DLT's SR Locos - Lord Nelson Craftsman Kit

[DLT]

Extending the footplate drop turned out to be fairly straightforward, but took quite a bit of preparation.
I first filed the spacer roughly to shape, soldered it to the underside of the footplate, and then finished the filing.



With the footplate firmly taped to its cradle the front section was held in place and quickly tack-soldered. When convinced that it was correctly positioned I finished adding solder.
The photo shows the finished underside filed back to clear the chassis and cylinder block.



The footplate drops are now pretty much the correct depth, and match up with the tender footplate.

The cab front and sides now need filing down so that it sits correctly on the footplate; and of course the boiler and firebox are too high, and need lowering relative to the footplate.



I have to dmit that the U is a loco that I had never paid much attention to in the past, with the N being more common in the Westcountry, and had always assumed it was just an N with bigger wheels.
With this project I have come to realise (as the rest of you already knew) that theres FAR more to it than that!

Cheers,
Dave.

Edited March 10, 2018 by DLT

[Horsetan]

...which is why an accurate new-build "U" wouldn't come amiss.

[DLT]

Sorry this thread has been a bit quiet recently, I've been concentrating on preparing Charmouth for Warley, bit I've not completely neglected the U.

Finally worked out the relatitive dimensions etc. I was struggling to tell from the photos the boiler/footplate distances compared to the N. Eventually the penny dropped, that the U boiler is 3 inches higher than the N, as the axles are 3 inches higher and the firebox has to sit above the rear axle. This accounts for the difference in the cab front, there being no room for the second set of spectacles above the firebox.

 

So, boiler has been lowered to sit closer to the footplate, and the cab lowered to sit correctly on the footplate step.

In addition the trumpet-shaped smokebox has been filed parallel and a new wrapper made from 5thou brass with a line of rivits around the rear edge.

Chassis has been all soldered up, and now awaits pickups before it can move under its own steam.

 

All the best,

Dave.

[DLT]

At last some progress to report on the U. The chassis spacers are all fitted and soldered up, coupling rods etc fitted and we have a working chassis. A bit light on its feet at the moment, but with whitemetal bodywork and pickups in the tender, it should run like a dream.
 

This view shows how narrow the Highlevel Slimliner gearbox is, enabling it to get in some tight spaces. The advantage here is that it fits in the existing cutout in the boiler barrel, without having to widen it to the extent that its visible from the sides.
 

More tomorrow,
Dave.

Edited March 10, 2018 by DLT

[darren01]

HI Dave

Looks very good so far,I have a high level gaer box to build a 108 ratio,looks like fun to build!.

Keep the photo and info coming.

All the best

Darren

[DLT]

One thing I didn't say about the chassis was that I made new spacers for the frames. Using the 00 spacers on the etch would have resulted in a chassis that was too narrow, with over half a mm of sideplay in the axles. Having the wheels slopping sideways has clearance consequences for the motion, and could lead to poor running. I widened the frames as far as I could while still allowing a minimum of sideplay on the axles. You could file down the EM spacers to do this, but i built new ones.

I initially said I wanted to fit Backscratcher pickups, as on the W-Class earlier, but soon realised I couldnt do this. With the whitemetal footplate sitting on top of the frames theres no space to fit the PCB strips or bend the pickups over the top of the frames. So it had to be conventional wire pickups and the fact that this loco has larger diameter wheels meant that there is more space available around the etched spring detail to fit wipers.
So the pickup plate is both utterley conventional, and my preferred method Two extra horizontal frame spacers added, 1mm above the bottom of the frames. This provides a 1mm deep recess for the 1.6mm PCB pickup plate, the surface of which is then 0.6mm proud of the frames, providing sufficient clearance to prevent the pickup wires touching the frames. Err, clear as mud?

Dave.
 

Edited March 10, 2018 by DLT

[Horsetan]

Sorry this thread has been a bit quiet recently, I've been concentrating on preparing Charmouth for Warley, bit I've not completely neglected the U.

Finally worked out the relatitive dimensions etc. I was struggling to tell from the photos the boiler/footplate distances compared to the N. Eventually the penny dropped, that the U boiler is 3 inches higher than the N, as the axles are 3 inches higher and the firebox has to sit above the rear axle. This accounts for the difference in the cab front, there being no room for the second set of spectacles above the firebox.

 

So, boiler has been lowered to sit closer to the footplate, and the cab lowered to sit correctly on the footplate step......

 

Slightly OT, but it seems that Ian Allan have recently published a volume on the Southern Moguls in their Locomotives in Detail series. Have ordered a copy and will be interested to see if the drawings are any good, particularly those specific to the new-build "U".

[DLT]

The front bufferbeam is always a distinctive part of a loco, and its worth getting it right. On the moguls its its a double layer assembly, made from two layers of etch. Yet again the N & U are different. There was an etched frontplate for the U, but no rear plate, so the N rearplate was used. You can see the different outlines around the lower edge of the beam, and these will be filed back to match.
Dave.

 

Edited March 10, 2018 by DLT

[georgeT]

Hi Dave, You are making good progress with the U class, l'm tempted to buy a springside (7mm) 45xx, but being mostly white metal worrie's me a little, never tried to solder any white metal kit's. have you found the kit easy to solder ??

[DLT]

An update on an earlier part of this thread, I have replaced the photos of the W-Build, that had dissappeared from the first page of the thread.

If anyone is interested of course.

Cheers, Dave.

[DLT]

Hi Dave, You are making good progress with the U class, l'm tempted to buy a springside (7mm) 45xx, but being mostly white metal worrie's me a little, never tried to solder any white metal kit's. have you found the kit easy to solder ??

Hi George,

Never had any problems with whitemetal soldering myself; although theres been a lot of scare stories about it over the years. You need 70degree solder, liquid flux, and an appropriate iron. The one I use is an old Weller 15-watt model, that I found wasnt powerful enough to solder brass.

The whole subject has been discussed at length, I seem to remember there is a thread devoted to it. Have you tried a Forum Search?

Hope this helps,

Dave

[Horsetan]

The new Ian Allan book on Southern Moguls fails to provide any "U" drawings at all. So that's that, then!

[DLT]

The new Ian Allan book on Southern Moguls fails to provide any "U" drawings at all. So that's that, then!

Very useful...

[DLT]

Time for another of my rather sporadic updates on this thread, this time its for sme of the bits attached to the footplate.
The front bufferbeam now looks the part (to me at least) Footsteps are always fiddly, the DJH etches went together very well but needed filing down a tad to blend with the curve of the footplate. After worrying about the melting the soldered footplate I soldered all these bits on without any problems. The heat required is so localised that theres no risk of heating up the whole footplate.
Smokebox wrapper is homemade and Araldited in place. It doesnt go all the way round, but stops where it meets the saddle; you can see this if you look closely at the photo. This abrupt end wont show when finished as it will be hidden by the smokebox front and the smoke deflectors.



The firebox is soldered to the footplate, but the boiler barrel is screwed on. It has to be removed for painting.



When put next to all that whitemetal the etched cab seems a bit flimsy and delicate, but is all the more realistic for it. Its just perched in place for the photos, hence the visible join.
I've left it loose for protection and will fix it in place later.





Dave.

Edited March 10, 2018 by DLT

[Horsetan]

Suddenly, I'm tempted to have a go at one of the Irish ones, though none exist today.

[Bluebell Model Railway]

Certainly a very nice build would definatly like a U-Class... sadly I lack the skills to do one of these but still always enjoy reading how to build one.

[DLT]

Certainly a very nice build would definatly like a U-Class... sadly I lack the skills to do one of these but still always enjoy reading how to build one.

Hi Matt,

You have an excellent set of skills; along with a determination to get on and build models, and the confidence to take on new challenges. You recent conversion of a GW 4-6-0 to a Brighton Atlantic is a case in point. Some real "outside the box" thinking that I wouldnt have thought of in a million years, and a unique and correct looking model without a trace of its origin. And followed by a stunning rendition of the very complex SECR livery on the H.

Don't run yourself down!

All the best, Dave.

[DLT]

Turning to the cylinders, SEF supply a fold-up etch with all the holes correctly located, and cast cylinders that push on to the ends.
Crossheads and slidebars are beautifully (and solidly) cast in nickel-silver.



A trial assembly revealed a hitch, the cylnders stick out much to far, almost a scale foot outside the footplate!
As hollowing out the whitemetal was a non-starter, I filed back the etching. The left hand cylinder is about right, the right hand as supplied



Rather than a plain hole, I soldered a piece of tube in place for the piston rod to run in; the square hole above it takes the slidebar.



Putting it all together: (but nothing fixed yet)



Bye for now,
Dave.

Edited March 10, 2018 by DLT

[hayfield]

Dave

 

A very timely thread, some time ago I bought a Wills N/U class loco built on a Hornby chassis with 22mm Romfords and an Airfix 5 pole motor, nicely built and painted but showing signs of ware. The week before Christmas I won a SEF N/U chassis with 22mm Romfords and a DS12 motor. The instructions and plans have been damaged and the seller was not sure if anything was missing.

 

From a quick look only the cast slide bar seems to be missing, and a few extra cast parts were included. As I paid less than £20 plus a bit of postage for the lot, I have plenty of room to buy the missing parts off Dave and still be well in pocket. Dont think I have paid more than £50 for both lots, and will end up with a spare motor and set of Romfords.

 

I now need to gen up a bit on the different versions, and learn from your aproach in building the chassis. I now look forward to watching the building of your loco

[Horsetan]

A trial assembly revealed a hitch, the cylnders stick out much to far, almost a scale foot outside the footplate!

As hollowing out the whitemetal was a non-starter, I filed back the etching. The left hand cylinder is about right, the right hand as supplied

 

 

? That surely makes the thing asymmetrical.....

 

How does that work out?

[DLT]

? That surely makes the thing asymmetrical.....

Yes, coz so far I've only done one side!

Perhaps I should have said "The left hand cylinder is NOW about right, the right hand as supplied"

I photographed it like that to show the difference.

 

Hope that explains,

Dave.

[DLT]

When it came to testing the all the bits together, a problem appeared.    Testing the crosshead in the slidebars revealed a maximum back and forth movement of 8mm.  However the crankpin throw of the supplied wheels gave a movement of nearly 9.5mm;  Problem!  Had I got the right wheels?  A check of the loco data said cylinder stroke 28 inches, scaling to 9.333mm, so yes.

So increasing the crosshead movement it had to be.  I managed to lenghten the slidebar slots VERY carefully, using an old blunt junior hacksaw blade.  Still not enough, so I shortened the crosshead slipper (the flat bit that actually slides in the slidebar slot).  Success! slightly under 10mm ov movement.

 

Slidebars were soldered to the cylinder assemblies with their fore-aft position quite critical.  Indeed it took three or four goes to get it right.  Anyway its all there now and the photos SHOULD show the mods, if you can see them!

 

 

 

 

 

Cheers, Dave.

Edited March 10, 2018 by DLT

[DLT]

Hoping to speed this build up before too long!

 

Following the crossheads and slidebars, comes the motion bracket.  The SEF part is a lovely brass casting, but even that needed a bit of fettling up and bending straight; and brass doesn't bend as easily as whitemetal!

In addition, the etched yokes that support the expansion link need bending to a "U" shape (appropriately) and soldering on.  To mount and pivot the expension link I drilled right through the holes in the yokes and through the brass casting in order to solder a 14ba nut on the inside.

 

This end shows the yokes drilled through

 

 

 

This end shows the screw and expansion link in place.

 

 

 

The whole casting from the front, nuts are not yet soldered.

 

 

 

The slot in the frames to accommodated the bracket is a bit on the large side, but no matter.  The bracket needs to be positioned to match the rest of the valvegear and mate with the slidebars; so I will have to build the rest before I can fix anything in place!

Dave.

Edited March 10, 2018 by DLT

[Horsetan]

..... crankpin throw of the supplied wheels gave a movement of nearly 9.5mm;  Problem!  Had I got the right wheels?  A check of the loco data said cylinder stroke 28 inches....

 

I thought it was wheel stroke which was the important one?

[DLT]

I thought it was wheel stroke which was the important one?

Same thing!  Diameter of the crankpin movement must equal the cylinder stroke.

If cylinder stroke is 28 inches, crankpin throw (distance from crankpin to axis of rotation) must be 14inches.

Dave.