Michael Edge

Nothing etched in that B3 Tony, everything sawn out of sheet material, mostly shim steel.

The 7mm Hunslet 0-4-0T has been like that for many years, I really ought to finish it but I don't have a layout for it to run on.

Now for the slidebars and con. rods. Sidebars are 1mm square, pushed through the cylinders and soldered to the motion bracket. 1mm n/s rod pushed through to check that the cylinders line up with the driving axle centre. Connecting rods have been soldered together and finished as for the coupling rods. A snag appeared with the crosshead etches - no hole in the centre! A cross mark was made from corner to corner, popped and drilled out to take the little end pin. On the left of this etch is the unused mechanical sanding lever. The crossheads (as in our other etches) are made from front and a back layer, both have small rebates etched into them to engage with the slidebars. At the piston rod end there are two thin fingers which are bent around the piston rod as seem here - leaving the rod full length for the time being. This shows the piston rod soldered into the fingers of the crosshead back which is propped in place with a selection of needle filesl Connecting rod in place with a pin dropped into the hole, the crosshead front is on the bench with its fingers already bent back. Front now threaded on, at this point the front is soldered to the piston rod. The whole assembly is slid out backwards and the little end pin securely soldered in (to both crosshead faces), the little end of the con.rod is well greased before doing this. Piston rod shortened, packing washer(s) added to the driving crankpin to bring the con. rod parallel to the coupling rods and finally the cylinder cover glued on. Because I have always put this on last after painting a lot of my work has appeared with shiny bright cylinder covers as certain professional painters have misinterpreted this process. A useful trick with bogie locos is to stick the covers on with epoxy so that they remain insulated fro the frames. Pick up wires from .35mm p/b soldered to the pre-fitted plates. Wheels run round by hand while doing this to check that the wires aren't being carried into the frames or brake gear as the wheels rotate. Wires connected to the motor and it's ready for its first track test. First track test quickly revealed that the big ends fouled the footplate so two holes were chopped out of it as shown. Finally on the dynamometer rig - not all that sophisticated, just a spring on a nail and the loco running past a scale. Temporary weight of a v block on the boiler brings it up to 550g - it still easily spins its wheels at this weight and pulls the spring out to about 45mm - more than enough for its likely jobs. For comparison the most powerful pacifics on Carlisle reach about 65 with a weight of 650g. I've made the pattern for the bogie axleboxes, just need to make a mould now.

S1 again With the frames out of the body brakes are attached on cross wires. Incidentally the Mabuchi motor bolts straight on to the High Level gearbox - as long as there is room for it to be at this angle, no problem in a big tank loco. View from underneath showing brake pull rods and the pcb pads which will carry the pickups. Motor and gearbox masked up for spraying. Hycote grey primer all over, wheels turned while spraying to get the frames covered through the spokes. Hycote satin black all over, masking tape removed now. The wheel treads and tyre backs are cleaned as soon as the paint dries, leaving it to fully harden just makes the job more difficult. All the motion parts from the etch laid out, because two of the rods had the holes drilled out for the crankpin all the others need to be opened put the same. The coupling rods are fluted both sides, also thickening pieces for the knuckle bosses and the trailing boss, the leading end doesn't have a thickened boss for clearance reasons. Connecting rod components there as well. Holes are etched in the components to make knuckle joints but far far the simplest way to articulate coupling rods is to split them and overlap on the crankpins. It's very difficult to spot the difference in movement when the loco is running and it's perfectly respectable practice mechanically - plenty of full size locos had separate coupling rods overlapped on the crankpins. This also avoids the possibility of accidentally moving the crankpin centres when making knuckle joints (very easy to do this if they are riveted). The photo shows the LH trailing section with the parts laid put in order, top to bottom = inside to outside. The parts are held together in register with broaches through the holes, solder run along the top edge only, it will get through by capillary action, no pre-tinning is required. Each section of rod is cleaned up along the top edge using a flat needle file and a round one around the bosses. After a final check that everything revolves freely the rods are greased up for final fitting. Each rod is retained with a small slice of 1mm I.D. brass tube (I cut these with a piercing saw), as thin as possible on the leading pin, thicker on the others. Excess crankpin length is snipped off, filed flat and just touched with the soldering iron, if you linger here it will heat the brass pin and could ruin the plastic wheel centre. Don't forget to leave the driving crankpin full length to take the con. rod later. just a small amount of solder is sufficient to keep these on but they can easily be popped off if the motion has to be dismantled at any time.

It's easy to get there by bus from Wakefield.

S1 again The steps are the last items to be fitted to the body, the front ones are as etched. However the step treads were not on the etch and are made from .006" nickel silver. A strip of the sheet is cut to width + the turn ups at the sides. This tool is used to chop a small square out of each top corner before bending up the back and sides. Cut to length with snips and soldered on to the back plate - no solder on the front for this, the tread is tinned on the back and held in place with tweezers while the iron is applied to the back. I bought the little guillotine many years ago thinking it would have all sorts of uses but in fact it is used for very little other than this job. The cab steps are a bit more difficult, when the booster was fitted they and the tank balance pipes had to be altered. No drawings for this and not many clear photos but the etched balance pipes were cut down and soldered to the underside of the footplate higher up. The unused tank fronts looked about the right width for the step plates and these were shortened to the same length as the front ones and soldered behind the balance pipe etch. It looks as though the new steps were attached to the balance pipes with straps, represented by the lengths of scrap etch soldered in here and trimmed off. Treads made as for the front ones. The finished step looks about right compared with photos. With the body of the S1 finished it's time to go back to the frames. Wheels removed, drilled and tapped 10BA for Romford crankpins which are set in with Loctite. Trailing axle fitted first with the motor and gearbox (High Level LoLoader and Mabuchi). One layer of each coupling rod drilled out to 1mm ready to set the quartering, no need to split the rods for this operation they will be re-assembled with joints for final assembly. Leading wheelset fitted next with as little sideplay as practicable, the wheels are quartered by eye at 90 degrees (should really be 120 but it's not worth the bother since it can't be seen). Each rod is checked in turn by rotating both wheelsets together, there should be no tight spots. Axle bushes threaded on the leading axle, these will be soldered to the compensating beams later. Checked again with both rods, any quartering adjustment is done with the leading wheels only - at this stage it can be rolled along the track as an additional check. Continuing with the next wheelset, again only adjust the last one fitted - don't touch the others. The wheels are pressed on with a machine vice, this size (4855L) are usually a good tight fit on the axles. Back to back is set with verniers, 14.6mm is what I usually aim for with Gibson wheels. Bushes soldered to the compensating beams - minimal flux and solder for this job, otherwise the axle might get locked up. Remaining details added to the frames now, cylinder wrappers and brakes are on the etch but not the balance weights (all the same and opposite the crankpins on this 3 cylinder loco) which I had to cut out of sheet. Cylinder drains made from .45mm wire, connecting rod from scrap etch, leading sandpipes (.5mm wire) soldered to the backs of the brake hangers and brake pull rods from scrap. the trailing sandboxes had to be moved up when the booster was fitted, previously the filler had been below the footplate. At the same time steam sanding was fitted, the etch includes the mechanical linkage for the leading sanders - not required for a booster loco. The trailing sandpipes and steam pipes need to be tucked in as close as possible to avoid fouling the bogie. Frames are now ready to spray black, the slidebars will be threaded in later and the front cylinder covers fitted last, after all the motion is assembled. Not seen in these photos but lengths of pcb sleeper strip have been soldered to two of the frame spacers to carry the pickup wires later.

Don't forget the photo is of the Barton Wright Ironclad, not an Aspinwall 0-6-0, although I'm sure the tender fallplate is the same.

Thanks, the building style seems much the same for most of them though.

Got it now, thanks. Might be an idea for the traditional Boxing Day walk.

I've just searched on various maps etc. but can't figure out exactly where this is - can one of you give me a map reference for it? Which side of the line is it on?

Thanks, I didn't know that one was still there. In the few photos I have most of the sub stations look similar in style at least. The bike doesn't go off road at this time of year but a walk might be a good idea.

I don't think it will be a problem once it's all ballasted and soaked in pva glue (written with fingers crossed...).

The fall plate is hinged on the tender, this is part of a drawing of unknown origin but looks right.

Carlisle has a lot more scratchbuilt wagons than you think - and hundreds of kit built ones. I did count the wagons a few years ago and there were over a thousand then.

Definitely wrong era (at the moment anyway...) More progress yesterday, with all the cork laid the trackplan needs to be transferred to the baseboards. Ignoring the 65mm step for the moment, track drawing starts at the top of the hill inside Silkstone No.2 tunnel. The 39" radius on the inner track is a bit sharper than I would like but is a lot gentler than the sharpest curves on previous layouts. The drawings I gave to Ken for the boards marked all the point motor positions but didn't think to mention underbridges and with unerring accuracy he managed to put this baseboard support slap in the middle of Moorend Lane. It shouldn't be too difficult to move though, as far as I remember these intermediate supports are only screwd and not glued. The next baseboard joint needs to have the tracks crossing exactly at right angles to allow for possible later (exhibition only) extension. Templot printout carefully positioned and securely weighted down while all the plain tracks are drawn to join up with it. No need to draw all the junctions on the boards as the pointwork will be built in two big chunks. At the other end, using carbon paper to transfer the rail positions. I had to split the whole drawing and move this end 40mm along to avoid a conflict between pointwork and baseboard joints but it won't make a lot of difference. There aren't very many buildings on this layout, it's mostly green fields but the biggest one is Strafford sub station, outlined here. This was built on part of the site of Strafford colliery, the siding from the junction was the last remaining bit of track from it and as can be seen I've had to shorten it a bit. On my last visit to the location I noticed that some of the concrete pillars of this building were still visible on the ground which might be some help. I still only have couple of poor photos of the sub station and only from the railway side but at least that will be the visible one.

It's 9mm plywood, open frame because there's not much track on it compared with my usual layout designs - and I haven't built them myself anyway.

I've been using it in everything I've built (and sold) for at least 40 years now with no reported problems - unlike many other so-called "special" lubricants I've come across over the years. It isn't applied with an oil can, just the point of a cocktail stick and I've never seen the slightest effect on any plastic components.

In theory yes but extensive use on my own layout and Carlisle (with gradients and very heavy trains) has not given any problems. The improvement in reliable running has been amazing.

I use both, car engine oil works well and stays around a long time. GT85 is very useful for freeing things up, neither of them have any effect on plastic components unlike some others such as WD40 and 3 in 1 oil.

It's been a bit warmer in the shed this week so more progress with cork laying on the baseboards - this is the first layout of mine with cork underlay, all the others have had track glued direct to the boards. Experience with Carlisle has led to this change of opinion. Not enough weights to do more than a few pieces at one time but my very heavy toolbox proved useful for this job.

The last six N5s had countersunk rivets, "snap head" are the visible type seen on all the others.

I put the horizontal handrail pillars in with temporary straight wires on each side, then use round nose pliers to form the first bend round the side of the smokebox. The next bend usually made with smooth flat pliers, form the top over a suitable sized rod or tube and thread the top handrail pillar on before proceeding with the last two bends. They usually need a fair bit of adjustment to fit, moving the bends along with combinations of the above tools. In 7mm it's not too difficult to join the handrail inside the top pillar which means that each side bend can be formed separately, the two halves fitted and snipped to length before soldering in. The small size of the handrail pillars makes this a bit delicate in 4mm scale though.

Back to the S1 I've taken a mould off the 1'6" built up chimney I turned for 69901. BluTack dam round the chimney and rubber poured in, it didn't seal as well I wanted but the excess is fairly easy to remove. I'll do the same another time with the steampipe covers. Remaining details added to the boiler now, snifting valve behind the chimney and handrails, smokebox door left out to get at the inside to solder the handrail pillars. Forming this type of handrail is never easy. Moulded smokebox door now fitted, the GC wheel had been replaced by a twin handle arrangement, the top lamp bracket bent from .010" n/s strip and pegged into the door. One last job on the top is the cab roof ventilator. Sometimes it's not possible to solder everything from the inside, the rails for the ventilator are soldered on from the outside after marking the position with dividers. It's easy to clean the solder away from this and the 2% silver solder spreads out into a very thin layer. I can't find any clear photos of the roof of an S1, nearly all seem to have been taken from a low angle, this is the best guess. The wire soldered on here is filed flatter and two sliding vents glued in between. I can't find anything showing the inside of the cab either, it's not very visible and presumably the backhead is much the same as an O4 but what did the reverser control look like? The S1 had steam reverse, not lever or screw.

I'm not sure why they are loose, they used to be such a tight fit that they were nearly impossible to remove once pressed on - in fact I had to saw through an axle to remove one wheelset on a loco which needed re-wheeling. Perhaps someone reamed them out, in which case they might not be very accurate. If they are only a bit loose try knurling the axle ends by rolling a rough flat file across them.

I did some tests with the 1 in 40 gradient when I first got the fiddle yard boards assembled, details on page one of the Herculaneum Dock thread. Everything seemed to work OK but the actual motive power will be different.