Horsetan

That was mental!

That may just be what it has become. The website is equally moribund - it hasn't been touched for over four years. Lack of money doesn't help either.

A role filled these days by the Rubberbandits, but with a lot more swearing. I mean, you wouldn't hear that type of language from a docker!

There are loads of screw-in brass spacers in the kit I acquired, but they all measure 11.1mm wide. I'm not quite sure what other purpose they could be used for - possibly reinforcing the insides of corners, maybe? Let me cut my own first. If I get into real trouble, I might have to come back to you.

This:

OK so, this morning I scribed horizontal lines through the driving axle centres: Generally mark on the inside of the chassis frames, not the outsides which would be visible to the public. The whole point of doing the lines is to have a visible guide to where the axles should rest once the suspension system has been introduced: I will need to scribe yet more lines to take account of where the leaf springs will run, and where the fulcrum points should be (midway between the driving axles, for example). Since this particular kit was produced before Ireland changed over to the Euro, I had expected bits to be missing. In fact the only things that were absent were dedicated wider spacers for 21mm gauge builders. Not sure if "Weshty" / Des has been able to supply wider ones since taking over the SSM range, but they certainly wouldn't go amiss. For my part, I'm making my own. The first major part is the upper rubbing plate which sits above the bogie, which you see here at the top left corner of the fret: As designed, it's for 16.5mm gauge only. I need to make a wider replica of it, keeping the same overall length and fold lines for now. In order to end up with an overall chassis width of 17 to 17.5mm wide, the estimate is that the spacers should be at least 16.7mm wide.

Am just after being informed by Allen Doherty that a kit for the "WT"/Jeep 2-6-4T is being worked on, with etching to take place at some point in the near-future. Apparently will come with castings. I think the chassis will follow a similar format to his "W"-class mogul, in that you can specify spacers for 16.5mm or 21mm gauge. Excellent news; I am going for one, as I'd like to have a go at replicating no.4

For me, that was the whole point of having them. Low resistance, low current consumption. And you don't need to undo any screws to disengage worm gears, because the thing will backdrive all day long. If you're going to be doing a bit of messin' with it, see if you can introduce different spurs to vary the overall ratio. I'm going to be experimenting by replacing the Escap motor with one by Maxon, which is supposed to be even stronger, using the same bevel gearbox. Meanwhile I've started to draw out the chassis spacers for 21mm gauge on nickel-silver sheet......

Have you eliminated all the cul-de-sacs in Wellington?

Would that be the new caravan?

That would be the easy part. There'd still be considerable import duty to pay once you get it into the country. Not sure it's something you can hide in your luggage as you slip through the EU/green channel either...

Clearly some phones are more flexible than others.

Sawing off the excess axle length means I have a grand total of ONE completed wheelset ....so I could start putting the coupling rods together: 2 layers for each rod. Aluminium hairgrip is all you need to keep 'em together during soldering: Then remove the rod from the fret in order to file down and clean up the excess solder: An evening's work: I think we'll start sawing out some chassis spacers next..... That would be a Chivas Regal 12-yr-old. It will be mostly empty by the time this engine is finished.

One wheel is mounted flush with the axle end: The other end shows the excess portion needing to be sawn-off: Easy job with a piercing saw. In this photo, you can see that I have test-quartered the wheels, with the offside (r/h) crank leading: For those who don't deal with steam, that basically means that when the engine moves forward, it's the right-hand crank that will come round first, followed 90 degrees later by the nearside (l/h) crank. I don't know yet whether right-hand lead is correct for the "S"-class. There were some British steam classes (I think the LNWR "G2A" 0-8-0 was an example) which had a left-hand crank lead, as does the Drewry "04" diesel shunter.