heraldcoupe

It was a big open space on the early prints, I felt I had to put something in there, but it was a test of my technical knowledge of steam locomotives! There's a much bigger open space under the Aberdare's boiler to worry me now...

Catching up with all the traffic around my bodyshell designs... As someone who long ago dabbled in P4/S4, I've been very careful to provide decent clearance between the splashers to accomodate scale wheelsets. Beyond this, I have also designed full underboilers and open areas between the frames to allow a finescale chassis with working motion to be fitted under it. I've only done a handful of prints for these variants, plus a few up-scaled to 7mm. This is one of the straight frame Bulldogs to this spec.

I've just been pointed towards some of the threads here about my Bulldog bodyshells. They started very much as a personal project, largely as I was teaching myself CAD and experimenting with 3D printing and needed a sufficiently complex subject to keep my interest and to keep testing my learning. Things took off from there... As a modeller with a reasonable skillset, but absolutely no affinity for working in brass or white metal, I liked the idea of de-skilling subjects I really wanted, but was unlikely to build to a decent standard with the kits available. Bachmann's Earl as a donor made this possible, though I couldn't leave the rather crude bogie untouched and had to redesign that as well... I've designed everything around late examples, basically looking at the latest examples in service and the features they had at end of life. So for anyone intersted in 3313, 3335, 3341, 3377, 3453 towards the end, they're well covered. 3454 was an early subject I tackled, but I improved a lot of the features in the print and haven't since committed to any more of that subject. I've also produced a series of Dukes, again aiming to replicate the last survivors. I have some wide cab shells left (specifically modelled after 9076) but will make some changes before I run any more. I also have a few of these with the full underboiler, to suit a scratch-built chassis. At the moment, I'm trying to find time (and motivation) to put a simple ecommerce website together as these seem to have caught people's imagination, but in the meantime I've been selling a few from direct enquiries through Facebook. I've been wary of wading into web forums with a "buy from me" angle where I don't regularly contribute, but I equally don't want to hide these away from people where there's a genuine interest. I have prototyped an Aberdare, the shell is basically ready to go, but with no RTR chassis, I've also taken to designing a chassis and mechanism to go beneath. Resin 3D printing a prototype chassis is all well and good, but it's not the best technology to make a robust mechanism so the development of that aspect will take more time. The prototype chassis' are built with Hornby 08 wheelsets, the next generation has compensation designed-in and it will ultimately be able to use Alan Gibson wheels Hopefully this is of interest.

I'm calculating something around 64-66 DP, but the exmple I'm measuring isn't completely dismantled, making t exact diameer a bit difficult to measure.

I've been looking for specifications on the gears used on the Hornby X03 and X04 motors. Finding like for like replacements isn't a problem as many suppliers match to the original part number, but is the actual pitch of the gears recorded anywhere? Worst case I'll take some careful measurements to work it out, but I'm reluctant to reinvet the wheel if the information is available. Cheers Bill.

Excellent, thanks for the NRM pointer.

I've long been interested in this mythological beast. Having first heard of it in my teens, I've recently put some time into creating a representation of it in CAD. I have read Mike Oxon's article on his model: As we all know, there are no known photographs of the locomotive in it's original form, just a few of it in it's rebuilt 2-2-2 configuration, as well as a drawing of the valve gear on the rebuilt engine. Though the dimensions stated in Ahrons "The British Steam Railway Locomotive 1825-1925" have been questioned, I am using these as my starting point. In the text on number 9, Ahrons states that he had a drawing of the side tanks. Has this drawing ever been published? If not, does it survive, and are it's whereabouts known? Bill.

That's great, thanks.

The face is a bit fat here, I will come back to this once I have some of the other bogie detail completed. Once I can get some test prints done I'll have a better idea of how it looks in context. Cheers Bill

Ys, as I've found this as I've gradually uncovered more images without inconvenient shadows. I'm on my fourth draft of the part now, and getting closer... Cheers Bill.

Thanks, I'd not seen that particular page, though the guide to outside frame 4-4-0s has been much used!

I've put together the basic shapes on the left of screen, it's quite a bit more substantial than my initial effort on the right. I'l refine the curves and add detail and see how it looks, Cheers Bill.

Yes, there are differences. I scoured images of preserved locos and could see interchanging of different axlbeox types into identical applicatiosn, so I made the leap of faith that the running dimensions are the same. In the grand scheme of things, it only has to 'look' right at 4mm scale, but I'm always happier to start from good data, Cheers Bill.

Thanks, the two major castings appear to be the same those on City of Truro's bogie. The top section is different, I'm going to make an assumption that the hornguide spacing matches though and that one or other of my drawings is in error, Cheers Bill.

The drawings I have are approx 10mm/ft, and rather thickly drawn. There is no view from above and when drawn in CAD, I am struggling to get the proportions to look right without deviating widely from what I can measure in the drawings. Good images of an axlebox out of it's guides, or properly dimensioned drawings would help me see where exactly things are going wrong. The width across the hornguides differs between the tender and bogie axleboxes in the drawings I have. Scaling differs between them, but once I've adjusted the figures according to known dimensions within each drawing, there is a significant mismatch. Cheers Bill.

I'm trying to model in CAD the axleboxes on a GWR locomotive bogie with ouside frames. This is specifically for a Bulldog or Duke, but the axleboxes will be common to other types, standardisation and all that... I am struggling to reconcile the dimensions I've measured from drawings to what I can observe in photographs. I theorised that they may match tender axleboxes, but the drawings I have are contradictory. In more normal times I would visit a museum or preserved railway and take my own measurements, but that's not going to be possible for some time. Can anyone point me to good references for with this part? Larger scale drawings, particularly with an image from above, would be particularly helpful. The drawings below are for an Atbara or City, which share these components. Cheers Bill

The last Aberdare was gone by October 1949, cutting it fine to have received the crest introduced that year. Bachmann making one would save me some effort.

Yes, it's more of an idle curiosity thing really. Cheers Bill.

I've had a Hornby loco-drive 9F knocking around without a tender for some time. I've now bought a secondhand tender minus the wheels and old ringfield casting which carries them in the loco drive version. I know the casting is known to disintegrate, so I set to making a pattern and casting a replacement in a high strength engineering resin. I had thought about using original Hornby wheels, but as I didn't have any to hand, I built it around 2mm diameter axles so that I could fit Gibson wheels and axles. With 12mm wheels fitted to test (correct diamter should be 13mm), the tender sits about right. From images, the Hornby axles sit a lot higher and look a lot chunkier - to sit right , this must mean they are considerably oversize for the overall height of the tender to match the loco. Does anyone have one of these available to check the wheel diameter for me? Here are a few photos of the work in progress.

That's great, thanks, certainly looks right. DCC wasn't on the immediate agenda but that's just changed... Cheers Bill.

I recently picked up a Hornby 2884/3800 ex-GWR locomotive in "untested" condition (which I always take to mean not-working). Having tested the drive with the tender disconnected and jumpers across the 4-way plug, the mechanism works well enough. Opening up the tender I was surprised to find a speaker and sound decoder installed, but not using the factory mountings. Can anyone tell me what decoder manufacturer and type this is? During testing on a DC track, it hisses for a few seconds, lurches forward, then stops dead. The only DCC equipment I currently own is an old Bachmann starter setup with 9 channels, no response from any of those, nor does it respond to the DC channel on that controller. I have no way of interrogating the decoder. I'm hoping my son will be able to help as he's been dabling recently with DCC programming, but that's likely to be a few days away at least. Any help much appreciated.

Yes, if you look at the fourth picture you'll see the intermediate gearset mounted in the LH casing, Cheers, Bill.

It's been a few years since I've done anything serious with the hobby, but lockdown had me digging through what was stashed in the loft. I have a number of Mainline models which don't run so well (don't we all) and stumbled acxross articles on fitting 24mm diameter can motors into Lima and Hornby power bogies. I wondered if I could do something similar with the Mainline locos as several won't run at all. Most also need new gear/axle sets, but I didn't see much point investing in those while the motors were dead. To cut a long story short, it wasn't quite as straightforward as gluing a new motor into a power bogie, but a pair of custom mountings were made by laminating sections of plastic card. These were copied in resin, adding a couple of readily available plasic gears has the first of my 56xx tank engines running again, albeit no electrical connections made to the chassis yet. Cheers Bill.