MAP66

Happy New Year Chris and all the best for 2024!

Hello folks, I trust you all had a good Christmas day and are still enjoying the festive Season? I popped back to the workbench today as I wanted to crack the electrical pick up problem with a satisfactory solution for the wipers and where best to site them on the chassis. While looking at the chassis again, I took the opportunity to touch up the chipped paintwork around the wheels and parts of the chassis and to glue on the wheel balance weights. Now here’s a thing to ponder while munching on yet another mince pie. Does anyone out there have an effective solution to prevent the paint from chipping off, which they wouldn’t mind sharing? Especially from around the wheel rims where it’s particularly vulnerable to chipping. I also found that just general handling of the chassis was enough for any raised areas of paintwork to rub off very easily. Before any painting, I had previously prepared all NS and brass surfaces by giving them a thorough wash and rinse and when dry a coat of etch primer. Still didn’t help though, the paint still comes off, even after a coat of matt varnish. I have used acrylic paints, should I be using enamel paints on metals instead? Going back to the electricals, I found some pcb board, copper clad sleepers and a few lengths of phosper bronze wire 0.35mm diameter and I got to work. I found that I could glue a strip of pcb board vertically to the side frames in the gap behind the rear sandboxes. I dealt with the trailing rear wheels first and soldered a length of PB wire to the pcb strip which had a slight bend introduced to provide a little resistive tension against the tops of the rear wheels. Next, the rear drivers. Another length of PB wire was soldered to the same pcb strip above the previous length and slightly below the top of the rear driver wheel. The other end of this length of wire then rests on the top of the rear driver wheels with enough resistive tension to remain in contact with the wheels through its vertical movement. A different approach was required for the front drivers and I decided to fit the pick ups from the underside of the chassis. Two pieces of copper clad sleeper were glued to the underside of the front spacer, onto which was previously soldered an angled piece of pb wire. The pb wire acts on the inside edge of the inner rim of the wheel. Next, I will need to test each wheel pick up separately to see if they all perform without any issue, progress pics below… Balance weights glued on and crankpin nuts have had a drop of blue threadlock applied. Note the pcb strip glued in place behind rear sandbox. PB wire soldered to pcb strip. This takes care of electrical pick up for the trailing wheels and rear drivers. Closer view of underside showing pick ups for front drivers using a combination of cut down copper clad sleepers and short lengths of angled pb wire. The lower assembly is still being clamped down until glue cures.

Seasons Greetings to all, Certainly, for the autocoach, the HO 1/87 passengers are a better fit for the interior seating and for the standing driver. I had already ordered seated 1/76 scale passengers before I decided to try the smaller 1/87 scale, they will now be saved and used later for platform seating etc. ModelU are quite expensive and I found a few appropriate seated figures from the following site https://www.scale3d.co.uk/ which are considerably cheaper, some of the figures are also available in 1/87 scale and 1/76. Here's a link to a couple of them but there are a few others, but mostly male figures https://www.scale3d.co.uk/products/dsp178-male-sitting https://www.scale3d.co.uk/products/dsp188-older-female-with-basket-sitting . I find the print quality to be pretty good as well for the price. I hope you don't mind but I have included a couple of images below from a modern era park diorama showing their figures. Judge the print quality for yourself, I think its pretty good. The female in the first image is even wearing glasses, amazing really! I have no affiliation with Scale3D, just a happy customer who has saved a few quid.

Merry Christmas to you both Rob and all the best for 2024 🎅🐺🍾

Thanks Gents, Very much appreciated words of encouragement, which have raised a smile on my previously panicked face.

Well, I finally succumbed to tackling the brake gear. It was not long into it that my trepidation of taking this stage on was realised. As, this has proved to be the most testing and tedious stage of the build. Even more so than the gear box and even more so than the inside motion. This is not the fault of the HL kit, far from it. This is me, not entirely mastering detail soldering and handling small parts simultaneously. In hindsight, a finer tip on the soldering iron for the in and out quick soldering technique would have been a huge advantage. However, after much fiddling, re-soldering and fettling everything to within an inch of its life… I finally managed to assembly it all and do a dry fit. Some final tweaking is still necessary but overall, I think I’ve gotten away with it. Just some final soldering to do once everything is correctly lined up. Just in case your wondering, as this was mentioned earlier, the whole brake gear assembly is designed to be removable. I therefore need to ensure I don’t solder the wrong bits after all that hard work! Once final soldering is complete and locating rods cut down to size, it will be removed for painting. View from the underside. Locating rods for brake hangers and stretchers still require cutting down to size. Soldering is a bit blobby on the middle stretcher, lucky its not visible! A view showing a better idea of the workings. Side on. On the tracks, side on. Next I will be looking into possible locations for installing the wipers for electrical pick up. I will be aiming for electrical pick up from both driving axles and the trailing axle.

A few posts ago, I mentioned that a solution was required to attach the front of the chassis to the bodyshell. I keep on finding excuses to put off the brake gear assembly! In my defence, securing the chassis and body shell together securely but not permanently is important and something which really should have been sorted by now and certainly before I start dabbling with the brakes. The idea I’m using is taken from a 48XX HL chassis build over on the Scale4 forum. We start by using a spare part from the kit and in my case it’s the front spacer for a 00 scale build. This is cut down to size and a nut is soldered to one side. The adapted front spacer etch for a 00gauge model which is spare for my build with soldered on nut. Some plastic material is filed away at the bottom of the removeable smoke box section, enough for a flush fit of the adapted front spacer. The spacer is superglued in place being careful not to get any glue on the main body shell, otherwise the removeable smoke box and boiler section will be bonded to the main bodyshell. Here we have the same front spacer, showing the opposite side and now glued in place to the underside of the smoke box. When the glue has cured. The chassis is offered up to the bodyshell, the rear lug is located and the front of the chassis is swung up into the bodyshell. Next the bolt is lined up and screwed into the nut, which had previously been soldered in place. Nice and secure and simple to take apart again. Back at Tyteford Halte again, weird to see daylight under the boiler on an Airfix model. This shot makes me think that poor old body shell is going to need some serious attention very soon.

A little more jiggery pokery with the chassis was required at the workbench this morning, which became evident on fitting the bodyshell. The crankpins would indeed foul against the lower valence of the body shell. This was resolved by winding them in a few more turns and gently filing down flat the excess length of the pins themselves. This was followed up by another rolling test under power and thankfully all went well. I next wanted to check the ride height at the front and back of the loco, using the buffer height as a reference. This is a well designed chassis and provision is there to adjust ride height up and down at the front and rear of the loco independently. As this loco is destined to live out the remainder of its days permanently coupled up to the autocoach, it made sense to check the loco's buffer height up against the autocoach. Both vehicles just about fitted on the test track together and again, testament to High Levels design, I found that no height adjustment was necessary as the buffers lined up perfectly. An underside view with bodyshell temporarily fitted. This is before the crankpins were screwed in further and then filed down. When the brakegear is finally fitted, it will give me an idea of how and where to install the wiper assembly for electrical pick up. Good chassis design meant no further height adjustment was necessary to match the autocoach. I used the driving end of the coach to test ride height as the end which would be coupled up (luggage end) has lots of wires coming out of it, which were in the way. I think, when coupled up to the luggage end, with steam and brake hoses connected with auto coupling rod and whistle chain attached it should look the part. Well, it better had after all the time I've spent on this 🤪

Nice work Rob, there must have been a lot of tea drunk since the last post. When your happy with the filler and bark detail on the main trunk and larger branches, I found it easier to then give it a base coat of paint. My two go to paints for this are Vallejo German black brown and they do a black grey colour, sorry, don’t have the name of that one. Dilute both colours down to consistency of milk and with a suitably sized brush, load it well and working from the top branches and top of trunk let the paint flow down the tree towards the base and it will highlight and pick up all the textures and details as it flows. I normally apply a couple of coats like this and when dry it makes it easier to see if any further detailing or filler work is needed. When that stage is completed, you can think about adding any extra finer gauge copper wire to represent the smaller branches and twiggy stuff or going in straight with the sea foam? Either will work or a combination of both, once attached use more filler to blend in to get a seamless join. For the sea foam, I try and keep most of the tufty florets facing upwards with the odd one or two facing down on a few of the lower branches as it looks more natural and tree like for the Oak I did. Basically, just work from a reference photo of an Ash tree and go from there. I’m telling you how to suck eggs here Rob, you know what your doing. 👍

I have decided to fit wiper pick-ups, which means I can get the wheels on and work it out from there. However, as always there is always something nagging me which needs sorting first. That something happened to be the rear wheel set on this occasion. I had painted the inside frame after dropping out the wheelset and managed to get paint where it shouldn’t be, which resulted in the rear wheel set hornblocks binding instead of sliding smoothly up and down. So, it all had to come out again, to allow access for a file to remove the paint. Some time later, I had it sorted and it was back to the main wheels. All crank pins had been fitted and I paid attention to ensure that all screw heads were well countersunk into the rear of the wheel boss to prevent them from catching on the side frames. Rightly or wrongly, I super glued them in place. The chassis kit includes axle washers of 2 different thicknesses (0.2 and 0.4mm). I opted for 0.4mm and slipped one over the front axle with wheel already attached. The axle was then pushed through the axle bushes and a second washer placed on the other end. The opposite wheel was lined up onto the axle, quartered by eye and pushed on by hand. So far, so good but now was the tricky driver axle which needed to engage the gearbox drive! Much fiddling, balancing and choice words later the driver axle was in with gearbox engaged. The axles opposite wheel was then pressed on, once again by hand. I then fitted the coupling rods, some more fathing, fettling and choice words later I had one side fitted and thankfully the opposite side went far more smoothly. Then it was testing time. The rolling chassis was placed on the test track and power was supplied from a Bachmann basic controller. Crocodile clips went from the track rails to the motor terminals and I turned the controllers speed dial a few notches, then watched and listened intently. The moment I was hoping for happened, a promising sound and the turning of wheels resulted in motion with no sign of spluttering or stalling. A satisfying moment indeed, time for a Doombar or three. Here she is, after just completing the electrical test. There is still some general tidying up to do around the chassis, some rods to cut down to size and the crank pin nuts need to go on further and the pins cut down. Then, I can go back to the brake gear and do my best get that fitted correctly.

Nice work, its already looking very good indeed, are you having fun?

By the way Rob, your wire tree armature is looking absolutely superb. Most of the trees I’ve made started as plastic tree armatures with wire and sea foam grafted on. I have however, made a couple of trees using just wire for the armature and it looked exactly like yours at this stage. You’re probably thinking, as I did, that how can this twisted lump of wire turn out to be a convincing looking tree? Don’t worry or be deterred, it’s meant to look like that at this stage and it WILL turn out absolutely magnificent in the end. Keep on following Gordons book and keep the progress pics coming. 🌳

I now have the gearing mostly assembled and the motor coupled up to the gearbox. The final drive gear is fitted when the driver axle is fitted. So, for now and without the final drive gear fitted, I hooked the motor and gearbox up to a 9V battery supply via crocodile clips and spun the motor in either direction for a few seconds. Everything seemed to work fine with no pops or plumes of smoke. With that test completed, I used a 2 part epoxy resin to glue in the drive shafts as it’s the gears which rotate and not the shafts. The next step will be to attempt to get the driver axle in with final gear and press on the second wheel. However, I read further on in the instructions where you are advised to fit the plunger pick ups before wheels are fitted! So, some more research required as I’m not sure what’s best, plunger type or wiper pick-ups? Wiper pick-ups can be fitted after the wheels go on. Any ideas or advice on either method, would be much appreciated. Gear box and motor become one. The final gear is shown to left of gearbox, the driver axle will eventually pass through the central axle bush and then through one side of the gearbox bush through the driver gear, out the other gearbox bush and finally the opposite axle bush. Easy eh!!! Close-up of the worm drive, showing gap between teeth. I think I have the gap correct, the instructions state there should be daylight between the teeth but with minimal backlash. The blobs on the frame casing are epoxy resin, holding the drive shafts in place. Too risky to solder in place as the plastic gears are only mm's away.

Depends on the tree your modelling, but I have found that masking tape wrapped tightly around the trunk and some of the larger limbs of the armature helps smooth out and disguise the wire profiles. The filler or gloop can still be applied over the top. For the final bark detailing and for other detailing such as broken off tree limbs and scarring etc. I use a much stiffer mix as its better to work with using sculpting tools or your fingers. That broken off tree limb on the image below is just moulded filler. If you’re a tea drinker, save the dust you get from the bottom of the box of tea bags as its very useful for sprinkling onto stiffer wet filler to add extra bark texture. I use it at the junction of main branches where it joins the trunk, like in image below (it’s the brown stuff). That’s the same Oak I showed earlier, before the extra wire and sea foam was added. Once fully dried, the tea dust reacts well when overpainted with thinned down acrylics and helps give the effect of bark textures. When you get to the painting stage, something else good to have at your disposal is MIG sun bleach filter, I use several coats of this as a final stage to painting and weathering to give a mossy green tinge effect to certain areas of a tree. Just for reference, the paler textured areas of the trunk and branches are the result of applying deep gap filler by hand from the tub with a small amount of dilute pva which helps it adhere to the plastic armature. This method was used for the main trunk and larger branches. I found that it dries with that texture which is very helpful. I used a slightly more dilute filler mix and applied by brush to the smaller type upper branches and upper trunk.

Cracking start Rob, keep on twisting 🔀

Some more progress to report and in this instalment, a start on the gearbox! But we start with first assembling and installing the steam brake and hand brake to the cross shaft at the rear end of the chassis. For this to happen the rear wheel set is first dropped out from between the frame sides. Below are a few close-up images of assembled gubbings located onto cross shaft… The next step in the instructions are to temporarily fit the wheels for ‘setting up the chassis’. The thought of this stage feels me with dread but it seems necessary for continuing with installing the brake gear for correct alignment/spacing and ride height with wheels in place. However, for reasons previously explained, I really only wanted to fit the wheels once and once only. While I contemplated the way forward, I decided to start on the gearbox which is a separate assembly in itself and could be done at any time in the build. The first step is to ream out all the pre-drilled holes in the gearbox housing etch to accept the supplied 1/8” brass bushes and the 2 gear shafts which will require cutting to length. The bushes are soldered in place and the etch folded to form a 3-sided housing. I then soldered into position the motor mounting plate and gear protector and thought that was a good place to stop until next time. I fitted the driver axle with one wheel fitted through the frame and through the gear box housing to see how it all looked. I found the Poppies jig useful for this exercise. For the next instalment, I’m hoping that I will have completed all the gear box gearing and motor fitting and have given it a successful test out side of the chassis. I will then see if it’s possible to fit one hand of the brake gear assembly to the wheeled side of the chassis and go from there with some trial and error modelling.

I haven’t really moved forward with the build over the past couple of days, Instead I have been using the time to go back over a few things which were nagging at me. First off, the inside faces of the front driver bushes were catching slightly on the inside motion. I managed to get a small file board in there and take a little off each side which put that nag right. Then I dismantled the compensation beams and rear wheel set to get access to that blob of solder which needed to be filed down. A dozen or so strokes of the file sorted that one. It wasn’t time to re-assemble just yet, as with the rear wheel set out from the frames, meant another couple of jobs could be completed. First off, I placed a blob of super glue gel on the outside of each wheel boss to secure the wheel in place onto the axle and when dry, the wheels where primed and painted. I then moved onto some touch up painting of the chassis and finally a weathering session which culminated in everything getting a rattle can dosing of varnish. When all that is dry and hardened, I can re-assemble and test again for any tight spots of all moving parts. All being good, I can continue with the build and get onto the brake gear... Painting and weathering in progress 🖌️

I can imagine that tackling scenery in the larger scales can be challenging, especially convincing looking trees. I think I would look to mother nature herself and look for small dead branches and large twigs for suitable armatures, the sea foam and wire still has its place for the finer branches and everything can still be covered in filler to disguise the joins. A case of experimentation for the foliage in that scale, as you’re basically looking at individual leaves. There are leaf cutting dies on the market now which might suit 7/8” scale, not sure how you would go about gluing them all on though without it being very time consuming 🤔

Yes, a production line is key to getting through the numbers that you will require and probably won't feel like such a chore. Maybe start with 3 or 4 at a time to get a feel for the materials and techniques required and then slowly add to the numbers. The ones further back can also be more duller in colour and smaller in scale to add to the illusion of being further away. I've seen lots of methods for making conifers and the like over the years, none of them really convincing, but unable to recall any of them now. I will need to look up those MBR Scots pines. I do still remember how to make a very convincing silver birch though if your interested.

Nice one Bill, I'm sure you'll crack it and I'll look forward to your report in due course.

Nice one, looks like you have enough wire now for a small forest. Good luck with the tree building, it can be quite therapeutic once you get into it.

Hi Rob, this doesn’t solve your need for lots of less detailed trees, but ridiculous as it sounds its dead easy to make a few of your own more detailed trees to plonk in more prominent locations, a nice old Oak by that splendid wall could look good. I made this representation of an English Oak in 4mm scale from a plastic tree armature onto which were grafted twisted wire and finally sprigs of sea foam. The bark texture is deep gap filler with a small amount of dilute pva glue. Ivy vines are strands of plumber’s hemp. Use your choice of different blends of leaf scatter to represent the season you are modelling. I used Vallejo acrylics and Humbrol weathering powders for the colours. Discounting the time to let things dry overnight construction time was around 5 hours.

Hi Bill, Sorry to hear about your unsuccessful attempts for the hornblocks. Not sure if I can add any further advice other than what's already written in the instructions. But here goes... I feel it is imortant that everything is held flat during each fold sequence to avoid any distortion of the etched carrier. After making the initial first fold (folding in on itself with the small x facing each other) I really made sure they were flat by placing the folded etch in my folding jig and clamping down tight on the etch. For the second fold (the securing tab or pin) I first checked to see if the pin looked to be free of any burrs or material which would prevent it from passing through the locking tab and did the same for the locking tab to check the hole was clean and free. It was then a case of holding it all flat within the bending jig and forcing or more of a rounding over movement onto the locking tab with the end of a sharp file bending it over 90 degrees until the pin engaged into the locking tab. Then I used the folding jig to grip the etched carrier while I folded up the horn cheeks using the flat edge of a steel rule. This step is shown again below. I did find that that when the brass bushes where inserted within the carriers they were initially a little tight. I found that bending the horncheeks slightly over the 90 degree mark along with some minimal filing resolved this. Using the folding jig to clamp the carrier etch straight while at the same time forming the bend of the horncheeks with the aid of a steel rule. The jig in question is the 'Hold and Fold' by Avonside Works and shown below...

Thanks Neal, Yes, I'm pretty chuffed with how its looking and for not giving up. It's actually quite a joy to build this kit. @longchap has got there first with the answer on the brake gear which is indeed next on the agenda, being removeable will certainly help when it comes to wheel fitting later.

It was quite an intense modelling session yesterday evening, in fact I was so engrossed within the rear end of the chassis and all its workings, that I completely forgot to document my progress with photos. Easily done when you’re on a roll. Hopefully, I’m forgiven and I will just have to subject you all to a written account with some images of how it all looks now… I started with the rear wheels which needed to be pushed onto the 2mm axle (supplied with the Alan Gibson wheels). Ha, Ha I thought, I have just the tool for that. The GW wheel press comes into action again and this time using the reversible sprung loaded wheel peg to reveal the 2mm ended option. The wheels pressed on with no issues, remembering of course to first slip onto the axle the two rear wheel horn blocks I made earlier. I wasn’t able to put any washers on the axle as it was already too short in my opinion stopping about 1mm short of the outside face of the wheel boss on each wheel. This has resulted in an under-gauge wheel but not enough to cause issue I hope. The whole rear axle assembly was then slotted into the cut aways of the rear end of the inside frames and some further fettling was required to get a smooth sliding movement without any tight spots. You then solder in part 59 (the pivot carrier) between the frames and from this insert 2 lengths of 0.5mm wire which is bent to shape to retain the rear axle and prevent it from dropping out. The next stage was to assemble the compensation which consisted of the pair of compensation beams, a length of 1.6mm OD tube (supplied in kit) cut into 2 equal lengths of approx. 7.5mm to fit within the frames. This is all fed onto a length of 0.8mm brass rod between the frames which I have purposefully left overlength and not soldered in for now. I soldered the left and right handed beams onto the pieces of tube first. Once everything was in place, I checked for smooth operation of the beams against the driven axle bushes and the rear horn block assemblies. There was a slight tight spot causing the left hand beam to stick occasionally. The culprit was identified as a blob of raised solder along the top of the driven axle horn block guide which was catching the beam. However, it was getting late, so I Will leave the dis-assembly of the compensation so that I can file off that blob of solder for another day. This will not be such a pain as it all comes apart, due to not soldering in the 0.8mm rod between the frames – a good call it turns out. So, a few images showing how it all looks now and its assembling the brake gear next... An upside down view. Below the beam you can see the 2 lengths of brass tube, all held in place by the length of brass rod cut over length and not yet soldered in. In view are also the 2 wires bent to prevent the rear axle from dropping out. I have installed the rear axle to be fully compensated. There are also options for a rigid axle or semi-rigid. A closeup view of the end of the beam acting onto the top of the driving axle bush. Another zoom in closeup from top showing the rear wheel set in situ and how the other end of the beam acts onto the channelled slot of the hornblock etch. How it all looks at the moment, sat on the test track with the off-side propped up as driving wheels only fitted on one side. At least it's starting to look like something now and I hope that I can do justice to the brake gear as there is some very fine detail parts to fit. Is my soldering up to the task? 😬