinghouse pump and fit up the handrail.  It always seems to take me a long time to fit up boiler handrails.  I always fill the pre etched holes as they are never in the right place, but of course the kit boiler was in the scrap bin and there were none on mine.  I used the pointy measuring thingy on my vernier calipers set to the correct height for the handrail, upside down balanced on a sheet of plate glass and pushed the assembled loco past them .  This scribes the height of the handrail, and in this case the handrail is in the boiler centre line so the knobs are embedded in the boiler clothing there too.  I always let some tube that is the same OD as the knob shanks into the boiler to ensure the knobs can be held securely.  It's always tricky making the rail pass round the front of the loco and over the smokebox door, remaining concentric with the door and smokebox.  This run of handrail has a cute kink round the Westinghouse pump.

 

 

 

I have stared at the cab side windows many times trying to convince myself that they are OK but they're not.  They're not tall enough and the gap between the bottom of the roof and the top of the beading is too large, and it gives the loco the look of a Raven NER Pacific.  I decided to sort it out and peeled the existing window beading off.  I commissioned Mick Davies to etch me a new set of taller ones on the edge of his next set of etches.  

 

This was all a bit unfortunate for two reasons.  The cab was the only remaining part I used from the kit for the loco, and it was wrong.  Virtually every part in the box supplied to build the locomotive was useless.  Secondly there'll be a delay of a couple of weeks while I get the new window beading etches.  I should have scrapped the whole thing and scratchbuilt.  It would have been quicker.

 

I added some cast LGM lamp irons to the front of the footplate and one to the smokebox door.  I have some lubricators on back order for the footplate area above the cylinders.  So that's more or less it, cab window mods and lubricators to be added.  Another day's work and it'll be done.

 

 

Here it will sit on my window ledge until the parts turn up.

 

If you really feel your life would be incomplete without a NBR Reid Atlantic, and there's no doubt it's a handsome loco, I would urge you not to buy this kit under any circumstances.  It is a very very poor product and ought not to be on the market.  Even if you're pretty handy at modifying kits, spend the £225 on gin and fags and scratchbuild one instead.

 

[30368]

1 hour ago, nickd said:

If you really feel your life would be incomplete without a NBR Reid Atlantic, and there's no doubt it's a handsome loco, I would urge you not to buy this kit under any circumstances.  It is a very very poor product and ought not to be on the market.  Even if you're pretty handy at modifying kits, spend the £225 on gin and fags and scratchbuild one instead.

 

Nick,

 

What a really good job you have made of this "kit". I have followed this build with interest. Some years ago I bought an ACE 4mm N15X "kit". It was simply the most difficult kit I have ever built and needed much scratch building. I posted some fairly well balanced comments along the lines of "not recommended for the beginner". I was PC'd by the owner of ACE to be told that the N15X was not a kit just a "few experimental etches" and my comments were unfair. The box said "N15X Kit" and that is what I paid for. I wonder if you (or your client) will face a similar response?

 

32331 alongside its home depot 70D.

 

Kind regards,

 

Richard B

[DOCJACOB]

As said earlier, would love one but well beyond my ability and “chapeau” for tackling this. 

[Blandford1969]

1 hour ago, DOCJACOB said:

As said earlier, would love one but well beyond my ability and “chapeau” for tackling this. 

Needs someone like Michael Edge to do a kit for one.

[nickd]

Here's 3 little jobs that I chugged through whilst waiting for parts for the Atlantic to appear.  

 

 

 

This is a Connoisseur J39 chassis that has had inside motion retro fitted and has passed through a few hands.  The fella who was fitting the motion up to the chassis unfortunately died and I was tasked with finishing the job.  The original kit laminated rods had been replaced with Premier Component rods.  I think that someone had made the assumption that they would be a straight swap, but I had to take the horn guides off the frames and reset the axle centres using my jury axles and the new rods as a jig.  It worked very well after that.  The loco is fitted with AGH wheel sets and the insulated wheels had crept on their axles and the quartering was out on a couple of wheels.  In my experience this is a common fault on this type of wheel, especially if the axle centres don't match those of the rods.  Any consiquent binding can often force the wheels to creep on the axles making the matter worse.  If your chassis is binding not at 3 or 9 o'clock that's a sign that the quartering is out or you have a crankpin issue.  Check your AHG wheels all have the same quartering.

 

Someone had designed some nice inside motion parts and had them 3D printed and cast at Shapeways.  They had been assembled with lots of machine screws, but the screws couldn't be tightened up on the rod joints as they would prevent free movement.  This meant they had a tendancy to unwind themselves and crash into the screw head next door that had become loose too.  I soldered the screws in place and ground all the adjacent surfaces flat.  A couple of other joints needed a bit of relieving to prevent binding and off it went.

 

 

The next job was a loco bought off Ebay (I think?) by a client who wanted it converting to S7 and giving a bit of an upgrade.  It has all the hallmarks of a Geoff Holt built loco but had been repainted quite badly.  I stripped the paint and moved the large splashers outboard a bit to accomodate a S7 wheel set.  Colin Dowling reprofiled the Walsall Industry wheels for me with  S7 Soc form tool and added some S7 axles.  They all dropped nicely back into the chassis and I had to rebuild the brake rigging.  I added some new clacks and a new boiler handrail and it went off to Warren Haywood for a lick or two of paint.  It came back to me last week and I have reassembled it and popped some coal in the tender.  I think it looks rather resplendent in it's new livery.

 

 

The third job was the reassembly of a GWR Broad Gauge Armstrong convertible I made a couple of years ago.  It had been opened and inspected by customs agents on it's way to Australia.  I suspect that customs had dropped it and it arrived in Melbourne in a very sorry state.

 

 

 

 

Jeff Ennis of Scorpio kindly provided some etches for a new cab and I was able to make the loco as good as new with some new whistle turrets.  The courier's insurance scheme did pay out to cover the cost (I would suggest that insurance is essential on all models sent by post.)  Warren has made a fabulous remedial paint job on the loco.

 

 

3 happy customers I hope.

[nickd]

The Atlantic is back from paint and reassembled.  I'll test it tomorrow and add coal etc.

 

 

 

 

 

Painted by Pail Moore and with a lot of help from Robin McHugh.  I think it has turned out well, and I have forgotten about the abominable kit.  More pics to come when I get a pro to take some.

[JeffP]

That's up there with the best.

Inspirational.

[DOCJACOB]

Like button isn’t enough IMHO 

 

Just needs the matching coaches. 
 

In awe. 

[sir douglas]

Beautiful

[nickd]

All done and ready to ship. Thanks to Paul Moore for the paint and Robin McHugh for details and help.