hartleymartin

Thanks Bob. Saturdays and Sundays are generally out for me because I work weekends as a Church organist. When they moved to Mortdale several years back I went along on a few Wednesdays, and I don't think they were open on Fridays back then.

That reminds me, I have a small signal box kits from Skytrex stashed away somewhere, including an interior kit. I should dig it up and build it!

From where I live in Sydney, it is about 2 hours by train to get to Mortdale. They are also opened mostly on Wednesdays which is not great for many people.

Trouble is that Mortdale is a long trip for a lot of people.

I've been using a standard Hornby controller for years with O-gauge locomotives. I only use small 0-4-0 and 0-6-0 locomotives and a few wagons.

I'll say that there were lots of ROD's - We still had a few of them operating in the 1970s in Australia! As far as I am aware, the only surviving one in the UK was a GCR 8K, whilst the only ones built for the ROD still surviving are in Australia.

That link isn't working for me, but I think I know the loco you're talking about. There were a pair of 0-4-2s that went through a few rebuilds, one of which ended up as an 0-4-0. I think this is the one: https://livinghistories.newcastle.edu.au/nodes/view/44889

Link to source: https://c1.staticflickr.com/8/7001/6751915089_1cc39e9433_b.jpg Looks like an ideal subject for a scratch-build. No outside cylinders, little 0-4-0. Going to put this on the list of locos I'd like to build, but will probably never get around to doing.

Come to think of it, I should add some shunter's grab-rails and the like. Great thing about freelance models is that you can always add something as you see fit.

A year later, and it seems that I've not had the "good time" just yet. Once a few other things are sorted out, I'll just have to put some track on a couple of boards and do up a little shunting layout for myself. But at the moment, I am only just making the basic living expenses.

Dava is responsible for the first 0-4-0 conversion I had ever seen. I started on my own "Planet" conversion, but I had to abandon it when one of the wheel sets got damaged. In the end I purchased the model that was inspiring my own conversion: http://www.rmweb.co.uk/community/index.php?/topic/60529-atlas-plymouth-to-hibberd-planet-conversion/ After I purchased this one, I did a little bit of work to it - I sorted out the tendency for it to wheelie by adding some lead sheet behind the radiator and I added some cast brass handles to the hood doors, a couple of handrails to the hood and an etched brass No. 5 plate from the leftovers of my Ixion Hudswell Clarke. I think I also replaced the buffers with larger ones (hence why the housings are painted black). DCC conversion may prove too much, but I have been meaning to put in new lighting. I also have some more body mouldings for the Atlas somewhere in my collection. I had planned to do a second body for this loco so the chassis can do double-duty if I ever need a bit of extra variety at an exhibition.

Would you believe that I won the Year 10 school prize for woodworking? (Or, as it was called then: Industrial Arts, Wood Technology) and even better, I initially enrolled in a Bachelor of Technology in Mechatronic Engineering? The fact was that I got out of it after 12 months because the writing was on the wall for manufacturing in Australia. Most manufactured goods are now imported to Australia, because we've got in place these free-trade agreements which have devastated local industry and manufacturing. I then went and trained as a librarian, but as soon as I got my Cert. III the "Global Economic Crisis" hit and all libraries in Australia (almost all government funded) froze their staff numbers and pay for 3 years to protect the current work-force, but it meant that it was virtually impossible for any newcomers to break into the work-force. When I went back to university, one of the units I did was Museum Studies. My teachers for that course practically wet themselves with excitement when I told them that I was a model-builder and that I had participated in exhibitions. I showed them some of my work and they thought it was amazing. I also showed them some of my restoration work on vintage bicycles and they thought that it was all marvellous.

Most FineScale O gauge locomotives can be converted to ScaleSeven. The distance outside the faces of the wheel sets for locomotives is 37.67mm to 37.77mm in ScaleSeven. The same dimension in 7mm FineScale standard is 37.0mm (29.0mm Back-to-back plus twice the 3.5mm wheel width) So as long as you have at east 0.4mm extra space between the outside faces of the wheel sets and the inside of the splashers, you have room to convert to ScaleSeven.

So far it is: Cert. III Library and Information Services (SIT), Cert. IV Training and Assessment (ITA), Dip. Classical Languages, Latin (CCA) and now I'll be adding Dip. Liberal Arts (CCA). Not to mention my professional post-nominals of FSCO and AAL (Fellow of the Society of Crematorium Organists and Australian Air League)

Thanks. I am about to get my Diploma of Liberal Arts, and trying to finish up other qualifications to start work soon. I have a rather eclectic collection of postnominals which have not really helped me get steady work. But I do plan to do some model-making in January since this is the traditional holiday period in Australia. Usually, people don't do much. Between Christmas Day and Australia Day (January 26th) It is also the usual time of year that I do all my model painting since the weather is hot and dry most days. In recent years we've had up to 47 degrees Celsius!

I dare say it would be a challenge to mount automatic couplers on the die-cast chassis block, but it could be done. You might get long-shank Kadee couplers if you drilled and tapped appropriate holes.

Project stalled because life and yet another house move intervened. The loco and all the bites are in a project box waiting for me to get back into it now that I am on break from university.

I did once build a chassis using 1" Aluminium U-channel and a drill press. I was able to also drill holes in such a way to hole the motor and gears into position so negated the need for a separate gearbox. No picture though, and I recall considerable work filing the chassis bottom end to shape. It would have probably been easier to use brass strips and spacers in the traditional method. Tower Models did something similar with their Andrew Barclay beginners kit as I recall.

A bit late to suggest it, perhaps, but if the footplate is about 3mm thick, you might have been able to get a little more weight by using a sheet of steel. The only issue then perhaps being how're cut it to size.

If you put pick ups onto the backs of the wheels try rubbing a 9B pencil lead onto those areas. It acts as a conductive dry lubricant but also helps prevents muck from sticking to the backs of the wheels.

The Dapol terrier must have been a real boon for O gauge and for people who wanted to model pre-grouping stuff in particular. Hard to believe that a class of locomotive from the 1870s was still working in the 1960s. This happened in Australia for various reasons, but was certainly unusual in the UK.

If it is a solid polyurethane casting, you can easily bore it out using a pillar drill. You would need to wrap it in such a way that the detail work won't be damaged (cloth/soft balsa?) and mount it in a vice. Just start with about a 1/4" drill to make a pilot hole and you can use spade bits for wood. I have done this, but all that said, if you have someone who can do the job in a machine lathe for you, it would be much better.

I would have thought that having the motor standing vertical in the boiler would have made sense, but you would have to find a gearbox that got everything into a suitable position. I am sure there is some manufacture out there making what you need.

Where are you putting the drive train for the coffee-pot?

Tamiya make an excellent modeller's masking tape in several widths that you can get from your hobby shop. The adhesive is strong enough to keep the tape in place, but won't pull the paint off your work.