flubrush

If you are modelling the Victorian era then another way of building S scale track is to use 4mm products from suppliers like C&L and Exactoscale. The smaller rail size reflects the lighter rail section of those times. The current S scale bullhead rail is scaled from the twentieth century rail which was larger in section to carry the increased weight of locos and rolling stock. I know of at least one member who built his SECR (if I remember correctly) layout using 4mm rail components. Jim.

Plus Bill Eaglesham under the Heilan Man's Umbrella. I think he might have become M. G. Sharp by that time on his move from Cumbernauld. Jim.

The British film industry depended on Red Star. The major film processing laboratories were based in London and film was sent daily from locations all over Britain by Red Star. One of the first acts when setting up a location was to establish the closest station with a London service and the latest train time for a delivery to London in late evening of the same day. The film laboratories had a regular van service which trawled round the London Red Star stations from early evening picking up whatever had arrived. And then for regional film or television centres, there was the reverse delivery of processed film from London back to them by Red Star the following day. It was possible to have film rushes sent from Inverness at lunchtime one day and the processed film back in BBC Glasgow the following afternoon/evening. There were the occasional problems and some Red Star stations were better than others. But in the main it worked very well and millions of feet of film were transported in this way every year. Jim.

I tried about fifty years ago to get drawings from BR(S) in Glasgow and they sent me the diagrams for the set - complete with major dimensions but definitely not accurate enough for modelling purposes. This was long before the NRM and OPC. I should maybe have gone over to Pressed Steel at Linwood. :-) I have occasionally gone digging over the years since but have never found any GAs. I did find out that the company who made a 4mm scale model had visited a preserved set to take their own measurements. Jim.

Good when something comes together in 3D CAD. :-) I spent yesterday trying to draw a reverse curve in a sketch in Solid Edge - something I would do in seconds, almost without thinking, in 2D CAD. I spent hours trawling though Googled pages until I hit on the method to use almost by accident. I then remembered that I had learned about it a year ago when starting in Solid Edge. :-) So a day when I had hoped to do some more prints "went out the window". But at least I know for the next time - if I remember. :-) Jim.

I just purchased the 2mm Association gauge, drilled a hole through the centre and tapped 8BA then cut the gauge in half, tidied up the inner, sawn faces on the lathe, mounted the two parts on an 8BA screw and adjusted them until the gauge was achieved and locked the two parts with nuts. Saved finding a slotting tool. :-) Jim.

Not forgetting The Refrigerator. :-) Jim.

I do remember the C4 NFL programmes in the 1980s. The earlier years were excellent, usually with a longish feature on a top game and short features on other games in the week, and with intelligent commentators. Wasn't that where Nat Coombs and Mike Carlson first appeared on our screens? But later on they changed it and had younger presenters and I switched off on them - - young and cool and with it - not!!! A bit like the C5 programme I had a quick look at last season. Can someone confirm if the early C4 mainly covered NFC games? I have a memory that the AFC teams were ones we only saw very occasionally until the play-offs and Superbowl. The C4 sports section also interfered quite a lot with the productions. In the 1990s, my company worked on the Kabaddi series and I remember the producers complaining about the C4 management dictating styles which they really didn't like. Jim.

A method I'm hoping to use in S is to use metal frames but with 3D printed spacers. I've done it already in a 1:32 scale chassis :- As well as the frame spacers I was also experimenting with using 3D printed hornguides and aiming to use brass axleboxes in them. The experiment would be to see how good the wear properties of the 3D resin is. The 1:32 project has stalled at the moment but I'm looking to use the same system in an S scale chassis about now. The frames and printed spacers are held together with 12BA screws and I reckon to use 14BA screws on the S scale version. The resin taps satisfactorily but I took care not to over tighten in case I stripped the threads. I dare say I should do a test to destruction to see where the threads strip. :-) The 3D printing also allowed me to add the necessary leaf and coil spring detail. In the 1:32 frame the springs are separate prints to the hornguides and are held in place with 14BA srews, allowing them to be removed to allow axles to be removed. I'm not sure if I can do this in S and I'm working on an alternative method. :-) Jim.

i believe that after WW2, British manufacturers where debating what small scale gauge relationships should be developed for UK model railways since there was pretty well a clean slate. But Hornby scuppered what plans were being discussed by re-starting the production of Hornby-Dublo using their pre-war tooling and carrying on the 4mm scale on 16.5mm gauge. Jim.

Just been messing around CNC milling some TT120 coaches and thought I would try a 3mm scale version as well. TT120 in front and 3mm version behind. The protoype is a Caledonian 48ft seven compartment first. Jim.

Rob, I was referring to making small changes to the original .stl file when you need to load the altered file into Chitubox and start all over again with the supports. :-) Jim.

Place a piece of scrap support/raft in the bath close to the edge at the end of the bath and propped against the bath side. After you have done the cleaning exposure, the bit of scrap should act as a handle to lift the edge of the exposed layer. Jim.

I note that you changed your thread title when you posted the above message. I suspect that the previous title probably didn't indicate that the thread was your personal fiefdom. I can't remember what the previous title was, but I do remember looking for a suitable thread to post in regarding TT120 stock and your original thread title suggested that it was. I note that my message has now been deleted. Jim.

Do it yourself. :-) Drummond Caledonian 28ft coach :-) Jim.

I agree with Rob - you need a lot more supports along these overhanging edges and light ones will do the job if you've got plenty of medium supports doing the main grunt of providing a secure base for the part. Here's the slicer image of the medium supports for the 16 tonner The medium sized supports are all round the base and quite close together. But to reproduce major details like the angle round the top of the sides and all the angles on the end door, copious amounts of light supports are provided to give a reasonable base to start these overhanging edges. It took many attempts until I got a support setup that could give me a good print every time. The rubbish bin sits right under the printer and that's where a lot of attempts go straight off the plate. :-) A member on another forum, who does a lot of excellent 3D prints, recently stated that he expects to have at least five attempts at setting out supports until he gets a good print. Jim.

Having done the non-top door version of the mineral, I moved on to the more popular top door version. I had a bit of a fight with Solid Edge Assembly, but got there in the end. It's "sort-of" cleaned up from the support pips but could do with a bit more cleaning up. Jim.

I've just been doing a bit of work on another set of "W" irons and I realised that I had quoted the wrong dimension for the width between the legs on the "W" irons for larger bearings. It should be around 9.5", not the 8" I stated. I suspect I was probably thinking about the actual bearing diameter at the time. Jim.

WI002 is for wooden underframe wagons with smaller bearings - basically most wagons up to the turn of the 19th/20th century WI003 is for wooden underframe wagons with larger bearings - basically most wagons from the start of the twentieth century. The main difference between these two "W" irons is the distance between the legs of the "W" irons. Earlier Victorian wagons had smaller bearings and the distance between the legs was around 6.5 inches. The later, heavier wagons had larger bearings and the distance between the legs was around 8 inches. These "W" irons are designed to fit wooden framed wagons where the distance to the underside of the floor is about 4 feet above rail level. WI004 is for steel underframe wagons with larger bearings, the main difference being that the floors on steel underframe wagons were about 3' 9" above rail level. WIBR1 is a BR plate "W" iron for steel underframes. For your LNWR brake van with a wooden underframe, either WI002 or WI003 will suit - just measure the distance between the "W" iron legs on your plan to make the choice. All the above are for 3' 1" wheels. WI001 is for 3' 7" wheels on a wooden underframe with 4' to the underside of the floor. Jim.

Rob, Have you tried printing the wheels directly on the plate with no supports? I did my wagon wheels this way and it worked very well - very quick printing as well. :-) One thing I did do was to put a small chamfer on each bottom edge to minise elephant's foot. I also cut down the bottom layers progressively to minimise elephant's foot and got it down to two layers with everything still sticking to the plate. The wheels were round - pretty well nothing to distort them. Jim.

I dug up some information on UP industrial trackage which I used to build my S scale switching layout some years ago. The main index page is here :- https://www.up.com/emp/engineering/apps/archives/standards/public/index.cfm ...and if you click on "Turnouts and Turnout Components" you get a choice of subjects pertaining to turnouts. I used this information to set up templates in Templot and everything worked very well. Jim.

Following up on Scott's suggestions, to make things easier for yourself, dig around for a prototype which will suit a driver from the Markits 4mm range then get some S scale Romford style axles from Paul Greene and you've overcome the major problem of wheels. Then you can use a lot of 4mm parts to complete your chassis. I have used Alan Gibson's adjustable 4mm coupling rods in S scale to good effect (Current Gibson catalogue Page 18 Part 4M92). Or you can really cheat and go for a GER tram loco where you can get away with anything underneath it. :-) Jim.

I built a layout of Dursley in S scale in the 1980s and found that the operation of the layout was actually quite interesting, possibly because the platform road is off the end of the run-round loop. Plenty of sidings, especially if you include the siding into the gasworks at the station throat. If you have the length you could also include the sidings into Lister's yard on the other side of the throat. I think I would prefer to build the station as the LMS rebuilt it, getting rid of the three-way turnout at the entrance to the goods yard and replacing it with turnouts. I built the earlier three-way turnout version and the turnout was a continuing problem with some quite tight radii. I also amassed a fair amount of information including the titles mentioned above, but another great source was Lister's publicity department which gave me several pictures of the Dursley plant which also featured the station. There is also a good shot in the book of the history of Listers which shows the yard during a strike during WW1. The yard is full of workers but the weighbridge building features quite clearly in the mass of figures. I gave all this information to someone else in the 90s who wanted to model the station. Jim.

At last I got some decent prints of the 16T mineral wagon body after a lot of messing around with the thickness of the body sides, the orientation of the body and the supporting of the body. I've now lost count of rejected prints, but it has to be in the region of three dozen. The door end and one of the sides, oretty well straight off the printer and with all the support pips not fully cleaned off. I also gave it a quick scoosh of Halford's Grey Primer to get better pictures - not a very good coat since it was the last day of the storms which wasn't really conducive to spraying. I'm very happy that the sides are not bowing and I've taken no special measures to stop bowing while cleaning and curing. The print is designed to take a 1.6mm brass floor - shown right - to get the weight of the body up from single figure grams to 44 grams. ...and a shot of the two married together. You can also see some printer ridges on the inside - this is due to the body sides being tapered from 1.2mm thick at the bottom to 0.6mm thick at the top. This has been the main compromise to finish up with a good body print. It only shows up with the top angle being about 0.4mm wider than it should be. Otherwise I managed to get everything close to scale on the outside. I won't manage to get to the AGM tomorrow but I've sent four samples up to Paul and he will have them on his parts stand for comment. And I'm working on the top flap door version right now. I know that was the most popular version when Alan Gibson's kits were available. The body is designed to go on Justin Newtitt's underframe (Rumney Models) Jim.

Rob, I haven't tried that yet being still at the learning stage with the software. But I'll have a go and see what happens. :-) Now on V9 of the mineral. :-) Jim.