jwealleans

I have the Mainly Trains conversion kit, which I think is largely Iain Rice. I had it in mind as the next loco to do, being in a North Eastern 0-6-0 sort of frame of mind at the moment. I haven't started researching it yet, but i can see that the bunker on yours (your etches, I assume?) is quite a bit shorter. I know the early build J72s had a smaller bunker - were the J71s altered similarly? The conversion kit is an etch with a new chassis, front splasher, buffer beams and brake gear. There are some Gibson NE tapered buffeers and a cast piece for the boiler where the Mainline chassis used to stick up into it. As I'm building a new chassis it might be easy enough to shorten it, but then the replacement chassis is designed to fit the Mainline body so I may create more problems than I solve. Mikemeg has just done one of these and I don't think he shortened the bunker on his; knowing how thoroughly he researches that suggests to me that the larger bunker is an option. The loco was a swapmeet buy by my dad several years ago and needs something doing with it as it has been dropped, the front buffer beam and body are cracked and it runs like a 3 legged proverbial dog.

Beat me to it, Arthur. This is a J72 which is going to be a J71.

Detailing and finishing off almost complete. There are no castings for the tank fillers so I'll make something from plastic. Other than that I did tweak a couple of things; the holes for the sander operating rods were a bit too far forward so I made new ones and filled the originals (the green patch you can see on the front corner. I replaced the smokebox dart with one made up from Mainly Trains bits (MT 317/260) and put the grilles over the cab rear windows on from the same source (MT 226). They do some very useful loco detailing etches. The safety valve lever has been moved up as you can also see (thanks Arthur). The other thing to make is the small bracket for the fire irons on the left hand side tank top.

Firstly, the promised photograph of the Dapol Sentinel, with Crownline version to the left and NuCast (with plastic superstructure) to the right. I've been messing about with it on the test track and it does run very nicely; once it's had the prescribed amount of running in we'll do some haulage trials. In the meantime, I suddenly found myself at the end of the instructions last night. The castings are only sitting in place as yet and I will need to get the low temp soldering iron out, but the back of it seems to have been broken now. That's more or less a week of evenings to complete. I did have to make some little tweaks here and there and there's some more work to do on the chassis once the drive unit arrives (1424 and High Level RR+) but it looks like what it's supposed to be which I suppose is the aim. Please tell me now if you can see anything wrong with it.

Hi Tim, Not really - if you take Newcastle as the northern end of their range and Hull as the southern, it's almost exactly in the middle. I haven't lived near Ely for several years now. This loco will be finished as 552 which covered most of that patch during its career. Your observations about the kit are spot on - well designed and accurate sums it up. I've had the odd hiccup - nothing more than that - but Arthur is very good at answering any questions I've had so far. I spent a Sunday afternoon building the chassis and all the rest has been done in roughly a week of evenings. I got distracted onto energising the test track last night, but I have just dropped my first bo**ock; I finished cleaning up the boiler and smokebox (which bolt together and on) then went into autopilot and soldered them into place without having added all the detail, which is now that much more fiddly to do. Nothing terminal, though.

They do; I added them. I agree they're probably for the sanders and Yeadon shows them both sides in photographs. they're operated by another rod which goes up through the web of the solebar into the cab.

Isn't No. 1 end the one with the ventilation grilles? Or am I mixing it up with something else? Just for interest, here it is with the offerings from Crownline (left) and NuCast (right). The NuCast one is the version with the plastic top rather than whitemetal.

Mine works in both directions as well.

Hi Alan. It was this being announced which prodded me into building the other two. I'd never have done them afterwards. It's a bit early to give a proper judgement as I haven't run it in yet (next Monday at the club). Slow speed running seems good and it pulls everything on the 'in progress' board with no trouble. . The original plan was to do one of my kits as a Y3 and one as a Y1 but I decided it was more trouble taking the grilles off and I'd probably not manage it without messing them up. Hence this is a Y1 to go with my pair of Y3s. My only slight reservation is the lettering, specifically the number. It looks cockeyed. I've had a calliperon it and if it is out it's microscopic, but it looks out. The question remains as to whether I can do any better, but it maybe repainted in due course just so it has a different number. I'll put a photograph up in due course. In the meantime another session with soldering iron and rollers has got this looking much more like it should:

That's a yes from me!

That's very helpful, Mike, thanks. That's a humpshunter, I deduce? I can only use a few of the HL gearboxes as I cling to my insistence on a grubscrew or some other non-destructive means of taking things apart again. I can see a Road Runner Plus going in there just as well, though. I'll keep an eye on ride height. No other problems with it, I assume?

That's interesting, Mike - can I prevail upon you to illustrate it? I have one in the queue for after I've completed Arthur's J73 and I haven't yet settled on how to motorise it. It will be a High Level gearbox of some sort. What motor have you used and is there room for a flywheel?

I've been back to the loco this evening. For those who haven't guessed or found Rob2's previous build, this is an Arthur Kimber J73. Arthur sells these, among other engines as North Eastern Kits. There is a lot of tab and slot on these kits as Rob2 commented. They can to a large extent be clipped together as here. The cab and side tanks (all one fold up component) are just slotted into the running plate. This was more or less my starting point this evening. By the end of the night all that had been attached along with some of the cab interior detail and the cab rear and bunker are made up and ready to be soldered into place. The homemade spacing washer on the wheel seems to have worked so the other axles will be getting the same treatment. Here is the new build being moved round the works by something the postman dropped off today.

Ah, sorry, missed that. So it unclips from underneath rather than having to be unscrewed from above.

Much obliged, Cap'n. Has anyone got far enough into theirs to unscrew the NEM pocket holders yet? I want 3 links on mine bit it seems cleaner to unscrew rather than cut them off.

A rainy afternoon (I had my fill of getting wet this morning) provided the opportunity to bring out the HMRS sheets and letter up the vans. This is not a task I relish as anyone who has used the pre-TOPS BR freight lettering sheet will understand. Here are the results from a lengthy session punctuated with much tea and other necessary sustenance. One of the LNE vans is finished in the LNER version of bauxite (the right one above) to give some variety to the finished train. The Cambrian instructions say yellow lettering, but I'm sure that should only be for maroon vans. I've gone with my instinct here (apologies to Barry if his research proves me wrong). The different appearance of the left hand panel is the gloss varnish applied before the transfers. These were actually completed during the week and just had another coat of varnish today. I used Modelmaster NE lettering on the toad. I have a love/hate relationship with Modelmaster transfers and the halo effect and the part-lifted covering film above shows you why. Once it's thoroughly dry I shall try to remove that film as recommended and if that doesn't work I'm told you can dissolve it with White Spirit. This is the rough side all round - apart from that chip on the stepboard the roof's lifted slightly at the left hand end. I'm very pleased with it overall and everyone I showed it to at Hartlepool was impressed. That done I got the soldering iron out again for a couple of hours before calling it a night. Mostly cutting out and preparing components, but the whole thing has visibly advanced a little. Now, the more perceptive may have noticed that the 0-4-0 above was an 0-6-0 when I showed it with the lid off. I found that the W & T wheels I'm using had a back to back which was slightly narrow. Graeme used the same make (possibly exactly the same wheel) on his P1 and didn't have a problem so it may just be the batch or the odd wheel in the set I've got. Anyway it seemed to be a problem when I tested the chassis in some of the pointwork on the Ormesby layouts, so I turned my mind to what to do about it. I didn't want to try bending/moving the plastic wheel centres so what I've come up with involves shimming the axle. The difference is slight, so I found a hole punch which produces a disk of the same diameter as the Romford axles. I've punched a paper disk (bog-standard paper is about 7 thou, I believe), impregnated it with cyano and placed on the back of the wheel. I'm hoping that the resultant disc will be hard enough to withstand me making the required square hole in it and then add just enough to the back to back, possibly even allowing for a midges to be shaved off if necessary. All that will be revealed in due course, I expect. And now someone will tell me that you can get suitable washers from somewhere.

Cheers, Paul. A very straightforward conversion, which had to be pointed out to me as I was too slow to spot it. Slightly more complex if you go for a 9' WB version but very doable nonetheless. I may well go that way in the future. Question for anyone who might know; I've painted the Cambrian fish van bauxite as you can see. Barry's instructions specify yellow lettering, but wasn't this only for maroon or red vehicles? I'd always thought white lettering was used on BR bauxite vehicles.

Now then, I'm dredging my memory... I think you'd have to go back to RMWeb 2 to find this discussed in any detail.... I've just had a look and the centre part of the chassis is definitely etched. There are bits of plastic on it but I can't tell if they're parts of the original or bits I've stuck on. I have found a photo of the chassis under construction, so perhaps you can tell: I seem to remember having to supply some of the brake bits, although some were included. What also sticks in my mind is a discussion with Dave Smith (for it was then he) about bogies... the Siphon component pack came with one type of bogie but either that wasn't right for what I wanted or there was some other question over them.... in the end I bought the pack and another set of different bogies, used the different bogies on the Siphon and the ones from the pack on a Kirk 'Monster' I did at the same time. I expect someone who knows their way around these things can say which bogie is what. The couplings are Bill Bedford, which I use on nearly all my corridor stock. Both Siphon and Monster run on Thurston, so anyone interested is welcome to have a look at either Manchester or Tolworth later in the year.

Hi Phil, I'm a complete ignoramus when it comes to things GWR but you can also update them to a BR built version using a handy component pack available from Blacksmith. It also contains a chassis but includes side vents and new corridor connectors. This one started life as a Palethorpes van.

I think I've told this one before, but perhaps it bears repeating.... A number of years ago when I lived in one of the more rural (read 'inbred') parts of Cambridgeshire, I went into our local newsagent looking for the Modeller. After a few minutes of vainly browsing the shelves I asked the school leaver behind the counter if they kept it. "I don't know", she replied. "What magazine was it?" "Railway Modeller". There followed a few moments of intense concentration as she stared at the same shelves I'd been looking at. Finally she asked, "Is it a boat magazine, then?" I moved in case my kids had to go to the same school.

Clever of them to put that pin on for you to pivot the jib, Brian.

Either side of my weekend in Hartlepool I've been back on the road for a few days so it was back to the plastic. The first of the conflats has been loaded up and readied for the road: Stuartp has already been here: an attractive prototype and not a bad kit to build, the Cambrian C87 LMS fish van. The corners took a bit of tidying up and I can see an excess of putty where I filled the hole round the door handle (I used thinner wire than supplied) but overall it went together very well. I've replaced the buffers and roof vents with cast items, apart from that it's as it came. Lastly a pair of Parkside fish vans cut down to the 10' wheelbase version. This was fairly straightforward and once painted you'll have to look hard to see the join. It should be fairly obvious here where the cuts go. I eventually worked out that the best thing to do is shorten the floor, attach the ends and then assemble the outer extremities of the sides to them. The location is very positive on these kits and you end up with a solid and square shell to which you can cut and shape your centre piece. This is all then reinforced with plastikard on the inside once attached. The solebar has two plates in the middle which very handily mark where you need to cut. You do need to remove some of the floor ribs which are now in the way of the brake shoes and I've used brake linkages from other Parkside kits rather than cut down the ones supplied. Buffer heads are also 51L steel ones.

You're not wrong, Gilbert, although they do include a full set of Romford wheels which are pretty eye-watering in their own right these days. The Craftsman A5 was the first etched loco I built and came out very well. It still gets the odd outing today. That would certainly be my choice.

Craftsman Models Nu Cast

This week my low boredom threshold has kicked in again; somehow container securing chains didn't appeal so I went off on my next tangent instead. In the immortal words of Dame Edna Everage, "Can you tell what it is yet?" More later if I'm a good boy and get all the hedges cut while it's nice out.