Dean Goods - High Level Chassis

[nickwood]

Paul,

Many thanks for your comment regarding the tabs as it made me look at the photo of the chassis again. I noticed on this photo that I hadn't got the top tabs fully located on the right hand spacer.

 

 

When looking at the chassis on my workbench I had to use a magnifying glass to see it. Just goes to show the value of taking photographs of work in progress.

 

It is a good job that I had only tacked them in place. Needless to say they are properly located now. 

[nickwood]

Thanks you for all the interest and comments so far. I am having to put this project is on hold for a couple of weeks or so due to family and work commitments.

 

Normal service will be renewed shortly.

[DLT]

Please don't keep us in suspense for too long!

Cheers, Dave.

[Limpley Stoker]

Please don't keep us in suspense for too long!

Cheers, Dave.

I hope you can continue this project soon: you have inspired me to get my chassis kit out again and have another go!

 

When I read the instructions I was put off because I couldn't work out how to secure the brass gear wheel onto the drive axle without gluing up the wheel bearings, and then how to arrange the pickups in the limited space.

 

Thank you for your efforts!

[nickwood]

I hope you can continue this project soon: you have inspired me to get my chassis kit out again and have another go!

When I read the instructions I was put off because I couldn't work out how to secure the brass gear wheel onto the drive axle without gluing up the wheel bearings, and then how to arrange the pickups in the limited space.

Thank you for your efforts!

Don't panic, I will be back on this project soon. Your experience sounds very much like mine and I hope you make some progress with your chassis kit.

 

I'm returning home tomorrow and after sorting a few things out over the weekend including fitting in a trip to Railex I should be able to pick up where I left off next week.

[Limpley Stoker]

Don't panic, I will be back on this project soon. Your experience sounds very much like mine and I hope you make some progress with your chassis kit.

I'm returning home tomorrow and after sorting a few things out over the weekend including fitting in a trip to Railex I should be able to pick up where I left off next week.

Excellent - though I haven't caught up with you yet. I was disappointed to find the Alan Gibson axles wouldn't pass through the bearings as supplied, and it's very difficult reaming them out in your fingers, and it's too risky doing it soldered to the chassis in case it gets distorted.

 

I have been looking for a reference to safe use of loctite in the gearbox but haven't found one yet.

 

Your photos are really useful, though the supplied exploded diagrams are good.

 

Keep solderin' on

 

Mike

[nickwood]

Mike

 

I had the same problem with some of the bearings supplied and found it was a slight burr on the outer face. A very light twist with a cutting broach sorted it out.

 

 

I've not managed to get very far since Railex where I did buy a 14xx chassis ready for my next project.

 

I got the soldering iron out earlier this week and went to make a start, read further on the instructions and realised that I need some valve gear rivets for the articulated coupling rods. These I do not have. Frustrating as I could have got them at Gibson's stand at Railex last weekend if I had realised.

 

I've tried phoning to place an order but only get an answering machine that says to leave your details and they will call you back but no-one has so far, again frustrating. So until I can get these I'll have to content myself with other things. Maybe I can do the butchering required to the loco body in the meantime.

[MikeTrice]

To order from Alan Gibson I email my order and state that I will phone later to leave my credit card details, that way no-one has to be around to naswer the phone. This process has never let me down and I have received my goods very quickly.

[Siberian Snooper]

Mike

 

I had the same problem with some of the bearings supplied and found it was a slight burr on the outer face. A very light twist with a cutting broach sorted it out.

 

 

I've not managed to get very far since Railex where I did buy a 14xx chassis ready for my next project.

 

I got the soldering iron out earlier this week and went to make a start, read further on the instructions and realised that I need some valve gear rivets for the articulated coupling rods. These I do not have. Frustrating as I could have got them at Gibson's stand at Railex last weekend if I had realised.

 

I've tried phoning to place an order but only get an answering machine that says to leave your details and they will call you back but no-one has so far, again frustrating. So until I can get these I'll have to content myself with other things. Maybe I can do the butchering required to the loco body in the meantime.

 

The best time to phone Colin at AGW is from about 3pm Tuesday to Thursday. Once you have made contact you can usually get next day delivery.

 

Usual disclaimers just a satisfied customer.

[Limpley Stoker]

The best time to phone Colin at AGW is from about 3pm Tuesday to Thursday. Once you have made contact you can usually get next day delivery.

Usual disclaimers just a satisfied customer.

Mike

 

I had the same problem with some of the bearings supplied and found it was a slight burr on the outer face. A very light twist with a cutting broach sorted it out.

 

 

I've not managed to get very far since Railex where I did buy a 14xx chassis ready for my next project.

 

I got the soldering iron out earlier this week and went to make a start, read further on the instructions and realised that I need some valve gear rivets for the articulated coupling rods. These I do not have. Frustrating as I could have got them at Gibson's stand at Railex last weekend if I had realised.

 

I've tried phoning to place an order but only get an answering machine that says to leave your details and they will call you back but no-one has so far, again frustrating. So until I can get these I'll have to content myself with other things. Maybe I can do the butchering required to the loco body in the meantime.

Looking in my bag of giblets supplied with the kit , there are a couple of small rivets which I assume are the coupling rod rivets. (Must remember not to open the bag over the carpet......)

 

 

Mike

 

Mike

[Brassey]

Yes the rivets are supplied with the kit; well they were with mine.

 

[nickwood]

I checked again after the last two replies but can't find any rivets in mine. I managed to get hold of Colin yesterday and the rivets and a few other bits and pieces are on their way so I should be able to make some progress with the chassis soon.

 

In the meantime I've done the necessary butchering to the body to fit the chassis. First the body has to be split into its component parts.

 

 

The front mounting has to be removed

 

 

two sections of the footplate inside the firebox

 

 

and the protruding pip under the safety valve cover

 

 

Completed, tidied up and ready for a trial fit.

 

 

 

 

 

[nickwood]

The rivets arrived in the post this afternoon, an excellent 1 day service from Gibson's. 

 

Hopefully I'll find some time tomorrow to do a bit more.

[nickwood]

Unfortunately I didn't find the time I was hoping. I have to go away next week and weekends can be difficult for modelling other than quick, easy small projects and this doesn't quite fit that profile.

 

A bit of patience required methinks.

[nickwood]

I've managed to get this project moving again and make a little progress. After receiving the valve gear rivets that I was waiting for the first thing I wanted to do was to make sure that the chassis is absolutely square especially as I'm building it rigid. There are some very expensive chassis jigs on the market and I couldn't justify the cost unless I was going to be building lots of chassis' in the future.

A bit of research and I stumbled across a homemade jig that someone here on RMweb (wish I could remember where so that I could give credit ) had made and it seemed to make sense to me, so I nicked the idea and built my own which can be seen here. No explanation should be necessary on how I built it.

The dimensions between the block of wood and the first bar are checked at various points to ensure that the bar is parallel and then the gap between each of the other bars are checked to ensure that they are consistent. The ends of the bars are secured with blutack. Simples!!

 

 

After a check and a very small tweak to one of the bushes the next step was to solder the gearbox pivot bracket in place. The wire had to be cut off leaving 2mm projecting and I took the photo before I dressed the cut end with a file.

 

 

These are half of the coupling rods, the other half are joined to these using the valve gear rivets through the small hole on the longer rods to make an articulated coupling rod. I have kept them on the fret until all the holes are opened out to accept the crank pins and the valve gear rivets. You can see a crank pin through the hole in the left hand hole of the fourth rod down. The bottom two rods have not had the holes opened out so that you can see the difference.
 

 

Each rod is made up of three laminations which have to be soldered together which of course is the next step coming soon.
 

[nickwood]

I now have assembled coupling rods. The photo below shows the laminated two halves of one articulated coupling rod ready for joining. Before joining them together and inserting the rivet a light coat of oil is placed on the projecting tongue of the top rod shown to lubricate and stop solder running through the joint when fixing the rivet end at the rear of the coupling rod.

 

 

This photo shows them loosely joined before inserting the rivet. Getting the rivet into place was perhaps the most fiddly job I've had to do so far. Someone must have a trick to doing this and I'd be pleased if they would share it. 

 

 

The next photo shows the joint on both coupling rods. The top coupling rod shows the rivet head on the outside and  the bottom rod shows the soldered end of the rivet at the rear. Apologies for the poor photo.

 

 

Both rods articulate freely but not sloppily.

 

The next job is to test fit the chassis to the loco body and then I think it is on to the dummy inside motion.

[nickwood]

I had a slack day today workwise so rather than mooch around I decided to have a lengthy session at the workbench. The Chassis has been test fitted, the inside motion assembled and the rest of the chassis structure completed. Wheels, motor & gearbox and brake gear remain to be done.

Heres some photos of the test fitting of the chassis and I'll post the rest of the progress tomorrow.  

The front mounting bracket with M2 nut soldered for fixing.

 

 

Front of the chassis screwed into place

 

 

The rear fixing uses the original fixing point and screw

 

 

Starting to look like a loco again.

 

 

To be continued .....

[nickwood]

Here's the rest of yesterdays session.

The kit gives you the option of installing inside motion but for an OO model the instructions recommend a simplified version due to the space restraints between the frames. I decided to go with the kit recommendations.

These are the parts recommended, the slidebars, the photo shows one of these but there are two and the valve gear assemblies.

 

 

The first slidebar in place, it pushes nicely through the slots in the two frame spacers

 

 

Both Slidebars installed and soldered

 

 

At this point I decided that it wasn't going to look right without the connecting rods fitted as well. The tabs on the ends of the connecting rods clip into the slotted holes in the slidebars. You need the preverbial three hands to do this job but I eventually worked out how I could hold the frame steady whilst springing the slidebars apart slightly and inserting the rods.

 

 

The connecting rods in place
 

 

Valvegear fitted. Two wires are passed through the holes in each component. The ends of the wires are soldered to the frames and the excess clipped off and filed flush. The whole assembly is then adjusted so that the parts are parallel to the frames and then soldered to the wires. There are also crossheads soldered to the connecting rods inside the slidebars but the camera can't pick this up.

 

 

I dropped the body on quickly to see how things looked

 

 

Inside motion job done, easy to say but this small assembly took almost three hours to do !!!

The vacuum pump body whilst under construction. One end of the wire to clip off and the top to fit. This goes inside the frames and can hardly be seen when in position.
 

 

Finally (for now) the four footplate supports and rivet strips.

 

 

This is the chassis construction completed. The next stage is to temporarily fit the driving wheels and set up the running for sideplay etc. then onto the brakegear assembly, motor and gearbox.
 

[Limpley Stoker]

I had a slack day today workwise so rather than mooch around I decided to have a lengthy session at the workbench. The Chassis has been test fitted, the inside motion assembled and the rest of the chassis structure completed. Wheels, motor & gearbox and brake gear remain to be done.

Heres some photos of the test fitting of the chassis and I'll post the rest of the progress tomorrow.  

The front mounting bracket with M2 nut soldered for fixing.

 

Dean Goods 066 small.jpg

 

Front of the chassis screwed into place

 

Dean Goods 069 small.jpg

 

The rear fixing uses the original fixing point and screw

 

Dean Goods 070 small.jpg

 

Starting to look like a loco again.

 

Dean Goods 072 small.jpg

 

To be continued .....

I now have assembled coupling rods. The photo below shows the laminated two halves of one articulated coupling rod ready for joining. Before joining them together and inserting the rivet a light coat of oil is placed on the projecting tongue of the top rod shown to lubricate and stop solder running through the joint when fixing the rivet end at the rear of the coupling rod.

 

Dean Goods 061 small.jpg

 

This photo shows them loosely joined before inserting the rivet. Getting the rivet into place was perhaps the most fiddly job I've had to do so far. Someone must have a trick to doing this and I'd be pleased if they would share it. 

 

Dean Goods 062 small.jpg

 

The next photo shows the joint on both coupling rods. The top coupling rod shows the rivet head on the outside and  the bottom rod shows the soldered end of the rivet at the rear. Apologies for the poor photo.

 

Dean Goods 065 small.jpg

 

Both rods articulate freely but not sloppily.

 

The next job is to test fit the chassis to the loco body and then I think it is on to the dummy inside motion.

 

Terrific progress, though I'm catching up thanks to the break in transmission!

I'm sure you have tried the 'blob of bluetack on the end of a cocktail stick' for manipulating tiny objects such as rivets.

I'm still fretting about that gearbox and the final gear!

Will you paint the dummy motion before assembling it ?

 

Keep solderin' on

 

Mike

[nickwood]

Terrific progress, though I'm catching up thanks to the break in transmission!

I'm sure you have tried the 'blob of bluetack on the end of a cocktail stick' for manipulating tiny objects such as rivets.

I'm still fretting about that gearbox and the final gear!

Will you paint the dummy motion before assembling it ?

 

Keep solderin' on

 

Mike

 

Hi Mike

 

Actually I hadn't thought of such a simple solution as using blutack and a cocktail stick.  Thanks, it's always the obviuos solution that you miss

 

The inside motion is already soldered in place so the answer to the painting question is no. In fact I don't know what colour to paint it. All the models I've seen seem to paint it bright red and whilst it might have been outshopped like this I can't see the red staying visible for long. All my locos are weathered so I might paint it red to begin with and then make it virtually disappear under layers of oily grime.

[nickwood]

Before I go about fitting the wheels to the loco chassis, I thought I'd better do the ones on the tender and get that chassis finished first. If nothing else it will give me some much needed practice.

Here's the tender chassis with the wheels fitted. As I've decided to pick up current from the tender wheels as well as the loco it is essential that the brake gear does not touch the wheels and cause short circuits. There was a fair bit of fettling to do to allow the wheels to turn freely, mainly grinding off some of the brake blocks. The brake gear was removed and re-fitted many times to check free movement and the chassis pushed around the layout. When I took the photo the front (LH) brakes still needed some adjustment.

 

 

Once satisfied that all was well the pickups could be fabricated. I used strips of copper clad paxolin to mount the wiper pickups glued to the chassis top with 5 minute expoxy. Before gluing the copper was removed from one side of the strip and a file used to thin the strip to about half of its original thickness. This was necessary to keep within the clearance available under the plastic tender frames. The copper top was then tinned with solder.

Wiper pickups were made from phosphor bronze wire wound around a cocktail stick to form a small spring. The spring helps to keep the wiper in contact with the wheel tread and also if any wipers need adjusting in the future.

 

 

 

With the plastic tender frames fitted to the chassis you can see one set of sprung pickups. It looks like the plastic frames actually put a little bit of pressure on the pickups which I'm a little concerned about. There is the possibility that they will act like brakes but we will see if it turns out to be a problem. Some further tweaking may be necessary if it is.

 

 

After seeing this photo I decided to tidy up the rough cutout (ashamed of my workmanship, I was). I also had to decide how the tender was going to be wired to the loco. I want to able to separate the tender and loco for maintenance in the future so wires running direct from the tender to the motor was out. So I needed some form of connector for the wires. I visited my local Maplins and found a pack of jumper cables for PCs that have a male socket at one end and a female at the other which seemed ideal. The wires are only about 75mm long, with the female socket cut off these are ok for the tender but the wires running from the socket to the loco will need to be longer and have the female socket re-attached. A tricky little job as these sockets are tiny.

 

 

The wires will join in the tender body and exit through the small cut out in the plastic frames that you can see on the extreme left of the photo.

A shot of the (almost) completed tender. The chassis will be painted at the same time as the Loco chassis and there is some detailing still to do to the tender body. The coal mountain has to be removed for one thing and the addition of lamp irons, fire irons and replace those handrails with something finer should just about do it.

 

 

A poorly lit photo but you can just about make out the slotted hole where they wiring will exit the tender. This is where the drawbar was was on the original loco.

 

 

Back to the loco soon.

[nickwood]

Returning to the loco chassis, the next job is to set up the chassis by temporarily fitting the wheels and making sure that the running and sideplay is not too sloppy or too tight. The wheels are from Alan Gibson and the first thing to do is fit the crank pins. The crankpins are actually small screws and the wheels have pre drilled holes to accept them.

The AG instructions say to countersink the hole at the rear of the wheel to allow the screw head to lay flush with the rear face. I encountered a problem with this as the screw head fouls on the rasied wheel centre and this means that the screw tends to wander and not drive in straight. I solved this by shaving away a small amount of the wheel centre, enough to clear the screw head. Counter sinking of the hole was done using a much larger drill bit given a couple of turns using my fingers.



A couple of shots of the crankpin inserted from both faces of the wheel.





I bought this tool specifically for this project. It will probably be very familiar to many of you but for those not, its purpose is to press the wheels onto the axles quartering them very accurately at the same time. It is very well engineered and for those of you who haven't come across it before I've shown it with the contact details. No connection with the company, I'm just very pleased with it.



The chassis with all the wheels fitted. Sideplay is controlled by adding washers on the axle between the wheels and the frames. Initially I added washers sufficient to almost eliminate sideplay.  



Coupling rods loosely fitted, this proved that the wheel press had done its job as no adjustments were needed to fit them. The chassis was then pushed around the track to check the running



The only adjustment necessary was to allow a little more sideplay on the front and rear axles. This was easily done by removing the wheels and taking out a washer from each side. The chassis seems to be perfectly square, all wheels are in contact with the track and run freely. It was a massive relief and has exceeded my expectations.

The brake gear is up next. Having read the instructions through it seems to be a very similar process to that used on the tender so should be fairly straightforward.  
 

[Limpley Stoker]

That's a brilliant series of photos of the tricky bits of chassis construction- thank you Nick.. I plan to fit the wheels without the wheel press .Did you countersink the axle holes a little before fitting the wheels to the axles?

I must say the internal motion looks terrific , it's the reason I chose this kit, I'm putting aside a whole day for this bit - it looks so fiddly..

Mike

[nickwood]

Thanks Mike

 

I didn't countersink the holes before pressing the wheels but I think you might need to if you are going to do them by hand. You should only need enough depth to lead the axles into position I would think.

 

The inside motion did take a fair amount of time, around three hours if I recall correctly.

[nickwood]

Thanks to everyone for the 'likes'. I've managed to get most of the brakegear asembly constructed today but I've not had time to write it up and post some photos. Hopefully I'll get some time to finish if off and post it up tomorrow evening

.