David Holman

The light at the end of the covid tunnel? Very apt! Have a good one, everybody. This forum remains a small island of sanity in an otherwise strange and challenging going world.

Thanks Ken and everyone. The possible plate you mention is, I think, a support for a cross shaft, supporting the reversing mechanism to the inside valve gear. The reversing lever itself appears to go below the frames, but as I understand it, in most cases this joined a cross shaft above the frames on which was a lever/link to moving the valve gear. I assume there would be a top and bottom cross shaft, but hopefully knowledgeable folk on this forum will clarify. The GSR Bible has a nice side on photo of this, though the same photo is much more clearly produced in JHB's Rails to Achill.

Bits and pieces Have had some fun with various bits of detailing over the last week or so, though also spent a fair bit of time simply making sure that the boiler unit and footplate/cab sit nice and square with each other. The latter is important at this stage, as experience tells me that once the details go on, it makes any corrections so much harder. The boiler/smokebox/firebox unit has a 10ba bolt to fix it to the cab front while another bolt is screwed into the base of the smokebox from underneath. Anyway, the various additions are as follows: Inside motion: decided to make this from plastic strip and used the working motion on my SLNCR Sir Henry as a guide, though for the D16, it is only dummy because the low pitched boiler means that you can't see a great deal of what is going on between the frames. The motion stops short at a frame spacer, but this isn't really noticeable either as it is between the big front splashers. Then decided it was time to tidy up the wheels and coupling rods, filing down the latter's bearings and trimming the fixing bolts. The chassis is remarkably free running, so much so I have to be careful when carrying it around on my work board as the slightest tilt will set it rolling. Next up was the cab floor, which is a piece of 10thou nickel silver & then was able to build up the splashers inside the cab floor from the same material. You can cut thin nickel silver with strong scissors, which speeds up the process, especially for simple rectangular parts like these. The cab interior came next, starting with the back of the firebox. Cut a piece of 15thou NS to shape, then wrapped a 5mm strip of 10 thou brass which was formed and soldered in place to make it look like the firebox extends into the cab. This was where the fun started as I now had to make the main controls and gauges. I must admit they are more generic than anything, but include the two water gauges, two injectors, the firehole door, vacuum and boiler pressure gauges, regulator handle and the brake valve, plus associated pipework. The boiler pressure gauge is a brass casting from the scrap box, while the vacuum gauge is a 1/8th inch wheel bearing. The injectors and water gauges were cut and filed from square and round brass strip, carefully soldered together, by using first 240 solder and then 145 for the later additions, also using various clips as heat sinks to stop bits falling off as fast as I was attaching them. These were all attached to the 'backhead', along with the firehole door, this a circle of nickel silver with some added strips for detail, hinges etc. The driver's brake valve was made in much the same way and is fitted to the right hand side of the cab front sheet, as MGWR locos were all right hand drive - or so I read. I'd been intending to make the cab spectacle windows from brass tube, but while rummaging through my spares boxes [there are many], was delighted to find an unused cab front with two etched circles still in place. What's more, they are exactly the right diameter too, thereby saving me quite a bit of work. I carefully soldered these in place and the opened the holes in the cab front with a combination of a tapered reamer and rat tailed files. So decent progress, helped no end by the fact that, unlike the Sligo tank that Galteemore is building, this little 4-4-0 has very few rivets, though there are quite a lot of handrails now awaiting attention.

Fascinating and excellent stuff, Ken!

Having done two Small Tanks from kits and a scratchbuilt Large Tank, I can testify just how much time and effort has gone into those few bits of nickel silver! Great work, the loco is indeed emerging.

Lovely stuff!

A fine bit of work, Ken. Hangs together really well and makes an excellent setting for your locos and rolling stock.

Clever and very classy. Every home should have one!

Yep, looks a bit of alright. Good model.

A fine combination of traditional and modern techniques, which works really well.

Think you are right about pre curving the sheet metal. I found I had to slacken the rollers enough to get the sheet all the way through or the rollers wouldn't grip. Hence the flat sections on the seam I guess. Obvious when you think about it! As for soldering, my new temperature controlled iron, with a pointed bit has certainly helped, not least because it helps getting into tight corners when soldering from the inside. Cuts down significantly on excess solder too, which then means much less cleaning up.

The last week has been spent making the boiler/smokebox/firebox combination and [just as important] trying to make sure this unit will sit properly on the locomotive. First up, it was time to acquaint myself with my model railway club's rolling bars. They are from GW Models and like their rivet punch are an extremely robust construction of mild steel. Picked them up from our club president, a lovely 90 year old man, still an active modeller who knows more about how steam locomotives work than most. Got some useful advice from him, plus there are a couple of pages in Geoff Holt's books too. Basically, there are Allen key headed screws at each end of the rollers and it is simply a case of feeding in your piece of flat sheet and then wind the handle. The more you tighten the screws, the tighter the radius produced, so with light pressure you can easily roll coach or van roofs, but crank things up and you soon get a tube. I had problems getting the sheet to curve properly either side of the seam, but it wasn't too difficult tweaking things later. I used 15thou nickel silver for the boiler. The other key pieces are the formers, which I cut and filed from 18thou. There is one circular piece for the front of the boiler, with a second profiled to the shape of the firebox, to go at the other end. I had to cut a slot, a scale 4'3 from the back of the boiler [and half way up the side], so I could then straighten the nickel silver to the shape of the firebox. I piece of brass strip then fills the slot to make the firebox front. The third former was shaped to the profile of the smokebox and a 10thou strip of nickel silver rolled and formed to go over the end of the boiler. So far, so good? Well, no... Trying the assembly on the footplate showed the firebox was too wide to fit between the splashers and somehow, I'd created a 'flat' on the smokebox front. Rude words? You bet! Ended up spending an hour or so measuring everything & discovered that I'd made the boiler diameter too big - only a scale two inches, but enough to throw the whole thing out, so the was no option but to make another boiler and smokebox, along with filing a bit off the splashers. The boiler is currently fixed to the cab front with a 10ba nut and bolt; I'm considering bolting the base of the smokebox to the footplate, in the hope of making painting [and especially lining], easier. Earlier in this little saga, managed to roll the first boiler the wrong way [despite studying and marking everything carefully [more rude words] and came pretty damn close to doing it with the mark two version as well, but consulted the missus [who can work such things out far better than me], thereby saving a possible meltdown.! Fingers crossed, the basic shape of the loco is complete, so what follows is all about the detailing. Plenty of challenges ahead mind, not least signature items like chimney, dome and buffers - commercial items of which I have thus far been unable to source. If I had a lathe [and more importantly, knew how to use it], then it would be less of a problem. We do have one at the club, but Kent and Medway are a proverbial plague pit at the moment, so can't see me getting down there any time soon. Still, there are plenty of other things to look at, so the next job will be making a list of what needs doing. Plus there is also the tender of course. Thank goodness for model railways in these challenging times!

Fine work indeed.

Remarkable what keeps turning up.

So much better than tension locks!

Living as I do in Kent, find it extraordinary that trucking firms are happy to drive across England and Wales, rather than ferry goods straight to Ireland. It's the same for stuff that goes to the north of England and Scotland, rather than use ports up there. The result is that Kent is braced to become a lorry park from January, with even schools told to expect disruption because of traffic problems. Yet we have a rail tunnel and container trains could significantly reduce long distance lorry trips everywhere. So while it would be great for the local economy of Rosslare - and a post Brexit container port may well be essential if lorry freight through England and Wales becomes less practical - surely the sensible approach would be to plan for more rail based container traffic? But then, when has politics ever been sensible?! Nevertheless, the prospect of a boom in loco hauled freight is certainly attractive to most of us ferro-equinologists, methinks!

Great to see the latest progress!

My 7mm G has a wheelbase of 8'6 Angus. Built from the Worsley etches, though adapted them to make mine one of the early versions. Reported the build on my workshop thread a couple of years ago.

More progress, less swearing! The next step was the splashers over the front drivers. A case of more cutting and filing for the two sides, [18thou NS], with 10 thou brass for the tops. The latter is easily cut with a pair of strong scissors with little distortion - much better than using a fret saw. As with the coupling rod splashers on the footplate, I made a simple jig from a piece of hardwood to support the top while soldering on the sides. Used 240 degree solder for this, so that my general purpose 145 solder could be used to solder the finished articles to the footplate. Once again, am grateful to Roger for some more Alphagraphix bits and pieces - in this case to 'top' frames [above the footplate] and the cab sides. Unfortunately, the latter were both for the same side, so the etched bend line which acts as the roof support had to be bent the other way on one of them. As have said before, it would be interesting to know how far Roger got before deciding not to progress with a kit for the D16. The cab sides also needed a bit of fettling, as there were no cut outs on the bottom to fit over the coupling rod splashers, though it didn't take too long to file these to shape. The etched holes for the various handrails look way too big for the usual 0.8mm wire used for these things in 7mm scale, but have decided it was easier to use them as is, with some filler later, rather than cut two new sides. Time will tell... The fiddly bit has been the cab front. I soldered the sides in place, then did some more careful measuring in order to cut out a piece of 18thou nickel silver. This was made harder because the front curves outwards to make part of the splasher over the rear pair of drivers. All in all pretty awkward & am wondering if I should have used thinner sheet metal as forming these curves hasn't gone too well, so will be needing some more filler. Also needed to mark where the exact centre of the boiler will be, so I can use a bolt to align the latter accurately, with the same idea at the smokebox end. The cab spectacle windows are only partially drilled out at the moment , while I need to buy some brass tube of the right diameter to make the surround. Speaking of tubes, the next step will be the boiler. The Chatham Club has a set of rolling bars, so hope to pick those up tomorrow.

May have been 16 years in the making, but worth the wait, for sure.

One of my previous layouts was based on a fictional roadside tramway, so built one of the Connoisseur GER tram engine kits which also came with a set of 'Toby' nameplates. Couldn't resist fitting them and even bought the book, so I could draw Toby's face on two squares of card. Stuck them on with bluetak, in case I offended the purists, but needn't have worried, Tony proved a real hit at exhibitions and not just with the children.

Now come on Noel, surely Thomas is an 0-6-0T!

Thanks Ken. Know what you mean - am going to have to either file a slot in the plate, or thin down the coupling. There's always a compromise somewhere, it seems.

Impressive scene.

[Lots] of rude words Thought the footplate and valences would be a challenge and I was right, though I didn't really help myself. Never mind 'measure twice, cut once', the moral is really just 'measure, measure, measure... Started by soldering two strips of nickel silver together for the valences, after which came the laborious task of marking and then cutting out with a fine bladed fret saw, followed by carefully filing to shape. The footplate was done the same way, but to follow the curves of the valances, it needed a lot of trial and error to work out the dimensions and I eventually resorted to a piece of thread. The footplate is 10thou nickel silver, the valances are 18thou. So far, so good and the initial soldering went ok too. Taking a tip from Geoff Holt's book, I made a template/jig of the valance curves from a thin piece of hardwood, then clamped this to a piece of MDF and the workbench. A strip of cereal packet card was stapled on as well, so as to ensure the footplate has a small overhang. Indeed, it was all going far too well, but when I tried the footplate against the chassis, it became clear that all was not as it should be. The cut outs on the footplate top needed a fair bit of adjustment, while I also discovered that the spacers on the frames weren't consistent in their width. Hence a profusion of bad language followed by having to dismantle parts of the chassis and file everything down to the correct dimensions. Geoff Holt has a novel way of joining the chassis to the loco body, which involves the front of the former fitting into a slot behind the buffer beam, then the rear of the chassis is bolted to the drag beam with two 10BA bolts. This avoids using nuts and bolts under the footplate, but required a bit of thought, not least to ensure that everything lines up properly before drilling the bolt holes. Needless to say, what I now have is the mark two version. On top of all this, I also discovered that cutting the front frames to the prototypical shape meant the bogie wouldn't sit properly, so have hard to carve a chunk off them. Fingers crossed, am hoping I've now got these issues solved and can now move on to things like splashers and foot steps while I psyche myself for the boiler and smokebox.