buffalo

It is quite possible that the demographics of the model railway world is going to change significantly in the years ahead.  This is particularly true for those of us who witnessed the last days of steam and remember steam locos for what they were then, not the pristine museum pieces that run on our heritage lines (I am not knocking them, it's just that they are not the same as it was back then)...

Of course interests will change over time but, if I understand you correctly, you are assuming that folk always model what they remember. Certainly, many do and are encouraged to do so by the limited temporal range of models offered by the rtr manufacturers. However, many of us who choose to build kits or scratchbuild using whatever methods we prefer do not model what we remember. I am old enough to remember steam but I choose to model the much earlier late Victorian and Edwardian eras, and see no reason why interest in such times would decline over time. Modelling periods may be influenced by fashion and other external factors. For example, there has recently been a growth in interest in WW1 models resulting from the widespread commemoration of the centenary.

...Personal 3D printers are becoming a reality - look at the B9 Creator - with potential detailing down to the all important rivets (at scale size, possibly too small for some of us to count).  Print your own building papers and card kits are a revelation to the owner of an ink jet printer...

3D printing and other developing techniques simply add to our arsenal of modelling methods. A wider range of methods may encourage more people to try them but, like anything else, they require their own skill sets. Models do not simply drop out of printers, you need motivation and then the design skills and experience with the machine to be able to produce anything. Different skills but essentially no different to any other modelling technique. I might add that decent printers, like the B9, are still significantly more expensive that entry level machine tools and material costs are not insignificant.

Nick

...Please don't think me a 'tool snob'...

Not at all, Tony, I would use much the same tools by preference over the, to me, more tedious methods of hand cutting and drilling. Mind you, compared with your experience, I'm probably still in or very close to the 'botched-building' phase. I was a little suprised by your comment about rolling bars as I'd never used them until last week having always found a set of round bars and a mouse mat suitable for most jobs. It was only when I was faced with producing a 70' tri-arc roof that I felt the need. The mouse mat wasn't long enough and I couldn't find a suitably long commercial offering, so I made my own. That couldn't have easily been done without some of my luxury machine tools.

David's comment about time was an interesting reminder that we all have different priorities. I'm retired and don't have any deadlines so I can, and do, take as long as I like over making things. To me, it's an enjoyable process and I'm not particularly concerned about seeing the results running on a layout. To others, running, operating, etc. are more important. Then there are others whose work rate is such that they can do all of it.

Nick

The Bachmann van in the form withougt duckets would be suitable. I believe it is LMS diag 1659, the final Midland type and was continued by the LMS. As it happens, the S&DJR aquired three of these (Nos 23-5) from the LMS in 1925.

I don't know about LSWR road vans, though I doubt it and haven't seen any photographic evidence. I would expect them to be kept for their own local use on LSWR/SR lines. The S&DJR had their own vehicles labelled as "road vans", but they were outside framed covered goods vans and, apparently, travelled much further afield than their own lines.

Nick

Nick's point is right, of course, in encouraging those of us in the lower orders to achieve more...

I hope it didn't come over like that, Ian. Yes, it was biased towards metal bashing because that's what I mostly do, but there is also much excellent practical work in plastic, card, wood, etc. on these pages that is equally worthy of exposure in the magazines

...Sadly, that may not be what the mainstream modelling magazine editors are seeking to do...

That is also my fear, so it's reasuring to read Tony's comment about Ben Jones.

As to expensive/special tools, it's interesting to note the effect that cutting machines are having on plastic and card working. I certainly wouldn't be without most of my more expensive tools but, for the purposes of magazine articles, perhaps it's worth remembering that most of us metal bashers started with no more than a pair of smooth jawed pliers and perhaps a couple of steel rulers for bending, a piece of suitable rod and a mouse mat for rolling boilers, and some lenghts of silver steel for aligning chassis. The rest is convenient luxury.

Nick

Of course it is suitable! If the practical articles in mainstream mags descend to little more than how to renumber an x or, at best, a lttle basic weathering. how will newer modellers ever discover that there is so much more to the hobby than opening boxes? Without articles about builds like your 0-8-4T, more and more will fall into believing that "no one needs kits because rtr is so good". When the rtr manufacturers start to give us scale thickness frames and inside motion (dummy will be good enough for most), maybe I'll start to believe it, but not yet.

As to the oft heralded "demise of kit-building", is it really inevitable? Even if supplies of new kits ever dries up, I suspect there are enough unbuilt kits out there to keep the second-hand market going for a generation or two. Similarly, kit shortages may well lead kit builders on to scratch building. After all, some build kits because their chosen prototypes are not available in rtr and others scratch build because they are not available in kits. Such folk have always been a minority, but that's no reason to exclude such work from the mags. As to 3D printing, remember that someone still has to do the design work.

Phil's point reminds me that there appears to be growth in many forms of craft skills, so surely they should be encouraged in railway modelling?

Nick

LMS vans were not replaced by BR ones they just worked alongside each other till their demise during the late 80's/early 90's!

 

Mark Saunders

Paul, we are discussing brake vans on the former Somerset and Dorset. There was precious little of anything to be seen there in late 80's/early 90's!

It's my impression from photos that BR vans were rare up to 1958. Indeed, some (or more) of those vans seen in the distance at the end of long trains may well be the Southern type as noted above by Combe Barton. During this period LMS types predominate. Thereafter, and presumably as a result of the transfer to the Western Region, the number of LMS vans decreases quite rapidly so that by 1961/2 very few are seen and the majority, if not all, are BR vans. The only exceptions that I can recall are the couple of ex-GWR toads that appeared with the BR vans during track lifting in 1969.

Nick

May I be a little pedantic in the hope of avoiding any confusion by future readers of this topic? Neither the Somerset and Dorset nor the Joint company ever used anything like this as the companies no longer existed when BR introduced them. Forty odd S&DJR vans lasted to the LMS takeover in 1930 and were quite quickly replaced by LMS vehicles. LMS Stanier vans were still to be seen on the former S&D lines for some years after nationalisation when they were replaced by the BR standard type discussed here.

Nick

Now that is a subtle way of bringing us back on topic, Larry. After all, I believe Bill Hoole began his railway career in Edwardian times.

Nick

...For those who like complications, let them do the modifications - aren't they the more competent to do this, anyway?...

Ah, you mean us weirdos who work in P4   Seriously, though, you make some good points here. Yes, most of us are prpbably happy to modify as needed but often kits intended to be built with compensation or springing still need to be modified because we prefer a different approach to suspension. Sometimes a rigid approach might be a better starting point.

As to frames being too wide for 00, I wonder if some manufacturers take a dismissive approach to 00 and don't believe many would build kits for this gauge? I wonder what the relative proportions of kit builders are between 00, EM and P4?

Nick

...I think the GW-built batches had Dean-Churchward brakes...

DC brakes in 1945-8   Yes, they were on the 1902 P6 from which the P22 is derived, but not on the P22.

...The packet illustration appears to show the mounting for a DC handbrake lever (though not the lever itself) but this bracket does not feature in the kit itself....

There is a cross shaft between a pair of triangular brackets below the solebars at one end. It may look like part of a DC brake but the shaft is connected by a lever to the vacuum cylinder above. See the P22 wagon diagram and a photo in Atkins et al. The handbrake is one of the jointed lever types.

Nick

...On some layouts that have been set in the Victorian and Edwardian period and have GWR buildings painted in the later style look quite odd to my mind. I look forward to seeing a 517 with Indian red frames running in to a GWR station with the earlier structure colour application.

Will a 517 in chocolate brown livery at a station with chocolate frames and doors do? Mind you, I still have to finish and paint both (and the autotrailer) so don't hold your breath. Of course, Dave's much further ahead -- see fifth and sixth photos in this blog entry, I expect Ian will get there before me as well.

Nick

Yes, it's superb. See also Dave's blog entry and construction details in preceding entries. What I particularly like is the presence of the timber strips on the walls to support the posters, very obvious in photos but rarely seen on models.

Nick

You could but, as Jol asked a reasonable question, it's only fair to try to answer it. The simple answer is that, as I model in P4, anything less that 4' radius is tight, but the method will allow much tighter radii in 00. Starting with the available sideplay on the middle axle, I get about 1.4mm on P4 wheels so would expect about 3.3mm in 00 with the same axleguards. Half this figure gives the maximum sideways movement in any curve. Using a typical GWR 6-wheel wheelbase of 19' or a scale 76mm, the versine of a chord of this length (which gives the required sideplay) is 0.6mm at 1200mm radius, 0.8mm at 900mm and 1.2mm at 600mm. At my estimated 00 sideplay, the minimum radius is about 438mm.

For the alignment of the outer axles, it's a question of when the angle between the wheel and the tangent to the rail is sufficient for the wheel to try to climb over the rail or, more likely, to strike a crossing vee. At 900mm radius, this angle is only 2.4 degrees and at 600mm it is about 3.6 degrees. With the typical flangeway gaps in 00 or EM track (1.5-1.0mm) I doubt that this is enough to cause problems (though I haven't done the sums), but anything much tighter could do.

Another thing to consider with the outer wheel angles is that any 4-wheel vehicle of the same wheelbase will, of course, encounter the same problems as a 6-wheeler. This rather makes a mockery of the fact that most companies used 4-wheelers on lines where the radii were too tight for 6-wheelers.

So yes, Cleminsons have their place but in 00 is suspect it is only well below 2' radius.

Nick

...I wanted them as trouble free as possible plus cost is a major factor cleminson kits don't come cheep...

You really don't need a Cleminson chassis unless you have very tight radii and need the outer wheels to turn into the curve. The method Peter describes is both cheep and reliable. Get a length of 2mm o/d, 1mm i/d brass tube and a length of 1mm silver steel from Eileen's or other sources. Cut the tube and mount the wheels on it. It should not protrude beyond the wheel faces. Cut the silver steel to the normal axle length and shape the pinpoints by mounting in a drill and filing to shape. Alternatively, you can use Exactoscale axles with the plastic removed instead of the silver steel. Both pinpoint and plain ends are available as are plain bearings if you want to use them.

Nick

Kerrekt - but you'm don' come fram down there, me 'ansome - down there we call 'em brokkli...

Quite so, and not just Cornwall. I can remember some older folk calling them broccoli in the fifties in the Bristol area. It was, after all, years before most people had seen calabrese or other funny coloured brassica.

Nick

Surely, broccoli on the GWR was mostly white?

Nick

...My parting tool holder has a fixing screw on right hand side, see my picture, which does not let the tool get close to the chuck if held upside down in front tool post. Not a problem with small stock or brass but co uld be if larger steel being parted.

If he tool is set up to the correct height before starting you dont need to see the cutting edge. There is not much you can do if there is a dig in as there is usually no warning, it just happens sometimes with a bang! Been there got the tee shirt!

Rear post allows the swarf to fall by gravity away from the cut.

Thanks for the comments, Ian. I also have that tee shirt and it's part of the reason why I was thinking about this. The idea in my head was to make a parting tool holder that would fit in the normal toolpost with any clamp screw(s) on top so nothing to foul the chuck. Running in reverse with an inverted front-mounted tool also lets the swarf fall away under gravity.

...On running the lathe in reverse whilst undertaking such a high load operation: beware unscrewing the chuck or collet from the headstock spindle! ...

Well, David (and Pat), I did say "a lathe with a reversible spindle". Like that described by Ozzyo, there's nothing to unscrew on mine.

Nick

Jeff,

It would require making a holder to get the tool to the right height, but that would be a fairly simple task.

Nick

I've been thinking of making a rear-mounted tool post for parting off as illustrated by Ian for the last few months. Part of the reason for not having got around to it is that there is an alternative for lathes with a reversible spindle. That is to mount the tool upside-down at the front and run the spindle in reverse. My gut feeling is that with this approach it would be easier to see what was going on.

Any views on the relative merits of the two methods?

Nick

Herewith the promised photos of the guard as supplied in the three possible positions dictated by the pin and slot:

Even if it had been assembled the other way round, it's difficult to see most of the possible positions beinof much use. I think I can live without it

Nick

Thanks Pebbles. I've just been out to the garage to have a look and that does seem to be the answer. In fact, the lathe came with two plastic screens and I'd assumed the second one was an alternative chuck screen with a fitting for a different type of hinged cutout switch so I'd never taken it out of its sealed bag. The pastic is already cracked around one of the mounting holes. The three indexing slots set the screen in some strange positions so it's difficult to imagine just what it is meant to screen from what. I'll take some photos later but it's too cold at the moment. Largely redundant seems to sum it up.

Nick

...After all, it's a well known actual fact that all forms of panniers are identical boxes on wheels.  The only discernible difference is whether they're painted green or black....

 

It is perhaps ironic for those who are still amused by such tired old nonsense that, other than minor details as much within as beteen classes, most of the 54XX and 64XX are the same except for wheel size and the resulting difference in splasher size and buffer height.

Nick

I see Bachmann have repeated their over size splashers and got the fire iron supports about 30% too large as well....

Yes, the usual 00 disease splashers were the first thing that struck me. Mind you, if you fit larger wheels and move the buffers down a bit, they'll be about right for a 54xx.

Nick

Sorry I can't really help, Nick, but it would seem to me that the post retains some sort of tool (holder) in the 10mm hole that may be indexed into one of three positions.  David

I was thinking along similar lines, David, but the hole centre is 100mm from the left hand end of the slide so, even with the normal toolpost removed, it wouldn't get very close to the chuck unless the cross slide was wound out to its limit.

I'm not sure about a tool holder but it could be a mount for a dial indicator I suppose.

Maybe, Pat, but 10mm seems a little on the large size for most dial indicator supports, and why the indexing slots? There's plenty of room on the machine for magnetic bases.

At least I now know that I'm not alone in wondering what it is

Nick

A mystery part question. On the top slide of my Sieg C3 (Warco model) there is a D shaped blackened steel object. It is 20mm high and about 33mm diameter and attached to the slide by two recessed screws.

It has a 10mm hole drilled right through and on the top face there are three slots about 2.5-3.0mm wide and of similar depth. The appearance is rather like a cartoon hand making an improper gesture. Not seen in the photo is a grup screw in the centre of the curved face opposite the flat, presumably to retain a 10mm shaft in the large hole.

It doesn't appear on most photos of other C3s, it's shown in the parts diagram but the entry in the parts list is blank. Any ideas?

Nick