Tullygrainey

Neat! That's coming along very nicely David. I like your jig for lining up the square tubing on the axles. Simple but effective. I'm going to wait till you've solved all the problems of building chassis with outside frames and cranks before I tackle one! That High Level gearbox looks minuscule in there - I'm used to them taking up half the space in the boiler.

David, Alan Gibson still lists 4mm hornblocks, both for 1/8" (4M60 or 4M60A) and 2mm (4M61 or 4M61A) axles. I have a set though I've never used them. They have integral springing. London Road Models also list their version, also for both sizes of axle.

That is exceptionally good. Beautifully made and perfectly finished.

That is very fine indeed! Lovely job David

I've come to the computer to get a better look at these on a bigger screen. Great coach work as always, David. Crisp and with lovely attention to detail in the panelling and metalwork. These look the business even in grey primer.

I've been following this one with interest Mol. You're making great (and rapid) progress. The most flexible approach to offering a chassis for OO builders might be to adopt the common method of fully etching axle bearing holes for all axles but also providing half-etched guides for horn block cutouts. That way, builders can choose how best to motorise. If you also included brackets for the Fleischmann chassis, you've covered all the bases. Alan

I’ve no experience of building in 7mm apart from one diminutive narrow gauge scratch-build and a few O:16.5 conversions using proprietary OO chassis but I’ve recently had a chance to look quite closely at a variety of standard gauge 7mm locomotives, both kit-built and scratch-built. What I’ve seen suggests to me that while 4mm work can be described as model making, some of the work that I’ve seen in 7mm approaches miniature engineering, especially when it comes to things like suspension systems, gearboxes and working inside motion. Respect! Alan

The long and the short of it. One of the inspirations for the building of No.6 in 4mm and a source of many clues and references was this 7mm version built by Tony Ragg using the Alphagraphix kit as the basis. Contrasting interpretations of BCDR green!

The joys of a garden railway! Challenges that we indoor modellers never have to deal with. Our vegetation never grows any bigger and the weather hardly ever changes. Impressive stuff and that photograph of the electronic circuitry compartment with your 4mm loco projects in the background gives some indication of just how big these 1:20.3 models are. A whole different experience! Alan

Thanks for a great day Patrick. And who knew we could get sound out of No6 on DC! Really chuffed

I must admit I tend to wrap the chip in masking tape and cover all joints with heatshrink sleeving but it’s all too easy to trap a wire and break through the insulation when bolting everything together.

Thank you John. I wonder what caused your chips to fry. That sounds like very bad luck.

Ha Ha, thanks Leslie. Yes, I knew I was winging it with this one but came to the same conclusion. For the time being, number 6 is impersonating a LSWR Beattie Well Tank. Have you been talking to @Patrick Davey? He's lined me up to build the BCDR ex-Royal Saloon next. He'll be packing me off to Downpatrick with a tape measure any day

I'm still trying to work out whether the two items in the centre of the picture are oil cans, teapots or mugs.

Finally got to the end of lining out No.6 (breathes huge sigh of relief). Some small details have also been added - whistle, safety valves, tender springs - and a bit of light weathering done. Compared to the BCDR tank locos where the large tanks could be filled with lead, there is a lot less space in this one to stow extra weight. However, putting the DCC gubbins in the tender freed up the boiler for this. Arranging things this way means having 4 wires running between loco and tender - 2 for the pickups and 2 for the motor. If the wires are too stiff as they were in my first attempts, they tend to interfere with the reliable tracking of the ensemble. Fine wire of the sort usually connected to DCC chips does the job ok. A pair micro sockets, one connected to the motor and one to the pickups are glued under the loco chassis at the back and flying leads from the tender plug into these. The lack of backhead detail is very evident in the above view. My excuse is that I wasn't sure what it should look like so as usual, the crew have the extra task of hiding the evidence, or lack of it. Also very evident is how ridiculously out of scale 16.5mm gauge is. I'm going to have to give up on OO one of these days. Even with extra weight inside the tender, there was still a wealth of free space so I decided to try a sound chip for this one. The chip, speaker and stay-alive capacitor are all secreted in the tender. It still needs some detailing and a coal load in the tender. That left side number plate needs straightened too but all in all I think it's just about done. A run at Loughan Quay. No 6.mov