Fen End Pit

In my previous blog on this subject I mentioned I'd 3D printed some wheel centres to fit into Alan Gibson 4'10" tyres. I put these into my test chassis and got it working but I was not entirely happy with the result. The issue I believe is that 'Gibson Style' wheels rely on having the centre molded out of a fairly 'grippy' plastic, the hole through the centre is designed to be a good tight fit on an 1/8th inch axle. even so most of us have had a wheel be a bit loose at times and some people resort to pinning the wheels to the axles. Those modelling in OO and EM have the opportunity to use wheels from Romford, now Markits which make use of an axle with a square end which fits into a square hole in the back of the wheel. I thought I'd try and replicate this with my wheel centre print so modified the wheel centre to match the style of a Romford wheel and I purchased some Markits EM axles. Obviously the P4 Back-to-Back is slightly wider than the EM one so my wheels needed a little section in the back to take their thickness out so that when fastened to the EM axles they present a P4 Back-to-Back. The drawing shows the rear of the wheel centre. Printing horizontally does mean that the back of the wheel has all the support structure which needs to be removed but it cleans up alright (photo taken half way through the process). The key is not to interfere with the central boss and just to make the rest of the wheel rear smooth. I've put a touch of black sharpie on the rear of the wheel to better show up the square whole. I had to play about a bit with the model to get the right size central boss. A little bit of trial and error was needed at this point but in the end I fitted all 3 axles to the test chassis and the quartering of the wheels worked from the get-go. Obviously I'll need to make some covers for the axle ends but the result took less effort than using my GW wheel press. I have now assembled the footplate and cab sides and it all fits together quite nicely with the 3D printed boiler though nothing is fastened down at this point. I've borrowed a GW models roller to roll the cab roof (thanks Middlepeak) so that is the next job on the cab. Although I have etched the brake gear I've also produced a 3D printed version of the brake hangers and brake blocks to see how they work and whether they are robust enough. I also need to make up the tender chassis, I've rubbed down the tender sides very slightly to remove a little bit of marking from the printing process. All together I think it is some good progress. David

One of the hardest bits with the PDK kits for ex-GER locomotives is the tender flairs. The 3D print comes out pretty well and slight line you see on the photo cleans up quite easily. As to the robustness the 3D print I have on my first J17 is still looking good after being hauled around and shown to various people. I have had the footsteps break off with heavy handling but stick back on with superglue. David

I've often joked about putting something in the sand pit of Fen End Pit to dig up but this takes it to a different level! David

On Sunday Fen End Pit visited the Narrow Gauge show being organised at Bressingham Steam Museum in Norfolk. It was an excellent day out and thanks are due to the organising team for putting on a good show. We were able to set up on the Saturday evening which meant a much more relaxed setup and an extra hours' lie-in. The layout worked pretty well, no big issues which impacted operation. As usual my son produced a long list of 'improvements' to keep me busy for a few months. The room we were set up in is used as a creche so, if we got bored, we could play with the Brio or the play fire-engine! The artwork was attractive, even if not the most realistic clouds I've ever seen on a backscene! Operation was working so well that I was even able to leave the layout in the capable hands of 'the crew' while I sneaked out and had a run around on the Nursery line. Some of the crew got their own back and had a ride on the Gallopers in the background! On standard gauge duty was a Southern 'P' and we obviously went at paid our respects the 'Eric' the E4 and the J69 from the National Collection which were in the museum shed. If you haven't been to Bressingham it is certainly worth a visit, it was great to see so many people there and to hear that their programmes on channel 5 have had a positive impact on visitor numbers. Next to us in the creche was a lovely On14 layout Gweithdy Dyffryn which was featured quite recently in NG&IRM Review. The pretty much unique feature was the modelling of working stub points. It was the layout's first outing to a show and the owner said it was ok for me to include a couple of photos here. David

Take a look at the bogie power designed on the CLAG website http://www.clag.org.uk/index.html some interesting work by the likes of Ted Ted Scannell and Graham Hickson. While focused on P4 some of the ideas and suppliers of motors/gears might be applicable to other scales. David

I see Markits do a 4'9" 15 spoke wheel which would probably be fine in EM or OO. The frames I have designed fold up to be a suitable width for P4 but I've included spacers on the etch which can be used if you need something narrower. David

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

I've been working on a chassis and detailing kit for a Bachmann Ivatt class 2 2-6-0 tender loco for several years now with my friends from Brassmasters. Progress has been sporadic but we recently received another set of test etches from PPD and this time we got two copies, one is being build by one of the Brassmasters team using the full Easi-Chas approach using the Bachmann motor and gears and mine is being built using a High Level gearbox and motor. This later option allows you to fill in the front of the Belpaire firebox and move the backhead in the cab forward. The basic 0-6-0 chassis s is fairly straight-forward sprung using the Brassmasters horn blocks and springs. With the fold up design of the side frames and the soldered on rear and front the unit comes out rather nicely. You can see that the front crank pin has been reversed and slimmed down to get the clearance behind the crossheads, a perennial problem in P4, less so in EM. The coupling rods are jointed in the prototypical manner. The motor ends up vertical in the smokebox so the gearbox is not in the correct orientation in the photo. The cylinders are made up with brass tube for the piston and valve rods. Trying to design the etch to form the valve spindle rods/cover was a bit of a strain on the brain. Still I am quite pleased with the result. The slide bars are a fold up etch, one of several deliberately designed with a frame around them to make alignment easier and add additional strength while fettling. There is an alignment hole to aid soldering the unit at the right angle when you get to that stage. The cross-head may look ridiculously complicated but the fold up nature and the support/alignment frame actually make it relatively straight-forward. The parts can be tinned, folded, aligned with a couple of pairs of tweezers and then sweated together. The slidebars, cylinders and cross heads can then be test fitted before you start making the rest of the valve gear. I won't go blow-by-blow through the valve gear. I've been writing the instructions at the same time as building this and have probably gone a bit overboard with detail and photos of each bit of rod. Trying to remember your combination lever from your return crank from you radius rod is designed to exercise the grey matter. But if you go one bit at a time you hopefully end up with something that looks like this. As a bit of light relief I worked on the tender chassis, much less fiddly but also sprung with continuous springy beams. Finally I have the chassis matched with the body, the brake-gear added and a Brassmasters Ivatt pony truck to match. The body is looking a bit mashed about as it has now been used and abused all the way through the design and build process. Also it is totally the wrong colour for Clare, deep in G.E.R. territory. Now I have a working chassis I intend to fit it under a second black Ivatt which will look much more appropriate. So what is still to do before we have something which could be a kit? Well, as usual at this stage we have a little 'snag list' mostly of the 'make this hole a bit bigger/smaller', 'move this slot by .5mm', add parts on the etch for the early/later version of X. But, it is coming along..... David

Hi Malcolm It was good to meet you too.. I have a Phrozen Sonic 4K. (there is an 8K coming soon for ~£300) Typically I'm using Onshape for my 3D CAD drawing. It is available for non-commercial hobbyist use. Hope that helps David

Yesterday we took Fen End Pit out to the Norfolk and Suffolk Narrow Gauge modellers open day in exotic Beccles and an excellent day was had by all. It took us a few minutes longer to put the layout up than it should. I'd forgotten which way around the legs went after nearly 3 years since the last show (must label them better!) I'd checked each baseboard out and cleaned everything and everything worked pretty well. We seemed to be appreciated by the public (several children not old enough to know better described the drag-line as 'really cool') and it was great to catch up with an natter to some old friends. Thanks are due to the organizing team for putting on such a fun and relaxed day. One thing we were able to play with was the new addition to the locomotive stud, a wireless controlled Wingrove and Rogers battery electric locomotive. This ran nicely on the straight track but suffered with the overfine profile of the wheels on the nasty curves. I'd used Alan Gibson O gauge lowmac wheels for the basis of the drive wheels and while these seem fine on the skip wagons the act of driving them seems to make them climb over the rails on the sharpest points. Does anyone have a good source of a relatively coarse scale O gauge lowmac wheel? I've after ~20mm diameter with a rather heavy flange and tread? We need to get these battery locomotives working reliably if we are ever going to meet our Net-Zero targets! Meanwhile the Ruston LAT paused in the shed waiting for the battery to run our. <shameless plug mode>We came away rather looking forward to our next trip out to Bressingham on 9th July.</shameless plug mode> David

I'm really pleased that after having no shows for what seems like years owing to the pandemic we finally have the opportunity to take Fen End Pit out again. Next Saturday, 3rd June, we are going to the Norfolk and Suffolk Narrow Gauge Modellers' open day in Beccles. https://www.ukmodelshops.co.uk/event/y2023/25165-NorfolkSuffolkNarrowGaugeModellers_OpenDay Then, all being well, we are attending the Bressingham Narrow Gauge model railway show on Sunday 9th July. https://bressingham.co.uk/events/2023/narrow-gauge-model-railway-show Having had an excellent day out at RailEx today I really looking forward to taking my own layout out again. Looking forward to seeing people there... David

I loved the phrase 'engine rich exhaust' David

After several weeks and lots of help from RMwebber UAX6 I now finally have the Type A and Type B telephone exchange completed. For such relatively simple building there are some subtle details which are quite difficult to get right. The slight 'pagoda' look to the hip roof of the B and the little tiles on the quoins of the smaller Type A. There a a few very interesting websites with lots of photographs of different exchanges and these have lots of photographs of similar buildings from all over the country. It was quite common to have a pair together like this where the equipment outgrew the original building. https://www.uax.me.uk/ http://www.aeolian-hall.myzen.co.uk/ I took more attempts than it should have taken to get a laser cutter drawing which I was happy with and now all I have to do is bed them into the layout. A visit to the March model railway exhibition turned up a Morris van in GPO guise and again UAX6 helped with some additional background I added wing mirrors and painted the hub caps black. It is interesting that when you look online for pictures all the 'preserved' moggies have lots of shiny chrome which isn't original. So now I have a load of work to do bedding them in, adding a bit of picket fencing and completing the ground texture in the goods yard. David

I use Wilco smooth surface interior filler, I add a little water and wipe it over the brickwork and then wipe it off. I then final wash over the wall with Vallejo grey wash. David

Glad you enjoyed it. I'm sorry I have no details on the camera, it came from China and, while it has 'Sports DV' and 'UKK@SXA1705S' on the box, that doesn't bring up anything on Google. David

I went through a very similar process with a Comet Thompson full-brake. The roof profile was per some drawing on a thread about Gresley coaches on Western Thunder. https://www.westernthunder.co.uk/threads/gresley-carriages-in-detail.9809/ I ended up 3d printing a roof because the Comet one didn't really match the LNER being a sort of cross between a Midland and GWR carriage roof. I also remodeled and printed the ends to match the new profile. I'm fairly happy with the result now. Trying to pluck up the courage to glaze it next and decide whether it gets lining. David

I had a bit of fun with a miniature camera. I've also continued to work on the low-relief malting buildings for the far corner of the layout. I'm rather pleased with the brickwork, just trying to pluck up the courage to add the mortar mix. The different colours of brickwork came out very well thanks to Tamiya masking tape. I'm quite pleased with the way the loading area looks. Even though you won't be able to see much of it in the end. I think there are going to be two roll shutter doors fitted over this. Once in-situ it looks about right and when I've completed the two telephone exchanges opposite it should really complete this corner. David

Ok, here is an 'out there' suggestion. Could Bodmin north just be a single sector plate which turned to allow access to/from either the Bodmin General fiddleyard or even, by a hidden line along the back to the Wadebridge cassette board? It almost looks like from the plan you could get a 4' radius curve and turn the Bodmin north yard to be parallel to the end wall. My minimum radius on Clare is down to 3'4" off-scene going into the fiddleyards and I have no problems which my P4 stock which includes some pretty long wheelbase locos like B1's and J20's. David

A fascinating location. What shape is the man-cave? Is the intention to place the layout against a wall? Might it be better to straighten out the rear right fiddleyard even if the straighten out results in the overall length being slightly more? I found the process of getting the layout I wanted to built to fit into the room I had in a way which was going to be something I wanted to live with something that took a lot of time. It was very easy to draw a plan which would go into the man cave but it is harder to consider what else you want to be able to do in the man cave and consider whether, in the future, you may wish you'd built the grand scheme slightly differently. David

In my previous blog entry I talked about using planning records to help research buildings at Clare. These have certainly help but what has helped even more is the advice and assistance from another RMweb contributor. Uax6 immediately recognized two small builds as Type A and Type B telephone exchange buildings and was able to give me loads of information regarding their construction. The 16 page 1950's tender document informing contractors the requirements to build one of these buildings was fascinating. Unfortunately I have failed the process immediately by not constructing the required earth latrine for the contractors to use while building the exchange! I've drawn out the parts in TurboCAD and have cut the parts in MDF. The central core is 3mm MDF for strength with the brick engraved layer in 1.5mm, just to keep things complicated the roof is cut from 1mm, the roof support from 2mm and the windows and surrounds from oiled manila card. Using lots of different thickness of material was probably overkill but I had all the different ones to hand. As usual I had to cut several parts more than once because I screwed my logic of which bit fitted around which other, I'd like to think I'm getting better and not making so many mistakes but I'm not so sure . I'll continue assembling the exchange and also try to draw out the other type of exchange with the hipped roof. The maltings building is also coming along. I revised my earlier drawing and shortened the model by one window bay because the original version was too long and left the end wall too far forward and in the wrong place relative to the goods yard. I'm still a bit too far forward but I think I'll live with it because shortening the building even more would not leave enough of it left to make sense. I was pleased with the way the windows for the maltings came out cut in the manila card. I drew the glazing bar lines at .7mm which has meant that the glazing bars when cut at .5mm wide. I've cut the windows in the 3mm inner layer to the size of these window components and the 1.5mm layer with the bricks engraved in it is 2mm smaller in each dimension. That means that the final window will have nice strong structure and I can cut some glazing material to fit. It has been a great deal of fun so far making these buildings and I'll post more as progress continues. David

Thanks Andy, that is really helpful. I've been searching online and I'm guessing that the A type would be something like this I found on Twitter while the B type was like this (only not rendered) Does anyone know of a site with any plans for these and where they generally a standard size and layout? Actually I've found two better examples - Glemsford, not far from Clare in Suffolk and Bures and Felsted Yeh! another research rabbit hole to dive down! and now I've found some plans from where someone was refused permission to turn one in Oxfordshire into a house. David

So I'm finally making a start on the buildings adjacent to the goods yard at Clare. We have a large maltings, still existing as an antiques centre, and a pair of buildings, one with a hipped roof and the other with a pitched roof. One of these is marked on one site plan as 'telephone exchange'. The maltings has been heavily altered but the current 'Greek portico' is just an embellishment of the original loading area where lorries would reverse in to tip grain. A search on West Suffolk's public access planning application site found a recent application for converting some of the space from an antiques centre into flats and this application included some useful drawings. If you are thinking of modeling any building which existed until fairly recently it is worth looking to see if there are any planning applications available online. While searching for this I also found drawings of Clare station building (application to make changes to make it suitable to be a cafe) and Clare goods shed (application to add a toilet block). https://planning.westsuffolk.gov.uk/online-applications/applicationDetails.do?keyVal=O18SI2PDMLV00&activeTab=summary However I would point out that some architects may not be as diligent and those of my acquaintance because the drawing incorrectly shows the windows on the top storey as the same height as on the ground and first floor. I guess they just didn't count the brick coarse correctly! Memo to self - Cross-reference your sources! I had a go at cutting a 'first attempt' yesterday and then found loads of mistakes in the my drawing. I've hopefully corrected those and I'll have another go at cutting it later in the week. Although it is quite a large building I don't think it unbalances the corner too much. Obviously I've had to shorted it a bit because I couldn't fit the full length in. This then leave me thinking about the two little building opposite. What is currently there is a Scout hut which according the same West Suffolk planning site was granted permission to be converted from the old telephone exchange in 1983. https://planning.westsuffolk.gov.uk/online-applications/files/110212DD9A8AE2D70C6297425E509E6E/pdf/E_83_3477_P-DECISION_NOTICE-979890.pdf So I'm left wondering how this building relates to the two in the aerial photograph from 1949. It looks to me as if the building has been extended on the end nearest the camera as the brickwork has a distinct change. Could the remainder of the building be the pitched roof building? The resolution of the aerial photo is not enough to be sure but it doesn't look to me as if the buildings had any obvious windows which I guess fits with a telephone exchange. Could both buildings have been something to do with the GPO? Any ideas welcome! Thanks David

I'd agree too You didn't say if you were planning DC or DCC operation, if you had the 4 x 2 board covered in parallel tracks and a DCC sound fitted locomotive on every inch of track you might have an issue but that is a somewhat unlikely scenario! David

But have they got a design which doesn't result in massively reducing the number of paths available between Cambridge and Shepreth Branch Junction? If you just put platforms either side of the track and expect trains to stop (probably the kind of price tag the budget allows for) it won't be enough. You would need to add extra tracks between Cambridge and Cambridge South and probably install a grade crossing between the Liverpool Street and King's Cross lines. David

One of my Christmas presents this year was a Sunfounder 10' touch screen designed to fit a Raspberry Pi. How my wife knew I wanted one of these is a mystery, must have been something to do with the hints I dropped. Today I managed to get JMRI installed on it and make up a simple panel to show the fiddleyard of my Stour Valley layout. I intend to also try using it on Fen End Pit. The touch screen works rather well as just touching the point changes it, also if the point get changed by other means (such as using the DCC controller) the change is reflected on the display. The back of the screen has positions to bolt a Pi together with the electronics for the screen and touch inputs. It doesn't come with any cover so I laser cut a piece of acrylic to protect the back. On Boxing Day an enjoyable running session highlighted a couple of minor repairs which were required to track work. So this morning the soldering iron came out to fix a couple of misaligned rail joints. This was a good excuse to drive a few more trains around and take the opportunity to clean a few wheels. It is amazing how much better wagons run when the wheels aren't covered in muck! The J17 turned up on the regular pickup goods easing over the river bridge on its way past the goods yard. Will 2023 be the year I final get around to the buildings in the far corner? Costing past the station building into the platform... ...before coming to a stand next to the signalbox to hand the token to the bobby. My wife also managed to buy me a copy of the instruction manual for a Ruston 22RB which will be useful as she also booked an experience day at Rocks by Rail when I will be allowed to try driving one 'under close instruction' which I am much looking forward to! Season's greetings to you all. David