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Fen End Pit

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  1. Fen End Pit
    I'd spent a fair amount of time trying to solder up a belpaire firebox and despite many attempts I really wasn't that happy with the results. So, as much as an intellectual exercise as with any practical expectation of success, I thought I'd try and model the firebox, boiler and smokebox up in CAD and try to print it. This is very much a 'work in progress' but the results are rather encouraging. The layer lines at a .03mm layer height are virtually invisible to my eye and will disappear even further under a coat of paint.
     

     
    I was astonished by how well the rivets around the smokebox came out and how cleanly the holes for handrail knobs have been printed. I printed the chimney and dome as separate pieces (and haven't cleaned the bottom of the dome off properly hence the poor fit). In terms of the actual model I think the smokebox door needs a slightly more pronounces curve to is and I believe I can probably add the sandboxes to the 3D print.  I might just add the dome and chimney to the model rather than have them as separate pieces. I think a lot of the other issues are related to getting the printing support right, I'm wondering about modeling a support base in CAD rather than adding on in Chitubox.
     
    I was pleased enough with the results to dismantle the etched splashers on the my current footplate so I could match the 3D printed part with the etch - I think the footplate and cab are still best made from brass. Bear in mind that the holes left in the foot plate from the original splashers are over-size and I'll need to fill them to make them the same size as the 3D printed parts. When press down the gap between the 3D printed part and the footplate around the front splashers disappears.
     

     
    So I'm very much encouraged to keep going this route. I will solder up the cab and print the rest of the super-structure with a few tweaks and then see how it all looks.  This was printed on a Phrozen Mini 4K at .03 layer height using 'The Technology Outlets' premier Low odour grey resin.
     

     
    Having read the latest MRJ I would like to refute the idea that this 'Dreadful 3D printing' kills craftsmanship.. It just takes a different sort of craftsmanship, just in the same way that photo-etching brass didn't kill craftsmanship when it meant we no longer had to cut everything else out by hand with a piecing saw.
     
    Please let me know what you think.
     
    David
     
     
  2. Fen End Pit
    I realized that the spring on the lever was effectively duplicating the one in the micro-switch so in the best traditions of trying to keep things simple I tried to build a version which doesn't bother using it. The revised lever arrangement is a bit simpler but it takes a little bit of adjustment to:-

    get the springing in the lever right,
    the micro-switch to change correctly as the catch handle is pulled and also
    the screw which fastens the attachment to the lever not to foul the micro-switch on the lever.


     
     
    The resulting modules fasten on the levers quite well. (though I realized after I took this picture I'd got the one on the end with the mounting bracket upside down.
     

     
    Then I thought I'd turn to the locking bar. This is very much option 1 so I'm expecting to have a load of different arrangements before I settle on the best way of working. This version using the push rods on the frame which pass through a 'key hole' shaped hole. A piece of brass tube will only go through the large part of the 'key hole'. I used a piece of square brass tube as the basis of the locking bar as it is stronger than a sheet material. I drilled 2 1.2mm holes 5mm apart for each lever and then opened both the holes out to 4mm on one side and one of them to 4mm on the other. The I joined the holes up with a piecing saw and a dremel to make the shape required.
     
    The photos below show the operating sequence.
     
    Initially all the levers are locked as the piece of tube around the push rod is trapped behind the lock in the small part of the 'key hole' shape.
     

     
    The lock moves the the left aligning the large part of the 'key hole' with the push rod.
     

     
    A lever (in this case lever 2nd from the left is reversed, pushing the piece of tube through the larger part of the 'key hole'.
     

     
    Finally the locking bar slides back to the right locking the push rods again, in this case with the piece of tube on lever 2 on the other side of the lock.
     

     
    It works in theory, I just need to try and connect a servo to the locking bar now!
     
    I think I'd like to make the locking 'spring loaded' so the servo pushes the locking off, but a spring pushes it back. That way if you release the catch handle, but the lock isn't quite aligned exactly the servo can just go back to the locked position but a spring actually does the work.
     
    Any one got any better ideas?
     
     
    David
  3. Fen End Pit
    I've joined an organisation in Cambridge called 'Makespace' who are setting up a public access 'hackspace' in Cambridge. These organisation seem to be springing up in quite a few large cities (see http://hackerspaces.org/wiki/United_Kingdom ) and are intended for people who want to build things to share the cost of owning and running tools. So for the price of a gym membership (and anyone who tells me that would do me more good is probably on the wrong forum) I can have access to tools which I would never have been able to justify buying myself.
     
    Well today Makespace took delivery of a seriously good tool - a 60W laser cutter with a bed size of 600x900mm. I went along to see it commissioned and receive some training on how to use it. As a test I took along a small drawing of a wall in TurboCAD and we downloaded it and cut it on an odd bit of luminous acrylic left over from something else.
     
    In its natural state it hasn't photographed very well but I am seriously impressed by it as a first attempt. The wall took just over 5 minutes to print and the software allows me to draw the different levels in different colours and then control the laser power and speed so that one colour ends up as engraving and another as cuts.
     

     
    When I got home I thought I'd have an experiment and see how it might look painted. The first attempt was done by painting the wall with an matt enamel mortar colour and then trying to dry brush on a brick colour once it was dry.
     

     
    The second attempt was painting a brick colour in enamel and then washing over with an acrylic mortar colour and washing it off.
     

     
    So now I have to order some suitable material to cut and workout the best method to draw things up. I'd like advice from anyone who has experience on producing artwork for buildings. Specifically, what is the best way to deal with the corner joins? I have demonstrated that I can put a tiny cut which 'takes the mortar course around the corner' but am I just best to do this and us a butt joint? I can see some people have actually cut around the individual bricks at the end of the wall to produce a kind of dove-tail joint, does this really work?
     
    Also how do people find using thin MDF versus using one of the laser cutable plastics? I know I can't use plasticard as it gives off chlorine gas when it is burned.
     
    I'm must confess I'm rather excited about the possibilities of this bit of equipment.
     
    David
  4. Fen End Pit
    So I've been thinking about a little 16mm project to keep up my narrow gauge interest while I can't take Fen End Pit out. I don't mean to distract too much from the construction of Clare but just have something extra to work on when I fancy a change.
     
    One of my favourite places to visit is the Thelkeld Quarry Museum and I have long thought that the engine shed is full of modelling potential but I've not been sure how I could use its inspiration.
     

     
    What I have been thinking about is building a 'photo plank' which captures some of the Thelkeld building but I'm wondering about turning things inside out, looking at the interior as a basis for a scene.  I fancy trying to capture some of the atmosphere of the workshop and clutter.  I don't think this is Thelkeld but it is the kind of thing I'm after.
     

     
    I also have a memory of the belt driven workshop at the back of the sheds at the Launceston steam railway.
     
    So at the moment I'm thinking about trying to build a 'box' which represents the inside of the shed, along the back I make a variety of workshop tools, ideally belt driven, and a work bench. In front of that I have a line of track set in concrete which goes out of the door.  Even though this isn't a big building it will be probably be something like 2'x1'..
     
    So I'm searching for additional inspiration....
    Anyone got any nice photos of belt driven workshops or ideas about the best way to layout a belt drive workshop?
     
    Thanks
    David
     
     
  5. Fen End Pit
    Since I built my J17 by scrapping most of the parts of a PDK kit and making my own etched and 3D printed bits I have been thinking about the possibility of turning the result into a kit. A first draft of the artwork was turned into nickel-silver by PPD with help from my good friends at Brassmasters. (If this turns into a kit that will be where it will come from). The intention is the use etched metal for the chassis and thin bits like the cab and foot plate while 3D printing the complex shapes like the boiler and tender.
     
    The first test etch has turned out pretty well and I've had my first go at putting the chassis together, after the external Walschaerts  valve gear of the Ivatt this was nice and straight-forward. I've opted to design the chassis using what I have learnt from the design of Brassmasters' Easichas(sis). I've used their square hornblocks and run them in the chassis cut outs, adding an overlay which combines the cosmetic leave spring below the axlebox and a continuous springy beam (CSB) wire carrier above. Rather than have to solder hand rail knobs or the like into the chassis for the CSB wire pivots I have just located the chassis cross members in the right places and added holes for the wire. The result is a simple to assemble sprung chassis.
     

     
    Inspired by David Lane (BigCheeseplant) I had a go at 3D printing my own centres to convert Alan Gibson 16 spoke wheels into 15 spoke GER wheels. He kindly sent me a 3D model but in the end I went back to the Great Eastern Railway Society drawing and made my own. A friend with a lathe produced a nice little jig to allow me to assemble the wheel and tyre ensuing that everything is concentric. 
     

     
    The resulting chassis runs, I think I might have to look at pinning the wheels to the axles because the resin is not as 'grippy' as the Alan Gibson plastic. As per normal power is provide using High Level Models superb gearbox and motor.
     

     
    I printed the body work out yesterday. Five and half hours on the Phrozen Sonic Mini 4K produced this lot, I will go back and do some modification in the slicer to modify some of the support, some is not needed and there are some bits where moving it would make removal easier. Still not bad for an afternoons' printing.

     
    Bearing in mind that the photograph above is BEFORE I've done anything to the surface finish, there really isn't that much required. After removing just a bit of support resin.....
     

     
    .... I was left with these pieces for the body and tender.
     

     
    and these for the inside motion (I've since realized I need to split these again because of one of the frame spaces)

     
    So now I have to solder up the footplate and cab etches and make the etched tender chassis.
     
     
    The etchings will allow for multiple variants of the body, I've already drawn up one version as vacuum fitted and one as steam braked only. I've got versions of the tender with and without the cut out for the token exchange equipment. It should be possible to do non-super heated version (shorted smokebox without rivets) and even a round topped boiler J16 version. I'll be interested to hear what folks think about a 'mixed media' kit like this so please let me know.
     
    David
  6. Fen End Pit

    Fitting TOUs

    By Fen End Pit,

    I spent a few hours today fitting the TOUs and servos which I built yesterday. I'm hoping a step by step guide might be useful to some people.
     
    The first step is to drill the holes which the TOU will go through to connect to the switch blades. If you are sensible and have planned ahead you will of course have drilled these before you stuck the point down or at least before you fitted the rails! However all is not lost as you can carefully drill a couple of pilot holes in the right place about 5mm from the end of the switch blade. Having drilled these I then VERYCAREFULLY opened the holes out to 8mm in several stages, making sure that the drill bit didn't go to far and touch the rails! A decent electric drill helped here (good to know I got something useful for working with my current employer for 5 years!). Designing the bracing on the board so it won't foul the TOU is obviously a must (spot the deliberate mistake).
     

     
    The TOU and servo mount were positioned under the board, It is a bit tricky to see both sides of the board at once and I found that putting some double sided tape on the units helped me stick them to the board while then allowing me to adjust a bit. It provides enough hold to them allow me to get a pilot hole drilled prior to putting the screws in.
     

     
    Then the length of .8mm brass wire can be bent up. I usually go for a short right angle bend and then bend that slightly to one side so that the short section will sit into the web of the bull-head rail. The wire can then be threaded down through the brass tube and soldered to the rail. Once both sides are done the TOU should move the blades smoothly. There is space for a little bit of tweaking if the blades aren't quite the right distance apart, the tube will take a little bend if you need 1/2mm of extra or less movement.
     

     
    Next job is to link the TOU to the servo, and this is where the real advantage of the servo comes into play. Because you can adjust the throw so easily you don't have to fiddle about making the linkage exactly the right length. I simply made a short length of steel wire by eye the distance from the hole in the TOU operating arm to the centre of the servo drive. Then I fitted one of the smallest servo arms (the servos have a variety of shapes and sizes supplied) and threaded the wire linkage between the two units.
     

     
    The downside of servos of course is that they need some electronics to make them work, but the 4 servo unit produced by the MERG (called a Servo4) is very easy to build and cheap at GBP 5.50. This unit has 4 double-pole-double-throw switches connected to it, one pole switching the frog polarity and the other switching the input on the Servo4. To set the board up you can either build and use the purpose built programmer which the MERG sell (probably a good idea to get one to take to exhibitions if you need to do any adjustment) or use a serial cable to a PC running the ServoSet application.
     

     
    The Servoset application runs on windows (there is a java based version available I believe for linux users). The left hand side of the display shows which servo you are programming and where it is connected on the Servo4 board. In the centre are the sliders which you move up and down to set the on and off positions and the speed you want the servo to move at. Once happy you just write the data to the board and you can disconnect the PC.
     

     
    The servos make a noise if you push them too hard so it is easy to get a feel for where to set the end points, you shouldn't need so much torque that the servo buzzes. The servo controller switches off the power to the servo after 5 seconds so that they are completely silent once changed (unlike some of the alternatives which stall a motor and can hum gentle to themselves).
     
    If you are offended by a brief plug for the MERG please stop reading now!
     
    Just to finish, a few thoughts about cost. A quick internet trawl shows a typical Tortoise point motor at about GBP 14.50, a Cobalt point motor at GBP 17.50 and a typical Servo at under GBP 3 and the MERG's Servo4 board at GBP 5.50. So, four points driven by Tortoises would cost GBP 58.00 while four driven by servos comes out at GBP 17.50. I think the difference pays for the MERG membership fee several times over.
     
    David
  7. Fen End Pit
    I managed to get the lever frame I'd printed painted (as per posting on the Anycubic photon thread) but additional furniture was required.
     

     
    I found a website which had photographs of the tokens for the sections either side of Clare. These showed that the token apparatus was of two different types. A Tyer number 6 and a Tyer number 9, the web also furnished pictures of each type which I tried to model up in CAD. The results came out rather well, even the details of the pile of tokens in the number 9 machine came out.
     

     
    Any Bobby needs a stove and a decent chair so I went to the Thingyverse  and found a few other bits of furniture, I still need a desk for the train register. To be honest you really can't see much of this once the roof is on but you get enough of an idea that there is something going on.
     

     

     
    Must get around to adding the drain pipes and stove chimney, I'm not convinced by the 'H' shaped chimney in the kit. If anyone has any ideas how it should look I'd love to hear.
     
    David
     
  8. Fen End Pit
    Thursday night saw the bodies of the wagons fitted and Friday evening was spent fitting weight and Alex Jackson couplings. Still need to fit the dropper wires for the coupling.
     

     
    I realized that having removed the toy hinges for the side doors I needed to replace them with something more to scale. A few pieces of plasticard from the scrap box were enough to fabricate something suitable. Painting was by brush with Humbrol acrylics.
     

     
    Transfers from the Modelmaster range were applied this afternoon, the only concern I had was that the white diagonal line on the transfer sheet looked incredibly wide. I reduced the thickness to about a scale 4 inches. I put a bit of Railmatch matt varnish over the transfers to avoid them coming off later.
     
    Finally I've started the weathering with various washes of dilute dark rust and black, still a little way to go to even out some of the lines which look a bit too defined. A final spray with some frame dirt will be next.
     

     
    Not bad for a 30 year old kit.
     
    David
  9. Fen End Pit

    16mm photo-plank - Pillar Drill and test wall

    By Fen End Pit,


    16mm photo-plank
    As I mentioned in my last blog the next bit of workshop machinery I fancied trying to reproduce was a pillar drill. This proved to be quite a tricky bit of modeling just because there were so many features. I'd taken a photograph of this drill in the shed at Thelkeld.
     
     

    It looked to me as if the drill was originally belt driven with a 'new' electric motor powering the original drive wheel at the bottom. There then seems to be a belt which takes the drive to the top of the drill via a choice of three pairs of pulleys depending on the speed you require. I could also see the interesting hand wheel which raises and lowers the platform on the pillar. I'm not really sure exactly what all the rest of the gubbins on the top of the drill is for. Perhaps someone can enlighten me. It looked to me as if there was a handle to pull down the drill head but it looks as if this can be reconfigured to give some kind of automatic geared lowering? It looks like you could set the machine up and leave it to drill down at a preset speed? Anyway, it had lots of interesting shapes and, while I've not exactly modeled it all precisely I hope I've captured the feel of the prototype.
     

    The main pillar was divided into two and the table and bottom drive wheels printed as separate parts. Also separate are the hand wheel to lift the table and the quadrant handle. The parts took just over 4 hours to print at .04mm layer height on the Anycubic Photon. The parts took a little cleaning up but I was blown away by the detail which came out. The toothed rack behind the drill head and the teeth of the gears came out remarkable well, even the lift rod on the table has a thread on it (albeit with a rather coarse pitch than the prototype).

     
     
     

    Please bear in mind that this part is only 35mm from front to back.
     

    I intend to make some drive belts out of paper in a bit.
     
    I found a rather nice Bachmann 16mm fireman and together with workbench you can get a sense of scale.
     
     

     
    The sharp eyed amongst you will have noticed that there is a section of wall behind the workbench rather that piece of MDF and I'd like your opinion on this. I've never been any good at trying to scribe random stone so I thought I'd try a rolling pin I downloaded from the thingiverse. This printed out on my Ender 5 and looks, well frankly, a bit weird. The roller is 86mm tall and ~25mm diameter so gives a repeat in the pattern at ~80mm. I laid down a 6mm thick of layer of Sculptamold and let it go off for about 30 minutes until it was firm but still 'green'. The roller was rolled into the surface and it took the pattern well. I then made the pattern slightly less patio and more wall by adding in some extra horizontal joints in the stonework. I also found I could smooth in a little extra Sculptamold to fill in some of the joints to make the pattern so it didn't repeat so obviously. Finally I found that a coarse old paint brush could be used to apply a little more texture and strata markings to individual rocks. Do you think this will work as the inside walls of the shed? Ultimately I want something which looks like old white-washed stone.

     
     
     
     
    Please let me know what you think.
     
    David
     

  10. Fen End Pit
    My clever wife bought me a new 3D printer for Christmas (how did she guess what I wanted?)
     

    I was a bit concerned because the box was shipped direct from China by FedEx via what appears to be a puddle at Cologne Airport. Creality customer service were very helpful and we decided it was worth trying to build it and just replace any bits if we found they had been damaged. In the end everything went together very easily ( about 30-45 minutes assembly to first print) and I managed to print off the sample 'little dog'.

     
    The only issue I had was that the print bed was just slightly bent and trying to get it level just using the four leveling screws proved difficult. This wouldn't be a problem for small pieces but trying to print large models would have been impossible.
     
    Fortunately I had already fitted a BLTouch probe to my old Wanhao duplicator i3 plus printer and I decided to move this onto the new Ender 5. This device allows the printer to detect the actual position of the bed and the firmware then adjusts for any differences in height. The mounting bracket was printed off prior to fitting.

     
    You can see that a diagnostic test of a single layer print adhered well to the bed and gave a decent evenly printed part. I was a little scared of doing the additional wiring and firmware update to make this work but in the end it went pretty smoothly following some decent guides on Youtube.
     
    As I had white filament supplied with the printer and it is Christmas I found a polar bear on the thingiverse to print. It came out really nicely and the layer surface finish is excellent for a filament printer though it is hard to see in the pictures as my camera seems to refuse to focus on the part properly.
     


    You'll probably be wondering why I wanted another filament printer. Well while I think the Anycubic Photon is great for the small detail work in resin but the old Wanhao was still used for 'structural' bits like servo mounts and uncoupling magnet mechanisms. It is very noisy compared with the new Ender 5 and I wanted something that I could do various upgrades to.
     
    Festive greetings to you all.
     
    David
     

  11. Fen End Pit
    A bit of standard gauge for a change. I took delivery of a couple of the new Bachmann grain wagons which have been on order with Hattons for what seems like years. I've got a P4 wheel set in it now and replaced the coupling with Alex Jacksons. I can (just) remember seeing these being loaded at Sandy on the occasions when I used to cycle over there to watch some proper main-line trains in the later '70s. By then they were in a 'rust based livery' but I think they had been going that way for some years.
     
    As usual Paul Bartlett's site comes to the rescue with some suitable pictures.
     
    So I had a go at dry brushing on some rust and also added a bit of weathering power. I still need to give the underframe a quick dusting on Rail Match frame dirt.
     
    So, my question to the jury is, 'Have I overdone it?'
     

     
    David
  12. Fen End Pit
    *This is the standing joke in my house when model railways become just too difficult.
     
    I'm in the dumps as no matter what I try I just can't get a brick finish I'm happy with, I can see now why I stuck to using Scalescenes for so long, I just can't paint brickwork.
     
    The desk is covered with dozens of little laser cut test sheds which are going to end up in the bin very soon at this rate.
     

     
    I've tried painting a brick colour in Enamel and using an Acrylic to run the mortar into the cracks. I've tried painting the whole building in a mortar colour and then painting the bricks using a sponge pad. I'm incapable of picking out individual bricks i just end up with painty blobs and I don't seem to be able to get enough of the 'mortar wash' off the surface of the bricks (using water or IPA) to bring it back to a decent colour.
     

     

     
    I'll admit to feeling right royally hacked off with it.
     
    HELP!
     
    David
     
    edit :- feeling better already
     

  13. Fen End Pit
    I've been making slow progress on the scenics over the last couple of weeks. I've covered all the polystyrene with a layer of Sculptamold and got what I hope will be a suitable base for static grassing in a future.
     

     
    I'd not used this stuff until I was recommended it by one of my friends, having always used modrock or other plaster bandage type things in the past. I've been very impressed as it dries quickly, forms a strong layer even when applied quite thinly and is very light. It sticks well to itself so you can mix a small quantity up at a time and work on little areas.
     
    I found mixing in an old plastic container and spreading with a plastic tool which was originally intended for removing prints from a 3D printer (but was useless for that purpose) worked well.
     
     
    The resulting ground has been painted with poster paint to hopefully give a reasonable base. I think the intention is to cover with a sprinkling of sieved soil (Our American friends might say 'Yard dirt') and seal the surface a little more before applying static grass. In the photograph below the right hand track is the running line and the left hand track just a siding/lay-by hence the smoking staining on the bridge being on one side only.

     
    I gave the track a spray with Railmatch' Sleeper Grime' with a sideways waft of 'rust' to paint the rails. Ballast is Woodland Scenics grey, using a mix a medium and fine grades. I tried sticking it down with both DeLuxe Materials 'Ballast Bond' which is a dilute glue and 'Ballast Magic' which is a dry powder that you add to the ballast as you apply it and then spray with water. Of the two methods I'll admit to getting on better with the 'Ballast Magic', being able to apply the ballast and move it about in a dry state and then just spray some water on with a fine sprayer seems the easiest approach. I found some tiny spray bottles with the 'liquids must be in a transparent bottle for airport security' bottles in Sainsbury's for ~75p.
     

     
    The cess is Woodland Scenic fine cinders which hopefully will get blended in a little when the ballast gets a light weathering later. The idea is that there used to be a track on the left hand side of the formation which has been removed, I'm trying to work out whether to ballast with the light grey or cinders.
     
    The river area is coming on. I've used Sculptamold to form a river bank and will ultimately use a two-part resin to make the water (hence the 'dam' at the back of the layout!). I'm quite happy with the shape of the land, I don't think it looks too bad, you can see the path of the disused farm track which lead down from the road over the bridge to the now disused loading siding. I'm planning on this having some overgrown hedges and grass rather than anything paved.
     

     
    I think I'm pleased with the way the bridge is looking, The abutments look ok with a mixture of red and blue brick.
     

     
    It is a bit weird actually doing scenic work on a 4mm scale layout after so long. I don't think I've modeled scenic areas like this for about 20 years. I'm getting quite excited about it turning green over the next week or so.
     
    David
     
  14. Fen End Pit
    I designed and printed a servo operated uncoupling magnet for the Alex Jackson couplings I'm using on my P4 layout. Many people just use an electromagnet to do this but I don't really like the current these draw and get worried about them burning themselves out if left on for too long while you shunt wagons over them. One solution is to use a permanent magnet and move it up and down so it that it attracts the coupling (or doesn't).
    As usual there were a few iterations in the design to get the sizes right but I managed to get a design that worked in the end. I used a short length of styrene  tube in the design as this is smoother than trying to print a tube and results in less friction.
    As I already have all the infrastructure to control servos under the layout fitting the device was very simple.
    The operation can be seen in this Youtube clip
     
    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=11sM5U8yVQs
     
    Now I can waste hours shunting in and out of the coal siding.
     
    David
     
  15. Fen End Pit
    I did a bit of 3d modelling in CAD this weekend and produced some rainwater goods. This included some of the castings that hold the pipes onto the walls, some spouts for the bottom of downpipes and some hoppers for where one pipe goes into another. I also drew up some chimney pots and some suitcases, just for the laughs.
     
    They came out pretty well on the Anycubic photon.

     
    The holes in the drain components were drawn at 1.3mm and drilled out easily to fit some plastruct rod of that size. These were made up into various downpipes I needed.
     

     
    The east side of the building has a downpipe for the gutters and a stench pipe, the later goes up through the roof.
     
     

     
    On the other side has a pipe down the corner of the wall which joins on with the guttering from the lower part of the roof. I had  to remove the guttering I'd attached to the lower section because I realised I'd made the overhang too long and it prevented the downpipe from fitting in. I'll fix this  in a bit. There is also a downpipe for the lower section which goes down the wall of the toilet block. The windows still haven't been  glued in yet as I'm still not I'm quite happy with them which is why the front of the waiting shelter isn't quite vertical.
     

     
    As you can see the chimney pot got stuck in place too.
     
    David
     
     
  16. Fen End Pit
    First up, here is a picture of what I've done with the top of the water tank. in the absence of pictures or drawings I'm hoping I've got something which is plausible. I stuck some plastruct angle inside the tank and then tried to model some tie-bars to hold it all together. The water is clear acrylic with the bottom painted black.
     

     
    Next is a little experiment on one of those things which is just so much easier to make when you have something that cuts accurately! I drew up this wagon turntable and cut it as 2 layers of 1.5mm MDF stuck onto a base of 3mm MDF. The rails are just short lengths of phosphor bronze rail stuck in place. The fact that the slots are accurate means that it is easy just to get the gauge and alignment right.
     

     
    A wagon rolls on it and it turns very easily.
     

     
    I'm half wondering about cutting a few of these and seeing if anyone would like to buy them off me. I'd have to modify the drawing to go from 18.83 to EM or OO but that should be straight-forward. I'm thinking it will be quite easy to drive with a servo to make it turn, I've not made any attempt to power the rails as I don't think locos would have past over it.
     
    David
  17. Fen End Pit
    Over the last week or so I've been inspired by an article in the MERG magazine to have a go with an Arduino. These little micro-controllers are ridiculously cheap and can be programmed to do all kinds of things. I've chosen to control a couple of stepper motors to make a pair of level crossing gates.
     

     
     
     
    David
  18. Fen End Pit
    I made a start on the etched chassis for the Slater's simplex. The etch is quite thick material so a little filing needed to remove tabs and cusp. Very pleased with how well the parts fitted. A fair amount of heat was needed to get the solder to flow but the resulting chassis is strong and square.
     

     
    The horn guides are cleverly made from the etched parts and form a slot which allows the horn block to move vertically. Again the fit the very good just requiring a few strokes with a file to get a smooth vertical movement with no horizontal wobble.
     

     
    The parts for the brake gear also got attached at this point, the pull rod, complete with turn-buckle is just located in the castings at the moment, the instructions suggest not fitting permanently until the wheels the in place.
     

     
    Next step involves sprung plunger pickups.... I'm enjoying this.
     
    I'm starting to consider the possibility of putting a sound chip in this. Trying to find a Simplex sound is hard but what do you think to this one?
    http://www.d-i-e-t-z.de/jd/mp3/micro/klanzh.mp3
     
    David
  19. Fen End Pit
    One of the things about keeping a blog is that it makes you photograph your models and one of the things about photographing your models is that every time you do you just can't avoid seeing the faults in the results - things that somehow the eye only picks up when blown up on the screen when you look at the photograph.
     
    So, here is the current state of the E4. I had to go back once and clean off around the dome which I didn't really pick up until I took some pictures last night. Tonight I can see boiler isn't quite fitted properly and I've not put the valve cover in place.
     
    Still, it is the right colour, not covered in the dreaded 'orange peel' and it runs smoothly. I had to attack the inside of the tender side-frames with insulation tape just to make sure the wheels didn't short on the frames.
     
    I think locos always look a bit weird before you get the numbers and crests in place and a bit of light weathering will make a big difference.
     

     
    David
  20. Fen End Pit
    I've made a start on the point rodding for Clare. Before anyone asks this is NOT functional! It has been great fun trying to work out the rodding runs from photographs as they changed over time at the Cavendish end when the coal siding was realigned. The prototype was built using round rod rather than the more modern square section - typically I had bought a load of .5mm square brass wire from Eileen!
     
    I've used cranks from Brassmasters and rodding stools from DCC concepts. These rodding stools are hand-cut in purest platinum by a zen hermit hiding in a cave in the Himalayas* and cost an appropriate amount.

     
    The lead-out from the signal box was made up as one unit and sits in the hole in the platform face. I've still got to put in the wire runs for the signals but most of these just go straight across to the face of the opposite platform.

     
    The platform isn't stuck down yet so there is still a bit of a gap.

     
    Just as the run gets to the baseboard joint it takes a 90 degree angle to jump to between the tracks in the loop, however one of the rods also goes straight on as it operators the catch point on the coal siding.  The run then continues between the tracks until just after the river bridge where it jumps back to the far side of the original siding's alignment. This will mean in my timescale that there is a space between the running line and the rodding where the siding used to be.
     

     
    Please bear in mind these photos are pretty cruel enlargements!
     
    * actually I think they are molded in Delrin or a particularly hard plastic. It has been quite easy to cut out one of the central wheels to make a 1-rod and 2-rod stool.
     
    I have also purchased some of the Woodland Scenics static grass which seems to be quite a bit less 'shiny' than some of the other brands (I'm looking at you Peco). I've tried adding some using a layering glue aerosol. The result is better but I obviously still need to do a lot more varieties of texture before I'm done.
     

     
    You can see the difference between the area on the far side of the track and that nearest the camera.
     

     
    Must get the hoover on the track again - I just used the little dust buster with a sock over the end to pick up most of the loose fibres.
     
    I've found one nice photograph which shows a row of beehives along the bank where the track is. These were obviously only positioned there once the siding had fallen into disuse. I wonder whether they were tended by a railway man?
     
    David
     
     
     
  21. Fen End Pit
    This is one for those of you who fancy building potato or sugar beet railways, or maybe a drainage board line taking clay to strengthen a bank. I took these pictures a good few years back during an afternoon driving around the fen. Some of these magnificent buildings are still standing though most of the engines inside them have long since gone.
     
    First up is Hundred foot bank, near Welney.
     

     
    Like several of the engine houses you have a tall central section which originally housed a large beam engine. The lower brick section nearest the camera held the scoop wheel while the section on the other side was a boiler house. The extension at the end with the large door is later addition which would have housed the diesel replacement for the steam engine. Stretham Old Engine is very similar and still contains the preserved beam engine.
     

     
    The end of the extension needed a fair bit of buttressing to stop it from falling over!
     

     
    The rear of the extension is distinctly more utilitarian than the original building.
     

     

     
    I think it is fair to say that the modern replacement station which is adjacent to it doesn't quite have the same presence and the automated weed rake doesn't quite have the same attraction as the Ruston 10RB drag-line it would have replaced.
     

     
    Again at the other end of the spectrum is this tiny pump which I'm afraid I don't have a record of the location of. It contained a single electric centrifuge pump.
     

     
    On the A10 just north of Brandon creek are this pair of engine houses. One had been converted into a house at this time but the other still contained an engine and pump.
     

     
    I used the other engine house at this location as the basis for a building on my 7mm narrow gauge layout 'The Works' several decades ago.
     



     
    Along the old bank between Littleport and Ely was this old engine house. The road had a distinct bump where it went over the main water pipe. The chimney had long since been taken down and capped but the building still housed a pump.
     


     
    On the River Lark near Prickwillow is this little group of buildings
     

     
    At this site there was still an old boiler.
     

     
    Last of the pumping station photographs is this one of the engine house at 'The Overfall' on the road from Ely to Queen Adelaide along the river, this was where the original route of the River Ouse turned towards Prickwillow before the new cut direct between Ely and Littleport cut off the corner. This engine house has now been demolished but there is still a modern pump at this location. 
     

     
    Finally there is a wonderful collection of farm buildings behind the museum at Prickwillow. This is the one I based the new engine shed on Fen End Pit on.
     

     

     
    The curved end has this wonderful lattice beam structure.
     

     
    I hope you enjoyed that quick drive around the fens.
     
    David
  22. Fen End Pit
    I had a go at cutting the building again, this time in the more conventional 3mm MDF, using .7mm ply for the quions. The result fitted together quite nicely, though I probably shouldn't have turned the 'corner power' down so far on the ply as I had to resort to a scalpel to get some of the parts free.
     


     
    Before discussing painting here is a picture of Clare station to give you some idea of the colouring. I'm not convinced that four decades of no trains and possible cleaning haven't changed the colour a bit.
     

     
    I painted the building with an acrylic varnish to seal it, and then fairly crudely painted the walls in Humbrol brick red (Matt 70) and the quions in light stone (Matt 121).
     

     
    When dry I applied ModelMates Brick joint filler, This is an interesting material as you are meant to paint it on, leave it to dry and then wipe off with a damp cloth (or in my case cotton buds)

     
    The problem I have is that the filler also tones down the colour of the bricks making them too pale and I'm not sure that the mortar would really be that white.
     
    I've tried dealing with that by applying some earth weathering powder and then washing most of it off the brickwork. I'd appreciate your views on the result. Worth putting a roof on?
     

     
    thanks
    David
  23. Fen End Pit
    I finished off my P4 conversion of the Hornby horsebox. It is a lovely model and I am very pleased with how it looks. The original W-irons were filed down to wafer thin and then I stuck a set of Bill Bedford sprung W-irons behind them.
     

     
    I purchased some of the new Lanarkshire  models Jackson coupling droppers and fitted these. I've always hated trying to make droppers for Jackson's as I never seemed to be able to either bend iron wire to the right shape or solder iron wire to the sprung guitar string . These etches fold over the coupling wire just in line with the coupling hook, an iron link is added under the etch which is what is attracted to the uncoupling magnet.
     

     
    The finished dropper is discrete and looks very good.
     

     
    I also made some more progress on the station building. I 3D printed a load more guttering and stuck these onto the bargeboards. I looked at the few colour photographs I have of Clare and it appears that the ironwork and the windows surrounds were a light green colour, a slightly lighter version of the colour used on the beams of the signalbox. Next up will be the chimneys and the skylights. (yes I have got to retouch the bottom row of slates)
     

     
  24. Fen End Pit
    Friday night saw the ends of the Wickham trolley assembled and then Saturday saw the roof bent to shape and the parts soldered together. At the moment everything is just resting together but you get the general idea. The wires sticking out the front are to the motor.
     

     
    The plan is to stick a DCC chip under the roof and run the four wires up the each of the corner posts, the power from the track up the rear posts and the drive back to the motor down the front ones. The seats were mighty fiddly but the effect of not having the trolley filled with mechanism is rather nice.
     
    I also did a bit of drawing, followed by some laser cutting this lunchtime. The result is a prototype under baseboard turnout operating unit. The idea of the design is that the brass tubes stick up through the baseboard and have a wire attached to the switch blade threaded through them. The drawing needs a bit of fine tuning to get the holes a nice tight fit but the basic principle seems good and very easy to put together.
     

     
    Let me know what you think..
     
    David
  25. Fen End Pit
    Having finished soldering bits on to the loco body it was out with the glue to fasten on the boiler fittings, Westinghouse pump and lubricator.
     
    The Westinghouse pump casting broke in half as I was trying to clean it up so the middle section was replaced with lengths of brass wire. The hole in the footplate for the pipework from the pump didn't match with the drawing or photographs so it got filled and re-drilled.
     
    I had a slight 'Oh $h1t' moment when I looked at the plans and saw two snifter valves behind the chimney. Then I looked at the photograph of my chosen loco and it appears to only have one. I presume that different engines and boilers had then fitted differently?
     
    The lubricator had three horizontal holes drilled in it so I fed some .33mm wire through these and then bent the wires to feed either side of the valve chest and disappear behind the frame sides. I softened the wire first by heating so that it would make the tight bends better.
     

     
    so still left we have boiler bands, guard irons and brakes.... and a tender.
     
    The motor has still to be fitted but the loco pushes nicely through my single-slip so I'm hopeful it should stay on the track.
     
    David
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