Hello again and happy New Year.

Christmas always limits progress in “The Tank” and increasingly I find that age too has its effect on progress.

However I have managed an hour or two there, and the Q4 chassis is getting fairly close to its first running trial.

The pics show left and right sides but with only front and third axles in place.

Fairly evident is the colour coding for the axleboxes (bearings if you prefer).

The tin-plated wires showing through the horn way for the second axle, are part of the axle retainer for axles 1&2.

Also just showing through the vacant hornways are the phosphor-bronze cantilever springs.

On at least one occasion over the years I have had a gearbox failure due to the idler gear shaft/shafts coming out of the holes in which they should be fixed. Now I solder a strip of shim brass (say 0.005”) over the outside of these holes. This stops the shaft falling out; it does not really matter if the shaft rotates but it MUST stay in position. It’s not a neat solution but it’s dependable! The shim brass shows in both pics.

In the left side view further brass attachments are obvious. This is the torque arm, designed to stop the transmission unit from oscillating around the driven axle.

Its made from 1/16” brass tube with its internal diameter threaded 14BA (it’s just the right size!), and a piece of 1mm brass rod which is also very fortunately a suitable diameter for a 14BA thread.

Bent through 90 degrees this rod threads through a removable bracket on a frame spacer. The rod-hole in this bracket is of sufficient diameter to allow the axle limited vertical movement due to track irregularities.

All a bit of a fiddle, but necessary if I am to be able to easily drop the driven axle and its transmission unit at will. To allow this I had to use a flat can motor. Originally it was to have been a round can 1630 but the “16” will not pass through the frames.

Pictures of the Parkside PMV have still not been taken. Next time perhaps!!

Dave