BWsTrains

KADEE Uncoupling - continued.. The single most important thing I discovered was the importance of using a steel "intensifier plate". This is simply a thin piece of mild steel (0.5mm will do) which holds the magnets and intensifies the "Up" directing field". Repulsion between adjacent magnets is greatly reduced while the focused field above the magnets is increased. This is often found in Cup or Pot magnets. Simply aligning all same poles up becomes easy as magnets lose their propensity to jump one on top of another. The end result is shown here on a 30mm * 50mm steel holder. The black PS strip marks the mid point of the track and magnets have been aligned manually to get the best uncoupling in this location (all approach here is from right). Magnets when fully tested are held in final location with some drops of CA and then primed. While not shown, the rails would run directly above the centre of each line of magnets R -> L # The original uncoupling video in Feburary was recorded using this particular uncoupler plate. These magnets are hi-intensity Neos extracted from an old Hard Disk Drive. I find this to be a very reliable source of material; on-line you need to be careful as there is much rubbish being sold and it's hard to identify good from other. # bottom left magnet excepted, that looks to have moved and avoided detection. Oh! and drill the mounting holes first up before magnets come anywhere near!

KADEE Uncoupling - I'm well overdue to get back to this, so my apologies. Previously I showed the well known problem encountered with standard Kadee uncouplers, viz. axle drag. There is a much watched Youtube on the topic (something about "the inconvenient truth"...) where the presence of a perpendicular magnetic field was rightly identified as the source of the problem. This is best illustrated by a few pics for the less familiar. Uncoupling depends on a soft iron hanging pin (a bit like a mini elephant trunk) seen in 2 uncoupled wagons here. The default position being slightly right in direction of travel. When coupled, the engaged pair looks like this and uncoupling requires the hangers to be pulled to their respective sides, opening the jaws. (Red arrows). From this is shouid be clear why a perpendicular field is appealing, both hangers lie in the field and will be drawn towards the nearer pole. It's just the unwanted side effect of the strong cross field which drags axles as per section 1 of the short video. https://youtu.be/MgCePqwWfCs My solution requires all upward facing poles to be the same. The magnets are thin flat ones polarised across their thinnest dimension. Axle drag is mostly eliminated by the lack of the cross field. However achieving a functioning solution requires a little work and this will be covered in a following post.

I see this year marks 180 since IKB was appointed engineer and set in motion the design and building of the South Devon Railway. As a reminder, this link relates some of that early history http://www.exetermemories.co.uk/em/_events/atmospheric_railway.php I think ANT -IKB will be in order while you're down there. Colin

John raises an important point here and it might be worth doing a "retake" on impacts for your potential designs. Have you a real life location for the CR II situation which might better define the layout? Viz. which operating line, (presumably GWR) between X and Y and then from that decision, when the stations took on their Era 3 configurations? Next, deciding on any tradeoffs between being prototypical wrt to configuration and getting all the functionality you desire and the ability to model them in the available space. All this "motherhood" I know but can be helpful to do a check-back during the planning process. Colin

Re Phil's: "Templot is a Marmite program so be sure you can get on with before you shell out on Parallels" It might be simpler if you could find someone with a laptop they could spare for a while while you try it out. Pity I'm 10000km away as I have just the thing.

Andy, I was attracted by the appearance of general yard surfaces at Stoke Courtney and John told me he'd used Chinchilla dust. https://content-eu.invisioncic.com/y320084/monthly_2022_05/y1.jpg.831733e2cde6ae49d20bb0dc4494377e.jpg As that's not available here I did some searching around and found that finely sieved gypsum seemed promising. Haven't don't much more since but initial post is here. It's a very fine texture and could be poured in between tracks, tamped down and glued with dilute PVA. My gypsum has a pink/ orange tinge but when I followed by applied a dilute cream acrylic paint / PVA I got the result shown. More grey would be easy. Colin

There might be upsides and downsides to using the combination kit. Benefit comes when you want that specific configuration, plus perfect blending of sleepers in a straight. Not sure if the combo would work well being built into curved settings as a single module. Combining a slip with turnouts into a compound build worked well for me. Having switched to using kits, I found the design freedom you gain being able to place everything where it works best and where you want it to be is liberating. Below is a variant of my station approaches as designed with help from Phil @Harlequin. Colin

Not quite sure which particular OO-SF you're referring to but the B7 and A5 Turnouts plus single / double B7s are listed there. Only 1:7 Diamond is missing but I imagine that cannot be far away. Colin

For anyone looking, try Brushford, that's the spot. https://maps.nls.uk/view/106023452

hi Graham, I can see a lot of the issues in your plan which I also was trying to juggle in my own design. I'm assuming the switch to thru traffic on CRII is a given; long trains etc. then one key decision is the entire station. I think I understand why you want it placed in the upper left quadrant but this raises the problem that your station lines will be on a very tight radius (~3ft, 900mm by eye). This leads to wide unprototypical appearance of standing trains with long coaches showing wide separation gaps. I explored this before settling on 1800+mm radius for my platform line. The image shows the gap with a 2000mm radius. I've another image (I'll PM as I cannot put it up here) which will give you a reference point. If you move the station into the middle it will allow more a much better situation and allow room for a better Goods yard setting as per Stoke Courtney. I note you're considering the OO-SF, this may present issues with various clearances if you run much older stock. Others can advise you about this issue, how it might matter and be addressed Regards, Colin

Talk to me sometime, I'll try to convince you.

lovely work Graham, I've an BR Era 57xx Black Pannier of no use in my setting and your efforts might well spur me to take it back to the 30s! But I must get those uncouplers installed first. Too many interesting distractions are an impediment to progress, whatever that is?

Not me buddy! A wise colleague advised that as soon as I bought even one (and I had momentarily shown some weakness in this regard), the rest of my older stock would be screaming out "I'm yesterday's child, replace me". I shall remain content with my current holdings and not succumb by stepping onto the slippery slope of "wagon-envy". 😎 Besides, I have a whole load of kits to build, a prospect which entices me greatly. PS SWMBO was right there with you with on the G&Ts today. I couldn't go past a 24 yr old Torbreck "Runrig", and a 1988 S&K Vintage Port not tipples I get offered every day of the week! Colin

I've had a question about details of my build and as the response might have wider interest I'll post it here. The Components which I sourced from Ratio Kits I used components from the Ratio 4 wheel coach kit (612). I'd already kit bashed various of these (see my blog) into coaches for my WC&PR stock and had leftovers. The parts used were the sole bar assemblies + the roof. A little wasteful if you had to buy the full kits just for those. There might well be better options e.g. the axle W Irons + bearing assemblies (Wizard perhaps? suggestions welcomed). There was card supplied in the kit for the roof but the Ratio one was the easy way out as it has the correct shape (low 3 arc) and rain strips. TBH if you aren't a purist regarding close details you could use what I did for the middle axle assemblies. I built my middle axle W Irons from 1mm PS sheet, Diagram3D provides a card assembly for the leaf springs which I've highlighted in situ. As @john dew said, after a bit of weathering rust, who would know? All you'd need is the axle box externals (I've yet to add them on my middle axle) and an internal support for the end axle bearings. Eminently achievable I think. Sole Bar and foot rail could be assembled from PS angle of some sort. Colin

Siphon O1(2) Nearing the end for this kit, I've added end piping but still need to address the various underneath fittings. Some trimming of the roof weight edges is needed to allow for a snug fit but the photo will give the idea. Around 550 or so of these low roofed 6 wheeled Siphons (O2, O1(2) O3 and O4) were built from 1880 up to 1903 and together with the later Diagrams remained in use well into the 1930s . By then it was O1(2) O3 and O4 along with the later high roofed O5 and O6s. So it is surprising that they are so poorly represented by commercial models and in layouts of that era. Milk production and processing even in Devon, the Dairy "Heart of England" was rarely on a scale to warrant bulk transportation of milk so Siphons must have dominated the rail transport of that time. In this regard, the Diagram3D kits can be turned into very fine models with excellent detail and the Ratio under-frames add to the finish and excellent operation.

Methinks a torrent of new RTR stock has just turned into a deluge. What must the other manufacturers be thinking / feeling as such an immense flow of high quality supply just keeps on coming into play? "Sinking" springs to mind. It seems to me that Rapido are executing one very well thought out plan of attack on a market sector which was ripe for the picking. Bravo indeed!

You might find this solution helpful for holding flex flat https://content-eu.invisioncic.com/y320084/monthly_2023_02/IMG_1924c.jpg.dab0c0b5eaa99ba2d9587d8ef21c4561.jpg Colin

Meanwhile over in the signwriters' office things have also been busy

The Early Siphons - Continued Siphon Diagram. 01(2) Turning to the sub-chassis, I have the remnants of two Ratio 4-wheel coaches which were to become donors for sole bars / the front / rear axles and the three arc roof. All I needed was a solution for the middle axle and right on cue @Coach bogie was reporting on his preferred approach on ANTB. A length of 2.mm brass tube, some stiff 0.7mm brass rod and voilà. With a test axle And fully assembled This works superbly and the fully weighted model runs, almost floats, effortlessly across the layout.

How about careful use of a fine paint brush with a slightly darker shade of green to hint at a shadow? The undo button would be easy if it doesn't work. Colin

The Early Siphons - Continued Siphon Diagram. 01(2) Next to the sides and end panels. These are built up from four thicknesses of 0.2mm card, laser cut and detailed on the surface. The kit includes clear instructions which have been thoroughly validated elsewhere. https://www.rmweb.co.uk/topic/100542-diagram3d-gnr-4-comp-3rd-class-brake-dia-281/ I chose not to paint each layer before assembly and once done I reckon it would have still left me further painting to be done. However, sealing each layer of card with a fixative is essential! This photo shows the jig with the four assembled layers, if you zoom in you can just see the top surface detail of all the door hinges and corner stays, they must be ~0.05mm above the body of the top layer. Once the PVA is brushed along all the edges, I wiped off the excess, checked everything was aligned, wrapped the removed layers in baking paper and pressed flat with my default heavy acrylic photo block. Then the cards were hand painted using quality artists acrylic as this seemed most appropriate for the medium. My default dark brown shade is Van Dyke Brown which is too biased to red to suit GWR NPCCS vehicles. To offset this I blended in 1 part Deep Green to 6 parts Brown to produce a satisfactory neutral dark brown. Door handles were attached and we're ready to add the exterior veneer to the main bodywork structure. But perhaps adding the transfers first would be easier. My next task was attending to the undersides and addressing the issue of the middle axle. TBC...

I'm guessing you've been thru this page: http://www.gwr.org.uk/no4-coup-tanks.html Two points I noted, Quite a few locos which were numbered 14xx well before the first Class 48xx rolled out of Swindon, Large Metros, Small Metros over several generations. GWR numbering was all over the shop. The side-on photo of 4830 and the drawing above it show the ash-pan (behind the sand box) which IMO you only notice if its missing (so you can see clear thru underneath!) . Leave it out and it screams "missing"; put one in and you'll hardly notice it again.

then just in add ash-pan envy to round out its psychological profile.

As produced and up until 1946 this Class were numbered in the 4800s. At that point GWR converted eight Class 28xx to oil fired and decided to number these in the 4800s (don't ask why!) This then required the entire existing Class 48xx series to be changed, 14xx numbers were chosen. (Wikipedia) The situation is confused in discussion because the entire Class was renumbered and hence the reference BR Railway Database talks about "GWR Collett "1400" Class 0-4-2T" making it easy to forget how they started out life. However those sporting "Great Western" and Shirtbutton GWR and belonging in the 1930s are numbered in the 48xxs Colin

Using the Smart Frame in 2023 I found no problems, all slotted together perfectly. (Edit: I see the OP reported this in his later topic) @MikeTrice thanks for these most useful posts, helping me with my two Siphon builds for Upper Hembury. Colin