Adventures in kit and scratch-building.

[sej]

I have read with interest a number of threads whose authors take great pains to keep soldered joints free of excess solder by soldering from the inside of the joint.

And extremely effective it is too.

 

Normally I'm more of a "spread and scrape" solderer, or occasionally "slop and scrap". All of which generally takes far more time than preparing the model for an inside joint. It can be very therapeutic though, cleaning all that pesky solder off.

 

This time I thought I'd have a go and cut some wide slots at either end of the main roof to allow me to solder the clerestory on from the inside. Which didn't take long and was very pleasing and very effective.

 

 

 I didn't get solder over all of those rivets and spent virtually no time at all on cleaning up.

 

 

 

Hmmm.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

[richbrummitt]

Those pliers will provide a reasonable heat sink too! 

 

My iron lives around 320°C for most work, but none of my 2mm bits have been big.

[sej]

Thanks Rich, the pliers may explain a few things. Luckily my fingers are less of a heat sink but they don't stay in place long.

 

Further very pleasing progress with the roof.

 

There are two handrails(?) or stiffening ribs on the clerestory, made of L section strip supported by small rectangular blocks. I soldered these up using square section brass wire. I love square section brass wire, it's incredibly useful. Once trimmed and cleaned up they were soldered on to the roof using the resistance iron to hold everything down.

 

 

 

Then there was the exhaust pipe to the tin bath, a truly remarkable piece of piping with a vague resemblance to that duck-shaped comet that is currently being chased by a NASA probe.

 

I soldered it up from two 7mm axle bushes, a set of nested brass tubes (I love nested tubes...) and a single smaller diameter down-pipe.

 

 

Everything was gunked up with 224 gap filling solder. I don't use it very often. It tends to puddle more than fill gaps, which I suspect is my usual problem with iron temperature. I did notch it up to 415 degrees, racy eh?

 

After that, a great deal of filing, sanding, cleaning and polishing.

 

 

 

And everything on.

 

 

 

[sej]

Moved on to the bogies for a change.

 

I've discovered that left-over Great Western Dean Single tender springs and axle-boxes can be modified to a spot on fit for the Ford, (thankyou, thankyou Scorpio kits, for all those little extra details). Who'd have guessed it? Great Western standardization reaches those parts other railways never did...

 

Of course, there are only six of each moulding (five springs unless I can find the one I've lost) so I've got to make some.

 

First; umpteen small rectangles of 10 thou brass.

 

 

More practice with the infernal resistance iron.

 

 

Thick enough for three, needing some attention from the piercing saw.

 

 

Sliced and soldered.

 

 

Ta-da! (That took me the best part of five hours...) But I like it.

 

 

Two more to go.

 

[N15class]

You are really making a good job of this. I do not know the prototype, but it looks a nice challenge. I am looking forward to see it complete.

 

I have started to enjoy scratch building after a few years of just kit building

[richbrummitt]

Two more to go.

 

Surely you just use this as a master and cast a few (or many) more? 

[Pete Harvey]

It's not worth the trouble to cast these as there are only three needed if this model was being designed as a kit then you make the amount needed for one kit and have the tooling/mold created for the amount needed for one kit and that way no waste and no extra cost.

 

Pete 

[sej]

Thanks for everyone's interest and comments.

 

I am actually intending to produce a kit of the Ford and will be casting those fiddly bits but for now it gets faster and easier the more I make, it's the initial thinking and faffing about that takes most of the time. And I found the missing sixth spring.

I very much enjoy scratch-building, particularly for the problem solving process and the satisfaction of making stuff, that to the best of my ability, represents the real thing.

 

So, more bits of axle-boxes.

 

I wanted to use 16BA nuts for the hangers and am hanging round the door mat for a marvellous bag of 100 of the little ###### from Eileens. So while I'm waiting I thought I'd have a go myself. You can produce quite nice hexagonal shapes by holding a bit of tube in the chuck of a hand drill and filing flats. The chuck is divided into three parts so you can rotate it quite precisely six times to get that authentic honeycomb look.

 

 

I used slices of it to represent the bolts.

 

 

Then I tackled the modification of the cast axle-boxes and discovered, excitingly, that you really can use the resistance iron to solder white metal to brass and nickel, (that and Carrs special low-melt solder, brilliant stuff). Thanks EKR.

 

 

And carefully balanced for that nearly finished look...

 

Edited August 27, 2014 by sej

[sej]

Oh, that's interesting, the site censors the word "". I didn't think that it was that rude. I'll be more careful in future.

[sej]

Hi, distractions again. I'll get back to the Ford a.s.a.p.

For now though; taking inspiration form Ozzy O's lovely little Ivor models and Eric Bransden's delightful "Emett's Effie" (see Gauge O Guild Gazette Summer 2005), I've built something in a similar vein. 

My local independent bookshop (yes there are some still) has kindly and enthusiastically offered to host a launch party for my book and asked for a window display. 

It's a longish thin space about 2 foot wide and I initially thought I'd put in a 3mm oval with some Triang TT stock which is pretty but small.

Then at the recent Guildex I came across the Agenoria stand, which has a tiny oval of O gauge track with a diminutive 7mm industrial 0-4-0 loco running faultlessly around it. And I realised that I was being blinkered by thoughts of practicable radius curves for O gauge. But solve a few coupling and overhang issues and a 7mm oval was a viable and far better visual solution.

 

I built the baseboard from some sundeala notice boards salvaged from school, (hence the hessian) and tested it with my Armstrong-Whitworth 0-4-0 which coped admirably with the 1ft radius curved Peco track.

 

 

I tarted the board up a bit with lurid green teddy-bear fur carefully manicured and hoovered, to prevent snagging, and then got on with the rolling stock.

Inspiration struck when I thought of using a 5 inch Dr Who figure to provide some sort of scale. Why not continue with the theme. So out came an old Dalek Bubble Bath bottle (I'm sure you've all got one somewhere) and after much cutting and sticking this was the result.

 

Yes folks, that's First Doctor, William Hartnell at the controls.

 

The mechanism had to be very reliable as the train trundles around a very confined space for an 8 hour day (or it's supposed to...); I built it as a short wheelbase 0-4-0, beam compensated with phospher bronze strip pick-ups bearing on the top of the wheels. The motor is a large Mashima with a massive fly-wheel driving through a double reduction gear-box from ABC.

 

 

The coaching stock is TARDIS shaped from blue mounting card.

 

 

And here's the finished display.

 

 

The most interesting lesson about the whole thing is how much I've enjoyed modelling without any sort of constraints. We do seem to get a little hide-bound and this sort of project really lets your imagination flow and has allowed me to try out all sorts of techniques and materials that I might not have necessarily got around to. I can thoroughly recommend it!

 

If any local-ish RMWEB members would like to pop round for a glass and nibbles you would be very welcome. It's this Thursday, 2nd October, 6pm at the Castle Book Shop, Ludlow. Please PM me to let me know if you'd like to come.

 

Cheers Simon

 

(me on the left, Stanton (proud book shop owner) in the middle and Julia (admiring by-stander) on the right)

 

 

[sej]

Inspired by recent visits to some excellent layouts: (Shropshire and Herefordshire is full of brilliant modellers, take a look at Heyside for instance), I'll show how things are progressing for me.

 

The Ford Bo-Bo is this far, with detailing to come.

 

 

 

 

The reason there's been a bit of a slow-down is that I'm scratch-building a 00 gauge Tilbury Tank for my next book.

 

 

 

 

(So no doubt there will be a r-t-r model announced as I'm typing this...)

 

And finally, a link to a video of my Dr Who train running in the book shop window; very popular with railway modellers' wives I'm told...

 

www.youtube.com/watch?v=rRmcEiOkEBc

 

Cheers

Simon

Edited November 10, 2014 by sej

[dikitriki]

Tee hee. Thank you Simon. I shall show Lady D the video later.

 

Richard

[sej]

Thanks Richard, I hope she enjoys it. The squeaky soundtrack is particularly jolly.

 

I notice that what I thought would be a link to the video has just turned out to be an exercise in cutting and pasting. Why hasn't it turned blue, or why hasn't a still from the video appeared? Are there instructions anywhere? Curses on my IT skills!

 

Cheers

Simon

[Kev_Lewis]

I notice that what I thought would be a link to the video has just turned out to be an exercise in cutting and pasting. Why hasn't it turned blue, or why hasn't a still from the video appeared? Are there instructions anywhere? Curses on my IT skills!

 

Strangely it works when I try....

 

www.youtube.com/watch?v=rRmcEiOkEBc

Edited November 10, 2014 by Kev_Lewis

[sej]

Kev, you're a star!

 

Many thanks

 

Simon.

[ArdsleyTank]

Might I ask what ever happened to "Brunel"?

[sej]

Hi ArdsleyTank, thanks for your question.

 

"Brunel" is a temporary victim of house-moving, book writing and other projects and he/she is currently stored carefully away in a box somewhere until I get some free time. Which I am very much looking forward to!

For more information and a superb record of building the Armstrong kit, I can thoroughly recommend Raymond Walley's website: raymondwalley.com

 

I am busy sorting the Ford Diesel out for its first public performance in April and will try to get some more pictures of that up soon.

 

And briefly, I had to make a model Chinook helicopter for another window display (I seem to be in demand for those...) and came across some great products; Vallejo paint, a ready to airbrush (acrylic, I think). It's virtually odourless, smooth and strong, and dries very quickly. Also a masking compound in a bottle with a fine nozzle from Hobby Holidays, great for fiddly masking. It's good to branch out into other modelling areas occasionally, there's interesting stuff out there.

 

 

 

Cheers

Simon

[sej]

Just a quick hello to say that I've finished building these:

 

 

 

And now have a bit of free time, here and there, to get on and finish some other projects, starting with a 2mm Tilbury Tank. Progress to follow.

 

Cheers

 

Simon

[sej]

Here's the 2mm Tilbury so far. The boiler and extended smokebox and footplate.

 

 

And the cab sides and tanks, compared to the 4mm version...

 

 

Next to make are the cab front and rear.

 

Cheers

Simon

 

[EKR]

I'm just taking a break from my bench after cursing O gauge for being so damned fiddly and you show me that........

 

Can't wait to see your 2mm  lamp irons

[sej]

Hi EKR, it's the same thing really; just that in 7mm the little bits are the fiddly bits and in 2mm it's the big bits that are the fiddly bits instead. 

 

Cheers

 

Simon

[sej]

A bit further on, with the boiler/smoke-box temporarily bolted in place.

 

 

 

Another thing about scratch-building 2mm locomotives in metal is that they are rather extra-ordinarily jewel-like objects. Pair of cuff-links anyone?

 

[sej]

Further Tilbury progress:

 

I made up a smoke-box saddle that allows me to bolt the boiler components to the cab and footplate.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

[bgman]

Hi ArdsleyTank, thanks for your question.

 

"Brunel" is a temporary victim of house-moving, book writing and other projects and he/she is currently stored carefully away in a box somewhere until I get some free time. Which I am very much looking forward to!

For more information and a superb record of building the Armstrong kit, I can thoroughly recommend Raymond Walley's website: raymondwalley.com

 

I am busy sorting the Ford Diesel out for its first public performance in April and will try to get some more pictures of that up soon.

 

And briefly, I had to make a model Chinook helicopter for another window display (I seem to be in demand for those...) and came across some great products; Vallejo paint, a ready to airbrush (acrylic, I think). It's virtually odourless, smooth and strong, and dries very quickly. Also a masking compound in a bottle with a fine nozzle from Hobby Holidays, great for fiddly masking. It's good to branch out into other modelling areas occasionally, there's interesting stuff out there.

 

P1060763 (1024x768).jpg

 

P1060766 (1024x628).jpg

 

Cheers

Simon

Hi Simon

I'm a user of the Vallejo air and find them superb. I also noticed the Masquepen fluid in your pic, do you find the nib to be sufficiently fine enough to carry out finer masking on models or does it tend to "blob" with use on say boiler bands etc ?

Excellent work you're producing and really enjoying this.

Regards

Grahame

[sej]

Hi Grahame, thank-you very much.

 

I used the finest nozzle on the Masquepen to mask the window frames on the Chinnook cockpit, which it did extremely well, with no blobbing. I would have thought that it could cope with boiler bands in 4mm scale at least. Incidentally, I noticed that my local stationary shop has got them in stock now.

 

I'd be interested if anyone knew of a colour match from Vallejo for LMS red? I agree with you that it is a superb paint.

 

Once the Tilbury's done (and painted red...) I'll get on with finishing some more of those unfinished projects.

 

Thanks again

 

Simon