craigwelsh

Just a quick step by step I did in pictures about 1am last night! Apart from the length niggle all four of the ones i've folded so far have come out fine with 2 from the 8 thou sheet and 2 from the 10 thou. The 10 has less of a length issue as the folds were really designed for that thickness so it all ends up shorter. Tools used, the tweezers are the useful bit for the folds while the sharp knife is vital to get it off the fret without distortion. I recommend a good optivisor or similar to most as my eyesight is still young enough to do it without. No I wasn't using the digest as a cutting mat . Fold 1 - right angle Fold 2 - small overfold Fold 3 - right angle Fold 4 - right angle Fold 5 - overfold Folds 6 and 7 - right angles form the end shape fold 8 - right angle to close the loop and give you the correct shaped lever guard To finish you can pin the hole at the top and push the stay through the solebar. Then the other stay needs forming in a z so that it meets the w-iron correctly. Compare it against my prototype shot here This BR standard has been lying around for a few years now and its picking up bits along the way. You can tell its an early one as I left the plastic brake gear on and didn't even replace the safety loops! Its now got my new tie bars (a lot thinner than i've managed to cut strip those) and some of the new brake lever guards. I'm making up the levers at the moment. Let me know if the pictures portray the sequence ok or if I should add arrows. Its obviously easier if you have the piece in front of you to visualise the fold lines but I do want to fix that length issue before I production these. Once its right its right for most wagons!

Yay my test etch turned up frmm PPD, not sure if they just did it or if Royal Mail held on to it for a bit. Anyway, mostly lever etches in both 8 thou and 10 thou to test each, I needed to measure the thickness of each one as their etch of that detail seems to have gone a little awry.. Lever guard made up in 8 thou, no breaks and its square now but the top bit has turned up overlength this time, might need to adjust it again . These worked well though - posed on top of an Exactoscale 1:7 but its a 1:8 and proves the sleeper spacing are spot on and it fits that 1:8 vee nicely. I'll try and make up a crossing on one in the next couple of days. edit: I've made up a crossing now, the nickel might be slightly thinner than I really need as you can flex a finished assembly a bit too easily. I'd probably do these in brass anyway as there is no real need for the crispness of nickel. Switch anchor strips that fit within the web of the rail allowing you to make up a switch anchor easily. It should be about twice as long as need so you can make one from each half but I haven't tried it get. Pleased it fits properly in the web though as that'll aid drilling the rail. I also put 10ft tie bars on this etch.

Yes these brake lever guards will suit the RCH chassis, see my previous blog post for the view of the fret with the levers on as well. As the chassis etch can fit morton wagons as well it made sense to put the levers and guards separate.

I can't remember if I tried their guards but their levers always had a silly bit of 1/2 etch on the end that made them too short without it and tedious with it. It may look complicated but there is a spare on the etch and once you've done one its a quick process to repeat. A couple of club members broke their trial ones before but they didn't have such photo reference for the process, hopefully with the reference people will be fine now.

I'm jealous, I was out of the country the week of the Space Hulk re-release and missed the whole episode although having seen the price the bank account is slightly happier. I agree it was an amazing game and I have the 2nd release still intact apart from the models being painted. Wargame modelling certainly shouldn't be knocked for its skill set. The MTA's look good too although far too modern for me!

Your mantlepiece is certainly straining under the weight (camera lens is causing a nice curve). There are a couple of free applications i've seen online to stitch pictures together, http://www.irfanview.com/ can do it I believe. Im impressed at what you've done sticking all those bits together, look forward to seeing them painted.

Depending on what wheels are 'fitted' to that CAD artwork everything looks very close to the wheels... Can I ask how long ago it was scanned? The turnaround to something that looks useful seems quite impressive. Laser scanning is certainly coming on in leaps and bounds! As I said on the Model Rail thread I was sort of hoping for a Sentinel diesel shunter with the outside cranks.

Depends on how bad it is, i've done the elongating and the gears now mesh tight but there is still a bit of a sea-saw! Only this to do would be to lower the outer axles or move the gears.. Or a Shawplan sprung Deltic bogie when he finishes them. A smaller middle wheel looks a bit pants imho.

Thanks iak. Well if its 4mm and you need some help with the technical details then give me a pm and I don't mind helping based on my experience. Its been about a year now since my first etch test of a sprung underframe and i've been improving since. I'm obviously not an expert but my CAD artwork is coming out in metal as expected so far!

Are they supposed to be the same wagon with the same bogies Dave or are they slightly different diagrams? Apart from the bogies the Hurst one looks a lot lower. I don't understand why these 'back in the day we only had a lump of coal to play with' type comments come up whenever someone criticises a detail. If its fine for you then great, buy one. But as long as the criticism is valid and constructive with some pictorial evidence (if possible) then its fine. Its more insulting to push your idea of fun onto someone who may enjoy different aspects of the hobby like getting the prototype as correctly modelled as possible. Dapol, Hornby etc are all commercial companies, if they stay or leave modern image 00 it'll be the sales and not the hurt feeling that would do it. Though phrasing it nicely when criticising does help . Another wagon with an obvious flaw - wrong w-irons. Correctable yes, annoying when pictures would disprove it yes!

I've not received my levers etch back from PPD yet (not sure if its stuck in a post backlog..) so I haven't done much in the meantime as my workbench is full of unfinished wagons.. I have tried fitting the underframe to a couple of different wagons though just to see how it goes and add some variety to my fleet. First is a LNER 6-plank merchandise wagon based on the ABS kit for a 9ft wb unfitted example. A bit of filing back of the white metal solebars and once soldered together the underframe slots in place. I need to look at the club copy of Tatlow to decide on a prototype as most pictures I have seen are of late surviving 10ft WB examples. The wm door springs have yet to be removed as they are a bit chunky compared to my etched ones. There are a couple of prototypes in Paul Bartlett's gallery although I think they are all 10ft WB http://gallery6801.fotopic.net/c1000911.html . Next is the Cambrian kit for the LMS dia 1666 merchandise wagon that I picked a couple of body frets up for at Scaleforum. With 54,000 made its a prototype every steam era layout should have! These frets contain the sides and ends along with the solebars so I only need to make up some headstocks to complete. Its posed on the underframe for the LNEr wagon for now hence it has push rods in the Morton configuration. Whilst watching Abu Dhabi i've been busy on the laptop doing some more artwork to get the parts for the LMS 17ft 6" underframe into 'fret' format. Levers are being left until last again but the springy bits and brakes are suitably complete along with the main floor. Note the separate reinforcing diagonals and the triangular piece that fits on the small vee and provides support for the lift-link lever. ps Anyone who has one managed to build one of these underframes yet? I realise people might be waiting for the levers (I certainly am!) but any feedback would be great, thanks.

Yes well, don't look too soon, those are longer term as they are much more complex than the stuff i've done so far. Im sure i'll be interested...

Yes, balsa had been used on the layout before the relaying and it had been down 10 years and worked well (any problems were known track issues hence the rebuild, where the track had been built fine it hadn't moved). As we weren't after sound deadening then cork wasn't really needed although Dick still would have preferred it! With the full height plastic sleepers on the plain line the ballast will be hard enough to negate any movement the cork would allow anyway. We could have stuck straight to ply but the balsa is earlier to tweak and create a shoulder in.

Thanks guys, that's an interesting one Jim as its definitely skewed to the river/canal and therefore the hump is skewed as well. I'll have a look at the bridge I take to the sandwich shop over the canal at Lunchtime. Although its definately not a skew bridge in this case http://maps.google.co.uk/maps?ie=UTF8&ll=53.394064,-2.373177&spn=0.000521,0.001041&t=h&z=20 (its also hit by a truck each month meaning a lot of its wing walls are replaced but that's a different story!).

A bit of progress overall since the last update. The trackplan is now cut to size and stuck down on two of the boards, the third needs a little woodworking still on the inner curve while the outer is having its balsa finished. Andy G was not available tonight but his trackwork for the goods yard entry was on show. Not sure what was being pointed out, possibly that the 3-way still needs its switch blades fitting. Dick Petter has been busy in the background... He surprised everyone by bringing down his completed double junction and we checked it fitted the plan perfectly and was being tested by a Crab he is working on. He has taken some cosmetic chairs with him to fit to it but as soon as Andy's trackwork is also finished we can prepare to lay it. More straight track is also ready to be laid after this. The scenic guys meanwhile have been prototyping the road bridge over the canal at the front of the layout. We aren't quite sure yet if this should be a humped bridge, straight or skewed as yet... If there are any experts in bridge design do let us know how a hump bridge would fit in with a canal!

Any chance of some more details/pictures of the Pannier? It looks like a very nice job.

This is the same version as the last I sent you I think (0.9.2). Hopefully i'll have lever etch tests back next week as I sent them off while I was in Ireland.

No problems, it took me a minute to find that one down the bottom, the other DW picture seems to have the later w-irons it its the nearer of the two. I looked between hotel and restaurant over here in Ireland, no cooking this week for me . Actually i've already looked at it while pondering a Cambrian kit and haven't quite thought it through properly yet. Catfish are more important at the moment as I have a picture of two tagged on the back of a coal train coming down to Neath.. LMS 17ft 6" underframe got some work though on the train to the airport! They have made a good effort on a difficult prototype though as Adam says, its certainly up there with the hopper wagons for kit building!

Pre war build have that type of w-iron http://gallery6801.fotopic.net/p9709437.html, it also has push rod brakes though and not clasp. BR build certainly didn't though .

The picture was shown in the new Dapol catalogue linked to off the Dapol releases thread, the catalogue also showed the large modern open wagons Dapol have been working on and the CAD shots of the class22

A 4mm kit to this quality would look as good imho, especially in P4. The PDK kit needs a lot of work to get it to standard though! Thats incredibly fast work on it you've managed, I am jealous of your dedication to a project.

Can you possibly use the hot water trick to straighten them out again? I actually straightened some resin solebars with the soldering iron when doing a couple of the wagons!

I'm assuming you cut out squares for the [ iron rather than thinning down the backs of the T-section and gusset plates? Looks very good though. I have some ABS bodies of these in 4mm to do unfitted.

I will do once I have the lever and guard etch done to go with them, price will depend on what the etchers charge for that etch and my further test bits. Some guys had been following my project for a while so got the first of the main frets at Scaleforum. Hopefully now the instructions are out i'll get feedback on a couple of builds outside of the Manchester club.

I need to pull finger on my wagons so if I ever visit i'll have a train to run! It is looking like a superb asset now guys and the workmanship and finish is great as well. I'm not sure about taking it to Scaleforum unless you do something like a haulage competition but it would be great at an AGM or other gathering where more time is available to run stuff on a large roundy layout.