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Just for a change

Just by way of a change, some pics of my finished locos - not me driving! This is a 5 in gauge B1.















And this is my A3 Pacific, again in 5 in gauge.

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Dianne said…
Norman your work is brilliant, the train is beautiful. What a pair of artist you are, you were made for each other...
April 4, 2007 at 4:01 PM
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Wheels

What I started with was a set of frames with hornblocks fitted, and wheels turned. So I'm afraid I've no construction details for these. Except for quartering the wheels. You can do this either with a jig,or in the lathe. I've used both methods - a jig works well. Most books and drawings show jigs which are specific to one model, which is not brilliant. Since then, I have seen a general one detailed, which is a far beter idea. I've also quartered wheels in the lathe, which is what I chose to do this time. Two sets of wheels were already assembled and quartered, but, when I checked them, both were different ! The object is to set the two wheels on an axle at 90 Deg to each other -usually, the right leads on British locos. Having said that, the really critical thing about quatering is not the exact angle, but is that all the wheelsets on the loco must be set at EXACTLY the same angle. This is because the wheel relationships are locked by the coupling rods, and any diffe
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Coupling Rods

The spacing of the coupling rod centres is critical to the free running of the loco. I measure each side separately and comparing it with the drawing. Any inaccuracies in making up the axle-boxes or in setting the crank-pins will show up here. I started by marking out the centres and outline on the rod blank, then drilled the centres, starting with a small centre drill, then drilling out at (say) 2BA clearance at one end, and 2BA tapping at the other. The rods tapered from 3/8 to 1/4 in. - i.e a taper of 1/16 in. on each side. So I marked out the centre line on the support bar, and another, offset by 1/16 in. I drilled and tapped a fixing for one end of the bar on the centre line, and attached the rod blank. Then I lined up the other centre on the 1/16 in offset line, clamped and drilled through 2BA tapping. Now I removed the rod blank, and opened the 2BA tapping hole on the rod blank to 2BA clearance. Also I tapped 2BA threads in the support bar and bolted the two together. I clampe
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Tender Body

The original drawings showed what I think is the Hawksworth tender - I've previously made one in 5 in gauge, and thought the Collett tender would make an interesting change. It has a couple of major challenges - the top of the sides are flared, and also the rear corners of the tand are very rounded, so a tricky compound curve is created where they meet. I took the basic dimentions from the drawings, and scaled the Collet specifics from a couple of photographs. The fact that the major lines of the tender matched up with the profile of the cab gave me some useful reference points. Then there's a raised extension which fits on top. I left a tab which I curved to match the lower part of the tender, and riveted and soldered the two together. The other tricky bit was the rivets -there are several hunders of them, and they're very prominent. My solution was to make the tender tank out of thinner brass than usual -about 22 gauge. (Another reason for this was that I had a couple
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