Rob Pulham

Guild Spring Show 2024 Date: Saturday, 2nd March 2024 10:00 - 16:00 (09:30 for advanced ticket holders) Location: The Arena. Kettering Leisure Village. Thurston drive. Kettering. NN15 6PB. Price: £10.00 for members and £15.00 for non-members if purchased in advance. £2.00 extra on the door On-line tickets: https://www.gaugeoguild.com/onlinesales/ticketsales.aspx The Show Guide is now available to download in pdf format: Gauge O Guild Spring Show Guide Gauge O Guild Spring Show Floor Plan Layouts booked: BOOKS BRIDGE 2ft.4in. gauge rural electric trams. c.1900 WELLAND MILLS ex-LNER branch line, 1960s QUESTA American narrow gauge in Colorado / New Mexico. On30 PRIORY YARD Small shunting layout featuring a manufacturing plant. STREETON WAY SIDINGS Shunting layout THE WAGON WORKS A micro layout using wagon turntables instead of pointwork. WEEKEND YARD The Guild's own 'Build it in a Weekend' project layout. EAST MIDLANDS TEST TRACK Demonstrators booked: WEEKEND YARD The Guild layout build team LOCO BUILDING Brian Tole ARCHITECTURAL MODELLING Richard Ellis SOLDERING & RIVETTING Rob Bishop COACH BUILDING Robin Taylor WEATHERING 'Arry Dodd PAINTING & LINING Ian Rathbone BUILDING DIESEL & ELECTRIC ROLLING STOCK Dick Dockerill CAD to 3D PRINTED REALITY Nigel Paine Demonstrators: See above Stands: We have 75 confirmed traders for Kettering 1039 Models Ace Products AirFramed Amberly Components Bill Hudson Transport Books Brushes 4 Models Buzz Models C & L Finescale Track Building Systems Ltd Coastal DCC Connoisseur Models CPL Products CRT Kits D & S Models DS Smith Books Dapol Diane Carney Duncan Models Easy-Build Coaches EBMA Hobby & Craft Ellis Clark Fine Scale Brass (UK) Finney7 First Class kits Geoff Stratford Gladiator Gloforce Greenwood Railway Products Haywood Railway HMRS Ian Kirk Models Intentio James Green Artist Judith Edge Kits Lanky Kits LCUT Creative Martin Bloxsom Masterpiece Models Metalsmith (Leeds) Ltd Midland Railway Society Minerva Model Railways MMM (Made in Manchester Models) MMR Models Moorview Models MSC Models Nick Tozer Railway Books Northumbrian Painting Service P.R.Model Railway Products Parliamentary Trains Peartree Engineering Peter Clark Models Phoenix Precision Paints PLM Cast-a-Ways Poppy's Woodtech Premier Components Primo Models Ragstone Models Ray Heard Model Railways SM Models Sanspareil ICS SBT Developments Scorpio Models Shamrock Trains Simon's Sort Out Skytrex Ltd Slaters Plastikard Squires Model and Craft Tools Steamline Ltd. The Paperchase Tim Hughes TMS Models Tower Collection Blackpool Tower Models Walsall Model Industries Walsworth Models Warren Haywood SOCIETIES x 13 are booked MIOG ALSRM Great Eastern Railway Society Great Northern Railway Society 7mm Narrow Gauge Association Scale7 Group Warley Model Railway Club Great Central Railway Society London North Western Railway Society Northampton Society of Model Engineers Severn Valley Railway Telford Steam Railway Nene Valley Railway Driving: Take Junction 8 off the A14. Head towards town. At 1st roundabout turn Rt. into Lake Ave. At next roundabout turn Rt. into Thurston Drive. Leisure Village is on Rt. Stewards will direct you to parking areas. Transport: By Train Kettering Midland Mainline Station is served by trains to & from London/Nottingham/Derby/Sheffield ( East Midlands Railway Inter City, diesels), London St. Pancras/Luton/Bedford (EMR Connect, electrics) A complimentary shuttle bus will transfer visitors to and from the railway station, between 08:30 and 16:30. Walking time to the venue is about 15 min. Exit station, turn left, left again into Northfield Avenue, left under railway bridge and left into Thurston Drive. Follow footpath until it divides, bear left past football pitches. Venue is straight ahead, across road.

The Princess continues to challenge. The replacement for the live steam injector pipe took much tweaking and test fitting before it fit snugly with the chassis in place. Once I got my head around how the pipes ran, the two front oilers didn't present too much of an issue although I had to look at a good number of photos before I worked out where said pipes ran. Next I removed the pin rom the bottom of the steam pipe castings and drilled and tapped them 10 BA so that I could screw them to the footplate through the mounting holes As can be seen from the snips below there is quite a gap between the boiler and the steampipe flange. At the moment I am not sure where the problem lies, whether it's in the placement of the mounting holes, in the dimensions of the castings or something else. Initially I tried turning down some washers to fill the gap but I don't think that's the answer.

Despite having a few things going on in the real world this week, I have made some steady progress on the body details. While I had the boiler in place I fitted the front pipe clips for the vacuum ejector pipe. Then I fitted the pipes for the top feed which took quite a bit of filing to get them to sit snugly on top of the splasher without the boiler rocking. Then having removed the boiler I drilled a hole in the bottom of the elbow fitting for a small pipe which is visible on most photos no matter what period. That done, I moved onto fitting the twin oil boxes and their frames. This area still needs much cleaning done. Then it was the front vacuum pipe and associated pipework which was included as nice castings in the kit. I did make the bracket to hang it from the rear of the buffer plank after adding a pipe union from brass tube. Finally for this update I chose what I viewed as the easier set of pipework to add first. Not before I replaced the etched mounting brackets with some from flat bar after peering at photos and noticing that they were plates with two holes in them rather than straps wrapped around the pipework. Now to work out how to fit the injector pipe on the other side.

Of course sod's law dictates that I had just nicely finished assembling these when I found a second casting on another sprue that was identical to the first. I guess that I must have picked up both sprues separately at different times, thinking that they were both the same sprue...

There were no other pipe castings included in the kit. But there was a casting for a pipe flange for the smaller diameter pipe but only the one. In the end up I wasn't happy with the first pair of smaller pipe flanges because I hadn't managed to get the centre hole in the middle. The cross section of the bar that I used was too small for the 4 jaw so I put it in a collet to drill the centre hole. However I made the mistake of leaving it full length rather than cutting of a short length and I think that the length of the bar, not being properly supported by the round collet was pulled out of square by the length of the bar. So I milled a stub of round bar into a square and remade them. In the end I made five and chose the best three for the pipework. Working out the pipe runs required study of the GA and reference to photos but I think that I have it now. Other than the fitting of the handrails I think that these might be the last parts to make for the upper body/footplate but I will double check to be sure.

No problem Chaz, I needed to use my two 5p coins for their proper purpose earlier this week, so no more extra large 5p's until I get my hands on another. I will have to find something else to relate scale to.

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till working on the body details, I next approached the Injector pipe that runs along under the footplate on the right hand firebox side. This is the casting supplied. For Christmas, I received a new four jaw chuck for the lathe and wanted to give it a try so I decided to make the jointing flanges first. I had a length of brass bar which was the right outer size without further machining so I centred it and drilled it 3mm. Just to be sure I also ran a 3mm end mill through it. Finally parting it off to length I turned a 3mm spigot on the end of a piece of rod from the useful bits box and fitting the workpiece to it I mounted it in the dividing head and used the stub of a cheap carbide drill that I had reground after it broke off to spot drill each corner. These cheap Japanese carbide drills are very good but incredibly brittle even the act of bringing them down to the workpiece can break them off, if you are slightly heavy handed. Then I drilled them 0.7mm and fitted wire and tube hex nuts to complete the part. Next I turned a small top hat flange for the other end and then bent the pipe to shape before finally adding retaining straps from scrap etch strips and more 0.7mm wire. Onto the next...

The next bit of the puzzle before permanently fitting the firebox, is the vacuum ejector pipe running from the casting at the firebox to the smokebox pipe elbow fitted some time ago. Making up the pipe was relatively easy, make up the bends and kee trimming the ends until it fit in the right place. The ejector pipe is retained by four pipe clips. In the kit these are provided by 1.5mm wide etched strips. However upon checking photos these retaining clips were not flat but rounded like a big handrail knob. A couple of years ago when a friend passed away I inherited a box of 1 metre x 1.5mm brass brazing rods. I cut five lengths and soldered them to a piece of thick brass to hold them while I worked on them. I then milled off 0.75mm leaving them as half round pieces. These I removed from the block and scraped off most of the solder. I annealed them and then bent them round a length of the 1.5mm brass rod to form what are effectively brass split pins. Finally I cut them to length. They look much bigger than they are in the photos Next up is drilling the boiler and firebox to accept them.

This weekend has been about working out how to fix the firebox and boiler together and to the footplate. I put a couple of 12ba screws through the bottom of the firebox utilising the two holes etched in the footplate. The ultimate intention is to use adhesive but also to use the hole to dd a mechanical element to the fixing so the screws are temporary to allow me to get everything in place. I would also like to get all the soldering done around where the firebox and the lower sections will sit since resin is susceptible to heat damage if I am not careful. Picking up a tip from John Dale I elected to screw the front end of the boiler in place and I was rather reluctant to use just a nut on an internal curve as I didn't want it to come adrift sometime in the future. A rummage in my useful bits of brass recycling box yielded a former frame spacer from a set of frames that I had replaced with new ones. As a bonus it was already tapped 8BA. I filed the ends to help it seat in the curve and after marking and drilling a hole in the front saddle casting and transferring that through to the bottom of the smokebox I soldered it in. A dry fit of the boiler and firebox and all of a sudden it starts to look like a loco.

Hi Kevin Try - railwaycitytrains@btinternet.com

I am trying to get all the small details at least made into sub assemblies before I add them to the footplate once the firebox and boiler have been attached. I have worked on the firebox print and got that to sit down nicely. I needed a bit removing from the underside of the cutouts in the ring that fits inside the boiler to get it to sit down over the rear splashers. I also assembled the reversing levers which was an exercise in clumsiness n my part. The various parts are all held together with rivets but I decided to turn some nickel pins to do the job instead backing them up with some etched washers. Using some 2mm nickel rod I fit it in a collet and having the smallest stick out that I could I attempted to turn them down to 0.8mm. I broke the first three off, trying different tools (carbide insert first and then a round nosed HSS tool). Lastly and successfully I tried a new sharp edged HSS bit straight out of the packet. As supplied it had a diamond shaped grind on it with the leading point towards the chuck.. Running the lathe at approx 2000 rpm I managed to make the four different pins needed for this part of the build. I mentioned clumsiness on my part as I was starting to assemble the various bits on to the turned pins I thought it a good idea to pop a few etched washers onto the longest pin to make filing of the etching cusps a bit easier. No sooner had I got them threaded on than I dropped the thing on the floor. Or rather I dropped it onto my apron where it rolled to the edge, hesitated for a second then dropped off. Could I find it, not a chance. despite moving various items stored under my bench and wiping over the laminate floor with a cloth. Back to the lathe I went and turned another. I got most of it assembled when I happened to bend down to pick up a file that I dropped and found the missing pin complete with washers. However not 30 seconds later I managed to drop the last pin that I was fitting almost a repeat of the first where it dropped into the ether after slowly sliding down my apron. Thankfully the one that I found has allowed me to escape having to turn yet another. Below is the reversing levers all assembled but not yet fixed in place. Lastly I returned to the lathe to turn down the spigots on the bottoms of the safety valve castings so that they would fit in holes drilled in the top of the fire box as they came of the sprues the spigots were anything but round or parallel. I wrapped each casting in a slice of aluminium drinks can to protect it and popped it in a collet. Then I faced the ends of the spigots off and turned them all to 1.7mm diameter.

Progress since my last post has been steady with a number of small details added to the build. I added the door latch and the lamp iron to the smokebox door. It looks slightly wonky in these views something I will need to double check. As I mentioned earlier I had added the wrong covers for the pipes leading from the top feed so these were removed and replaced with the correct ones. Finally for this post I also fitted the cab seats after adding a stay which allows them to be lowered into position.

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I have managed to make steady progress over the festive period despite the setback of a power cut all day on Christmas Eve. I now have all the oilers repiped and soldered to their respective brackets or direct to the footplate. This was the setup that I used to solder the pipes into the rear of the bracket mounted two port oilers. An oak block with a hole drilled in it to accommodate the leadscrew f the handvice. The hole is quite a snug fit so that when the block is clamped to the bench the vice itself doesn't move. The brackets were clamped in the vice with a piece of square bar supporting them which seemed to make up for the third or fourth hands that I could have done with when soldering pipes to the others. I won't fit the bracket mounted ones until I have the firebox and boiler fitted in the next couple of days or so. I have also done work on a few other details but I am not ready to share them yet as they aren't completed yet.

Thanks Chaz, That was definitely my view but since then I have been doing a bit more research and unless I have made a mistake in scaling a GA, it seems that the kit supplied castings are a bit overscale. So I have decided to cut my losses and use those that are piped as needed and modify those that aren't. It serves me right I should have checked first before piping them all up.

A one step forward and two back moment this morning. Yesterday I spent some time finishing off piping up the rest of the 2 port oilboxe castings. This morning I pored over photographs to see where on the footplate these things were fitted. the upshot was that I was quite dismayed to find that of the 10 or 12 2 port oilboxes only possibly 2 of them were piped from the bottom as in the castings. The rest were piped from the back or inset into the footplate. I need to see if I can find a clear shot of the rear of the bracket supporting the front 4 port oil boxes as the instructions show a 2 port mounted to the inner side of the back of this bracket but I don't know whether this was fitted by 1936 or if it's a later addition. BR period photos show what appear to be two 4 ports back to back but they may be a 4 port on the front and two 2 ports side by side on the back.* Now I need to decide whether I file off all the pipes and 'nuts' that I have added to those that don't need them or whether I make some replacements and put the piped up versions in the spares box. I did a quick check through my spares box and kits to see if I had any suitable castings that I could swap them out for but I don't. Decisions, decisions... Edited to add that I found a photo and I do need a couple piped up from the bottom.

Progress has been inhibited somewhat by another bout of cold but I have been working away at the sand box fillers which are mostly fitted but I have forgotten to take photos of them and the many oil boxes that are dotted about the footplate. I haven't got them fitted yet, or to be more accurate I haven't even finished piping them all up yet. This is the process I went through to get the pipes fitted to them. Starting with the castings, I cut them from the sprues and cleaned them up making sure that the backs were flat. Next I soldered them to some lengths of coarse scale nickel rail that I have. It was at this point where I realised that I had yet another sprue so the process started again... Once soldered to the rail, the rail was supported on a parallel and held in place in the vice with a small offcut from a brass plug pin. Initially I tried to drill out the cast 'nuts' on the bottom of the oil boxes but they were so misshapen that I ended up filing/milling them down to witness marks and redrilling. I soldered in short lengths of micro bore tubing which I had filed to a hex and them some lengths of 28 gauge brass beading wire. In hindsight I am not sure that on most of them it was worth the effort of filing the hex but I know it's there...

Still plugging away at the small details but it's moving forward and that's what matters. I got the top feed fitted to the boiler which in the period being modelled is domeless so one less bit to worry about. Then I added the covers for the pipework underneath and two circular covers on top of the boiler. - Since starting to post this I have re-read the instructions and realised that I have fitted the wrong etched covers under the top feed so they will have to come off and be swapped. I still have the pipes to fit where they come out of the sides but as they disappear into the centre splashers I need to wait until the boiler is mounted to fit those. Next I have been working on the front end of the footplate where there is a surprising amount going on and photos are invaluable here as the instructions are not that easy to follow. Initially I fitted all the lamp irons the same way around but noted that the two outer ones are in fact reversed. Fitting the steps to the curve of the footplate was fun. The first one went into place really easy and first time. I tinned them and used the RSU from the back with the footplate on it's edge and clamped to the workbench to stop it moving away as I held the footstep in position. The second one took three or four attempts to get it in the right place... Looking at a 1935 photo when Princess Marie Louise was built, I thought that I would have to make the earlier style sandbox filler lids which had a knob on the top rather than a recessed bar. However, when I looked at a 1936 photo taken when the coal pusher tender was fitted I noted that it had already had the later style filler lids which are included as casting as in the kit. One job less There is still much to do, but we are getting there.

This week has been about adding small details to the body work starting at the front, I added the smokebox door dart, and the handrail above it. The LMS design of handrail has the rail ending in a button at each end. I have heard of people making these from microbore tube but I didn't have any nickel silver tube so I put a short length of 1.4mm nickel rod in the lathe and drilled it out to fit over the handrail at either end and then fitted the rod into a pin chuck to chop of the appropriate length soldering on to the hand rail and filing to finish. From the photo I still have a bit of cleanin up of excess solder to do on the handrail knobs. One detail that is quite prominent on the smokebox door but absent from the kit is the door latch. It is included in the GA reproduced on the front cover of the Wild Swan volume so I was able to import this into Fusion 360 not only to get the length and spacing of the handrail and knobs but also the outline and dimensions of the latch. The latch itself was filed up from a strip of scrap etch which I doubled up at the thicker end to file to shape to accommodate the curve of the smokebox door. The brass rod will be the stay which fits into the front ring. It's 2mm x 1mm bar and I popped it in a 1-2mm ER 25 collet to turn the spigot on the end. The fun bit will be soldering the latch onto the door. But more of that when I have achieved it.

I forgot to add that I also got the frame section of the sandbox filler pipes fitted too.

Well things have moved on somewhat since my last update prior to answering Chaz. I did get the injectors fitted. Then I moved onto the sandpipes which are almost the last bits for the chassis (unless I find something that I have missed. I say almost because there are also the bottom halves of the sandbox fillers to fit to the chassis, they are split at footplate level. I started with the brackets which come as a hockey stick shaped etch. Looking at photos they need to be bent into handed pairs. where they fit around either side of the wheel. Next in order to make the fittings for where they pass through the brackets and combine with the steam pipes I soldered two different diameter microbore tubes together. I cut half a dozen lengths at 2.5mm and another eight at 1mm using a pin chuck a ruler and a piercing saw I also created a hex on some thick walled tube to make nuts from. Again cutting lengths off with the piercing saw From all the photos that I have, there are only six sand pipes fitted so I have two spare brackets. In the photo below you can see the assembly order of the various bits of tube, bracket and nut. I will have to trim all the pipe ends to the same length

Hi Chaz, Yes, I do try to minimise this by using several different melting point solders. on this item I used 296 degree for the first fixings on each of the two main parts, melted with the microflame. Then I used 188 degree and then finally 145 degree and the RSU to attach the brackets. When joining the two main parts together I initially soldered then with 145 but having forgotten something I ended up loosening the joint with the heat so used some Loctite 638 to still them together.

A friend advised that the spurious bracket was a generic item included in quite a few David Andrews Kits to aid in fixing the exhaust injector casting. In the end I elected to do without it and drilled and tapped the main pipe. I will probably do the same to the flat on top of the bracket too because I have fixed one problem and create another - where it needs to sit there is nothing above it to screw it to. I will add a small plate under the main plates that fit under the cab to extend it and allow me to fix to it. Hopefully it will make sense when I have done it and taken photos. I have also added the missing control rod on top of the universal joint. The screw is slightly on the wonk but it won't be seen and I have used a countersunk screw to help compensate for it not sitting perfectly flat

This morning saw the injector back in one piece with all the right notes in the right order - for this loco at least. This was the set up for attaching the copper pipework using my RSU and cheapo self locking tweezers. Unlike many RSU users I don't use a steel plate to solder on to, much preferring to clip a smooth jawed crocodile clip to the part or the tweezers holding it. I do have one thing to work out and that's the bracket below. There are etched slots in the rear frame assembly for it but I am not sure at the minute how it attaches to the injector itself to allow it to mount. The other bracket which I have already attached is quite visible in the photo above to no issues with that one. I also see from the photo that I need to clean up the etching cusp from it too if I plan to use it.