Giles

Of course I'm talking about the layout as a whole...... I very much hope you're right, Mike - I'm rather struggling to conceive of it though!

I sincerely doubt that anything in model railway terms as extraordinary as this will ever be achieved again.

I bought the two bottles of Devcon epoxy for about £20 - which are much easier to dispense accurately, much less messy - and since when, I have used no other......... Highly recommend!

Progress is made on the Peckett. The body parts are fully assembled, but the fire box and back sheet won't be fixed til after painting. The motor is fitted, but I haven't moved the axle gear across yet, so it's not engaged. The coal bunker in the cab will house the charging socket, the on/off switch and hopefully the receiver as well, and all the wiring will pass into the fire box which will double as a junction box! The original white metal cab roof has been discarded as it just looked rather heavy, and a brass one bade, which improves things.

I know it's not the same thing, but quite a few people are converting 009 to RC successfully - the latest being Tim Watson of Copenhagen Fields, having scratch-built a new RC chassis to go under a Lynton & Barnstaple 2-6-2

More than thirty years ago I bought a second hand Peatol for my Dad when he retired to a teeny cottage with no room for a workshop, and had to give up his South Bend. It did him quite well for small stuff, and worked quite accurately handled with care. A Unimat 3 is a better lathe, I think - but the Peatol was a good substitute, and well capable of 0 gauge stuff.

I did find the steps a difficult balance between clearing the return crank, including the swing of the engine, against keeping them as tight in as is practical........ Good luck!

I should go for a number of 4800K LED Battens. Competively priced, and a decent colour.

Painted now, and with cross-heads and Conn rods fitted. It rolls as smoothly as anything - and with no fettling! I still have the lower fire-box to make and fit. 2020-10-17_06-25-08 by giles favell 2020-10-17_06-21-26 by giles favell, on Flickr

2020-10-16_06-20-36 by giles favell, on Flickr 2020-10-16_06-21-28 by giles favell, on Flickr Sorry - problems editing......

Slide bars were the next thing to sort. I thought I had some 1mm square NS in stock, but I didn't.... making an opportunity of a problem I decided to mill them from 1mm sheet - and to mill a 'U' shape at the correct spacing to make the job much easier. These were made, cleaned up and checked.... 2020-10-16_06-19-03 by giles favell, on Flickr The bars were assembled with the cylinder end covers and fitted, ready to be silver soldered to the motion brackets for strength 2020-10-16_06-19-41 by giles favell, on Flickr Of course, with white-metal castings involved, silver-soldering at high temperatures 20mm away would inevitably melt them within a second, so Cool Paste was deployed generously to make sure they stayed safe 2020-10-16_06-20-36 by giles favell, on Flickr All went fine, and the joints were all made with a little torch, and all the castings were fine...... 2020-10-16_06-21-28 by giles favell, on Flickr It will be a coat of paint over this, then refit the axles, and fit Conn rods.

And a narrow gauge Peckett..........

That all sound extremely sensible...... I find that the D cutters are usually a 'nominal' size (The box of 0.8mm are actually more like 0.9mm) so with a new box I tend to cut a test square and measure it to check, and adjust the drawing or tool paths to compensate. (Not trying to teach my Grandmother etc........!)

Many years ago I replaced my Unimat 3 belt which was cracking (it was the third belt if I recall) with a Hoover belt, which has lasted 25 years so far......

They're going to have to do some canny work on the lenses to get the cone narrow enough to enable the deep cuts that a 50W should be capable of.....

Those engine frames really are looking good! I wish that I had (been able to) gone down that route when I did mine. I got away with it - but yours is fundamentally a much better job!

Good heavens........ The exchequer can't justify one, sadly!

A little Wren. (0-14) 2 by giles favell, on Flickr

For those old enough, Casey Jones used to brake on the reverse if I recall correctly. I don't think I ever did it as a driver on preserved steam, but I certainly did it a lot on the larger 10 1/4" locos going down long gradients. I tended to do it with slide valve engines rather than piston valve, just in case! But certainly very effective and controllable, and no indication of doing anything unpleasant mechanically.

All I can say is - Nice - thank you!

My wife Diane does very much so.... she's definitely integral to the team! I'm very lucky!

2020-09-24_01-17-40 by giles favell, on Flickr 2020-09-24_01-17-16 by giles favell, on Flickr 2020-08-27_06-02-26 by giles favell, on Flickr

Duncan, those look great! I'll have any at some of them whether I use them or not... I love that wall, by the way!