ROSSPOP

Tis very very promising....................... Can be brush painted....................................... which I had to do with this chassis today as I could`nt remove the hornblocks or the plunger pickups and masking is such a fag job....... Plus....... It is such a fine paint that I was able to etch prime the whole cylinder block with rods and pistons in situ with just some minimal scraping away at the back of the slide bars to get things freely working. As for the superstructure...... you `ve got to really clumsy to swamp it all with too much paint.... such an easy afternoons work. ....................................................................................... Clostermann Rules !! ...........................................................................................................................................

Hi Mick This my one and only Peco Y point nickel silver rail .... bought by me in 2009 and never been used in anger...just as a loco build test track. As you can see it is complete and undamaged but tarnished over time.... it will work perfectly once the rail tops have been gently abraded. There is just some ancient blue tack to be removed..... £30 including postage if you are interested.

Also, rather than mess about with Precision two part primer and a Badger 200 both of which I`ve got....a rattle can of Closterman black etch primer( also available in grey) is an excellent product for 4mm and 7mm models ( now supplied by Advanced Paints). Highly recommended. I use this method all the time nowadays. ...and you don`t need a further black top coat for painting chassis....

Superstructure and chassis assemblies are now completed ...enough for me anyway. I shall prepare her for the paint shop and complete the cab backhead detailing then. ................. will be back when she is in ...pure green !!

Thanks Graham Damaged my Lumbar spine when I was 23 and spent 4 weeks in a plaster back slab. Always looked after my back ....so why did I lift and carry a large bag of potatoes to the car and not use my fold up trolley that I always carry in the boot???? This is the only loco kit Graham that I have made entirely standing up !!! ( had to get flight stockings as I`ve inherited Mother`s varicose veins...but only in one leg !!) getting dangerously close to 70 that`s probably to blame......

Lots of extra work needed for completing the chassis. Some of the turned brass parts for the cylinder block are overscale and unusable. The kit does not provide a complete set of parts. Fortunately Peter Roles (PRComponents) produces appropriate 45XX parts and these have been utilised. I want to produce a 1930`s rendition so this has required sourcing some double hanger brake gear. LGMiniatures have run out of their specific lost wax version so I have had to use whitemetal parts from Springside castings. I have used some odds and sods to reproduce earlier sandboxes. Springside components have enabled me to fit their plastic brake shoes which are a loose fit between the double hangers, so very handy for preventing electrical shorting when I get to the decoder fitting stage. The kit does not provide any brake pull rods so these I will fabricate this evening. Dastardly Sciatica has hampered my progress this week...... However, things are looking more Loco like now and I`m pleased with my choice of kit for this project

Must be something amiss with your hearing then Graham !! I`m relatively confident at getting a good performance from those fold up single stage gearboxes, but this JH Motor is even better ( and large and powerful ) there is some noise but it is getting quieter since I`ve run it in gently for 5 mins so far. It`s such good quality that the whole thing over runs when power is suddenly stopped. The whole unit is untethered between the frames at the moment but there is absolutely no lifting or movement under power. I always find that by using pure DC power any binding or stiffness in motion becomes very apparent. The whole unit has been running sweetly from the outset. Never used one before (£56 so good value I think) and the motor only draws a steady 0.4 amps so I`m happy about the Zimo MX645. I`d certainly invest in another. John

This afternoon she took her first steps on an umbilical power cord having been weighted with lead in the front boiler and bunker rear. This is the first time I have fitted an MSC JH 40.1 motor and single stage gearbox. Quite a substantial unit for a small loco. She still needs some final centre wheel spring adjustment but she seems very smooth using pure DC power.

I`m back to suffering for my hobby. Those damn magnifying visors disorient my visual capabilities with a soldering iron. Slow progress with adding some extra detailing of my own. I used some shim phosphor bronze to add some cladding around the boiler and firebox. I`ve managed with some trickery to make the cab shutters actually work. I`m waiting for a different safety valve so I will probably return to the chassis this week...

I seemed to get a bit ham fisted wit the roof this afternoon . The front and rear cab profiles were not level and I had to resort to all sorts to get the roof sides to remain level with the top of the cab door beading............................. .......................... any way it is done and held in place with sticky black sealant.... I had to raise the back of the roof by adding some height to the top of the rear panel Surprisingly the roof sliding door etch is far too small to use so I will fabricate a replacement tomorrow................. I think I`ve got away with the bodge..........................

Thanks Hal I use this very simple riveting embossing tool now produced by Midland Railway Centre using the 7mm and 4mm punches and anvils. The Warren Shepards rear windows are no easier I`m afraid!!.............

Hi Amanda, This may be of help as I have made the Springside 45XX as my first 7mm kit....... Nice kit, although mine had rather `tired` body tank side castings which needed a lot of cleaning up. It`s a very heavy kit and the Buhler motor supplied won`t last forever. The valve gear and slide bars are also whitemetal and therefore very vulnerable. At the moment I`m making Warren Shepards version but it is not for an absolute kit build beginner What clinched it for me was this................ Warren`s kit backend has castings to help achieve an accurate shape...................... The Mitchell kit as far as I can deduce is a blown-up7mm version of it`s 4mm version and does not scale up well with just having filed corners..... ( this is from Heather Kay`s excellent Mitchell build from Western Thunder forum to illustrate what I mean ---hope she does`nt mind) To me not acceptable for a 7mm kit .................................... You might consider looking at the MM1 Models 44XX kit which will be much easier to construct........ regards

The power of the internet. Just purchased 5 x 8mm x 2mm neodymium magnets from Guy`s magnets.............£2.85 and free postage............. Elegance it will be. John

Thankyou both...that`s this evenings www. search planned....... but I won`t be looking to China !!

I wish I did have a method Graham..... It will be very much on how I feel on the day but probably some kind of friction hold. I suspect those angled roof supports over the sides will have to be removed as they seem a little too high to me...... John

The Battle of The Boiler and Backside was tackled these last few days. There are a few errors on my part but she`s now looking like a loco. The next couple of days I shall tackle a removable roof with some added rivet work.............................................

I met Adrian many times over 20 years membership of the EMGS when I lived in Dorset. He was always looking for that gorgeous blond with stacks of money ..... but in the meantime was always helpful in all my modelling adventures. I last spoke to him at Guildex 2015. I shall miss his vast knowledge and products. RIP Adrian. Here is my tribute......

If you look at the roof magnets you may find that they need compressing down a little with flat nose pliers. I had the same issue with their Pannier Tank.

Thanks Graham, Was`nt too sure about this kit when I first checked it over but I have rather enjoyed the challenging work. And the good news this evening is that I have competed all the finger cramping bending of parts. So from here on in it will be plain sailing..... Warren has produced a very nice cast firebox which is a tad too wide between the cab window edges so I have done some heavy fettling to reduce the idiosyncrasy... There was some serious filing and fettling to the cab front panel to remove the raised etched fierbox location from the original construction method. I added some `wibbets` for good measure..... I rolled the boiler fret a few days back and a little fettling was needed to match it all up to make the complete boiler... Just many hours of pleasurable detailing to do and then back on the chassis......

So, a methodical progress is being made............. As you can see I`m not an advocate for polishing the rivets away at the end of each session and if you use plenty of heat and all those products that are bad for you you end up with very light solder stains. Very please with the bunker as I find them sometimes very awkward beasts. The window bars were a bit of a challenge. Some nice etchwork design will create a detailed cab interior with much close work with an 80watt iron and good old fashioned leaded solder with plenty of heat. A very pleasant evening in the shed filing the beading into a half round profile makes a lot of difference. I did get it very wrong when soldered in place the two cab inner side panels and forgot to fit the flooring in place first.... so as you can see I had to cut the flooring in half and graft the two pieces back in place............. wotter !!

Blimey, don`t all this go on...anyone with an ounce of modelling nowse would av/should av never taken on such an out of date poorly designed product in the first place what were they thinking of. As the saying goes " this Parrot is dead"

The 1970`s and very fond memories of Jidenco 4mm loco kits. I was in my LSWR modelling mode back then and Jidenco had a good range of relevant kits. Some had not been researched well enough (LSWR K10) but many others were very good for their day. You were required to do some modelling and work hard at getting them to look good and work well and be prepared to accept compromises. Here are some of my efforts from way back..... The pay back of course was learning how to solder and bend metal parts , such a great way to learn ....thankyou GB......

I umm`d and ah`d about it ( there is good flat surface areas to play with) and did a test with the nylon sprue first and used a fresh quality super glue, same as I did in P4 days. ( frames and hornblocks cleaned with industrial Meths first) An obvious choice would have been a two part epoxy but that is slow and messy and so yesterday... and I`m not totally sure about epoxy and nylon over time whereas I`ve got 40 year old albeit 4mm locos with these hornblocks stilll ok using thooper glue.... so on a `cheerie ` note I should be RIP if these fail JOhn

Today I got on and tackled those difficult areas of the kit, at least, difficult to me. Namely , making bends in thick gauge brass with minimal tools. The tank sides have bends at both their extremities which need to locate in pre-etched grooves on the footplate etch....not an easy task without any pre-etched references on the parts supplied. All these had to be worked out by eye and hand... Then there was the mighty job of fabricating the bunker with all it`s compound curves etc. Warren has suplied some cast top corners but I found that it was easier to reduce these down a fair bit . ...............a lot of fiddling and fettling required here , so plenty of patience req`d After a lot of work fitting the tank sides as squarely as I could everything seem to work out and I`m pleased and relieved this part of the construction has been achieved................. there still needs some tidying up to do and probably some Milliput work later on before painting. But everything ,so far , is looking square and I hav`nt lost many rivets during assembly... The last really worrying job will be rolling the boiler......... after that is done it should be an enjoyable jog adding all the detailing.....

This project is another part of my lockdown efforts. Warren Shepard`s small prairie kit was the only kit of this type available at the time of purchase and I`ve needed to replace the heavy whitemetal kit of the 45XX that I constructed back in 2009. I`ve never made this make of kit before and was encouraged in my research regarding the quality of his lost wax castings supplied with each kit. I also studied P A D`s 2017 build of this very kit and was made aware of a few of the kit`s short Cummings ( tee! hee!). The kit has a plethora of guidlines and diagramatical illustrations but no numbered written instructions to follow. Also this is not a tab and slot designed kit. So, if you are shy of soldering and possible anealing as well as shy of riveting this kit is probably not for you. You are required to work a bit to achieve a good build so I will see how things go......................... I always start with the coupling rods and for this kit a set of jointed Premier Components are supplied. That saves a few hours work... The next job is to fabricate some sprung hornblocks and I chose from my broom cupboard a set of Slaters old style nylon honblocks as I needed an adjustable axle ride height. Once these had been fettled up I used some metal blackening solution to save time later on together with the preparation and blackening of a set of Slaters wheels. I like to have very smooth backs of the wheel treads to reduce the braking effect of plunger pickups. Warrens chassis design is made from substantially thick brass etchings so I am using an 80watt bog standard Antex soldering iron with my all time favourite flux Baker`s Fluid which I have been using since the 1960`s. But before that You will need to mark and drill the brake hanger positions and rear sandbox positions which are not pre etched. I also needed to use some measured scratchings to position the axle ride height as designed for this kit before I cut out the hornblock slots. Time spent here will save a lot of tears later on. I also marked and drilled out the plunger pickup positions which are best placed at the axle centreline position so as not to impede the wheel suspension movement. I also fettled and soldered up the driving wheel springs so as not to melt the nylon hornblocks. Having mentioned the lack of tabs and slots , there are two chassis stretchers that are so...... but the slots are etched in the wrong places....more on this easily rectified issue later. Next is to fettle up and prepare all parts needed for the chassis assembly. The two cylinder block stretchers are designed to make the whole cylinder assembly completely removeable to which they are very useful parts to keep things square during assembly and soldering up. I needed to cut notches in two of the stretchers to accommodate the hornblock positions. The two stretchers with the incorrect slot positions were sorted out at this stage as they are both required to be the correct height for the two bogie trucks. The front stretcher I was able to solder to the rear of the chassis block to which it does have corresponding slots and tabs and does not need to be soldered to the chassis sides. Slots have to be cut to accommodate the hornblocks and the brake hanger rod and the plunger pickup positions to make it all removeable. If you see what I mean..... Eventually you can produce a very substantial solid chassis frame..... Here you can see where the original slots are too high in the chassis sides.... It was easy to use this datum to match the height of the front stretcher.... Once all that was sussed.... everything else was plain sailing.... ...with the exception of some crude springs to replace the originals that are far too strong for this application. My easy method of jigging evrything in place for a trouble free chassis and motion. And finally a wiz- popping free running basic chassis..... Next a pleasant evening putting together the two identical bogie trucks from Warrens brilliant quality castings... The back to finishing off the cylinder block mainframe...... requiring some riveting and metal bending.... and a wee bit of finger burning..... Knowing that I have a sweet running chassis I ventured on to perhaps the most challenging parts of the kit. Warren has cunningly produced a printed riveting guide which you cut out and stick to the rear of the loco tank sides, rear, and front footplate and then apply the rivets using these guides. Apparently the printed guides don`t match up to the etchings and I could`nt be arsed , so I used them to mark all rivets by hand and then rivet in the usual way....... Job done in one evening......... And now.... the real build begins.......... I felt the front footplate needed annealing to get that curved bend...... it was a b%$$£r to flatten out aferwards.... ...despite a few dents for added realism I just about got away with it.......... this time....