The Derby Line, Gladiator LNER O4/3

[dibateg]

Thanks Sandy - nice work.

 

It's not all loco building at the Derby line and there has been a re-shuffle of the '350s with my MMP one taking up the DC role and the Dapol being fitted with the excellent Paul Chetter sound Zimo decoder from Digitrains. It took about 5mins to fit the decoder and speaker, I like that.

 

So here is MMP D3169 ( built by Allen Hammett ) approaching Curzon Street with a transfer freight on Jonathan Matthews layout :-

[Jon Fitness]

Thanks Sandy - nice work.It's not all loco building at the Derby line and there has been a re-shuffle of the '350s with my MMP one taking up the DC role and the Dapol being fitted with the excellent Paul Chetter sound Zimo decoder from Digitrains. It took about 5mins to fit the decoder and speaker, I like that.So here is MMP D3169 ( built by Allen Hammett ) approaching Curzon Street with a transfer freight on Jonathan Matthews layout :-IMG_20170208_121933021_HDRa.jpg

Ooh, good looking layout! The signal is particularly nice...always glad to see a nicely built LMS welded stem bracket!

JF

[dibateg]

The County build has been well documented by Ozzyo:-

 

http://www.rmweb.co.uk/community/index.php?/topic/30482-building-a-gwr-grange-more-in-7mm-of-from-a-jltrt-kit-starts-on-p85-by-ozzyo/page-62

 

So there was no point in me doing the same, in fact Pauls excellent build has been a most valuable aid and has got me to this stage:-

[dibateg]

I'm not a fan of whitemetal components, they are not resilient enough for me, so I scratched up a new cross shaft from tube to replace the whitemetal one. There was not much I could do about the brakes and I've already broken one of them. The brass castings are very good though and didn't need too much cleaning up, although some are cast very close in to the sprue and have to be cut off carefully with a piercing saw. Curiously, some parts that one would expect in the kit had to be scratched up - the scoop brackets and linkage. I found some 30 year old 4mm Jamieson valve gear in the spares that was ideal for the job - see, it was worth keeping it all that time! The slotted link for the brake handle is made by bending some 0.8mm wire in a 'U' shape and soldering it to the end of a length of brass wire and then filing it flat. Safety chains are made from something that used to belong to an ex. I knew it would come in useful for something. Its probably gold... or it might not be...

[jim.snowdon]

It's very nice, but I think you should look carefully at the arrangement of the cranks on the brake shaft, bearing in mind that both the vacuum cylinder and the hand brake pull upwards (or downwards as far as the picture is concerned).

 

Jim

[dibateg]

As Captain Mainwairing would say:- " I wondered who'd be first to spot that! " ! You are quite right Jim, I don't know why I didn't see that on the drawing..

 

Regards

Tony

[3 link]

That gives a whole new meaning to "Push Pull"

 

Martyn.

[jim.snowdon]

Tony,

 

The drawing was upside down at the time?

 

At least it is not as bad as committing an error to print. I did once spot a scratchbuilt GWR Mink G on a layout at a show, where the builder had put the two centre stanchions visibly too close together. When I pointed this out, politely, the response was that he had built it to the drawing in the Constructor, where I had had quite a number of GW wagon drawings published, and he was quite adamant that it was right. I looked up the offending drawing, and sure enough, I had drawn the said stanchions a foot too close together. Not exactly a subtle mistake.  

 

And all that was before I had lots of grey hairs and the ability to claim a senior moment.

 

Jim

[3 link]

Jim,

 

Your the best spotter we know,

 

Martyn.

[jim.snowdon]

Jim,

 

Your the best spotter we know,

 

Martyn.

[dibateg]

So that's sorted - thanks Jim!

 

I didn't see any need for the whole 'brick to be inside the tender, so I cut off the rear portion. It made access for soldering the external parts from the inside easier and there is also an internal stretcher to go under the deck in the kit.

 

The sides are one piece and it takes a little care to fix them in place. I still ended up with slight dimples, it's best to solder around the edges of the panels. There is that temptation to just tack with the iron.. I drilled out the etches dimples on the periphery of the floor flange and used 0.7mm wire to represent the bolts. It didn't take long actually. The way the deck folds up leaves those little gaps round the edge, to be filled, or there might be a strip to cover them.. Traces of Loctite 480 around the scoop and brake handles.

[dibateg]

The horrible weather has allowed me to press on. Thanks to Ozzyo, photos of County of Chester show an extra oil pipe cover on the drivers side of the smokebox, so I scratched one up from bar and scrap etch. The upper one should be shorter than it is on this engine, but I couldn't work out a way of changing the moulding in a tidy way.

 

I've spent a couple of hours with the test reverse curve whilst fitting out the loco, making sure it can cope with 6 foot curves. It will be stripped and cleaned ready to go off to Warren on Saturday. Nice to see it at last with it's wheels on - but not for long.. It's a handsome machine.

[steve fay]

Fantastic build of one of my favourites

[ozzyo]

The County build has been well documented by Ozzyo:-

 

http://www.rmweb.co.uk/community/index.php?/topic/30482-building-a-gwr-grange-more-in-7mm-of-from-a-jltrt-kit-starts-on-p85-by-ozzyo/page-62

 

So there was no point in me doing the same, in fact Pauls excellent build has been a most valuable aid and has got me to this stage:-

P1040251.JPG

 

Hello Tony,

 

so what are you going to use for the bolster on the bogie as you've used it on the loco frames!!!

 

The one that I use on the loco frames has two slots and one round hole in the middle.

 

OzzyO.

[dibateg]

Thanks Paul -

 

fixed after a few minutes with the micro torch:-

 

[dibateg]

Raymond Whalley very effectively covered the build of the MOK Armstrong in the series of articles in the O Gauge Gazette. The MOK instructions are pretty good, but Raymond's documentation of the build has significantly helped me along the way, so there is no need for me to duplicate that work which is to a very high standard, but here is a taster, so that folks don't think the Derby Line has gone to sleep.

[3 link]

You can polish the loco as much as you like Tony, but it won't make it go any faster : )

 

Cheers,

 

Martyn.

[ozzyo]

Or make the paint stick any better!

 

LoL

 

OzzyO.

[dibateg]

Boiler bands gone, as Warren doesn't like them.. Tender body well under way..

 

[dibateg]

The Armstrong under test, now stripped down for painting:-

 

I'm now on to a project of my own for a while another WD, this time a JLTRT one to join my Oakville and Snow Hill ones.. You can't have too many WDS...

 

The frames are well on the way, with the cylinders just plonked on for the moment.

 

 

The motion bracket had an unsightly hole for the expansion pivot, so that was plugged with a disk cut from 1.6mm wire and the stub shortened:-

[Horsetan]

^^

Useful parallel study for the Dave Bradwell 4mm WD.

[jim.snowdon]

It will be interesting to see how it compares with my one (the Snowhill/Roxey one, for the unknowing).

 

Jim

[dibateg]

Some of the minor shortcomings are already apparent, but I can find that in any kit: -
the slidebars are very chunky,
I've made the motion bracket removable as I don't like these parts to be trapped on the frames,
the buffers supplied are LMS ones - although a bit of research shows that some WD's had these fitted later on. I've used modified MOK self contained ones.
Hornblock retention, my thought is possibly brass sleeves over the axles..

The Snow Hill rods represent the forked joins better than the JLTRT lap joints.

I found that the crosshead is drawn right to the rear edge of the slidebars at the rear most extent of travel.. So I elected to extend the con rods rather than modify the slidebars. A new hole was drilled 1.75 mm further forward and a section of scrap etch laminated on the rear to extend the rods. This will allow a spacer to be soldered in at the rear of the bars.

 

 

I still need to tidy the front platform here. Modified MOK buffers.:-

 

Demountable motion bracket, held with 12BA screws, high up, so the projecting thread won't notice under the running plate:-

 

It should build into an excellent model in any case.

 

[dibateg]

Here is the Snow Hill WD for comparison:-

 

And the Q1 has returned briefly for re-assembly before going off again to be weathered:-

 

[dibateg]

This is a background job at the moment, with client work taking a priority at the moment, but I spent today sorting out the hornblocks. There was no way of retaining them in the guides, so I hit on sleeving the axle some brass tube to keep them apart. It seems to work. The frames are set quite wide and with the wheels being so close together I decided to make my own picks ups. Essentially brass tube soldered in double sided pcb projecting through a small hole in the frames. One disadvantage of having the wheels so close, is that the brake hangers have to be partially ground away to prevent shorts.

 

The etched cab goes together nicely, but the boiler seems to be resting on the weighshaft, but it's taking shape...