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richbrummitt

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  1. richbrummitt

    Seven Up

    By richbrummitt,

    I felt I had free reign when I set up my workbench again to get out and start or re-start whatever I liked. The bench is temporary for the moment, because I want to rearrange the furniture to move my groaning bookcase next to a supported wall. I have been good though: most of the items on it were part finished when I packed them. The only 'new' items out are some 4 wheeled coaches and I'm convinced that it is much better to build these alongside some other short coaches that I started a long time ago.
     
    You may have seen these etches before on the What's On Your Workbench thread in the 2mm section of the forum.
     

     
    They cover pretty much every variation of the particular kit that has a body or body kit in the association shop. I built them for an article that the magazine editor now has in hand ready to assemble. (It's very picture heavy.) Hopefully it will be of use to someone.
     
    This left me with 7 wagons to make. Some of the more modern variations were subsequently chopped about or cut down to suit my requirements for models. First up were a few more resin Minks. These really are lovely and whilst a little more expensive than a plastic kit they really are very lovely. I said that already, sorry.
     

     
    From left to right: V5 (centre bonnet vent added, DC1 brakes); V14 (DC3 fitted); V16 (DC3 unfitted); V4 (DC1).
     
    Some Opens of various types and styles.
     

     
    From left to right: O5 (DC1 - uncommon with this brake and much more likely to have ordinary lever); O2 (DC2 fitted, clasp - also uncommon); O9 (DC2 fitted).
     
    The middle example is an LSWR 8 plank with the second top one removed. It will look a lot less untidy once it has a tarpaulin on, otherwise I'd be making more effort to cover my tracks. Some vacuum pipes to be added, along with replacing the ties between the W irons on the V14 and O9, although it is possible to find examples of fitted wagons without these they are the norm.
     
    Here are some cruel close ups because I was having fun getting better acquainted with a 4x lens and liking the results.
     

     
    V14 again. Nice buffers. These weren't available when I put together a V16 previously. I should have made an effort on a self contained buffer ages ago but Julia helped us all out. Thank you.
     

     
    V4. Is this roof okay? It's on the fret labelled 16' Mink roofs and the lines match up to the features but I cannot find a picture of a Mink with this type of roof in the many books I've trawled. Mex roofs are like this but I've not seen a single Mink and I'm concerned about creating an aberration.
     

     
    That awful plank gap again. Look at the chassis instead
     
    Having made a good bunch of coupling links for these I've finally taken many of the photographs I need to explain how the couplings are made. Unless I get distracted again that will be written up soon.
  2. richbrummitt
    No pictures today because I don't know where I last left the cable and they aren't very interesting anyway, just a pile of mangled nickel silver underframe parts that were looking lost on my bench.
     
    Those that read the 2mm VAG might have noticed that I decided to concoct my own RSU from a leftover car battery charger. I rewound the secondary coils to give three outputs similar to the commercial units (Don't ask me for any more details because I'm not electrically qualified and the moderators will likely remove such things to protect everyone legally in case you get hurt.) and adapted a spare soldering iron for the hand piece. A few connectors and a foot pedal have been added and tonight waiting on the doormat was the last piece of the puzzle - carbon rod. Total spend so far is around £50. Potential saving is therefore around £100.
     
    Having turned it on and played around with the settings I've managed to not solder anything satisfactorily. I can peel the parts away from each other afterwards. I've cleaned with a scratch brush, used flux, not used flux, used real solder as well as paste. It's not that I'm short of power either because The tip will easily get red hot on the high settings and I've fused parts together such that some of an overlay was left behind on the other part, but I am always able to peel them away. I tried my usual temperature controlled iron as well and suffered the same outcome. Often the material is deforming before the joint gives way, but I have been unable to make a soldered joint that could not be separated by my own hands yet this evening. Should I be dissatisfied
     
    The good news is that it should work and I haven't killed or maimed myself. The bad news is that I appear to have become totally inept when it comes to soldering and this is a massive pain because I also received a delivery from PPD today and feel unable to make a start if I can't solder properly. I may well have to look for a volunteer to do a test build. (Pre-requisites will be experience building small scale etched kits, preferably with an interest in GWR or NPCS.) Whilst waiting for my ability to rejoin me I will have to return to some Mathieson models wagons that I have been working on.
     
    Please help...
     
    Updated 23/07/11:
     
    I've tried some brass cleaned up with a nail file type abrasive stick until extra shiny. Solder appears to flow quite nicely. Force a knife through the joint with not too much effort and this is what it looks like. Both parts nicely tinned but not shiny unless you re-flow the solder. I used cored solder not paste because I thought this could be one of my problems.
     

     
    Everything is plenty hot when you grab a hold of it afterwards. I have a bunch of nickel silver parts in the bin in a similar condition. I even tried buffing the tinned parts adding flux and going for it again. Same result. Still scratching head. I have however managed to solder up a kit today, but didn't use this contraption.
  3. richbrummitt
    A picture heavy blog post to ask a fairly simple question. If it is possible to have a poll on a blog post I can't work out how but it would be useful in this instance.
     
    I had previously consigned myself to the replacement of the unsatisfactory toggle switches, which had only been bought because they were available in 3PDT and 4PDT flavours, with banks of linked slide switches. With the TOUs coming out as well I figured I would change these too.
     
    Having played with the S4 Society lever frame previously on Jerry's Tucking Mill and seeing them again on the S4 stand at the Southampton show I could not resist them any longer. The slide switches went in a cupboard and 10 levers worth (2 kits) were ordered immediately on returning from the show. The signal box at Littlemore had 15 levers, reduced to 7 and was then demolished leaving an actual ground frame where the box had been reclassified as one earlier. I figured that 10 levers would suffice because the layout isn't big enough to model any of the distants that could have existed but I would need the odd extra one where a switch was operated manually.The discussion on how the layout might be signalled based on my needs for the model and to use 10 levers is in a separate topic here. The electrical work will be covered in a later blog post with the help of a bulk purchase of microswitches that arrived today.
     
    This brings me back to the question. When considering where to house or attach the levers on the baseboards, which are a bit minimalist, I thought that it might be fun to have them located behind the signal box. I like the idea of operating from the front and this location would be convenient because very few operating rods would have to cross the baseboard joint. One down side is that it could make it a pain to photograph the layout. This problem could be overcome by making the frames detachable but I will demonstrate later why I do not think this is much of an issue. What might be the biggest problem is that it spoils the overall impression of the layout when exhibited. I've trial fitted the frames where I'm thinking of putting them and taken some overall views of the layout as best I can in it's current location.
     

     

     

     

     
    So does it offend you?
     
    It should still be possible to get some good photograph opportunities without the levers in view, or with the possibility of them being cropped out without losing the subject or the composition of the image as demonstrated by the following viewpoints looking along the layout.
     

     

     

     

     
    I'd appreciate yes or no answers to the above question, along with any other comments. Eecially from any people who exhibition manage.
     
    It's not possible to have them any lower than in the pictures without moving them outside of the baseboard facings because of the internal structure of the boards.
  4. richbrummitt
    A New Year means that exhibition season is under way. It used to start earlier back in the North but there isn't a lot locally until January and then it's St Albans, Southampton and then it is busy through until March until it's over for another year. Returning from St Albans the realisation hit me of what I had done to myself. Then I get an email from an exhibition manager to confirm details for next year that very much confirmed it. I am an idiot. I unwittingly talked myself into this over a year ago and now I have to live with it.
     
    Since that conversation some work has been done on the layout. This has been to remove some items I wasn't happy with. When making the platform substructure I had second thoughts about the ground contour and after asking second opinions of many people with the prototype photographs I have I concluded that the rear siding had to be relaid. Up it came...
     

     
    ...and back down it went - a little higher than before. It is now nearly platform height at the buffer stops and the ground levels can look much more like the real thing must have been. The many rolls of solder make useful weights until I get around to using them up on my unbuilt kit mountain.
     

     
    Another area that has given me massive headaches and continues to do so is the turnout operating units. These were built as a moving sleeper below the track bed with 0.3mm wires coming through a slit in the 2mm plywood and soldered to the point blades. They worked until someone prodded one loose at Ally Pally where the boards were sat on the Association stand as a demo piece. A repair was impossible to effect and the truth was as bad as I feared as the design was proven wholly unsuitable. Proper planning...? Idiot! They had to go and I'd put it off for over six months. Finally I built up the courage to cut out the mechanisms. This is an example before surgery:
     

     
    First the electrical connections were severed and the sleeper removed.
     

     
    The plywood was cut away along with the sleepers because they were fixed to baseboard far better than they were to the rail.
     

     
    Now I must replace them. A more robust solution would be for small tubes to pass through from the TOU to just below rail level with a thin wire soldered to the switch rail that is a sliding fit in the tube. To begin with a jig was milled in Tufnol to create a gapped structure with the small tubes at the correct separation. The following series of pictures demonstrate its use.
     

     

     

     
    I now have seven of these soldered up waiting for divine inspiration to provide the rest of the mechanism from my ganged DPDT slide switches to these. This hasn't worked out well so far. I have read the Associations latest publication Track How it Works and How to Model it and that didn't result in any tungsten filament above head moments either. I have some parts mocked up from telescoping styrene sections but I am not sure how I can actually assemble the only idea that I keep coming back to in my head. Anything that is fitted needs to be less than 4mm in depth because that was how much space I thought would be needed when I had the router out and put the recesses in for the TOUs. A consequence of the baseboard design is that it is not possible to access the switch from beneath the baseboard. I used 20mm ply and it is not much wider than the cess at each side of the track so cutting this up would have been unwise to begin with and very difficult to achieve now. The remaining requirements therefore are bombproof reliability whilst being sympathetic to the small section loose heel switches and plastic chairs. I've done various things in the meantime to distract me and remain motivated but I really need to get this problem of my own idiotic making behind me to move on with this layout.
     
    I have trains and I have a venue and a date and I need some reliable working switches.
  5. richbrummitt
    I had an enjoyable but tiring weekend. I was surprised by the quantity of layouts in attendance, including some that I had not seen before (even excepting the challenge layouts). The layout was transported and erected without problems and ran pretty well too. I had problems all day Saturday transferring from the layout into the cassettes with almost everything derailing, but the so far not very scenic section only has a few niggles. The problem with the cassettes is with the haste of construction and lack of care in ensuring the gauge was not too large. Inserting some plasticard strips just less than the back to back in the centre helped enormously and made Sundays timetable more enjoyable.
     
    Also on Saturday, just as the exhibition was opening ten minutes early I found that my second choice goods loco (1425) was short circuit on the track at some places and had to have the brakes removed for a cure. The reserve pannier tank was found to be permanent short circuit on the body so I was hoping for reliable service from the recently completed etched chassis replacement. Then the worm came off! The worm was specially bushed to suit the motor shaft and after finding the worm I tried to refix it with disasterous results
     

     
    What you see is a coreless motor with the can separated from the rear cap. I really needed reliable service from the rather lightweight 1425 now. Fortuantely she performed pretty well the whole weekend. Large amounts of wheelslip were reduced by running bunker first with a train and limiting the number of wagons handled. This was not difficult given that I had spent last week fitting three link couplings to as many wagons as possible and managing about ten. A few others that are still without hooks spent the weekend stranded in the goods yard looking pretty.
     
    On Saturday evening I solved the short circuit on the body of the reserve pannier tank and even got the coreless motor back together and kind of working. Not well enough to provide a locomotive for Sundays timetable. With two working locomotives and some loan wagons from Andy Hanson I operated a second goods train on Sunday. My something like 15 year old Farish railcar providing the passenger services with little compaint throughout the weekend.
     
    I got to to have a better look around when everything stopped at about half past two on Sunday afternoon. Something got too hot, possibly in the controller. I fitted an AC fan on the power supply box and that seemed to work really well. I had a couple of problems with the security of my leads, but that was not the problem this time. The controller would flash output, and then load, followed by overload and then there was nothing. After a time it would repeat this action. I gave up and took some pictures:
     

     
    This would be the approximate view from the house adjacent to the line on the north side of the line, with the diesel railcar paused where the station building will be one day.
     
     

     
    Another view, this time looking towards Oxford, showing the near empty yard. All the photographs show a yard brimming with wagons so I have some more work to do completing what is in my stock pile. I got some extruded polystyrene offcuts shaped into the rough shape of the landscape. There is a bit more work to do on them before they can be fixed and blended in but it has given me an idea of how it can shape up. For the moment the facia has just been cut to match and requires some smoothing when the final contour is produced.
     

     
    Finally a view capturing the whole layout within the exhibition.
  6. richbrummitt

    Frankenpannier

    By richbrummitt,

    Way back when Chris Higgs offered me a test build of the conversion chassis for the Farish pannier tank I always knew that it should have a new footplate. Alas I've had an almost complete chassis under an entirely unmodified body for around a decade. Moreover for my intended time period I also knew the body would require some changes beyond detailing to represent one of the predecessors of the 57xx class. 
     
    The photograph below shows how far I got in two days. Day one was spent machining off the cast running plate, followed by marking up and cutting out a new one. I used 0.4mm double sided copper clad with a view to providing the chassis insulation for the split frame in the underside of it. I also removed the top feed and various other details from the tanks. More than half of day two was spent making the splashers. First turning a couple if fat tubes with appropriate inside diameter and soldering a disc to create the front face. I got three splashers out of each of two discs.  The coupling rod was used to mark off the splasher positions along the running plate. After soldering in place some awkward material removal remains under the splashers to create space for the wheels. What remained of the day allowed me to get a start on the buffer beams, valances and steps. All these are fretted and filed from n/s sheet. At the moment the rear is over long since I haven't finalised the exact engine and/or bunker size to determine the rear overhang. 
     

     
    Putting everything together I have some obvious dimensional differences. The can side is from a 28xx and dimensionally a little lacking in height.  The tanks are I think still too high - as is the running plate, I think - but I can't get them much if any lower. Oddly the buffers appear to be the correct height against other rolling stock, which is weird. I've also cut the rear steps too short by around 1mm. The firebox still protrudes too much. There's quite a lot left to do but I need to ponder these dimensional issues before progressing further.
     
    I deliberately haven't disclosed the class of engine. Maybe we should have answers in the comments. For those that don't remember or are new here (it has been 5 years) I'm aiming for early 1920s condition, which perhaps makes working this out a little harder. 
  7. richbrummitt
    What might have been the last vaguely sunny evening of the year was used for getting the undercoat sprayed out in God's own paint booth. I am still working on a representation of the lake livery, which I personally think should be darker than most renditions I have seen. A mixture of a dark brown and deep red from the citadel range was used in this case.
     
    I thought I had all the details added and then, upon opening the white(ish) colour for the roofs, I realised there were no rain strips on the models! These were added in micro rod. You do need to have a plastic roof to solvent weld them on but they were easier to complete, and neater, like this than any other way I have tried for this detail.
     

     
    A couple of days later and the vehicles had livery and weathering completed. The picture below was taken at the 2mm AGM in Bolton and is the property of Mick Simpson (reproduced here with permission).
     

     
    I can't remember punching the rivets out on Mansel wheel inserts previously but on this larger than life portrait they do show. Unfortunately the short cuts I took with some of the brake details do too.
     
    According to the excellent articles in GWRJ on modern horse boxes 411 was delivered on the first lot of N12s during 1915 and 19 was delivered as part of the third and final lot of N12s before the end of 1918 so a workaday representation of the lake livery is appropriate for my c.1921 period and I'm reasonably happy with the final colour.
     
    With these finished it must be time for a rummage for the next project...
  8. richbrummitt

    4FO+1UFO

    By richbrummitt,

    If you were hoping for Southern MUs then you might want to leave now ;-)
     
    I've been trying very hard to finish some of what I have started. The amount of visible desk (zero) had become an impossible situation, especially considering that our spare bedroom has three lengths of worktop in it and SWMBO only has a small portion of that. In attempting to paint more of the items I had built but not painted I had a growing pile of stock that was 'finished' awaiting couplings. Progress was being made but things were not getting to the point where they could go in the stock boxes I bought earlier in the year. (I have a rule that stock cannot go in the box unless it is finished with couplings - i.e. really finished and suitable for use on the layout).
     
    Here we have the results of painting and coupling fitting from this week.
     
    LNWR diagram 88 van.
     

     
     
    Long time readers will have seen this in a previous entry. Since then some further weathering has been udnertaken, mostly the addition of various chalked notes. It only really needed some couplings to be complete.
     
    MR D342 coke hoppers.
     

     
     
    These have been hanging around unpainted almost since my order came through when Chris Higgs originally offered these as limited availability a few years ago. Fortunately for Midland fans they are now available from shop 2. The paint specification in Midland Wagons 1 suggests the paint recipe contained more than 12 parts white or clear to one part black. I had my doubts whether the lettering would be visible on such a light colour (there isn't much contrast in some pictures of the prototype) and I darkened the left one a little with a very light black wash from the light shade I chose. The one on the right has been in service a while longer and the lead in the paint has darkened the colour. The lettering stayed bright because of the paint used, which had a 'self cleaning' property.
     
    GER cattle wagon.
     

     
     
    Built with a steel under frame. According to LNER wagons a small number of this diagram were on steel, rather than wood, under frames.
     
    GC Lowmac.
     

     
     
    Okay, this one's not quite finished, but it is painted and has couplings. These wagons had the securing chains permanently fixed to rings in the deck and I have run out of N Brass Loco container securing chains after loading up the Macaw Bs seen in previous entries. More have been ordered so I expect to be finished soon.
     
    I didn't so myself any favours with the to-do pile at TINGS recently. Having intended to get a couple more Mathieson wagons I got talked into a few more. Fortunately I dealt with this swiftly by re-painting internally, dusting with weathering powders, re-wheeling, and adding couplings such that they aren't going to be hanging around in the UFO pile.
     

     
     
    I'm a little way off a mimic of the coal train on the Dartmoor scene at Pendon, but until I have an 8 coupled loco finished there might be a problem with siding space...
     

     
    ...because I think I might have an addiction: I've ordered more!
  9. richbrummitt

    Making an Exit

    By richbrummitt,

    After the emotional strain of the switch surgery I needed a break and considered what else needed doing soon. I wanted to plan out the right hand end of the board and make sure there was space for the planned signals to fit around the major engineering structure that is Sandford Rd overbridge.
     
    I measured up and comparing to photographs in my reference books marked and cut out a portal from mount board. This was duplicated by using this as a template. In my memory the road wasn't particularly wide and so I made a spacer to make a dry run.
     

     
    It didn't look nearly wide enough and it turns out my memory deceived me regarding the use of traffic calming measures at this location. I had thought that there was a single footpath and that pinch points controlled traffic to a single file over the bridge. I had estimated the width as less than 20' on this basis. Looking at photographs in a local history book and my own photographs it is clear that I was mistaken. The pinch points are either side of the bridge but there is plenty of width. There is still only a footpath on the side nearest the station.
     

    Looking North
     

    Looking South
     
    Remeasuring the available space on the baseboard I settled on a width of 60mm over faces. This allows space for the signals each side of the bridge to be accommodated on the baseboard.
     
    A good deal of cutting and several scalpel blades later I had a full kit of parts, excepting the wing or retaining walls. I've 'upgraded' to a Swan Morten No.4 handle recently and it is preferable to the X-Acto No.2 type knife I have used for many years. I won't be giving this up but now have a choice depending on the suitability for the task at hand.
     

     
    An hour later they were fully assembled.
     

     
    I can be somewhat impatient at times and used superglue for speed of assembly. I will likely go back and strengthen the assembly before finally securing to the baseboard but there is a way to go before that time yet. Painting and ballasting are two operations that will be difficult to accomplish unless it can be removed! It is placed temporarily for the moment to see that it looks okay.
     

     
    The over high coach nearly passes under. I really ought to swap the wheels for 6mm ones.
     
    Now I need some sticky backed ashlar stonework in the colour in the photograph that follows
     

     
    This is the best picture I could get of the bridge without trespassing. The path I was on two years ago when I took this is so overgrown now that it is not easy to get to this location any more but it offers a better glimpse of the prototype than is possible from the deck.
  10. richbrummitt
    Amongst the many other things that I alude to on my workbench in previous entries there have been a selection of horse boxes growing in number for some time. I am currently (still) working on a pair of GCR and an M&GN item from David Eveleigh along with a pair of Lima GWR items, that are the subject of this entry. I know they are branded LMS but from what I can gather from published books and photographs they are meant to be a GWR vehicle to diagram N16 and the LMS didn't have a vehicle anything like this.
     
    Lima horseboxes are not so easy to find for sensible money nowadays and I apologise to anyone who thinks such items should be treated as sacred. I was fortunate to collect one for £6 by blind luck and the other for a swap of a Chivers LNER horsebox kit that I never intended to build. As it turns out I could have quite probably scratch built the vehicles with a similar amount of effort because I only re-used the sides. Everything else went in the scrap box on the floor. At least I didn't canibalise models with in correct GWR livery! However, had I have tried, the initial outlay would have been significantly more.
     
    The Lima model is actually pretty good dimensionally. Roughly to 2mm scale in height and width, but closer to 1:148 for length. I'd always overlooked the model because I figured that it was probably Limas all too common blend of a minimum of two different incorrect scales in different directions; I realised I was wrong after reading some discussions on internet forums and listening to Jerry Clifford.
    Diagram N16 was introduced too late for my modelling period, but there are some not too significant differences between this diagram and some earlier ones. To go back to diagram N12 (which is as far as you would go with this body because the earlier diagrams were quite different), to suit my modelling period, would only require the addition of bolections around the fixed windows and some new ends with a turn-under in addition to the details that need changing to make a better model, for example the quantity of roof furniture provided by Lima is excessive. With a couple of tweaks, and a new chassis, this body could be a really nice model, but here's how I went about making something a little different.
     
    First I removed the ends completely and cut back the sides so I could get to almost scale length for 2mm when the new ones were added from styrene sheet. The floor is cut back to allow a second thickness of sheet to be added inside the end at the bottom where the outer end piece will be filed to whisker thin in the next stage to form the turn-under.
     

     
    New ends were cut from styrene sheet and the curve of the roof profile filed out. The blue colour is where a permanent marker has been used to allow clear marking with a scriber to show the extent of the turn-under. The body nearest the camera already has this feature complete whilst the one behind still needs filing to shape. There are also
     

     
    The next stage was to add the bolections around the fixed windows. The photograph shows them in the process of being added. I worked carefully around a former made from steel adding 0.010" MicroRod with enough solvent to make it pliable but not enough to make it deform, stretch or break. Careful persuasion with a blunt cocktail stick to prod it around into shape, combined with a lot of patience, has given a result that I think will be acceptable from normal viewing distances once painted. I made the former from steel because I have some available. I did try a wooden effort first off but it failed miserably: the solvent managed to attach the MicroRod to the wood sufficiently well that the bolection was dragged into the window aperture and destroyed when I removed the former.
     

     
    a completed bolection on the other side
     

     
    the bolection in very cruel close up.
     

     
    Much easier after doing five of those was adding the interior. A few pieces of styrene sheet and a length of coach seating strip suitably modified for the groom. The seats were in two sections, so I made a cut and file job in the centre to represent this. You will also notice that I cut the partitions to the wrong width and then rather than cut them to the right width slipped a small piece of styrene in to make things good. It don't think this bodge will be very noticeable once the roof is in place.
     

     
    The floor was cut out to allow the windows to be added from underneath after the exterior paint is completed. After a question on Yahoo! groups I was pointed to a reference for the interior colour, which is similar if not the same as, light stone. A support structure was built up along the tops of the sides and along the centre of the vehicle for the roof with assorted styrene sheet. The roofs themselves were cut from 0.005" styrene sheet and whilst still flat locations marked and drilled for the roof vents and lamp tops.
     

     
    Further details have also been added: The gaps between the sheeting on the ends have been produced with a skrawker (a piece of hacksaw blade ground to have just one tooth), I thickened up the protrusions at the tops of the doors with styrene strip and I also used styrene strip to alter the rather odd rounded shape of the drop lights to something that looks more like it should.
     
    To be continued...
  11. richbrummitt

    Double Heading

    By richbrummitt,

    I'm still working on having things moving on the layout at Expo with under three weeks remaining.
     
    Several weeks ago a pleasant suprise landed in my inbox, an opportunity to test build two new locomotive chassis kits. A short exchange of emails later and a subsequent jiffy packet arriving through the letter box and we were away.
     
    The chassis are to fit the GF 57xx body and the Dapol 0-4-2T
     

     
    Also included was a jig for assembling the frames
     

     
    First the frames are bushed before inserting into the jig, which is easily folded up sqaure using the tabs and markers provided.
     

     

     
    It is best to open up the bearing holes first and use 1.6mm drills to locate in the jig. I found this out afterwards. Phosphor bronze and even PCB frames are much stiffer than etched under the pillar drill!
     
    Next up the pick up springs were added and the motor mount attached...
     

     
    ...followed by gears and wheels. I quarter wheels by hand/eye.
     

     
    Next up was the brake assembly.
     

     
    I wanted to make these removable so set about insulating them from the frames to allow a complete cross piece from 0.3mm n/s wire through the bottom. Short pins of microrod were added at the top of the brake arms to locate into the holes in the frames. Once painted they are insulated.
     
    Here the locomotives are pictured working and near complete. Both have 8mm coreless motors. The bodies have had no detailing, but there is some minor interior modification to allow fitment of extra weight.
     

     
    This is especially true of the Dapol body. I mounted the motor the easy way (into the cab) and have virtually run out of space for lead to move the balance forward to gain better electrical pick up and adhesion.
     

  12. richbrummitt

    Frankenpannier II

    By richbrummitt,

    Following discussions on the previous entry I reasoned to construct a cab before making a decision about the tanks being close enough to the right size or completely unusable. I also went looking for a suitable engine in RCTS i.e. one that would have the potential to be on the lines of the ex. B&HER, on which more another time. The 645 and 655 class were originally Wolverhampton engines and most of them stayed 'North'. From locomotive allocations I've got 769 and 1804 at Bristol, which is a close to the B&HER as I can get. 1801 and 2701 were at Severn Tunnel Jcn. Of these the Severn Tunnel Jcn. engines were the first to have panniers but not until 1920. 1804 didn't receive them until 1926 - a little late for me - but 769 was adorned such at the end of 1922. That's in my post WWI to start of grouping modelling period and hopefully avoids me going full scratch build to create a saddle tank! According to RCTS 769 also had top feed at some point. Arrgh: I already filed this off the tanks I've got left over from the Farish body I've now discarded most off. 
     
    Looking at plenty of drawings and pictures of the cab the first thing that struck me was that compared to the cabs on engines in the Churchward era the side profile of the cabs is very much different. I made up a new file for the milling machine and after much head scratching to work out why I wasn't getting sensible output from the stepper motors I eventually got some new cab side sheets cut out. For some reason the tool list in my CAM software had replaced itself and I was trying to run at a feed of 15000mm/min, something the motors just won't keep up with, rather than around 120. This should have been really obvious when reading the .nc file, but I also had a duff version of the file I was comparing to with speeds that would also cause a huge number of skipped steps. I cut and filed up a cab front, soldered in position, and cut another large chunk of the Farish body away (the portion inside the cab and bunker) so that it could all fit together. The cab spectacles are probably a little undersize. I haven't found a definitive dimension and it's much easier to make them larger than try and put some metal back!
     


     
    The chimney - which was the incorrect tapered type - has been removed and the tanks lowered. This means that at present the body no longer fits on the chassis; the motor mount fouls the inside top of the tanks. Comparing with pictures the raised firebox on the 57xx was new with pannier tanks for that time. It was off with the safety valve cover, which didn't survive being centre popped out of the fixing hole, and more filing to get the firebox closer to flush.
     

     
    I am starting to wonder if the tank top with the plate over the tanks is representative of pannier tanks of the early 1920s. I've also filed back the cover for the lubricating? pipework into the smokebox and the tank vents. Oh, to find an above view. Maybe it is better to carry on in ignorance? I'll need to do a new smokebox door in time regardless because the moulded one is too flat, and quite possibly should be the earlier style with a dished front and a circular rim/border.
     
    Whilst I continue to search in books (I've gone through several likely tomes off my shelves without finding anything yet) there are plenty of other things that this engine will need. One such prominent item is the bunker. I followed some dimensions from drawings but couldn't reconcile the width with pictures. I'm absolutely convinced that the bunker at it's narrowest is as wide as the cab and the flares protrude beyond that profile even though the dimensioned drawing of a bunker I was looking at, presumably for the original bunker size, has a width much less. Did they get wider with time? They definitely got larger in other respects. I hope that I don't need to remake this narrower later on.
     
    I made the bunker from etch waste. I always save the edge pieces. The lower portion was made first with two parallel bends made in a precision vice, carefully measured to be the correct separation to create a bunker the same width as the cab. The sides were made overlong and then made to length after bending. The flare was made, again held in the vice, by gripping with smooth jawed pliers around a 3.5mm drill bit to create the large radius curve. I've not made such a shape before and had read that the corners a tricky many times. I concur they are interesting for all the reasons I've read about. I cut a front and fixed it in place to make a rectangular tube and soldered it onto the footplate in the correct place. The extension was made in a similar way but bent with an increased corner radius and width to match the size of the flared bunker top. Copious amounts of solder were added here - something that's easy to do with multicore - to allow for material to file back and hide any small gaps, especially on the aforementioned corners where there are some tears from forming the flare. The sides are trimmed to length and shaped after fixing.
     

     
    The cut out visible in the cab front is to clear the worm gear, which just protrudes into the cab but should be hidden well enough by the backhead.
     
    A couple more pictures of the current status. Rat tale files have been used to clean up the excess solder and finish the corner shape. Whilst I'm still looking for that photograph that shows the tank tops there are still plenty more jobs around the footplate to be getting on with, and I need to create a new motor mount to allow the lowered tanks to fit over the chassis.
     


  13. richbrummitt
    Thank you again to everyone who voiced an opinion last week. It is now too late to change my mind because the levers have subsequently been installed at the up/Thame/left-hand end of the layout and I'm not planning on taking them back out, ever.
     

     
    The front profile of the board has also been finalised to be a gentle slope downwards from the road overbridge to below rail level at this end. The ground is not below the rails at Littlemore but I think this makes most sense for incorporating the lever frame as low as is possible and into the ground contours. It should make viewing a little better, rather than looking into a cutting, and defintiely improve the possibilities for photographing trains.
     
    I'm currently mulling over exactly where one of the signals is to go and what to do regarding the interlocking; I really want to make the operator use the FPL levers but that isn't a straightforward electrical problem with a single line unless someone with more elctrickery skill has an obvious answer? The only way I see it working at the moment is a compromise where the FPL has to be engaged to pass onto and beyond a switch on the through route. It is likely that the only locking required is for the FPLs and at the minimum one signal so the mechanism for that should be straightforward enough. A thought that did strike me was to include all the signals off the layout too and have proper locking but I haven't got enough levers and because it isn't a block post and many moves must have been signalled by hand back in the real world it would not work as well as I might like anyway.
     
    Once the levers were installed and whilst I finish my considerations regarding the above I began building some additional structure within the baseboards to create the lead up-and-out from the frame. I plan to achieve this by using a surplus of servo discs and arms drilled out and mounted onto brass tube, which in turn will rotate around a brass tube or rod fixed to the structure.
     

     
    You should be able to make out the loop on TOU that has been installed above the lever frame. A relatively long wire from a servo arm, driven by wires from the lever, will pass through this and take up any excess movement in it's deflection.
     
    I had cut away the top couple of millimetres along the sleeper ends and whilst the glue was out I have added on a ledge immediately below this level to create a small ballast shoulder and cess. The following photo shows the scene whilst the glue dries. The ledge is on the front edge only at this point because the rear is met by either the platform or the yard. The latter will have a covering of dirty filth up to sleeper level rather than ballast proper.
     

     
     
    The wood bridging to the front edge is not permanent: it is a makeshift clamp.
  14. richbrummitt
    I'd done quite a bit of thinking and head scratching how to make an instanter link for some time. The shape is not easy to make around a former. Indeed my first few attempts failed to make it off the formers. The process still makes some duds during the cutting and final shaping stage but on the whole I am managing to make some slightly better than triangular links most of the time.
     
    This evening whilst clearing the workbench of assembled DC underframe etches and drilling headstocks to fit coupling hooks I pulled some of these triangular links and fitted them onto the closest appropriate wagon.
     

     
    and coupled it up to the adjacent one on the 'work' plank.
     

     
    On the left close coupled and on the right long coupled. I'll readily admit that they are really hard to get into the short position and couple there and there probably isn't much point but then why do we make these models? It's probably just because we can.
     
    Please excuse the incredibly cruel close ups and poor lighting.
  15. richbrummitt
    I've started work moving the layout forward again. Here's a photograph of progress since I got back from Peterborough. Progress has gone backwards to move forwards. I've printed out and mocked up the main railway buildings, the station and signal box. I want to get these started, and they can be worked on and completed before being incorporated into the layout when it is ready. That bit is all fine so far. You will see that a large chunk of the rear siding has been removed.
     

     
    It seems fashionable to tear up the track if you have a 2mm layout. Julia did it on Highclere to improve the foundations of what I am sure will be a superb layout in all respects when finished. Others have followed in an effort to improve running. Unfortunately I am in a different category. I got it wrong!
     

     
     
    Have a look at the following images that I have showing the actual yard area. Yes, all the photos are from the Oxford end because the location is in a pretty tight spot between the Asylum (now flats) and a pair of semi-detached houses, with the best vantage point being the road bridge at the end of the platform.
     

     

     

     
    They all show the siding next to the wall at a higher elevation than the rest of the area. I'm sure the wall was pre-existing (the siding was added later anyway) and therefore the ground level could not and in case there was no need for it to) be lowered. This was going to create a problem for me with a siding on an incline and I tried to keep all the track on the same level. I hoped that the viewer could be deceived with an alternate ground contour. You will see from the next pictures of how the ground on the model would be, and how ridiculous it would appear.
     

     

     
    I concluded therefore that the siding had to come up nearly three scale feet to be closer to platform level, unless any reader has an alternative idea based on the evidence and circumstances?
  16. richbrummitt
    First of all I must apologise for the lack of pictures tonight. I have finished updating the etch artwork that was the subject of the last post. This has taken a little longer than I thought due to having issues with swelling of my right eye for no particular reason not helped by a misdiagnosis the first time I visited the doctors. After several days off due to pain and problematic vision I got about sorting out the issues identified in the test builds. I included a chassis with a sliding centre axle on the fret, rather than having to use a cleminson chassis, although it will still be possible to take this route if desired. I also thought again about other diagrams and it is apparent from any photograph of a milk train from the early 20th century that to be representative it should probably have vehicles of differing heights, widths, lengths and include several vans for the various cuts.
     
    I have already covered diagrams O2, O1, O3, and O4. O2 has a different end profile but these are all 6'8" body height. Diagram O5 is similar to O4, but with 7'6" body height to allow an extra layer of crates for fish to be loaded. This would provide for different height vehicles, so I have drawn this and will be adding it to the sheet. With an alternate set of ends I could provide for the O6, which is an O5 with end doors, like a Siphon H. I'll have to see what can be sensibly catered for in the space of the fret. It might be sensible to consider these as two separate items. I hope to be sending the revised sheet off for etching early next week and further hope that everything is right.
     
    I was also considering drawing a Siphon C (diagrams O8, and O9), but there is already a kit for this in the Scale Link or Shire Scenes range. I have seen a picture of the etch and whilst not perfect I think it should be possible to produce a decent model from it. The inside planking for the end doors is not on the fret, but it could be cut from planked plastic sheet, or scribed separately and inserted inside the end framing. It would seem a bit silly to duplicate effort, and in addition I don't fancy my chances of getting the louvres right first time. I believe that all the longer siphons are available from Ultima Models so that allows for plenty of choice for vehicle length within a train.
  17. richbrummitt

    So Far So Bad

    By richbrummitt,

    The gingerbread man caught me in one. I've been working on some etch artwork for 6 wheeled siphons on and off since 2005. I got them pretty much finished for hatching and sending to be etched in 2007 and then didn't get around to it (like most other things in the hobby room...). Finally I pulled my finger out, bit the bullet, got around to it, or whatever and sent off the PPD (usual disclaimer, no connection &c.) for them to be turned into something that might just make up into a model.
     
    Working as a design engineer I'm used to the idea that most of the time things don't work out on the first shot. Even if you've got it right in theory there will be something that means it is better a different way when you have the parts off the tool. I was beside myself with excitement when they turned up because they looked the part, everything looked as it should and being the first time I'd tried to do this I was very pleased with what I believed could be a good result. So far so good.
     
    I spent much of the day forcing this into shape rather than building it.
     

     
    It's a bit rough and ready and not all the detail parts are. You will see witnesses for where the strapping is to fit and the lamp irons are still on the fret. There will also be two things that should be obviously wrong when you compare this to photographs of a siphon to diagram to O4. I made a mistake and a guess that doesn't look right. There are also a host of other things that need to be changed to make this into a kit that is build-able without using a pin hammer to make some of the fold lines, cutting parts up because they cannot be formed correctly or binning whole parts where something else works better assembled another way in addition to various fettling operations to make the additional clearance that needs to (and can) be made where parts fit together. These latter things I will only learn from experience of designing my own kits and something I expected. I am not too disheartened.
     
    I have covered all the 6 wheeled low roof siphons diagrams O1-O4 with two frets, except for the rebuild of 1777 with louvred sides. When I can I will try the other fret, which can create O1 thru O3 depending on the choice of end framing, because the underframes are slightly different and having made a list of things to sort out I want to do another one to try out the changes by modifying the fret and seeing that the issues are addressed.
     
    Don't hold your breath. The timescales have been pretty protracted thus far and although I don't anticipate spending another four years doing nothing with this I can't promise anything firm yet.
  18. richbrummitt
    Apologies for anyone who's been holding their breath: this entry has been a while because I keep getting distracted any time I come on rmweb and run out of time before I get to updating this. Sorry.
     
    This expands on a thread in the 3D Printing and CAD group on my experiment in 3D printing model railway items. I have a job that uses a 3D CAD system extensively so I have a 'leg up' (as one person kindly put it) on the skills required to create a file for printing. Having used similar technology for prototypes in this job I was somewhat sceptical about what could be achieved when asking for much smaller details on much smaller models. I chose a passenger cattle box (BEETLE) as a prototype because it has many different types of feature on the body; layering, planking, louvres, strapping, panels &c. Here it is when it first arrived from Shapeways in FUD (frosted ultra detail).
     

     
    There is a small hole where some of the louvre has broken away during the cleaning process. Below in black after a quick blast from the aerosol, which may make it a bit easier to see the detail (possibly not?).
     

     
    The smallest details are 0.1mm - the width between the planks on the ends. The layers are multiples of 0.125mm so that it matches up with etched construction, which in 2mm scale is almost always in 0.010" material and so matches with half etch.
     
    I was pleased with the outcome and so I continued to make the chassis. I was (un)fortunate enough to have a fair few Siphon underframes spare from test etches and mistakes that I cut and shut to 16'0" wheelbase with the aid of a chassis assembly jig from the association 2-312 RCH W irons fret. The brake blocks fold up from the W irons in this case so I was off to a good start. It still left a lot of bits to find. These vehicles are particularly busy underneath because they have central steps plus one at each corner, door bangers under the doors for the beasts, vacuum cylinder, and the longitudinal gas cylinder for lighting the drovers compartment!
     
    As can be seen I included the headstocks in the body. The solebars were added from nickel silver strip with wire soldered along the base to represent the bulb. The steps were made as previously on the milk brake with some extra holes in the jig
     

     
    The central footboards are very short, like on a horsebox. The brass wire holds the brass angle down in the jig to leave as many hands free as possible for orienting the stirrups (nickel silver wire), holding the soldering iron &c.
     

     
    This is what the component parts look like before assembly, and after cleaning up. There's no 1p, but the cutting mat should give an idea of size.
     
    Parts from various other sources were added until all the prominent items were present. The gas cylinder was mounted on a wireform as previously for the milk brake. There was a particularly scary moment soldering the door bangers in place once the whitemetal castings for the axle boxes and springs had been added where these could not be fitted afterwards.
     

     
    Here a top and bottom view of the chassis and a further picture of the bodies test fitted on them.
     

     
    Not the clearest photograph I'm afraid. It was at this point I realised that I had missed some items off the bodies. A pair of T stanchions from the ends and the water tank in the roof that was present on the early ones. (The models are meant to represent a pair from the first batch of diagram W7.)
     
    Now these details are added and the handrails and headstock details fitted they are ready for some more paint.
     

     
    I'm not sure what colour they should be? I thought they would have been lake in the early 20's but Atkins et al. GWR goods wagons 3rd Ed. seems to suggest that they would still have been grey until the grouping. Hmmm.
  19. richbrummitt
    For the first time in several months I had very very little on this weekend. Apart from a plan to get the first BBQ of the year in, that got rained off both days and is rescheduled for this weekend ), and a short visit to some of our significant others family I had a good chunk of time to use. Like many modellers I have more than one stash of stuff that I'd like to make one day. There are others that I would like to start soon. I have further stashes of stuff that I bought that is likely to remain wherever I put it. There is also the shelf of stuff that I started, plus the workbench(es) and finally there is a box of stuff that I consider finished. The latter has around a dozen wagons in it and I'd like to get more of the stuff from the shelf of stuff that I started, plus the workbench(es) into this box. Persistant readers will have probably concluded that I am easily distracted due to the lack of consecutive, or even subsequent, posts on any one subject.
     
    I built both of the 2mmSA GWR opens soon after they were released. One was finished fully lettered and loaded with an unusual (I thought) wood load, as previously seen in the post 'Wagons Also Spin'. The other languished on the shelf with the base colour, but no lettering. It was an ideal candidate for finishing off because it only required the livery completing, weathering and the couplings added. The lettering was a struggle. Thinking about a load, and flicking through some reference material I decided on a load of hay. This could be fully sheeted (two tarpaulins) and the wagon would virtually disappear, and the lettering wouldn't matter.
     

     
    I dug out an ancient email with a picture of a GWR sheet laid out flat attached to it and looked for a suitable item to pair it with. (Until I find a font that matches the GWR tarpaulin numbers then I'm a bit stuck for making any others!) Saturday morning was spent printing onto Rizlas, which is not as hard as it sounds. Print the sheet to scale size, then using the gummed edge of the Rizla stick it to the page so that the remainder covers the print, reinsert the page and print again. This time it should print onto the Rizla. I used the draft setting to get a faded look to begin with. The 'hay' is a suitably shaped chunk of expanded polystyrene (the same pink stuff I've been using as terraform for the layout). As long as you don't get them too wet when weathering (or use water fast inks) you should be fine. Now using small amounts of superglue and careful shaping with fingers and tweezers the load can be wrapped up in the sheets. Looking at photographs of the real thing will help to get it looking right. I only wish I'd removed most of the strapping, because the sheets seem to take their form, and the sheets lay quite flat over the wagon sides in the photos I looked at.
     
    Here's another view of 77046 from the other side. It's a GWR 5 plank open with DC1 brakes. The tarpaulins are pre-grouping GWR and LNWR styles. I read somewhere that they went grey in service (both letters and sheet) as they wore out, but I had to stop myself before the whole lot became a washed out grey. I also tried to keep the two tarpaulins a slightly different shade so they didn't merge. The couplings have only just been added and need a lick of colour.
     

     
    Sunday was spent cutting about 200 pieces of indentically sized bits of wood in a jig I made last week, but (as they say on the end of TTTE) that's another story.
  20. richbrummitt
    After an offer to Rabs of a file to try on his (then new) printer rather a lot of time passed and after an almost near miss with the postal service a little package arrived through the door recently with a bright orange one of these in it.
     

     
    The detail is comparable to some of the finest stereolithography that I have witnessed from professional bureaus. I know Rabs has spent quite a lot of time tweaking and practicing, refining the machine and the process and it has been worthwhile. The next picture shows a close up.
     

     
    The stepping is visible but was quickly cleaned up with some small fine sanding sticks over the course of an evening, trying to avoid destroying the rivet detail. They were all there in the CAD file The upper end was the worst but being the end it will usually be less visible than the sides and I think it will be okay but not perfect once painted now I've smoothed it out. Under 9x magnification the rivets seem to have distorted here but they are barely visible to the naked eye at 2'.
     

     
    The resin is supposed to have similar properties to some injection moulded plastics. (I didn't ask which ones, because it isn't important to me, sorry.) It is a little brittle and I have lost one of the buffer housings already, along with a small amount of the headstock. This, I suspect, is due to the very thin wall thicknesses. I don't know what I was thinking when I modelled them because I can't use the buffer housings that remain: this type are too small to drill such that they will accept a shank and head when the shank is 0.5mm. It will be back to brass for the buffers in due course, and I have some small repairs to make.
     
    I had considered using this as a master for resin casting a few more of these but there were never many of them built and their size meant they were not very useful except for bulk volumes of traffic, which were often conveyed between major traffic centres under darkness. They would be great for anyone craving a 47xx that gets one. Except for that they are a bit of a GWR modelling cliché. At least my model of a branch line isn't a terminus
     
    So for the moment I'm continuing on as a one-off. I have built the bogies up to check the buffer height and having used nearly all the packing pieces on the bogie etch it's looking pretty good so far.
     

     
    The GPV at the right hand side shows quite clearly why you can't produce one of these from two iron mink kits.
     
    To be continued...
  21. richbrummitt

    Back from the Dead

    By richbrummitt,

    It's been a while, 6 months I see from the last entry, but like buses three come along at once. Various real life (what model trains are not real life?) issues prevented much (any) progress with things for a long time. A couple of exhibition visits of late have really got me motivated again and after I treated myself to a frankly ridiculous desk light that Precision Paints had on offer at the Watford show I had to have a test.
     
    I've been working on the trio of Bachman Macaw Bs that were acquired last year. So far they have been treated to scale bogies, which dramaticaly reduces the width below the solebars. They are attached around the moulded pivots and retained with the original plastic pins. All the lettering has been removed and will be done by hand to match in with my existing stock. I have started the weathering and re-painting already, but have not yet got very far.
     

     
    Apologies for the quality of the lighting in the photo. The rest of the room seems almost like darkness compared to my desk now!
     
    Two of the three are going to be permanently joined to carry a 90' load of timber. I have to either find some 4mm square strip wood or wait until I can get in the garden to reduce some of the 8mm square that I have. An 8mm square 180mm long piece of wood is loaded in the photo so you can get an idea of the size of the load. I am planning to load the other wagon in a similar manner to that on the cover of Russel: Freight Wagons and Loads in Service on the GWR. I have some thin wood that will do nicely, however I calculate that I need to cut at least 400 pieces of wood 1.1mm width and around 40mm length for this one and that will take up a few evenings alone.
  22. richbrummitt

    Unfinished Business

    By richbrummitt,

    Sometimes it will be the case that when you post a photo of your work on RMWeb there is a helpful person who will kindly point out what is wrong with it. That was the case with my MR coke hoppers. What was missing?
     

     
    The handrail at the right hand side of the wagon. Now they are finished?
     
    I was waiting on some more container securing chains from N Brass Locos to finish off the GC machinery/implement wagon. They arrived earlier this week and I probably spent as long cutting the hooks, screw link, and securing eye up and splicing them onto some very fine chain acquired from Fleetline as I did assembling the wagon! I think the end result is worth it though.
     

     
    In the same parcel I got some of the driver/fireman figures. There is a third figure in the pack with a shovel, but he is waiting for a tender locomotive to ply his trade: he'd be a bit wasted in one of my tank engines. I soldered the small bases of the figures to some wire so that I would hold them in a pin chuck for painting (an idea I got from Mikkel). I am quite pleased with how they turned out, although close up I am not convinced about the shape of the cap for my time period.
     

     
    Here they are fitted in 1425. Although the cab number is rapidly wearing off due to handling. This the drivers side.
     

     
    and the fireman's side.
     

     
    Along with a lick of paint they hide the fact the motor protrudes a long way into the cab, although it doesn't really obscure the view directly through the opening from one side to other it used to noticeable when looking down into the cab. The locomotive has been re-motored recently and had a few touch-ups cosmetically. There is a lot more that could be done to improve the appearance, however I wish to concentrate on other matters and one day I will get around to making the locomotives to portray the early 1920's pre-grouping scene, for which 1425 is not suitable.
  23. richbrummitt
    No update last week because after I had fitted the first of my revised TOU mechanisms and feeling good about it I moved on to the others only to discover that the rebates in the other board were not as deep by 0.8mm!
     
    Oh-oh!
     
    I had to make the rebate deeper somehow and really didn't want to be rebuilding the switches. Inspiration came to me quickly and I was able to achieve the unthinkable in a reasonably short space of time.
     
    I used a 3mm graver for the one nearest the board edge where the facia was not in the way but there was no way I was going to fit the graver in the other spaces without grinding 75%+ off the length and resharpening. Another bit of useful quick thinking occurred. I really have excelled this week. Taking out the Minicraft and an abrasive wheel I set to work on a 3/16" tool blank to create a makeshift graver with the same section as the square section brass. I stoned the end off and set to work.
     

     

     
    The switch blades were removed for safe keeping and the rear siding was broken away carefully with a chisel for re-fixing later to improve access. (The rear siding needed to be realigned anyway so this wasn't a hardship.) Using a block of wood behind the blunt end provided a sizeable handle and prevented bruised and dented fingers. The tool could also be used as a check for depth because of it's shared size with the brass section.
     
    A couple of hours later and all the TOUs were installed. I fixed them with a couple of dabs of cyano before driving the pins in through pre-drilled holes. I treated myself to a pin pusher, which made fitting the pins much easier. I managed to go right through into my finger in one place. 1/8" is probably the limit of my pain threshold for such an incident.
     

     
    The switch rails are now back in place so that I don't lose them. They will be fixed permanently once again in the very near future. The woodworking to mount all the operating cranks to fit to is coming along nicely and two lengths of telescoping brass tube have been almost entirely consumed making the pivots. This has been achieved over several days because there is only so much pipe cutter action that my wrists will take at once, aside from the inherent tedium of round and round and round and...
     
    To avoid getting demotivated dug in crawling slowly forward on the uninteresting aspects I've painted up the lever frame in the correct colours in between. Some of the catch handles are stiff now. I expect once some of the paint has been worn away by the drop boxes it will start to operate more smoothly once again.
     

     
    I also stumbled upon the ring that I cut to go around the turntable. Rather than misplace it for a further two years I cut it carefully to fit around the rails and gaps and fixed it into position.
     

     
    TTFN.
  24. richbrummitt

    Bricking It

    By richbrummitt,

    Aside from running out of ideas and being in desperate need of linking a lever frame with my TOUs so that I commence scenic work I have been slowly putting brick after brick individually in various walls.
     
    I have a plan to produce my own brick paper 'kits' for the three station buildings (station building, signal box and weighbridge hut/goods office) on the computer using photographs of actual bricks arranged to proper bricklaying practices in as much as I understand them before printing them on sticky backed papers and wrapping them around a laser cut former. The latter so the sizes of the building and openings are more accurate than I can cut by hand. Fortunately drawings of the station building appear in the OPC line history and the signal box is a standard type that is covered in the Ericplans book. The weighbridge hut/goods office is similar enough to the one in this book to have just the West window changed for a smaller one, as indicated by pictures.
     
    I began by getting frustrated wrestling with GIMP until I realised that a vector graphics program was what I required. I downloaded Inkscape and got moving reasonably quickly after digesting a few tutorials. It is quite tedious work and initially I wanted to get a feel for how long copying and placing individual bricks would take but things have progressed reasonably quickly and some re-use is possible. For example opposite sides can never be seen together so you only never need draw one side of the building before making allowances for the window openings. No-one would know that the bricks repeat unless they read this!
     
    Thus far I have the weighbridge hut/goods office structure brickwork completed and have made a start on both the signal box and station buildings. The first step was to draw out a side and end. I drew these polygons with no border so that the line width does not need to be considered. I wasn't going to attempt to use the brick photographs as it was because of matching up the tile and patterning issues. I planned to use the bricks but not the mortar. I drew the mortar outlines in an off white colour as a series of rectangles. These brick outlines have no fill and the outline is a scale 3/8". I used four sizes - stretcher, header, queen closure, and a header plus stretcher for 'corner bricks'. When drawing these you need to consider the thickness of the mortar outline. The error is tiny but over the length of a building the error accumulates quickly. Inkscape allows snapping to the bounding box and to use the centre of the outline for the bounding box rather than outer edge of the line. This makes putting the 'bricks' together really easy. It is tedious though and at the moment there is only the mortar. Once I started drawing the bricks I found that I needed to adjust the sizes of the walls slightly to fit the bricks but these really are small alterations.
     
    Once you have all the mortar drawn in it is time to add the texture. I cut out the individual bricks from a texture available freely on the internet that had a colouring that I liked. I used paint to do this and copied each brick into inkscape as a separate bitmap. Try to use just the bricks and not select too much mortar. Resize the brick textures to the size of stretchers, headers, &c. and then duplicate and add the bricks. Using the snaps align them to the mortar outlines and then place them on a layer behind the mortar.
     
    Here's a crop of what it looks like

     
    I've printed this out onto paper and built it up around a shell of mount board to get an idea for how this method will work.

     
    and placed it in approximately the right position in the yard.

    It requires the glazier and tiler to visit now.
     
    I think this will work well and so am continuing to work on the other buildings. The bridge is taking some time because each brick also requires rotating to fit the arch. A lot of time will be saved painting things later though and I really quite like the effect. I must work on making the corners more square though.
  25. richbrummitt
    I mentioned working on Masterclass brake vans in a much earlier post. The kits go together very well but then there are the handrails. I've been doing some other things to give me a break from bending and cutting wire before *ping* and it's out of the tweezers goodness knows where! I think you have become a seasoned model maker when you can make a valiant attempt to recover the small parts based on the sound of what they land on or against? I must have half a set of handrails in the carpet somewhere because it's often easier to start again. After about three evenings work the handrails are fitted to the first pair of vans. (It would have been much longer too if it were not for David Eveleigh's little wire bending etch and a couple of other 'jigs' that I knocked up along the way.) They are 20' variants and one has later style foot boards (from a refurbishment) The roofs are placed on for now because I still need to fit the brake standard and stove pipe. There are also many other details to add, but these aren't included on the etch so I can file the spares and scraps away and clear something else off the bench too. I have some later styles and also a 6 wheeler to do, at a later date. For now this pair allow me to finish of a couple of goods trains in a proper manner.
     

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