Crymlyn A Shop Techniques. Agenoria 10/7 Avonside 2195 CWM MAWR

Did the foreman go to the dogs with Parry the Pipe?
Either Dai Larfin, the stores person has issued an oversized hole for the piston rod or Owen the Spanners was too busy ogling the girls from the local leisure centre when stuffing up the gland box!

 

It was the same size as the etched hole in the cylinder casting although it is larger than the piston rod.

 

28. Crank Pin Bushes and Brake Linkages.

The standard Slater’s crank pin bush will need to be shortened. More by luck than judgement I found that 10 thou, about 0.3mm play suffices. The pictures hopefully explain:



Centre in the picture is the standard Slater’s crank pin bush while to the left is a shortened specimen. This is quite easily done by placing a piece of Plasticard drilled to the diameter of the bush, 2.5mm, and slipped onto the bush. Place the relevant coupling rod over the bush with the outside face down against the plastic, you don’t want to damage the face. Gently file off the excess until it is flush with the back of the coupling rod, the Plasticard giving the required clearance, and clean up. The set up is shown in the right of the picture. Use the correct coupling rod for each bush as there will be slight differences in thickness. You did remember to mark each one didn’t you?



The next job is to fit some brake pull rods. Unfortunately all my hard work soldering the brake hangers at a measured spacing from the wheels became loose when handling the frames so next time I’ll just solder them approximately in position. .
I reassembled the wheel sets and trimmed the leading set’s crank pins to clear the inside of the slide bars. Don’t worry about obtaining extra clearance here as this will be dealt with later.
The brake cross bar, just above the rear sandboxes in the picture, had the two cranks threaded on and was soldered to the frames leaving the cranks loose for the moment. To each crank I soldered a length of rod long enough to just pass the leading brake hanger cross bar. I made a slight kink in the rods just over the rear axle so that the rods rest on the 3 hanger cross bars. Position the pull rods just inboard of the sliding horn blocks and adjust the brake shoe’s position relative to the wheel. When happy, solder the rods together. I positioned the pull rods to allow the horn blocks to be removed. Straighten the pull rods cranks and solder in position.



The model is taking shape and looks the part with its wheels fitted. The chimney is posed for the picture. There’s still a phenomenal amount of detail to add without the electrics and painting. Nobody has yet hazarded a guess to its prototype.

 

29. Steps and Drain Cocks.

Once again we’re back to the fiddling bits, the things you shouldn’t put off or they’ll never get done. As an early version of an early kit, I think that’s right, the model was a tad spartan in the cylinder drain cock department. As always, more captions with the pictures:



I was fortunate in having 4 spare drain cocks amongst my box of unused castings. It was simply a matter of marking out where to drill the locating holes. This was under the cylinder along the centre line of the end cover plate, the kit is designed to have the slide bars set further out to accommodate the crank pins with Finescale tolerances, and spaced apart by the drain cock operating bar. I tied a piece of white cotton, about 6 inches, to each drain cock before removing it from the sprue. This will give you a sporting chance if finding it before the carpet monster eats it. I tinned the spigot with an atomic sized piece of solder, flux on the hole, and press in with a hot soldering iron pressing on the drain cocks flange. Repeat three times.
Remove the drain cock operating bar, a spot of flux where it touches each cock and the bottom of the cylinder wrapper and make each joint with a dot of solder on your hot iron.



A minor disaster with fitting the first step, I mistakenly thought that I could solder it with my normal 145’. In this I was reasonably successful or so iI thought but the heat had allowed the bottom slide bar to move undoing all my work on free movement of the cross head. I then had to adjust the slide bar and, you’ve guessed it, the carefully positioned step fell off!
Ok then, low melt it is. Low melt solder won’t stick to brass or nickel silver but will stick to solder. You have to put no more than a stain of ordinary solder where you want to place the step, I then put a blob of low melt flux on the “solder stain” where the step is to be positioned, position the step, cut off a minute slither of low melt solder and touch the solder with my normal iron for literally 1 second. If it doesn’t melt try again for another second. The solder will melt and be sucked under the step by the flux. At 70’ the low melt didn’t disturb the 145’ holding the slide bars. It will take about 10 seconds to set so be patient. The molten solder is shiny and turns dull as it sets. Another snag is that the steps are horizontal and the bracket is slightly off vertical. You can allow for this with the angle where the step fits to the slide bar support bracket. The right hand bracket had only one stop.



While the left hand side had two. I must remember not to use really hot water when I clean up the model.

 

30. Sand Pipes and Buffer Plank Brackets.

A couple of hours work today saw the fitting of the rear sand pipes and buffer plank bracing brackets.
Once again, more captions with the pictures:



This kit had fold up rear sand boxes instead of cast items. I have found that the sand pipes often work loose on my models in service so I came up with the idea of drilling a similar hole at the top with the wire passing through and being soldered at the top as well as the bottom. A brass washer could be slipped over the wire on the top to represent a filler cap. I decided not to fit this here for two reasons, firstly there would be little room above the sand box for the top wiper pickups to be fitted and secondly it wouldn’t be visible underneath the footplate anyway. Difficult access was probably the reason why they were moved into the cab at a later date!



One of the rear buffer plank bracing brackets soldered in place. The instructions give you the option of soldering to either the frames or the buffer plank. I chose to solder them to the frames as this would give some sideways adjustment to the chassis fit. The picture shows the hand brake rod on the driver’s side which needs to be removed, there were 2 the same, although I’m sure a vacuum cylinder would live somewhere under there.



The picture shows the almost complete chassis fitted to the footplate. Front and rear frame brackets can be seen along with the brake pull rods, drain cocks etc. I think it’s only the cut outs in the frames for the copper clad mounts for the top wiper pickups to complete.

 

31. Pickup Mounts and a Start on the Cab Detail.

Copper clad has been soldered to the frames for pickups to be fitted and I’ll need to modify the firebox to fit a larger motor.
As always, more captions with the pictures.



With this early kit there are no cut outs for mounting the copper clad. Having built several others of its ilk this was not a problem working out where they went and filing out the slots. The 2 leading axles have one between them just behind the slide bar support bracket and the trailing axle has one just above the rear sand boxes. I cut a couple of slots with my new razor saw, don’t ask what I did with the other one, and filed down until the copper clad would fit slightly below the top of the frames. If they are too high they will stop the footplate sitting flush on the frames. I think the copper clad I used was for 4mm track construction. Of course the copper has to face down and I soon realised that it would be impossible to solder the rear pickups due to the location of the sandboxes! The picture shows another slot between the 2nd & 3rd axles for the rear pickup mount and the copper clad mount gapped ready to fit. You will need to remove 1mm of copper from each side just clear of the outside of the frames to give electrical isolation then solder from the inside and below.



The copper clad soldered in position and the vacuum pump manifold glued on top of cylinder. I cut the wire brake hanger between the frames to give access to my soldering iron and will probably cut the copper clad before painting. Certainly the rear one will need to be cut to give space for the motor.



I fitted the coupling rods to check that there was clearance with the slide bar support brackets and was quite happy that everything still spun freely with no tight spots.



The start made on the cab interior with the floor/bunker front formed, hand brake fitted, bunker door & handle fitted and the reverser rack fitted. The reversing lever will slot in and pivot on a piece of 0.7mm wire threaded through the hole at its base. Question, is the release catch on the lever to the front or the back?

 

32. The Chimney.

I like my chimneys to be hollow so it needs to be drilled out. This is hard work and I’m glad the chimney is white metal and not cast in brass!
As always, more captions with the pictures:



The chimney has a recess of about 5mm before the centre becomes solid. I started drilling a 1.5mm hole as central as possible with a pin chuck switching between top and bottom. Fortunately they met almost in the middle and I was able to work up to a 2.5mm hole which is the largest bit that either of my pin chucks will accommodate. I have a tapered reamer which I then used to gently enlarge the hole working equally from top and bottom until I was satisfied with the hole. This was not easy as the soft white metal clogged the reamer after only a few twists and needed to be cleared regularly. The hardest part is holding the chimney without damaging it. Finger tip pressure is all that can be used possibly with a few layers of kitchen roll. My fingers will be quite sore for a few days, there must be another way!



There is an offset lamp iron in front of the chimney and this led to a conundrum. Do I fit this first then have difficulty cleaning up around the chimney or fit the chimney first and hopefully not damage it soldering the lamp iron on. I went for option 2 and hopefully haven’t made a mistake. The iPhone lens has some distortion at the sides but the chimney is straight.

 

Davey,

I agree with your desire to hollow out the chimney. I settled for a partial (but at least round) hole at the top of the chimney of my Garratt (build is on t’other channel). I chickened out before I messed things up, but th3 approach doesn’t lead to sore fingers.

Another Beyer Garratt 0-4-4-0

hth
Simon

 

I don’t do anything on RMWeb since they deleted all my pics, could you describe your process here please. Unfortunately the reamer has exceedingly sharp edges and the base of the chimney does some damage to the fingers too. I’m still trying to work out if the end result is worth the discomfort.

 

I don’t suppose they’ll mind if you look . I hope they don’t delete mine, I have too much to move.

anyway, the chimney is furnished with a spigot to fit the hole in the boiler, happily, it’s concentric with the top. I mounted that in a Unimat dividing head set vertically in the miller, and used a 3mm 2-flute milling cutter. I fed it into the indeterminate hole provided by the casting process (I assume the mould core had broken) and then rotated the dividing head by hand to mill a hole larger than the cutter. I then used the feed on the miller table to make the cutter more eccentric from the axis, and repeated the process. Very small feeds & depth of cut, slow progress.

 

I don’t have a lathe so all done (painfully) by hand.

 

33. Front Lamp Irons.

A couple of hours work this afternoon saw some progress on the front end. As always, more captions with each picture:



The pair of spare lamp irons were added first to the l/h footplate, top of the picture. This model has several half etched slots to locate the fold up lamp irons provided in the etches. I have used some spare Laurie Griffin lamp irons here but they are too long for the slots and have a locating spigot. I know this could be filed off and the irons filed down to fit but I like the thought of the spigot giving extra strength so I drilled a 1mm hole in the appropriate position and filled the slot with solder.
The prototype did not have a central iron on the footplate and the r/h outer one, bottom of picture, was slightly hanging over the edge of the footplate in some pictures and missing in others!
The hole in the footplate left of the r/h iron is for the handrail for a very brave shunter to hold onto and unfortunately the half etched slots didn’t correspond with the lamp iron positions. These were filled with solder and still need some cleaning up. Also visible are the pieces of white cotton I tie onto small components to help locate them if they decide to make a break for freedom before being attached to the model. The l/h iron, top of picture, slightly overhangs the slot in the footplate which I believe could represent a lift up panel to inspect the valve chests behind the buffer plank. I will carefully file it back a fraction.



The view from the front showing the shaped lamp iron, again there was one of these on Laurie’s sprue, just to the left of the chimney. It was easy to clean up any Araldite outside the chimney base without the lamp iron in place and no problem was experienced soldering this in place even though I used my 40w iron. I think the trick is: in and out quick before the heat spreads.



The chassis with the wheels and axle boxes removed. The positioning of the brake pull rods slightly inboard has allowed this and with a little bit of jiggling the wheels around the brake shoes they can be dismantled. I think the chassis is complete and ready for painting. I don’t fit the front sand pipes on small outside cylinder locomotives as they are mostly hidden and tend to get in the way. I will trim the excess thread on the cylinder locating screws when I cut off the un required motor shaft end.

 

I soldered the bunker front/cab floor assembly in position merely tack soldering the bunker top just below the coal doors, which I have yet to refit, and each side to the footplate in the cab doorways. I also made a start on the cab roof, forming the curve by rolling a small Plasticweld bottle over it on the carpet.
I’ve ordered some cranked lamp iron brass castings for the bunker rear so hopefully these won’t take too long.
Visible in the foreground are the frames for the next locomotive which are bolted together and the two axles cut out ready for Slater’s horn blocks. I left the under slung springs in position to strengthen the frames until the horn blocks are fitted. They’ll probably have to be removed to fit and remove the axle boxes and I’ll try to solder them to the keeps.

 

35. A Start on the Roof.

Once again the weekend has too many family distractions but I managed to sneak off for an hour.



I cleaned the excess adhesive from the base of the dome and prepared the safety valve casting. These last two items have large spigots for locating on the tank but very small holes for them. Rather than enlarge the holes I cut the spigots off which allowed adjustment to get them inline, their positions being judged from prototype pictures. 2 lumps protrude from the safety valve bonnet and as there is no sign of any whistles in my prototype pictures I can only presume that these are they! How strange! Anyway, as an early kit the white metal castings are superb requiring very little cleaning up! Why can’t all kits be like this. I removed the excess adhesive around the base of the s/v bonnet after 10 minutes before it set hard which will make cleaning up tomorrow a lot easier.
Having shaped the roof yesterday I soldered the roof vent in the open position, it actually slides to the rear as I’ve placed it the wrong way around in the picture. I attempted to clean up the 2 etched rain strips but by the time the half etched marks were filed off they were thinner than a hair. I replaced them with some scrap etch filling them down to a suitable profile.
I mixed up a small amount of Milliput filler and treated a few open slots at the base of the cab sides, a nick in the base of the dome, the bottom of the overlay on the tank front and finally to tidy up an odd set of cast brass sand boxes I have that are a perfect match for the fold up items with this kit.

 

36. Sandboxes and Steps.

As I have mentioned previously I have a pair of cast brass sandboxes that match the fold up ones provided with the kit.



The sandboxes had some shrinkage in the castings and a previous attempt to fill this with solder wasn’t very successful. I had a few flaws in the body to address so I mixed up some Milliput to fill the flaws. The sandboxes faces were filed flat and the different materials are visible in the picture. As the sandboxes were painted green on the black footplate I normally paint them separately and glue them on at final assembly. To make positioning them easier I drilled a 1mm hole through the footplate underneath where the sandboxes sit and drilled a 1mm hole under the sandboxes. I soldered a piece of 1mm wire into the sandboxes which will help locate them in position only needing to align the box with the edge of the footplate. The cast brass is very hard and hole of only 1mm is necessary to solder the wire.



The previously made up cab footsteps were soldered in position after filing flat the ends of the cab doorway handrails that protruded beneath the floor which prevented the steps from sitting properly. This locomotive had a narrow footplate and the steps fit hard up against the valance. I noted earlier that the R/H front lamp iron overhung the edge of the footplate slightly on the prototype.



The components have had another clean with “shiny sinks” using an old toothbrush and warm water. Having used low melt solder for some components HOT water will cause them to dislodge. Note that although the shiny sinks cleans up the brass it blackens the white metal fittings and solder.

 

37. The Firebox.

I had previously formed the firebox to work out if the larger Mashima 18/33 motor would fit, so it was now time to bite the bullet and try to fit it.



I make the cab section of the fireboxes removable to facilitate easier painting. The method I use is to file a small notch in the cab front centre and level with the top of the firebox. Then solder a small piece of wire underneath the firebox top in the centre which locates in the notch. The base of the backhead fits between the floorboards and by gently pressing down on the top of the backhead it can be “sprung” out and the whole component removed.
The picture is a view from underneath the footplate looking up and slightly backwards with the front of the firebox at the top and the soldered wire in the notch in the cab front. This is not very clear but study the other pictures.



This is a view of the cab interior with the firebox clipped in place. As an early kit it came with a cast white metal steam fountain but I had a spare cast brass item which I chose to fit. This was cleaned up, the spigot removed and the body drilled to take some 1.5mm wire and soldered on. I placed a small brass washer on top of the firebox to represent a flange and soldered it in place. Unfortunately it’s not visible in any of these pictures. I’ll try to show it when I fit all the backhead detail.



The firebox “unclipped” and ready to lift out showing the short piece of brass wire.



The gears were assembled and I noticed that the gear wheel is cut with a slightly concave valley between the teeth, so I packed with shims either side of the gear to allow only the slightest side play to keep the worm central. The gear was coated with “Autosol” and run gently for 30 minutes in each direction to polish the gears. It is actually running in the picture hence the blurred gear.



The frames are soaking for 24 hours in a bath of Baking Soda. This is an alkaline solution and will react with any residual acidic flux. The first time you use the solution it will fizz like a can of coke but the solution will remain alkaline and last for many treatments without this effect. You’ll know if you have any on your hands as they’ll feel soapy.

 

38. Dai the Paint’s been Busy.

In Crymlyn A Shop today Dai the Paint’s given the frames a coat of primer. More captions with the pictures:



I delayed painting the frames for a few days just in case I remembered something that needed adding. So after a good scrub and a 24 hour soak in an alkaline baking soda solution to neutralise any acidic flux, the frames were given another good scrub and washed in warm water and not hot which might loosen any small parts affixed with low melt solder. After drying, the insides of the horn blocks and fixed rear bearings were “masked” with Blutac. The inner, outer and inside faces of the slide bars were masked with masking tape and the frames given a final inspection for any imperfections. As you can see I forgot to mask off the copper clad pickup mounts. I shall have to remove the primer from these with a fibreglass stick and mask before spraying the black.



A coat of “Upol Acid 8” was sprayed on and Dai the Paint can be seen applying the final touches. This aerosol of acid primer is available from Halfords and I find it a superb product giving a similar finish to their grey primer but being acid based attaches itself better to brass. Unfortunately it stinks to high heaven but fortunately diminishes after a few hours. I’ll give the frames a few days to completely dry before applying the black.



I cleaned the firebox doors, folded up the “shelf” and soldered on the backhead. I drilled two 0.7mm holes through the doors for wire to represent the door handles. The washer on top of the firebox representing the steam fountain flange can be seen. I’m not sure what the hole to the bottom right of the doors is supposed to represent? Regulator, gauge glasses and a pair of backhead clacks to add.
Looking at this enlarged picture those firebox doors aren't straight, a job for tomorrow methinks.

 

The Backhead.

A lot of work and little to show for it. I wasn’t happy with the position of the doors yesterday and as I’ve found that if something isn’t quite right it won’t go away and will annoy you until it’s sorted. I removed the wonky firebox doors and soldered them on straight. I used the fold up “regulator restrictor” supplied with the kit soldering it in position but used a spare cast brass handle. I also had spare brass gauge glasses and a firebox door opening mechanism which were fitted. There is no mention of backhead feed water clack valves and as there is no top feed or boiler side feed I fitted a spare pair of cast brass items with some copper wire shaped the way the pipe work would run. The outlet from the injectors on the footplate passed through the cab front around the side of the boiler and into the backhead clacks. These were simply non return valves which the boiler pressure would keep closed until the higher pressure water feed from the injectors opened them to allow the water into the boiler. There was often a valve or bolt which would securely close the clack in case of failure.
I’m just wondering if all this is worth the effort as it will be hidden away inside the cab. This is going to be a “working” model and with a crew member each side very little of the backhead will be seen!

 

I notice you use “ autosol “ , I think there are various types of the product ( I could be wrong ) is there one in particular that you use? Enjoying the thread, it’s always interesting to see different build methods being used.

Regards,

Martyn.

 

I think it might cost a bit more today!