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I could only see the connecting rod. I'm pretty sure the eccentric, expansion link and radius rod aren't in place yet. It all looks very nice and I'm sure is most satisfying when it runs smoothly. How are you planning to lock the return crank angle John? Cheers.....Morgan

Yes I do. It is paint that I gave him. I'll send you details.

That's what you get for living out in dial up land but I guess the sea views make up for it.

An earlier entry on my blog ruminated on tackling a fully lined out rendition of the 1880s-90s version of GWR livery. Whilst I think I could have tackled it I'm sure it would have taken me a long time to get it just right. This fact balanced against a lot of other bits of modelling work that are long overdue meant that I decided to engage the services of a sub-contractor for the painting and lining work. Today I received a few tantalising preview images of the work in progress. One of them is copied below from another TV channel. The painter is Warren Haywood and more of his excellent work can be seen on Western Thunder and his website. It should be back at Severnside Loco Works soon for final assembly and detailing. Cheers....M

For those readers of this blog that also thumb through the pages of Model Railway Journal it will be no surprise to see these photos. 2912 has been given the prestigious front cover photo in the recently release MRJ242. There are also a couple of lovely photos taken by Philip Hall towards the rear of the magazine. Here are a few more of Philips excellent photos showing some more detail. I'm pleased to have been associated with the re-engineering and re-painting of this wonderful model. Well done Gerry. See my previous blog entry for some background of the model and the work undertaken TTFN.....Morgan

Try not to blink when releasing the shutter....

Not built by me. I just copied the photo link from the LRM website. Apologies for no saying so. Post above duly edited. Morgan

There is also a newish kit from London Road models for the early batch of C12s with square tank/bunker corners (see photo below of kit built by Malcolm Crawley from LRM website). Malcolm also had a major hand in designing the GNR kits offered by LRM. Cheers....Morgan

Tony, As you said above it is worth noting that the quality of Gibson wheels is much improved since Alan was in charge. I've not had a single loose or wobbly tyre since Colin Seymour took over and, as I understand, introduced much better process control on the moulding of the wheel centres. Agreed that quartering is more difficult and locking on the axle is still less secure than the Markits/Romford method. I recall that Colin did produced some development parts with square holes to fit Markits axles but I guess there wasn't sufficient demand to put them into production. I use a very similar process to Graeme for quartering and it works a treat. Sighting through spokes is surprisingly effective. As for locking, I'm a machinist and have the facilities to do this to my wheels. A slot is milled into the axle. Once quartering is set and running satisfactory the other half of the hole is drilled in the wheel boss. A wire pin is then inserted, snipped off and filed flush. This method means that if, in extremis, the wheel has to come off the axle for any reason the wheel itself is not destroyed and the quartering can be reset exactly as before. Cheers....Morgan

Nice work Simon. Glad you've remembered the J3 totem. I'll be very annoying now and say the N7 totem is also back to front but that is quite understandable given that you've a young'un keeping you busy. Morgan

Hello John, I wonder if you have seen the photos here and in particular the one below. How are you intending to attached the lubricator drive rods? Would some representation of the lubricator drive crank not hide the 14BA slot head effectively? Particularly so if the diameter of the screw head was reduced slightly by spinning it up in the mini drill chuck and filing it down. Alternatively a really neat engineered (KotM) solution might see a 0.5mm hole drilled in the head of the screw into which a spigot of 0.5mm wire is soldered. The lubricator drive crank/linkage could then be soldered to the spigot and used to screw the expansion link shaft in and out. Just a thought and one that I'd be happy to help you out with if desired. Safe trip and see you on Saturday. Cheers.....Morgan

http://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/0-04mm-ENAMELLED-COPPER-WIRE-MAGNET-WIRE-COIL-WIRE-50grams-solderable-/121575509552 Only joking.....

Looks familiar......

Looks nice David. Just a couple of thoughts for you. I'm not sure if the Exactoscale tyres you are proposing to use have a counterbore and shoulder to put the centre into but Is the rim radial section thick enough? I know you wouldn't want to add any material to the inner diameter as you will lose the delicacy of the prototype but what about a small allowance on the O/D that could be trimmed/machined off when fitting the tyre. Also why not add the tyre retaining bolt head detail? Cheers....Morgan

Thanks for the confirmation. It is good to know and I'll admit I was a little surprised by your finding on the City. Martin's kits have a good reputation for fitting together properly without having to resort to modification. Cheers....Morgan

Hi, Some interesting observations on the backhead and cab splasher fit. I presume that you didn't find a similar issue on the Bulldog? I'm working one of Martin's Bulldogs at the moment but haven't erected the cab just yet. Cheers...Morgan

Thanks for all of the positive comments

Keeping with the Great Western theme for now over the last week or so I have been working on this beautiful locomotive Soon to be 2912 Saint Ambrose this particularly elegant GWR 4-6-0 has a rather interesting heritage. It was built more than 25 years ago by Martin Finney using the Proscale kit as a basis. However, how much of the Proscale kit is left is very much open for debate. Whether it is fact or fiction the story that I have been told is that his (frustrating) experience with this loco is what got Martin started on designing his own kits. The rest, as they say, is history. My association with this loco started about 3 or so years ago when my friend Gerry Beale bought the loco from Martin. Martin's interest in the pre-grouping LSWR made a Saint finished in 1920's condition surplus to requirements. The original loco was built to P4 standards and one of the first jobs I did on it was to re-wheel to EM gauge and make some modification to the compensation beam arrangement. In essence simplifying it. This image shows how it looked after I re-wheeled it back in 2012. The original guise was 2920 Saint David although it is not wearing the nameplates in this photo. Following the re-wheeling Gerry took the loco back and stripped off all of the paint and spent a lot of time updating the loco to the late 1940's appearance seen in the first picture. The level of extra detail that he added is quite stunning. Speedo drive, fine pipework and lot of small sundries really lift the loco into the "very special" classification. The agreement between us was that once he had completed the detailing I would take the loco back and apply a coat of GWR Middle Chrome green. Gerry would then do all of the finishing work. Painting the black areas, applying plates, transfers, weathering and final details. It would have been nice if things were so simple as at this point the Saint became a Sinner. Whilst the loco ran tolerably well we both felt that it could be better especially as the loco had a Portescap drive. Some investigative work concluded that the old "variflex" type hornblocks would be worth replacing along with the Maygib steel plunger pickup which were showing signs of rust. However, the biggest issue I discovered was the right hand leading coupling rod was longer than the left hand one by a fraction of a millimeter. This problem explained an awful lot in terms of the running quality of the loco so it was fixed with the help of my chassis jig. New Highlevel fold up hornblocks were fitted and provision made for a removable wiper type pickup plate. In addition to this the brake gear and injector pipe work were modified so that they could be removable for future maintenance should it be required. The chassis has now been repainted and trial run. With the rogue coupling rod shortened to match it's twin on the other side it is much smoother. It has eliminated some rather unhealthy slewing of the middle and leading wheel sets caused by the rods and movement in the variflex bearings. In the meantime the loco body has been thoroughly cleaned and degreased. Following a coat of primer.... ....the loco and tender have had a thin glossy coat of cellulose GWR green. So, with a little more work to be done on the chassis over the weekend Saint Ambrose should be going back to Gerry for final finishing next week. I'll make sure I post a final photo in due course when he has finished it off. Cheers....Morgan

Well the promise in the last blog entry of having "....a couple of things to post in the coming days" didn't come off in the way that I expected. Instead I fell into a work (Aerospace Engineering) vortex that chewed me up and only spat me out long after the Xmas break in 2014. Following this hiatus, where I effectively lost most of my winter modelling time, it has been hard to find the enthusiasm for a number of modelling projects, both personal and on commission. Through April and May I took a long hard look at the things on my list and have decided that I'm going to have to be pragmatic about what I can and cannot do. I'm getting to that time in my life when I realise that I'm not going to live forever. Quite selfishly, and perhaps with a narrowing of horizons, I want to build some of my own models. In future commission work is only going to be taken on if the task ticks a few fundamental boxes. It must really interest me either due to the subject matter or in a way that challenges/extends my skill as a craftsman, designer and engineer. In the case of the latter if I can utilise some of the spin offs from it, for instance a casting master, for my own projects then so much the better. So in the spirit of that I'd like to show a few pictures of a loco commission that is very nearly complete. It's unsual as I've never done any modelling in this gauge before, although it is P4. The kit is supplied by the Broad Gauge Society and on the whole has built into a nice model of a handsome prototype. There are a few issues that are being fed back to the BGS for inclusion in their instructions but nothing that is insummountable. The painting is still to come and that will also be a first as I've never done Early GWR livery before. Cheers....Morgan

Your tender totem is on the wrong way round. The early BR "Cycling Lion" always faced forwards.

On something so small a blowtorch such as you describe will do the job easily. The gas hob flame is also useful. W.r.t. hardening and tempering I would suggest you read pages 121 to 124 of the attached link Model Engineer's Handbook Cheers....Morgan

Hello Pete, The left hand side cab awning is looking much better now. Well done. As I said to you last week its rare that something is completely irretrievable and it really depends on how much work you are willing and prepared to put in. This loco body (considered a basket case by some) was completely rebuilt after attacking it with a cook's blow torch to get it back to component parts and cleaning up. I've done this quite a few times with poorly built brass kits. https://www.rmweb.co.uk/community/index.php?/blogs/entry/9490-coronation-tank/ Of course having a few sneaky tricks up your sleeve to get the metal to do what you want helps but on that subject there is always help and advice available. Cheers.....Morgan

Do you mean like this John? But I don't have a scooter.... I suppose I might be if you say so. I guess I'm just being spoilt at the moment building a Finney Bulldog kit. It is surprising how fast they go together when the kit is well designed and fits Cheers....Morgan (KotM)

Looking good John although, wanting to build a Brit of my own using a similar set of components, I can't help getting a little disheartened by all the mods your having to make to get the chassis to fit and approach something close to the prototype dimensions. Cheers....Morgan

Oh dear Simon, sorry to hear that you've been having problems. I hope you don't think the posting of my experiences have jinxed the build. From what I've seen so far on your other stuff I'd say it is far from it being a lack of competence. Slitting the frame spacers down the middle actually shows a lot of confidence that you could retrieve a bad situation by this approach. That is certainly a demonstration of skill in my book. No, I think it is more to do with equal measures of errors in the design approach coupled with an insufficient level of debugging of the kit with extensive test building and instruction writing/rewriting. I am not levelling this criticism at BM alone as I think it is a common problem with kits in general. I'll admit it must be really difficult for them to cover all potential permutations of how someone might want to build and use the model. However at the very least the instructions should state that "this is how it was test built" and "with these components" and if necessary "in all three gauges". I think it is remiss of a kit design to provide parts for the narrower gauges and not then be able to say confidently "it can be built in EM or 00 by doing A, B and C etc.... because we have done it". Without doing this putting the narrow gauge parts in is, at best, tokenism. High fidelity kits should not, in my opinion, be difficult to build. Time consuming, certainly, but each sub task should not be hard to execute because the parts don't fit with the bits you've bought to complete the ensemble. I guess I would consider myself an expert builder but I certainly don't think the BM 4F is a great kit. I agree with your statement. I have also found it to be a ball ache! I sense from you posting that you have one of the essential elements of a kit builder....Perseverance. So don't, as has been suggested, chuck the towel in with superkits. The other elements to good kit building whether, it's a rotten old lump of whitemetal or a piece of etched art, are Planning, Patience and Experience. You're making good inroads on all of these from what I've seen in this thread so far. Just keep at it and don't, as some do, sit there looking at the bits in the box. Cheers....Morgan