Restoring a Carson/Bassett Lowke LB&SCR J2 in 2 inch Gauge

[Florence Locomotive Works]

Hello all,

 

Another successful run on the track was had today, and I’ve decided that it needs to be lengthened as soon as possible as the engine really wants to go for a longer distance. Here’s  a photo from today’s run.

 

 

After a long delay my copy of “London, Brighton & South Coast Railway Miscellany” by Kevin Robertson arrived today. Within were these very interesting photos of Abergavenny. The photo of it in Brighton works looks exactly the same as how my model looks without the side tanks, next time I have them off I’ll do a  comparison.

 

 

 

Douglas

Edited Sunday at 04:20 by Florence Locomotive Works

[Victorian]

Thanks for showing those pics Douglas. I hadn't seen them before. The big tank engines were all the rage before the (Great) war, perhaps because they could offer improved acceleration in the face of the emerging electric stock. It all came to grief though when one of them rolled off the track on the (I think) South Eastern because of water surging in the huge side tanks.

 

That was in the future when Greenly published his design in the 1910 "Models, Railways and Locomotives" and Butcher & Co brought out an electric version, both in Gauge 2. Here they are side by side 114 years later:

 

 

Greenly admitted to making his live steam model overscale, but Butcher's was dead on, the boiler just large enough to hold an Ibbottson 'Boiler Motor'. Now reversibly re-motored with a Surpass '540' driving the original gear train, 'Abergavenny' is the most useful loco in my G2 fleet although she demands 10' radius curves and can only run on my outdoor track. The Greenly engine has yet to see a flame and will need some work since it's been restored from a similar condition to the one that Douglas has found but with no thought to ever running again.

 

Perhaps one day we can get a photo of all three together?

 

David

 

 

[J. S. Bach]

13 hours ago, Florence Locomotive Works said:

Hello Mark,

 

I was not aware of that coincidence. I wonder if perhaps there’s a stash of BL rail in the hands of an American collector somewhere. I might put an appeal out on Facebook, I know Leonard Carey has an original BL gauge 2 circle, so it must be out there.

He sure has a lot of neat old stuff. But then I have a small stash myself. Almost all 0 scale.

[J. S. Bach]

12 hours ago, Florence Locomotive Works said:

Hello all, ...snip...

Douglas

Now, that I like. Hmmm, how to non-visibly  power it!

[John R Smith]

 

Hello Douglas

 

Great progress that you have made there.  Just a cautionary word - Basset-Lowke rail section is different post WW II than it is before it. The pre-war 1930s rail is taller section, and wider across the rail head. So the two do not mix very well!

 

Don't ask me how I know this, but yes I was caught out and ended up with a horrible step in my track. And of course fishplates don't help, because they line up the bottom if the rail, not the top.

 

 

[Lacathedrale]

6 hours ago, Victorian said:

Thanks for showing those pics Douglas. I hadn't seen them before. The big tank engines were all the rage before the (Great) war, perhaps because they could offer improved acceleration in the face of the emerging electric stock. It all came to grief though when one of them rolled off the track on the (I think) South Eastern because of water surging in the huge side tanks.

 

That was in the future when Greenly published his design in the 1910 "Models, Railways and Locomotives" and Butcher & Co brought out an electric version, both in Gauge 2. Here they are side by side 114 years later:

 

 

Greenly admitted to making his live steam model overscale, but Butcher's was dead on, the boiler just large enough to hold an Ibbottson 'Boiler Motor'. Now reversibly re-motored with a Surpass '540' driving the original gear train, 'Abergavenny' is the most useful loco in my G2 fleet although she demands 10' radius curves and can only run on my outdoor track. The Greenly engine has yet to see a flame and will need some work since it's been restored from a similar condition to the one that Douglas has found but with no thought to ever running again.

 

Perhaps one day we can get a photo of all three together?

 

David

 

 

 

Offending locos were, AFAIK, the SECR K-Class 2-6-4T aka "Rolling" Rivers - they were all rebuilt as U-class tender locos. Large tank locos are really quite wonderful, hard to figure out why the Brighton's Baltic and Atlantic tanks have not yet seen RTR...

[GRASinBothell]

I think there was more than a little doubt whether the loco was offending at all - the Southern's permanent way (and shingle ballast) came in for a lot of criticism, and the Rivers ran fine under test on the LNER main line. I think it was a case of needing to be seen to be doing something that doomed the Rivers...

Gordon

[Florence Locomotive Works]

Update time. I discovered yesterday that Walsall Model Industries appears to have gone out of business, which leaves me with one less option for making the missing leading and trailing wheels. I decided to take the hardest, but probably most interesting option which was to make my own wheels.

 

So today I went to my metal dealer and bought 6 inches of 1018 cold rolled round bar, and headed to another workshop where there is a larger lathe than mine which is more suitable for turning big pieces of steel. I’d already made a test wheel on my lathe at home, but it took me ages due to my Rivett not being very enthused about machining 1.75 inch steel.

 

So this afternoon the billet was loaded into this 1934 Southbend and away we went.

 

 

Once I had the first disc roughed out it had to be parted off from the parent stock. Rather than doing this in the lathe I decided to use the 1925 Racine power hacksaw which despite making a huge racket and not cutting very accurately is huge fun to use. 

 

 

Then it was back to the lathe face off the rear and clean up the edges. And so the second disc was finished (the first was made at home).

 

Here they are sitting in front of the engine. I happen to work at the place where this lathe is, we make custom chandeliers (hence the raw brass castings for chandelier arms) and have been doing so for 70 years which explains the ancient equipment.

 

 

This is what the wheels look like in place under the engine. One has already been inked and divided into 10.

 

But I don’t want plain disc wheels, though I have nothing against them. So the discs will be drilled and then the negative space cut out with a jewelers saw, and then the spokes profiled using needle files. In all, there are 64 spokes to do on the whole engine. I’d say about two weeks work at present speed.

 

 

 

Tomorrow I’ll be back making the rest of the 6 discs, and then these will all be drilled on the drill press while I wait for the jewelers saw blades to arrive.

 

Douglas

[John R Smith]

Douglas

 

Well done, you are definitely doing things the hard way and good for you. There used to be articles in the MRN about making your own wheels, but until now I have never known anybody who actually did it. Even my father, who was a very fine model engineer, always bought castings from Reeves or whoever and finish turned them. But at least they already had spokes!

 

John

 

 

[goldfish]

1 hour ago, Florence Locomotive Works said:

Update time. I discovered yesterday that Walsall Model Industries appears to have gone out of business, which leaves me with one less option for making the missing leading and trailing wheels. I decided to take the hardest, but probably most interesting option which was to make my own wheels.

 

This is very sad news if true, and will leave quite a gap. Their website is still up and running though.

[Victorian]

Wow! I'm impressed. That's dedication indeed!

 

A note to bear in mind when you design your track: most G2 locos were made with underscale leading wheels. Even with this compromise, they were usually restricted to 10' radius curves. Abergavenny is no exception: here she is yesterday with the GN set:

 

 

These are actually 8 spoke 3' dia wagon wheels since the originals were missing when I acquired the loco. Fortunately the bogie casting was in the box, but I've no idea if the original wheels were to scale. This extract from Butcher's 1914 catalogue (Courtesy of Simon Goodyear) suggests not.:

 

Incidentally, almost all my G2 locos have been missing wheels and burners when acquired. Wheels may be explained by the need to run on 4' 6" radius Lowko track as the G2 model railways vanished, but burners? An enduring mystery.

 

David

 

[Lacathedrale]

Hello David, can you explain your last sentence please (Lowko, etc.) ?

 

[Victorian]

3 hours ago, Florence Locomotive Works said:

Update time. I discovered yesterday that Walsall Model Industries appears to have gone out of business, which leaves me with one less option for making the missing leading and trailing wheels. I decided to take the hardest, but probably most interesting option which was to make my own wheels.

Douglas

 

A friend is visiting them today to collect some wheels and is not aware of any issues. He will report back and I'll advise.

 

12 minutes ago, Lacathedrale said:

Hello David, can you explain your last sentence please (Lowko, etc.) ?

William

 

After the permanent outdoor Gauge 2 tracks were taken up (Brabazon's during the war for instance) the only option for many owners was Bassett Lowkes' 'Lowko' track which came in various radii up to 7' max, too small for many of the scale models. My own track is 10' radius but this still tightens the couplings on many of the scale carriages which have had to have an extra link installed!

 

 

Gauge 2 was big! You can see the Lowko track on the exhibition circuit, the TCS in Leicester on 2 December and Gaydon on 31st May next year (provisional) with some of the only known surviving pointwork panels. Next month (12th Oct.), the G1MRA AGM show at the Steam Museum, Swindon will feature the modern 'Australian' Gauge 2 tinplate oval, which at 7' is still not enough for Abergavenny!

 

 

David

[J. S. Bach]

7 hours ago, Florence Locomotive Works said:

Update time.  ...snip...

 

Tomorrow I’ll be back making the rest of the 6 discs, and then these will all be drilled on the drill press while I wait for the jewelers saw blades to arrive.

 

Douglas

Shades of the Scullin Disc drivers. I love then and they are the only thing that makes certain large New York Central locos palatable!!

https://www.rpnation.com/gallery/nyc-mohawk.7630/full?d=1457387678

 

[Lacathedrale]

Thank you, David. The history of G2 is absolutely fascinating. My 1929 edition of Model Railways by Greenly makes a distinction between No. 2 Gauge and 2-in gauge but has a fair number of both in.

 

 

I too hope that Walsall Model Industries isn't out of business @Florence Locomotive Works as I've just ordered some buffers and couplers from them!

Edited yesterday at 14:52 by Lacathedrale

[Florence Locomotive Works]

Another four hours were spent today down at the “office” preparing the last two blanks for the front wheels. These were then taken home and divided into 10 (this takes longer than you’d think) and then the line where the holes were to be drilled was made using this watchmakers pump divider. 
 

 

20 odd wholes later I had myself four wheels, and couldn’t resist the opportunity to cut the axles and takes these photos. Shades of what is to come.

 

 

 

Tomorrow I’ll turn the rear wheels and begin to construct the bogie frame, which will hopefully have full suspension even though it’s a little useless as the engine has rigid driving wheels.

 

Re track and such. According to the BL add* that Fred posted a month ago, this engine requires “a circle of 15 foot diameter” which seems a little small to me. I’m guessing the publisher got confused and they really mean a radius of 15 feet. I’ve seen publishers confuse engineering lingo before. 
 

Re Walsall. That is good to hear that they are still open, if this scheme of mine to make my own wheels goes pear shaped I’ll buy some castings from them if I can finally get them to answer the phone!

 

Douglas

 

* I eventually decided that this engine was made by Bassett Lowke using Carson parts around 1913. Simon Goodyear says he has some papers that should ID it but his scanner is broken at the moment. 

[John R Smith]

Douglas

 

The wheels look rather nice with just the holes in them! Good luck with the spokes.  I think that I am not really aware of just how large Gauge 2 is, never having seen an example. I was quite surprised by how big your new wheels seemed to be, judging by the picture of your holding one. Perhaps you could take a photo with an imperial inch scale laid alongside the engine?

 

John

[Victorian]

3 hours ago, Florence Locomotive Works said:

“a circle of 15 foot diameter”

That's quite common for G2 locomotives and almost ties in with the largest 'Lowco' radius of 7'. (The alternative 'scale' track with cast chairs and wooden keys was only stocked in 6' radius). But that's academic because the leading wheels were always undersize unless to special order.

 

Anyway the wheels look superb and you'll soon be able to decide your own curve radius!

 

David

 

 

Edited 9 hours ago by Victorian

[sncf231e]

5 hours ago, Florence Locomotive Works said:

I’ve seen publishers confuse engineering lingo before. 
 

I think this is a bit of a late insult to BL. Maybe you should take a look at their catalogues. "Nuff said" as LBSC often noted.

Regards

Fred 

[John R Smith]

5 hours ago, Florence Locomotive Works said:

20 odd wholes later I had myself four wheels, and couldn’t resist the opportunity to cut the axles and takes these photos. Shades of what is to come.

 

Does the engine still have the mounting points and fasteners for the front bogie and the rear pony truck? They seem to be a weak point on many of these elderly locos.