brightspark

I think that I have gone as far as I can with this for the moment. So finished. Front 3/4 view. I think that this looks about right. Close up of the Left hand side. The injector fills the gap nicely. This is my interpretation of the Dreadnought Injector. It been confirmed that the pipe coming out of the ashpan is the Boiler drain. I have also cleaned a shiny bit on the reversing rod where it sits in it's guide. This is about the same sort of angle as the photo of 30834 at Basingstoke 18/08/1962. This photo is often used to shew the AWS. Head code also to be added. Overview of cab and loaded tender. Its difficult to judge how much coal there should be in the tender. One would imagine that when passing through Swaynton from London it would be empty while those heading north would be stacked. I have looked a few photos and the evidence to support this is unclear. So I have half filled the tender and had the fireman draw the coal forward. I noticed that in a lot of photos that the coal at the front has been broken down quite fine and that large lumps are staked at the back. All there is to do is to add crew and add the weathering. Oh and it needs testing on the layout. I didn't manage to fit brakes to the tender but I think that I have a lead on that so it may not yet be over. So onto the next project...

Some photos of progress so far... I am finding that this build is dragging on a bit. Each time I sit down at the bench, I am starting to wonder "how much longer will this take?". But I want to finish this one so I can move onto the other projects that are lined up. Anyway, eyes down and here we go. Right hand side. It looks a lot better now that the transfers have been applied. Detail below the footplate is starting to be added. Brakes, sand pipes, sand cleaning pipe (on the tender) and the cylinder drain cocks. "I see ya baby...shakin' that ass..shakin' that ass...shakin' that ass...I see you baby..." Left hand side, showing the AWS battery box and the two holes in the cab side for access to the AWS equipment. 3/4 front view. Note the AWS equipment, as well as the battery box on the running board, there is the plate under the front buffer beam and the box of gubbin's bolted onto the front of the cab. I need to reattach the stowing hook for the front coupling and also the vac pipe, that seems to have fallen off. A close up of the left hand side. Still to add are the Injectors (currently in the mould), associated pipework and the other bits that live under the cab. It looks like there is a bracket that holds cranks for the drain cocks and the earlier type of pipework that included a water heater for the tender. Basic weathering at the moment, which is a splash with a dirty paint brush and thinners, done while cleaning out the brush. The more subtle weathering will follow. The nearside sand washer needs shortening as is it just resting on the rail. I just ran the loco up and down the test track and there was a satisfy screech when reversing. I will also reattach the cab doors at some point. Note the later type steam feeder valve on the top of the boiler. Also to be added is a pipe that comes out of the firebox. It will emerge from the bit you can see through the oval cut-out. It look like a boiler drain pipe. Anyone know differently? (The handrail is not running up hill. It is where I tried to straighten the photo and it's gone a bit funny) Andy

I am now making progress on the chassis. Again following DLT's build notes, I have fitted brakes from the mainly trains SR loco etch onto the loco. I was not so successful on finding a suitable set of brake gear for the tender. But the tender fret does have something suitable for other projects. At the moment I am fitting the sandpipes. These route down the front of the J hanger in exactly the area that I had freed up for the rear bogie wheel. I'll glue it in and then work out later how I get the clearance. Around the rear of the loco, the area under the cab looks very empty. So I am making up some injectors and trying to work out what else is under there. These are meant to represent the Dreadnought type that were being installed from the late 50's. The modification to fit these onto the prototype also included a new steam valve, located on top of the boiler, that was straight and involved re-routing the steam feed pipe in front of the rear handrail knob. The pipework under the footplate was also routed differently with a curve that ran closer to the cab. The older system had pipes running at a straight angle. Going back to the injectors, I have been studying photos to try and work out what is happening behind the step. There may be another valve body as the overflow pipe appears at the rear of the step slightly higher than the injector outlet. Does anyone have any information? It looks like the modifications affected both the S15's and the King Arthurs.

Has anyone found the correct colour for BR Southern Loco green? I did a search and all I find is the question...never the answer.

By this I mean a black loco, under normal light = black blob. But in the sunshine. Progress to date.

I said in the previous post that the tender goes around a 4' radius without having to clear the swing of the bogie. That statement was true as far as the tender goes, but when coupled to the loco, it became a different story. First of all you can get the clearance by thinning the step. You may want to do this anyway as whitemetal castings are a bit thick. The next problem was that the loco started to spin. I eventually tracked this down to a poor design of tender drawbar. The DJH design has a drawbar that is fixed to the leading bogie of the tender, so that it is part of the bogie. The drawbar being a solid arm projecting forward. This is intended to engage with a white metal pin on the rear drag bracket/ drawbar beam. I decide to adopt this as I wanted to close the gap between loco and tender and put in something a bit more robust than a whitemetal pin. So further inboard I have put a screw that retain a bearing. The drag beam is a 1mm steel bar doubled in width. A bent paperclip formed into a loop and bent back along its length with a loop to go around the loco bearing and glued to the bogie frame. So the design was similar in that there was a fixed beam to the leading bogie, but the bearing on the loco was further forward. The effect of a tight corner was that the arm, being in line with the bogie was pulling the loco sideways. There seems to be two possible solutions. The first is to make a new loop to go around the bearing but very wide so the arm would have a Tee end with an oblong hole. The second, and the one I went with was to have a drawbar that had two loops, one at each end. The forward one engaging with the Loco bearing in the dragbox and the tender picking up on the pin locating the front bogie. And it seems to work as the loco-tender assembly now seems much happier running around the 4'. I was going to take a photo, but its too dark.

David, can miss the odd e-mail. Just send it again. You normally get a reply if you ask for one. (It happens to me … especially if I get a load arrive at once. )

Thank you for the compliments. Hi Adam, I still think that the Hornby model is going to be better and an easier route to a EM/P4 than the DJH. Still how about a head to head with them on the test track sometime? Meanwhile, back in the Batcave... Sometime in the past 30 plus years since the kit left DJH, a few bits went missing. Including the footsteps. There are eight altogether but I only had four, three of one hand and one of the other. Luckily a pair was still on a sprue. So this week I made up a mould and cast my self some replacements. They didn't all come out the mould as nice as I would have liked, I could have spent more time working on getting the flow right, but I got enough reasonable casts for my needs. These I will then modify the various shape steps that the S15 had. I have just glued them on and I can now see why DJH added a bit of length to the tender, as the rear bogies doesn't clear the steps. As it goes around a four foot radius it is not an issue.

Today should have seen 30838 proving itself (or disgracing itself) around the EMGS test track at Bracknell. Sadly ExpoEM Spring has had to be cancelled. The furthest that she has run is on a couple of yards of test track. One straight and one curved. I am currently pondering how she (and the other locos in my stock box) will cope with the B6 points sold by the society. Anyway here is progress to date. This morning I made up the new smoke deflectors as the DJH ones are too long. They are fine for a King Arthur though. That is where people go wrong trying to convert King Arthurs to S15's as the latter is shorter. I think that DJH made the same mistake here. Or were they planning on doing an Arthur? DJH King Arthur on top and my home made S15 below. Anyway its starting to come along now and beginning to look like an S15. Battery box yet to be fixed in place, hence it leaning over. Next job - get these off to paint and...

Today would have been day 1 of ExpoEm, oh yes er Spring, I keep forgetting about that bit. At this point I would be manning the front doors, letting in those frantically setting up the bits of their layouts, or Traders carrying boxes of interesting things, the stewards who need to be pointed to the signing on sheet, while keeping out the great unwashed...sorry the paying public, assuring them that the tills will be open soon. Plus of course looking out for the people who don't quite fit and would probably not be welcome. Amongst all these people are many faces who are familiar and who is miss seeing. All I count as friends, even if some of you I haven't met yet. ExpoEM for me signals the start of the warm sunny days that are to. It always seems to be on the first sunny weekend of the year when the world starts to warm up and we finally say goodbye to the last grasps of winter chill. My memory of the first Expo I attended was at Paddington, with sloping floors, faded carpets and BR livered staff in the foyer. As the sun came out and the temperature went up the windows would be opened to allow the smells of the GWR trainshed to waft gently through the exhibition. Ah, what an atmosphere. It was at one of the Paddington shows that Barry Norman turned up with his baseboards made out of "flimsy" plywood and he had also laid the track the wrong way. Who in their right mind would lay track across the narrow width instead of the length. This was the embryonic Petheric and what we were seeing was the jump start into modern finescale. We have had interesting times at Bletchley. Did we ever take the same route from the M1 to the hall? It was where I started to find myself behind the layout. Watford, forget the catering incident, but remember seeing the mighty Retford. And finally Bracknell. This year was going to be a good show. I have my shopping list, but will have to buy on line now. I have something for the test track, but that will have to wait. The layouts wait to be shown another time. (Close your eyes) Only half an hour until the doors open. An orderly queue is forming and tickets are starting to be sold.

I have this from the SABLE collection of the late Douglas Smith. These are plated on. See MRJ90 Andy

Left Hand side Valve gear fitted. Right hand side yet to do. The aim is to have it ready for the test track at ExpoEM Spring on 16th 17th May. (That has been cancelled) Even though the event isn't on, it's still good to have a target. So RH side valve gear, buffers and AJ to be fitted by then.

At last Black Paint! I was in a bit of a panic on Friday as the last bit of Halfords primer splattered over the half painted boiler and I had no more and wondered if I could get more. Saturday was spent rubbing back the blobs while waiting for a text from my local Halfords that my order was ready to collect. Ordering on line was easy and an hour so later I made way to the other end of Woking to get pick it up. The counter has been moved to the door and they only operate a click and collect service. Honestly it is essential supplies, as it is for my sanity. It was also a lot easier that normal. What a great service. So the model has been primed, rubbed back re-primed and coated in Mr Halfords finest black in both satin and gloss. Buffer beams now red. I had a lovely reversing wheel that I picked up at a show for 20p. I had it on the bench ready for painting the same colour, and then it was gone...! Also- what colour is the inside of the cab? I have a photo of a preserved S15 cab, where the interior is a sort of khaki brown/ sand. So I painted it with some Humbrol sand colour. But it would be nice to get some accurate information. Doe anyone know what colour this should be for 1960? Andy

Testing my homebrewed chassis had proved to be somewhat troublesome and required much rework. I found that all of the problems were associated with the front end of the model. This was due to a lack of attention my part. I had taken great care to get the chassis square around the driving wheels, but, had taken less care around the front end, mistakenly believing it to be just cosmetic. A bit of bending and light work with the soldering iron has hopefully sorted this out. But it did indicate, with some hindsight, that there is not much room around the front bogie and that to get this loco to run right, you will need to keep your wits about you. As usual, it seems with this type of loco, there were a few problems around the frame clearance of the bogie wheels. But I getting alarmed at how much material I was removing as no matter what I did the wheels still touched. I came to the conclusion that my method of supporting the bogie as part of the compensation system was the problem and needed reworking. I had initially used the same method of mounting the front bogie as the Standard 5. That is a rubbing plate on the end of the compensating beam. Fixed onto the plate is the bogie pivot pin. Unfortunately, there is a lot more movement on this model and this had the effect of allowing the bogie to move fore and aft as the beam pivoted around its axis. The only solution was to have the pin fixed to the chassis and come to some other arrangement for the compensation beam. The side control springs have been abandoned at the moment as all they do is cause derailments. I have, at the moment, just a spring link at the rear of the bogie. The effect of this, is to cause the front of the bogie to steer into the corner. Although this seems to work, I would like a better solution. Again, DLT seems to have a good solution and might give this a go. Hopefully the pictures below should show what is going on. Assembled bogie. Note the U shape wire from the back of the bogie, going into a hole in the beam. I then moved onto the cylinders and J hangers (AKA slide-bar support brackets) Iain Rice wrote in his Loco Chassis Construction book much about the DJH S15 and I was using this as guidance. He pointed out that there is an incline in the cylinders and that the J hanger was prominent. However, the photos of his finished model, show the cylinders horizontal and the J hangers omitted. I was puzzled by this omission but then after offering up the cylinders in the horizontal realised that they don’t fit. They will only fit if you incline the cylinders to the correct angle. That is by the way in direct line with the centre driving axle. I reinforced the J hanger as DLT recommended in his thread. Oh, and the J hangers are positioned vertically and not perpendicular to the slide bars. I made that mistake and found that the rear bogie wheel fouls them. [photo not recovered] The cylinders are of interest. On review I initially thought that DJH had got these wrong, by making them too long and so causing them to foul the rear bogie wheel by around 1,5mm or so. I was also unhappy that they seemed to bind so I stripped them down by soaking them in Nitromors. This was a tip I found on this and other model railway forums. I took 48 hours to break down the thickest part of the araldite. Before taking a file to them, I had a feeling that I was still wrong because somehow the cylinders in the photos of S15’s looked to be the same proportion as the DJH castings. But both the BR/SR weight diagram and the Beattie drawing showed them to be approximately 1.5mm shorter at the rear. This confirmed my thinking but created a conflict. cleaned up cylinder casting on the Beattie drawing. Compare the position of the cylinder to photos of the real thing. 22-dec-2023. It was study of the Hornby drawing and scaling of the photographs that revealed the true picture. That is that the cylinders need to be 1.5mm further forward and clear of the rear bogie wheel and that the DJH cylinders are the correct length. It is the two 4mm drawings that are wrong! Other people on these forums have also reported that they moved the cylinder forward, but I get the impression that this was more out of desperation rather than by measurement. So, anyone reading this, these are the critical dimensions that I think you need. These photos show the correct measurements with the datum point marked 0-0 being the front of the main body of the cylinder. [photos lost- but picture above has the dimensions. The cylinders are angled at 1 in 24] Hopefully these make sense. Dimensions are 18mm to the front of the buffer beam, 3,3mm to the top of the outside edge of the top of the curve on the footplate. Other dimension to the right are for the position of the J hanger and the end of the slide bars. I know that it was a rubbish datum and if was doing it again I would work from the buffer beam at STN-O. By the way the Centre line is to the bogie pivot. As you can see there is an awful lot of filler and a little bit of reshaping of the top front of the cylinder block. The fouling seems to be caused by the thickness of the whitemetal running plate/footplate. The rest of the filler is replicate the shape of the casing around the cylinder on the prototype. And that brings you up to date.

Southeastern Finecast do a turntable kit. But it is not a "shake the box" item.

A fellow member of SLAG is currently building a loco with forked joints. It looks a bit fiddly, but then he has similar views of compensation. I actually have the slidebars on the bench now having debonded (unglued) the cylinder assembly. The slidebars in the kit do look chunky but I wonder if it because we are used to seeing etches. I am thinking that the DJH supplied items are the correct width but just lack a rib running along it.

Hi Tony, I am looking forward to another visit to LB and pint in that very pub.

Hi N15, I am intrigued could you go into bit more detail. Especially the valve gear as I have yet to attack that.

The Loco Body – Part 2 – The boiler and smoke box. I had been putting this off because as already discussed there is so much wrong and I wanted to have a clear plan as to how I was going to tackle this. I had in mind several ideas that included rolling a new boiler and smoke box. In the end I found that I could retain the original casting with the advantage of the additional weight and detail of the whitemetal casting. However, some modification was still required. The boiler length is correct if you fill up the area where the tab is. This I did with plastic strip and at the same time removed the cast boiler band. By the way in reference to earlier posts, I did look at the SEF N15 boiler, actually I obtained a kit and was also given a half-assembled model. The boiler is the correct length but is still too thin. The other problem is that the N15 has a splasher and thus the SEF boiler has nothing below that line, so you would have to fill that with something. The boiler will now fit flush up against the cab on a tab soldered to the front of the cab. In the same manner as DLT I removed the base of the smoke box to get the smoke box height correct and to eliminate the gap between the underside of the boiler and the running board. I then made three cuts on the boiler. The first is right behind the smoke box from the underside and upwards until the metal was weak enough for me to make a bend so that the boiler tilts upwards from the smoke box. Then the second cut was made on the top of the boiler along side second boiler band (the one in front of the dome). Using the boiler band was helpful in making a straight cut but I later realised that it is in the wrong place and the bend should be further back and under the dome. Both of these cuts only need to go just over halfway through the diameter of the casting. The final cut was on the underside of the boiler along the centre line from the motor cut-out to the rear of the smoke box. I then pulled out the sides of the boiler so as the get the correct diameter over the firebox and running parallel to the aft cut and then moving forward to taper in to the rear of the smoke box. I inserted plastic blocks into the cuts so that they held their position and then in the same manner as the tender glued in reinforcement strips on the inside and then used Milliput to fill the gap. Finally removing the moulded boiler band as I smoothed down the filler. These are replaced with Alan Gibson etched boiler bands where \I also corrected the position. The firebox and footplate casting will need a bit of fettling as the former is now larger than the latter. I did consider slotting open the smoke box but decided against it as the front of the boiler where it meets the smoke box is the correct diameter and keeping this whole ensured against the casting going oval when it was pulled out. I suspect that DJH assumed that the boiler was parallel, where it has a slight taper. To get over the undersize smokebox I made up a wrapper to the correct size and fitted it over the existing casting. There is a little step at the rear of the smoke box and I replicated this with one of the packing shims. The front casting of the smokebox was shortened and glued into position. I glued a bit of Plastikard on top of the existing pimple that represents the front step. This comes out in the correct position and is quite prominent. NOTE that the S15 smokebox is shorter than the N15. Which may explain why, in post 6, Horsetan thought that both the boiler and footplate were too short. The handrail knob positions are in the wrong place and because I have changed the diameter of the boiler are at the wrong height. The old were filled and new holes drilled for the knobs. I fixed these into place and because there is no boiler lining, fitted the handrails. I also fitted the chimney, dome safety valves and whistle, after first checking and correcting their positions. I also moved the washout plugs. These can be cut off with a sharp knife and reapplied with Araldite. Note that these are not directly opposite each other, DJH got this wrong as well. (sigh!) So that is the main part of the body done. Photo added - you may be able to make out the cuts and filler. Note that the slope on top of the boiler should start at the dome. 22-Dec-2023.

The Loco Body- Part 1 – The Cab After examination of the prototype and reading the comments above, one could conclude that the parts supplied in this kit seem to provide a seemingly daunting amount of errors. But I believe that there is still some potential. However, the cab was always going to be an issue. It’s one redeeming feature is that it will assemble without any trouble and you will get a cab shape that is approximate, just not the same shape that Mr Maunsell designed. I know that some of you who read this are contemplating scratch building and wondering how to turn a piece of sheet metal into a say a loco cab. For the benefit of that reader (and to see if I can write down a methodology that is coherent) I will describe my method and the issues I overcame. How I did it. The first thing to consider is what is really wrong with the cab provided in the kit. Apart from the wrong roof profile. 1. As stated previously, the outside profile is wrong. 2. The cab is a casting so is a bit thick at the ends. OK you can thin it down. 3. That the lower edge of cut out on the side of the cab is not in line with the tender. 838 was one of the S15’s with a smaller cut out to match the profile. 4. There was also a little bit of the casting was missing. But I could have filled that in. The next thing to consider is what are the characteristics of the prototype. This is a case of comparing the drawings to photos of the prototype and playing spot the difference. Always try to work from a photo of the actual prototype around the period that you are modelling. As you shall see 838 had some subtle changes in its life. 1. The cab of the Maunsell S15 is an art deco design with a smooth flowing shape where the roof just rolls into the sides and is totally unlike the Edwardian cab of Urie that just looks dated when placed side by the side. 2. There is also an overhang on the front of the cab that could be easily overlooked. 3. As already mentioned, the lower edge of the cab cut-out must align with the tender. 4. There is also the shape and position of the windows. Before making the first cut, especially in your precious sheet of metal we must remember to “MEASURE TWICE AND CUT ONCE” This is a golden rule, stick to it and you find that you are the road to nirvana. I found two “scaled” drawings of this variant of S15. The first is the reproduction of the official SR/BR weight diagram as in Russell. These are normally quite reliable and the drawings in his book are reproduced to almost to scale. I verified this by calculating known dimensions into 4mm scale and checking the drawing. These are very slightly undersize. There is also a drawing by Beattie, copyright Railway Modeller, that appears in “Locomotives in Profile 4 Maunsell 4-6-0 King Arthur Class” by Peter Swift and published by Ian Alan. This drawing is slightly over size. I also struck lucky with the Hornby website. As mentioned above, I printed off their low-resolution drawing and it came out at around 7mm scale. It’s not the exact variant of the Maunsell cab (it has the larger cut-out’s, but this is not an issue) I want but it does show detail not found on the other drawings. The first thing to do is to then make a paper model to understand the shape and how it goes together. The cab front is easy, you photocopy one of the “scale” drawings and cut out the shape. The roof and sides become more interesting. To keeps that smooth flow, it seemed that the best approach would be to make the whole thing out of one piece of material. This is where making a paper mock up or practice piece becomes a useful tool to have in your armoury. Because if you mess it up you can start again. What makes this hard is that you have 3 curves to work out. I did actually consider if it is practical to actually make the cab and perhaps the whole superstructure out of paper. But that is for another day. The sides are quite easy as they are flat. The harder part is the main roof and the even harder part are the tight radiused corners. The main part of the roof is easy, just roll your ruler along the edge to get the length. If you happen to know the radius and the angle of the roof pitch you could calculate it more accurately and the small corners. However, the trusty ruler works well for the flat sides and to some extent the main part of the roof. For the tight bends I did a bit of guesstimating. I found it easier to estimate the radius and remembering that Π (Pi – you thought that you left him back at school) is three and a bit you can take that radius and give a good estimate that because there is a third of a semicircle there the material you need is about one radius. (Circumference of a circle is 2Πr, therefore circumference of half a circle or semi-circle is Πr and a third of that is r) Marking out your shape, start at the centre line and work outwards. Then roll your paper to shape using the cab front as a former. Glue it together and see how it looks on the model. The cab windows proved to be an area of difficulty that I had not anticipated as both drawings in Russell and by Beattie seem to place the windows in slightly different positions. Even on each side of the centre line on each drawing! I did consider just folding up the outside of the cab and using the DJH cab front with a bit of filler on the corners and removing some material from the top. My thinking being that at least the thing is symmetrical. You may see this in the photo above. It’s at this point that you wish that you could pop down to the Bluebell to measure the prototype. It was here that I remembered the Hornby drawing and this seemed to show and accurate and symmetrical image and the proportions also seemed to match photos. So, with all the dimensions worked out the cutting and forming of the sheet metal was the quickest part of the process. The rivet detail is not as even as I would like and I wonder if I should invest in a GW riveting tool and if that would make a neater job. Finally, the cab was soldered together to make a nice square box with the roof brace added and Alan Gibson boiler band strips soldered into the cut-outs. The window frames are 0,4mm wire bent to shape (then checked that they match as a pair) soldered into position and flattened with a file. The rain strip was also some fine wire bent to shape and soldered on. Hopefully I have the shape right and the windows the correct shape and in the correct position. At the very least, I think that its an improvement on the DJH offering. With the cab assembled it was time to consider the boiler and smokebox.

Hi Blandford, Thanks. It's a new cab. Here is a close up of mine and the original (copied from DLT's loco build thread). Note that I have made the cabside cut-out smaller to match the tender. The lower part of the handrail will be added later. The boiler and cab are just resting on the footplate so the gap between them will disappear eventually. I have relocated the wonky washout plug since the photo was taken. The rivets are also a little uneven, but this doesn't look so bad when viewed at normal distance. (so long as that is in another room facing the opposite way with the lights turned off and reading a girly mag MRJ) Hopefully having a sheet metal cab ups the game on a Chinese plastic conversion.

Before moving onto the loco body… I’ll make it clear now that I am a little way ahead of the write-up. Although not too far as I have hit a few snags and have had to backtrack. However, in the background of the shots above you may have seen glimpses of the rest of the model. So here she is, more or less, at the present moment. While catching up with the various and wonderful entries on this forum, I saw that just above my last posting was DLT’s Southern Locos thread. He has thoughtfully created an index on page 1 where he lists his build of the DJH S15 that he completed some 10 years ago. Page 3 – 6: S15 - DJH: https://www.rmweb.co.uk/community/index.php?/topic/2359-dlts-sr-locos/&do=findComment&comment=190723 I would like to compliment DLT on the neatness of his work and his solutions to some of the problems inherent in this DJH kit. DLT’s construction varies from mine in that his brief is to build the kit as far as possible straight from the box and not get hung up on too many of the inaccuracies of the kit. He was also building to OO gauge which can have some advantages with white metal. He was also building a later version of the kit with the more advanced chassis. Above is the chassis DLT got, below is the more basic version in the kit that I got. Note the edge meat for the driving wheel axles. So that covers the deviation of the chassis. The tender he left to the intended length and replaced with Hornby N15 bogies. I shall report on my solution later describing my use of the original castings, but I warn you now that it is not as neat.

In response to the OP. To recover and to prevent... stand (or if you can't stand- sit up-right) with feet slightly apart and back and head as straight as possible. Breathe in and then as you slowly breathe out, slowly drop your head forward so your chin rests on your chest. If it hurts because you have strained it stop at the point that it starts to pull. Hold your head there and inhale in and then as you slowly exhale move your head back to normal. The secret is that as you do the movement slowly exhale. After nodding like this a few times to warm up, from the head down position and remembering to breathe out slowly as you do it, roll your head to one side so its above your shoulder. Stop, breathe in and then as you breathe out slowly roll your head back so that your chin rests on your chest, stop and repeat to the other shoulder. Do this a few times. Always finish the head roll with the chin on the chest, and from there bring your head upright. Don't move your head from over your shoulder to the upright position during this exercise if you can avoid it. Always rest between each move. If it starts to hurt or pull, stop there, breath in, and slowly breathing out move your head back to centre. Rolling your shoulders will also help, remember to exhale as you do it! I hope this makes sense and is helpful.

The tender After putting the chassis together and scrapping a set of wheels, I thought it best to start work on the tender. My logic being that if I mess up any other wheels I can cover my loss on one order. The tender assembly consists of a cast footplate onto which sits the box that forms the body. All of this sits on two bogies each made up of three cast pieces and are fixed to the chassis with two screws that also act as pivots for the bogies. The only real problem that has already been identified here is that the tender is too long. The tragedy is that you can see where DJH have extended the footplate, from good to bad, as there is a clear mark in the casting. The photo is of the underside the rear buffer beam mounting point to the right. The groove shows the DJH extension. The pencil marks are where I am planning to make the cut. As with any cut and shunt it is best to avoid having individual joints adjacent to each other. As each is a potential weakness. Starting with the footplate, the DJH extension is on the rear where the buffer beam attaches. This area is quite nice and would be difficult to reshape by trying to remove the extra material that has been added. I therefore removed approx. 4mm in the area above the rear pair of wheels as the pitch between the two bogies is correct. This will require the removal of some metal to clear the rear pair of wheels when the bogie rotates. The two sides were next and were corrected by a cut around the area where the reservoir tanks sit. This is little way forward of the chassis joint. The top was cut and spliced somewhere under coal. This plate also needed reshaping to match the drawing and once again the cut was well away from the other two joints. This was all bonded with araldite with support pieces strengthening the joint. In this case cocktail stick and wooden coffee stirrers. With that complete the sides were filled, flattened and the body assembled. Before assembly though I made sure to bond in the two 12BA screws that the bogies are mounted onto. The bogies are made up of three parts. The two sides and the centre bearing/ spacer. I took care here to ensure that the mating faces were flat and that there was clearance for the EM wheelsets. It’s the centre beam that needs the most adjustment and this is easy as the wheels can be assembled and dropped in. I didn’t see a need for washers to be fitted behind the wheels as the boss of the wheel touches the side of the frame casting first and there is little risk of electrical shorting. I also saw no need to fit any additional bearings as there is not too much slop in the slots provided and I don’t believe that these will wear significantly in the expected life of the model. A more exotic bearing choice may also force the builder to consider another design of bogie and create yet even more work in the build of this kit. I have no need of the fixings for the Hornby style coupling so this was removed and the front coupling or drawbar to the loco was replaced with a bent paperclip to get the correct distance between loco and tender. The only thing lacking from below the waterline is the brake gear and I will add this later. With the tender body assembled it was time to think about some detailing. The flat sided square corner tenders had three reservoirs on top on top aft of the coal bunker. The moulding provided in the kit measures up ok. But it will need to be sat on top of some risers and will need pipe work added. I made the risers from plastic strip so that the tops of the cylinders are just above the coal wall and the pipework was made from 0,5mm brass wire, suitable soldered. This disappears into a hole I drilled in the tender top. Refer to the drawing and photos of the prototype on the web for position. The platform was also assembled with the brake standard, trimmed to fit, painted and put to one side. And here the work stops as the kit appears to have been robbed of footsteps. Next- the loco body.

After the last post, the “kit”, resided where most kits reside, on a shelf to join the SABLE collection. My plan was to potter around with this at demonstration tables at various shows. Assuming that I am invited and can attend. As it is, I don’t get invited to as many shows and those were I was, I couldn’t attend. However, every so often I would open the box and do a little bit of pottering. Suddenly I found that I had made a lot of progress so here are some updates. So back in August the status was that the frames had been erected. Here is the chassis assembly roughly assembled. Note that I have discarded the frames supplied by DJH. These are the usual brass sheet cut to the profile from one of the scaled drawings found in various publications and shaped to fit the underside of the cast footplate. I am trying a different means of compensation on this build. If you recall, the Class 5 was powered on the rear axle which was fixed. The two front drivers were compensated to each other and these were linked by a beam to the front bogie. The effect of this was to distribute the weight of the loco equally between the rear axle and the rest of the axles. That is that the rear wheels were effectively carrying half the weight of the loco. Now in the model press, there have been some thoughts expressed as to the best way of transferring the weight of the loco through the wheels. Iain Rice is of the opinion that replicating the weight distribution as per the prototype would yield the best results. There is another theory that the bulk of the weight should be on the axles at the extreme end of the chassis. Ie the leading bogie and the rear wheels. So if the latter theory is correct I got it half right with 73018. The only trouble that I had with that loco was when I raised the tender height and lifted the rear of the loco so losing the effective traction. So I wonder how effective that method is. So on the S15 I have tried to change the weight distribution. The leading driving wheel is connected by beam to the front bogie. The two rear driving wheels are linked with two beams with the gearbox driving the centre axle which is free to articulate. This should give equal distribution of the weight across all wheels. It also means that all the wheels are free to move vertically. The drag pin for the tender is already in place as is the rear drag beam. This means that I can remove the loco body with the tender still in place. Hopefully this should make life easier for maintenance. The motor mount is also interesting. Normally with the driving wheel in a fixed bearing, the motor is solidly mounted. But as the driving wheel are now in hornguides the motor and gear box has to move with the axle and be solidly anchored. To facilitate this, I made up a mounting that sits on the pivot of the compensating beam with the motor mounted on a second pin. This will allow the motor out put shaft to move up and down by rotating around the pivot mounted to the frames and to also rotate around the centre line of the loco. The next stage is to paint the chassis. This is Halfords black on the outside and Mars Red on the interior. So here is a picture of the assembly stripped down and ready to paint. I managed to mess up the assembly of the rear set of wheels. The axles wasn’t quite square in the GW wheel press and before I realised the axle had pushed through the wheel. So another pair of wheels have been ordered and are on their way. Further updates to follow. Meanwhile I will be taking this along to the Southampton show this weekend. So you can see how far it has come on.