Building an Ace Kits "K"

[Dog Star]

I see no alternative but to mark up the footplate with the proper location, remove the tabs and solder the sides and rear in to the proper location via some sort of comedy right angle butt join. EDIT - just thought that I can solder some right angle on to the bottom of the sides and that will give a bigger area to which I can apply solder. Maybe I could also drill the tender footplate and install some location pins to keep the sides straight and parallel.

How about marking the location of the inner surface of the sides on the footplate... then soldering the angle to the line that you have just marked... and adding some pins through the angle / plate so that the angle does not move when adding the sides?

 

[Steph Dale]

Dad,
About that brake cylinder...
It's worth having a dig about on the Brighton Atlantic website, the tender frames are from a K (via a GWR 'single' I seem to remember). I recall a photo showing the cylinder if you can't see it on the drawings. Remember it's Westinghouse brake so it's a wee thing hiding up in the frame...
Steph

 

[Ressaldar]

There may have been some effort made to help with the issue of the flares at the corners as, although not mentioned in the instructions and a part without any part number we have these:

View attachment 48957

Do you think these are intended to be soldered in to the corners with a flood of solder and then filed back to shape?

Believe it or not, so far I'm actually enjoying the challenge. I must be out of my tree. bluppabluppablubba.

Brian

Hi Brian,

surely by now you have realised that these parts are provided by Mr A. so that you can remove them from the etch, clean them up and with the resultant sharp point, you can continually prick yourself to overcome the amazement that you are building the kit of your dreams that will fall together as you shake it out of the box!
Have fun.

cheers

Mike

 

[oldravendale]

How about marking the location of the inner surface of the sides on the footplate... then soldering the angle to the line that you have just marked... and adding some pins through the angle / plate so that the angle does not move when adding the sides?

That's the best idea so far. Many thanks.

Dad,
About that brake cylinder...
It's worth having a dig about on the Brighton Atlantic website, the tender frames are from a K (via a GWR 'single' I seem to remember). I recall a photo showing the cylinder if you can't see it on the drawings. Remember it's Westinghouse brake so it's a wee thing hiding up in the frame...
Steph

Thanks for this thought. I'll check the drawings, but interestingly the front brake rods definitely go downwards, under the front axle, so I'm guessing that the cylinder must be on a plinth of some sort - but as I say, I'll check. In truth I was looking for a standard size cylinder, so there may just be a small cylinder in the white metal bits. A prototype question about this, though - if working with vacuum braked stock what relevance does the Westinghouse brake have? Was the Westinghouse brake on the loco replaced with a vacuum brake later in the loco's life, or was the loco brake always Westinghouse and a vacuum ejector fitted for the stock?

Hi Brian,

surely by now you have realised that these parts are provided by Mr A. so that you can remove them from the etch, clean them up and with the resultant sharp point, you can continually prick yourself to overcome the amazement that you are building the kit of your dreams that will fall together as you shake it out of the box!
Have fun.

cheers

Mike

Thanks Mike. That sounds as though it's all they are good for! I'll have to find a way to fill the tender corners, and may just use them for that. Fixed with high temp solder and filled with low melt it may just act as the carrier for filling the corners and then filing them down. How much easier it would have been, though, to keep the tender top in one piece so that supporting "fingers" could be cut and then filled, a la all the other decent kits on the market.

Just for fun I'll review the errors when (and if ever) complete and send a letter to Mr Ascough. I'll be interested in his response!

Brian

 

[Steph Dale]

Vacuum brake ejectors were fitted to ex - LBSC locos by the Southern, but retained Westinghouse brake on the locos.

Steph

 

[oldravendale]

Vacuum brake ejectors were fitted to ex - LBSC locos by the Southern, but retained Westinghouse brake on the locos.

Steph

Thanks Steph. I didn't have the opportunity to check for the Westinghouse cylinder this afternoon between lunch and rugby, but I'll try to get that done tomorrow.

So, on to more comedy tender construction.

Unsurprisingly most of the slots are not symmetrical when they should be. I suspect I've found out why, and it's a fundamental error. It appears that the locations of the slots on the long sides have been taken from the edges of the cut outs in the centre rather than the outside edges. However, as a generalisation most of the holes and slots on the centre line are nominally correct. The width of the frames either side of the cut outs isn't the same and this has generated the errors.



Following Dog Star's suggestion I've measured and scribed the lines where the tender sides should be and soldered brass angle in place using 179 degree solder. I have yet to pin this in place.



I then thought to check the locations of the slots for the outside frames. Inevitably these are wrong too, so I've applied brass angle for these too, on the reverse of the footplate etch. Note how, on one side the angle is over the slots and on the other inside them. The footplate is actually as wonky as it looks.

I don't know the reference point for the grooves around the footplate, which are location points for the valances and, I assume buffer beam. However, these are symmetrical so must have been measured from the outside edges - I suppose!

Next jobs are to pin the brass angle so it doesn't move when fitting the outside frames and tender sides, and then find a way of managing the corners.

No need to send the funny white van quite yet, Mr Dikitriki.

Brian

 

[oldravendale]

I'm hoping that I can get on with some more comedy soldering the afternoon. If so there may be another post to come.

Watch this space.

In the meantime, some further help with these tender brakes/tender underpinnings, please. Below is a copy of two sections of the GA. The top one shows the brake rod run, marked in green. Alongside that in the same drawing is the view from the tender front, and right hand centre is a large what appears to be brake cylinder - see below.



However, on reviewing the plan view that cylinder, marked in blue, seems to have no relation to the brake rods. In fact it appears to be connected (via the pipes or rods marked in red) to another cylinder, which I've marked in brown. So, is this the vacuum cylinder, piped to a vacuum reservoir? In which case I'll need to get hold of a vac cylinder..... (No problem in making the reservoir from a bit of tube).


So, here's the plan view. The suggestion to my mind is that the cylinder marked in yellow must therefore be the Westinghouse cylinder, and following the rodding which appears to emanate from it (shown in green) this appears to have a direct attachment to the tender brakes via some sort of vertical linkage on one side only. There is a cross bar between the front wheels but this does not appear to have anything to do with the brakes.

I'm now going in to the Brighton Atlantic web site to see if I can turn anything up on there.

All the colouring - in has been done with crayon, as they don't allow anything sharp in here, so no graphites were hurt in the modification of these drawings.

Brian

PS. Just been on the Brighton Atlantic web site and regrettably the early stuff is "not available". That.s a shame as there are two early threads with tender details, although whether the photos would be of help must remain uncertain.

 

[Dog Star]

Hi Brian,

An interesting conundrum.

Taking the side view, the brake pull rods are below the brake cross-shaft and that seems ok when thinking about the connection from the handbrake column (apply handbrake, lift the lever on the brake cross shaft, rotate shaft clockwise and apply a pull force to the brake rods). Still with the side view, there is another lever on the cross shaft (to the opposite side compared with the handbrake) and that is linked to the cylinder in blue. If I have read all of this correctly then the cylinder in blue pushes on the lever to apply the brakes... hence an air brake.

I can see what might be a second cylinder (in yellow) in the plan view and yet I cannot see this fitting in either the side or front views.

 

[oldravendale]

Thanks for the thoughts and conclusions. All makes sense to me. I'm considering whether to get some brake cylinders to mock something up, or maybe even manage without! Such a suggestion must be sacrilege to members of WT but I'll build up the detail as I go. Fortunately I can get on with other aspects of the build as details start to become available.

Speaking of which......

On the basis of a quick check (see my previous post) I thought all the slots and holes on the centre line were in the centre. Not so. Apart from which the holes for fixing the body to the chassis are too large by far - the screws provided are 8BA which slide straight through. Etched holes now have a soldered patch and a hole drilled in the true centre. A captive nut was then soldered on top and the tender footplate can now be accurately screwed to the chassis - see below.


Next was to file the tabs off the tender sides so that they'd sit down on the footplate properly. Time then for a dry run - see below.



But best of all the tank top fits without modification:

Hooray!

This may justify breaking out the soldering iron tomorrow.

(Don't cheer - just throw money)

Brian.

 

[Yorkshire Dave]

Hi Brian

I've see two LBSC GAs, albeit tank engines, enough to identify the air brake systems. I have re-coloured your drawings above which I trust will assist.

I have used the same colours for identification: Orange is the air reservoir, blue is the hand brake, green is the air brake actuator pump and yellow are the fulcrum bars operating the brake rods. There are two of these, one for the handbrake and the other for the air brake. I hope it makes sense.

The items you've highlighted in red are the air lines for the actuator and reservoir (the latter you've coloured brown).

The vacuum brake ejector will be on the LHS of the cab whilst the Westinghouse pump governor will be on the RHS. There will be no vacuum brake cylinder on the loco or tender. I have attached a photo of my E4 cab when under construction to show the position of the vacuum brake ejector and Westinghouse governor if this helps.

 

[oldravendale]

Hi David.

Good to hear from you. I'll now be studying this and, with additional details coming from Roger Scanlon, should be able to make some sense of it.

I looked at the Brighton Atlantic pictures (managed to bust my way in to the site earlier today) and it appears that the Westinghouse cylinders actually are on the loco, not the tender. As a lot of this detail is totally hidden it may not be essential to the build but it would be helpful to know if any of the necessary parts are available as castings.

Thanks so much for the clarification.

Brian

 

[Yorkshire Dave]

Come to think of it, it makes sense the Westinghouse main air reservoir and cylinder would be on the loco. I should have looked at US prototypes whilst gazing at your drawings. D'oh !

There would only be a small cylinder on the tender, with the air supplied by the loco main reservoir, to actuate the tender brakes. The brown coloured item may be an auxiliary air reservoir.

For what it's worth, on my Terrier I used a coach vacuum cylinder (as it is partially hidden) as the air brake cylinder and brass tube for the air reservoir. And of course all the dual brake fittings are in the cab - quarts into pint pots.

 

[oldravendale]

Thanks David - and for your thoughts about a potential way forward. I'll look at this idea alongside Roger's and I'm now pretty confident a solution will be forthcoming.

Best regards.

Brian

 

[Overseer]

Brian

Vertical Westinghouse brake cylinders were much less common than horizontal cylinders but were standard Westinghouse fittings. To work with the automatic Westinghouse train brake every brake cylinder needs a reservoir and a triple valve, basically a pressure of 70lbs is maintained in the train line and the triple valve senses when the pressure drops in the train line and directs pressurised air from the reservoir to the cylinder to apply the brakes. Some locos had straight air brakes, i.e. pressure was directed straight to the brake cylinder from the drivers valve, so wouldn't need the reservoir adjacent to the brake cylinder - still need a main reservoir though and the drivers valve is more complex as it would reduce the pressure in the train line at the same time as applying pressure to the loco brake cylinder.

The tender brake cylinder would have looked something like this -


The GA probably shows enough to work out which version was used. You won't see much on the finished model though.

 

[oldravendale]

That's really helpful , and I'm pretty confident from the drawing that this is the cylinder I marked up in yellow. I'll expand the drawing a bit to see whether I can pick up any more detail.

It's a very good question as to how much of this will be seen. The outside frames and front steps will cover most of it, so I have to consider whether to provide all the detail, "just so I know it's there". I'll probably take the expedient route with this build as I suspect there are a lot more peasant traps to be surmounted with the rest of the build.

Brian

 

[richard carr]

Brian

This is the first time I have read your thread for a good few weeks, I did wonder how you were getting on. I have to admire your patience, I'm sure I would have thrown this in the bin by now if I had started it. It makes me realise that I wasn't imagining how bad the V1/3 kit really was.

I wish you well in finishing it as I know it will provide us all with many moments of amusement still to come.


Richard

 

[Steph Dale]

Dad,
The brake cylinder is the blue one. The feature you've highlighted in yellow on the brake rod is actually a hose - I suspect the yellow circle is a gland or mounting for an injector feed or perhaps even steam for heated feed water.
The reason you can't see a link from the blue cylinder to the brake rod is that the brake rod isn't shown on this side of the drawing - this part of the elevation is from above the tender, with some lower detail shown by dotted lines. The upper half of the view is taken from a view at frame height, which is why it's showing more details, including the tank base.
Steph

 

[oldravendale]

Thanks Stephen.

Gottit! What further clues do you need to tell you that I'm not an engineer? I can drive a desk OK, though.

Thanks for the help, though. It's all part of my learning process.

B/Dad

 

[Steph Dale]

Dad,
I'm not clear on those pictures. Have you got the half etches for the rear corners on the tender on the outside of the tender? I'm just trying to work that one out in my head. Tenders that have feed water heating might have cladding plates, but not sure about the Ks.
There is a brake reservoir and cylinder on the tender (it is in US practise as well, Dave), but it's all well hidden on these Brighton tenders. Have you got the handbrake arrangements clear, or should I try and have another look at the drawings later in the week?
Steph

 

[oldravendale]

The half etches are on the inside of the tender as an "aid" to creating the radius. I have a rather good picture of a "K" from the rear and the tender detail is very good. There is no relief at the rear corners on the prototype - if that's the question you are asking. (The LNWR G2a tender is sort of panelled and that relief is shown on the David Andrews kit by sweated on panels). In fact all the photos I have of "Ks" show a very plain tender - a few rivets on the outside and that's about it.

I soldered the tender body to footplate today after adding rivet detail to the tender rear and drilling holes for the lamp irons. I also soldered in the corner triangular pieces on the tender flare and then bulked out with plumbers solder which will be filed back to a neat radius tomorrow. Too little advancement today for more photos, I thought, so I'm hoping to do more tomorrow. Would you like to see the photo I have of the rear of the prototype tender? It's actually the only one I've seen.

In fact, despite all the help I'm getting I'll probably make up some approximation of the underneath detail - as you say and as others have pointed out, there is actually very little if anything to be seen under the tender.

Once again, I'm learning a huge amount, both in technique, which I'm largely teaching myself, but also the technicalities associated with the prototype from others. It's slow in gestation but proving very enjoyable.

B/Dad