It's been a busy week and today I've had the first chance since last weekend to do a bit more on the new chassis for 82044.

To re-cap, it's a Bachmann body, but the chassis just wouldn't run smoothly until I dismantled all the valve gear. Having seen how essentially loose and apparently wobbly the valve gear was, I decided to build a replacement chassis, based on a Comet kit for a 76XXX 2-6-0.

The Comet side frames needed a lot of alteration to fit the Bachmann body, and they also needed to be extended at the rear, due to the fact that this was now going on a 2-6-2T and not a 2-6-0.

Today I fitted the driving wheels, having first taken a tad off the flanges to give a slightly more satisfactory appearance. Yes, I'm using Romfords, despite there not being the correct number of spokes. This project is all about using up some of the stuff I've had in the Nutkin Store for years...

And anyway, no one has thus far tried to count the number of spokes on my other 82XXX at exhibitions...

Having soldered up the coupling rod overlays, these were fitted, together with the crankpins and retaining washers on the outer wheels and the whole thing directly wired into the motor and given a test on the bench. To my relief, it all worked nice and smoothly first time. Having said that, I'd have been slightly disappointed if it hadn't, given the very basic, uncompensated chassis...

Rear chassis extension: