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Another diversion...here's Geoff Hayne's beautiful paint job on my scratch-built MSWJR 4-4-4 and 2-6-0 tender for Stephen Duffell's lovely Roxey "Galloping Alice"...such a great name for a loco! Cheers Simon

Excellent service from Pete at 52F! Two very nice chassis kits with all the wheels and bits arrived within a week of first enquiries. Many thanks Simon

Excellent stuff. Thanks for posting! Cheers Simon

And back to the 7mm Tilbury tank... I beefed up the PCB spacers with some U-channel. Then soldered up the chassis using my Hobby Holidays jig held on its side. With the jig back the right way up, a quick test run wih the motor and driving wheels...and, oh joy, those self-quartering Slater's are so nice to use! And then a think about how to add the rear wheels and front pony truck. I'm going to pick up through the wheels using insulated axles, so I'll need to adapt a few more of those. The compensation on the drivers is by two seperate beams to avoid shorting across the frames. Cheers Simon

Just a quick post. Bradwell J27, finished and awaiting weathering in a lovely photo by Gordon Woods. Cheers Simon

Thanks everyone; the trouble with the pesky things is the time it takes to do all the test builds and then go back to tinker with the drawings then wait for the next etches and build them and then real life happens! All very enjoyable though and I'm still in awe of 2D drawing; it's like metal magic from a cloud! The 1400 is overtaking the Spinner at the moment but I intend to have something to show at the NGauge do in Warwick in September. I'm demo-ing at the 2mm stand on the Saturday. Meanwhile, big splashers! First I bolted the boiler to the cab and the smokebox. I find it's easier to be able to take things apart when doing fiddly things like splashers. (This photo was taken after the splashers were fitted.) The half etch splasher strip fits into a slot in the cab front after a quarter bend has been made. I marked the start of the reverse curve and bent it round a drill after testing for a good fit. Then the final big bend was made with a bit of brass tubing. When it all fitted properly I could solder it mostly from the inside. The splasher is held in place by the slots in the cab front and in the footplate and also where it touches the firebox and boiler as the etched boiler bands stop short of the edge leaving little steps for it to locate against. I checked everything was square and true. And took the boiler off to clean up and adjust things. It look as though it's ready to pounce: quite insect-like! Cheers Simon

That's superb! I'd like to read your build summary, particulalry about how you did the cab windows! Fantastic paint job too Cheers Simon

And now the boiler. The round firebox part needs removing for the belpair version by cutting along the boiler band. The boiler is rolled around the same dowelling former as I use for the Spinner and the back and front etched formers are soldered in. These are then used to bolt it to the firebox assembly and the saddle/smokebox front to check for fitting. Next, the splasher tops! Cheers Simon

Great stuff David; do you know where the name comes from and why it was chosen? Cheers Simon

Belpair firebox! Cheers Simon

Thanks for that, I'll have a go at the smoke paint! Did you fit each window individually? Cheers Simon

Looking great! How did you do the glazing? Cheers Simon

Hi Mike, that looks very good indeed. Looking forward to seeing it at Warley if you take along. And then I can decide how many to buy and whether I'll ever have the time to make up an HST! Cheers Simon

After the buffer beams, on went the rather beautifully ornate splasher sides. I've designed them to be soldered onto the small fold-ups that provide the smaller cut out parts. That went OK but I hadn't quite got the slots for the locating pips in the right place and need to look at the drawing to see how to line them up properly...also the folds on the little splashers could do with some relieving to make them easier to fold! Hind-sight is a wonderful thing. A bit of a fiddle to widen the slots and I got the splashers on. The cab front for the belpair version went in very nicely, I think I'll add some locating pips for that too on the re-drawn etch. Next time, my first 2mm belpair fire-box! Cheers Simon

This is where a test etch becomes interesting and little glitches start to show up... The front buffer beam is a great thick old thing on the real thing, with a sort of wooden sandwich construction, very retro, so I designed a concertina-like frame with four thicknesses of metal and a location flap,(bottom left hand on the photo). The frame folds up keeping all the thicknesses of the beam in line so everything can be soldered up in one go. Then the frame is cut off. There should have been three reverse folds on the frame, just wide enough to fold back on themselves, but only one fold showed up on the etch, we'll have to check the drawings. I sorted this one out in the old fashioned way with cocktail sticks holding everything together. I find it essential to make lots of detailed notes and drawings when I'm doing a test build otherwise I forget things very quickly when it comes to modifying the drawings. And I forgot to take photos as I built it but here it is attached to the frames. The pips and slots are in pleasing alignment, the back of the buffer beam fits neatly between the frames, the holes and coupling slot go all the way through and the front is half etched with the buffer bases. Cheers Simon

Bit more etch construction: the valances (side frames?) made easier with tabs and slots, actually tiny pips and slots... Cheers Simon

Couldn't resist having a little go.... Not fiddly exactly but you do have to be very careful not to bend or distort things when cutting out and filing off the etch tabs, which are as few and as small as possible to help. I folded the ornate cut-out coupling rod splashers very carefully one at a time using the flat nose of my pliers and the tiny vice, ensuring everything was properly folded and square each time. It helps to hold your breath and concentrate...a bit of jazz is good. Cheers Simon

Woohoo, here they are, lovely etches! Looking forward to the test build. Cheers Simon

Thanks Jerry, they're lovely photos! They were fine looking engines and I particularly like the Belpaire version (I think they remind me of the GWR!). We've drawn both firebox versions and designed it to fit 13mm wheels in 2mm or the nearest equivalent in N gauge. The tender is a 2950 gallon version, very slightly smaller than the one on the back of the Spinner. Just waiting for the test etch to come back and then I'll build some. We're hoping for finished etches of both the Spinner and 1400 to show off at the Leamington N Gauge show on the 8th September. Cheers Simon

OK, more on the Tilbury coming up soon, but first, off to the etchers for the 2mm/N Midland 1400 and then some more tweaking of the Spinner. Oh and we won the football! Cheers Simon

Tim does a good bolster!

That's great Joseph, thankyou very much. I'll have a search for your thread. And, I'd be interested in a 4mm model! Cheers Simon

I'm keen to build (eventually!) a 7mm model of one of the 3 car units that run around my local Shropshire area. Has anyone modelled one of these at all, or know of any drawings that might be available? Cheers Simon

Here are my 7mm Tilbury frames, ready for drilling. Cheers Simon

There you go Adrian; it's a Proxxon milling machine with a 1mm cutter on 1.5mm double sided PCB. It did seem to be chewing the cutter up a bit, which eventually broke because I hadn't adequately secured the PCB to the wooden board beneath and it vibrated...ping! More double-sided sticky tape next time. I would have thought you could rotate it quite easily. Cheers Simon