davknigh

Fair point Chris, but a 00 RTR user (or their favourite service techie) may at some point wish to take the gear cover off for cleaning and re-lubrication. If all parts of the brake gear are glued including the rodding that attaches to the gear cover this becomes a much more complicated and time consuming task. As it happens I contacted Kernow first about this issue and they suggested raising the matter on this forum. For my own purposes I intend to cut the hangers off flush with the base and insert locating pins and leave the gear glued to the gear cover. Cheers, David

I had a look at another one yesterday, same problem everything glued in place. This is not just about people wanting to convert to the wider gauges, if someone in 00 wants to get the lid off to do some maintenance they are faced with the same issue. Not the end of the world if you are prepared to make some modifications but, erm, tiresome. The sanding gear effectively will hold everything in place so as has been suggested there is no actual need for things to be glued all over. Cheers, David

Further to my earlier post, my version, the BR departmental loco #57 has all of the brake gear glued in place both at the corners and to the gear cover. If you have no intention of taking things apart for servicing or conversion to EM or P4 this is not a big deal. If you do intend to have the cover off then be prepared to be creative when it comes to restoring things to their original condition . Cheers, David

Mine came in and runs a treat but I have a small problem that needs sorting. I plan to convert mine to P4 which will entail removing assorted bits but the first step is to remove the brake gear and it is firmly stuck in place . Has anyone found any non-destructive solutions to this problem? Cheers, David

Detail types may find the drawings on this site useful; http://sentinel7109.blogspot.com/2011/07/lner-y3.html Cheers, David

In the Toronto area there are the usual suspects, George's and Credit Valley, Hamilton has Modeller's Choice but a good source that is a mobile feast is here; TMR DISTRIBUTING http://www.canadasouthern.com/tmr/ . Terry is at all the shows and carries a good stock of gear at competitive prices. Usual disclaimer. Cheers, David

The layout is fully functional and is now getting the structures added as evidenced by this posting; http://www.bronx-terminal.com/?m=201003 . I saw the layout "in the flesh" last year and it works wonderfully well. Cheers, David

Just as a cultural note The May 2-4 weekend has become the standard way of referring to the Victoria Day holiday weekend up here in the Great White North. Tradition dictates that loyal subjects go forth camping with a minimum of one case of beer each to celebrate the birthday of the good Queen. Well, that's one interpretation anyway Those who survive the black flies and the bears do the same next year..... Cheers, David

Hi Dave Thanks for the correction. I mad an assumption cos the projected 22 was easy to find on the Kernow site and not so easy to find on other sites (I got lazy). Note to self: engage brain before typing Cheers, David

Just wondering. Is the 21/29 going to be a limited edition run like the 22 being produced for Kernow or will it be general availability? Cheers, David

Here's hoping that this includes the sliding window/tablet catcher variant! I'll keep working on my Hornby conversion just to spur things along though Cheers, David

The problem with the light behind the headcode is its intensity. You get a bright spot with dark all around so the two centre characters are washed out and the outside ones dark. Now, if you can figure out a way to diffuse the light all is well, it's just that no body has done that yet (or if they have they're not telling). The path of least resistance is to leave the headcode box unlit. Of course if you insist on running in the dark then something will need to be done HTH David

Well Pete, there's only one way to find out . Take the engine for a test drive and if its not up to snuff there's no lack of information on how to set if right if you go back through this thread. Good Luck Cheers, David

I suspect it might be harder to find someone who has *not* taken one of the first batch to bits But to answer your question, yes, I've stripped mine down to the bare frame. Everything comes off with minimal difficulty and I filed notches in the frame corners so as to avoid removing the buffers in further maintenance efforts. HTH David

I wonder if there is something to be learned from this; http://www.rmweb.co.uk/community/index.php/topic/15273-lms-twins-10000-10001/ ? Here we have a subject of which only 2 were ever built yet they are going to do a run of, apparently, 8000 pieces. No doubt it helps that Rails is behind the scheme so I wonder if there is a suitable shop that might go for backing one of our choices? Cheers, David

A reminder to those who have not voted yet that the MREmag poll closes in 6 days. This is another opportunity to show Bachmann and Hornby that there is a massive groundswell of support for Scottish locos. As an added bonus you can also nominate appropriate rolling stock to follow your engines The poll can be found at; http://www.mremag.com/ scroll to the bottom of the day's news and click away! Cheers, David

There may be a new player in the game. http://maytex.rapidotrains.com/index.html . I have seen the work that Rapido has done on Canadian prototypes and the detail on these models is fantastic. They specifically mention UK prototypes in their intro so may be interested in an inroad into the UK market. Jason Shron, the man behind Rapido, is a fiend for accuracy so a product from him would be a good one. HTH David BTW I should add the usual disclaimer of having no connection with the company other than a satisfied customer.

I suppose we should take the recent news from Bachmann as encouragement. S&D 7Fs were hardly ubiquitous yet here is a model being planned of one for mass distribution. IIRC the 7F featured on the MREmag poll on a number of occasions so here is another route to follow; http://www.mremag.com/ is the starting point with the poll located at the bottom of the day's news. Cheers, David

It depends on how much work you are prepared to do. The worm gear bearings need to be sorted as they seem to pinch the worm in some models. The original motor tends to cog and may burn up unless the mechanism is freed up. The gearing is a double reduction in the first place (not a bad thing) so even with the best of luck your 17 will not double head with anything unless you are running on DCC. In short, be prepared to strip the engine down to the bare frame if you have one of the first run, if you can do this without a trembling hand a runner can be made of it. All that said I've re-motored mine and freed up the worms and it works much better than it did before. I still need to tweak it a bit but that can wait for a while as I have other jobs on the go. HTH David

The problem with the headcode light is that rather than a bulb there is an LED which is much more focused (and bright) and produces the uneven illumination. So, you have a choice of leaving it disconnected, salvaging the LED for other uses (ditch lights for Canadian engines?) or fitting a diffuser of some sort. I took option two. Cheers, David

Stephen, You may find some useful information here; http://homepage.ntlworld.com/robert.mcmanus/plans.htm where a free plan for the M/V Vital Spark can be found for download. Cheers, David

Trevor, A simple swap of the motors will help but the gear towers still need work to get them running better. I put a Mashima 1224 in mine and it helped but the bearings need to be freed up before any sort of speed is possible. HTH David

Gibson "Warship" wheels at 3' 2" are quite close. I've used them on my P4 conversion and the buffers present at a suitable height. HTH David

A hint for those who expect to have the body off more than once during the lifetime of the loco: file a notch in each corner of the metal frame to clear the buffer ends, then you can remove and replace without ever having to touch the buffers again. You will have to remove the buffers at one end to get the frame off for the first time but after that, no problem. :icon_winker: HTH David

Getting back to the model, I saw one in action the other day and it handled 10 Bachmann Mk1s up a 1:100 grade with no problem, we did not test it to destruction but it might have been able to handle more. Cheers, David