Atlantic's works: Portable layout - Ground Signals Again

[Atlantic 3279]

Got it to work now thanks Rob. Superb!

[Atlantic 3279]

A couple of modelling ideas that I am yet to try, on which comment from others with any relevant experience will be gratefully received:

A4 to W1 conversions: As I showed a couple of pages back, my latest couple have been built with a flangeless rear wheel set in the rear "bogie" in order to suit trainset curves. Out of necessity, the flangeless wheels are non-weight bearing, merely brushing the surface of the rails when the track is flat. Track isn't all flat of course so they are intermittently airborne with the non-rotating spokes visibly betraying the fact that they are dummies. I'm thinking of trying a band/belt on the axles (or a loop of thread with a few turns on each axle for grip) as a means making the dummy wheels rotate in unison with the adjacent real set in the front of the rear bogie.

Improving the Railroad Corridor Tender: When I did my original W1 conversion I also put quite a lot of time and effort into sorting out the top of the "cheap" Railroad corridor tender. I've done nothing at all to the tender for my 4-8-2 which is also the Railroad version, but I'm considering doing something that might save a lot of the time previously spent on carefully cutting out parts of the moulding and then reinstating those same parts differently. It occurs to me that it might be possible to lower and re-shape the shoulders of the tender more quickly by firstly pouring resin into the insides of shoulders of the moulding to make these thick and solid, and then simply filing the outside down to shape. I'm wondering how well the polyester resin will bond to the (styrene?) plastic of the tender body, and whether I ought to key the surface for best adhesion and/or give it a slosh over with liquid poly or similar just before pouring on the resin.

"Other Kings said I was daft to build a castle on swamp, but I built it all the same.....it sank into the swamp"

[Atso]

I would recommend that you don't use a solvent before pouring resin. The resin cures using a chemical reaction and there is no way of knowing how the solvent will react with this process. You might find the resin doesn't cure or worse...

Maybe wait until the resin has cured and seal the edges with super glue?

[Multiprinter]

Most resins generate heat when setting and may distort the plastic body.

[Atlantic 3279]

Thanks for those two observations. After some more thought it has occurred to me that if the internal contours of the body moulding are favourable, I may be able to bond on layers of plastikard within the shoulders in the vital places, instead of using the resin. If I can do that the problem of resin-to-plastic adhesion disappears. Even if I do have to try the resin, I'm glad to say that the overall quantity and the thickness of layer in this case will be minimal. I have definitely observed a significant heating effect with larger amounts, but I think the volume that I have in mind will be incapable of distorting the plastic moulding.

[Multiprinter]

Many, many years ago someone suggested 'melting'offcuts of Plastikard in solvent to make a soft paste type filler. I would experiment on something unwanted before trying this on your tender.

[Saint Johnstoun]

Rather than pour resin how about filling in with body filler? I've done this successfully on many occasions for various applications. One tip - If you're using Plastic Padding or Isopon go easy on the catalyst and then it won't heat up.

[Atlantic 3279]

Thanks for the further ideas. You've got my little grey cells working overtime.

[S.A.C. Martin]

Just my penny-orth. I've been making a spare corridor tender conversion using two railroad tender bodies, cut and shut to fit. I've used the Gamesworkshop Yellow/Blue moulding putty, and Revell plastic filler to make the roof smooth. A combination of the two, whereby you use the putty first to make a strong bond, and then the plastic filler over the top to make it smooth, was something I also did on the valances for my (ahem) 4-6-4 I posted earlier in this thread.

[Atlantic 3279]

I'll bear that information in mind too Simon, thanks.

Now for a confession . Initially I was only working from memory, or a "mind's eye" view of the inside of the tender moulding, whilst concentrating my efforts (quite properly) on the two locos that folks are kindly waiting for me to finish. Yesterday at last, I took a couple of minutes to have a real look within a tender body, and I now realise that I may not need filler / resin / putty to give more substance to the shoulders of the moulding. It is actually straight enough and plain enough in the vital areas for it to appear potentially possible to bond a few simple strips of plastikard into the internal angles. That should be quick enough, and ought to cause no concerns regarding quality of adhesion to the original moulding, should I happen to file all the way through the old material.

[Atlantic 3279]

Brief update on the last week's modelling: Two more W1 conversions are now getting body details refitted ready for final painting. I imagine this news comes as a relief for those who patiently await the locos. Also, that "easier" Railroad corridor tender upgrade perhaps turns out to be even easier than I had expected. It sometimes pays to be delayed so much that you have time for ample thought before actually starting a job. I'll post an explanation and pictures eventually.

Still no success with linking the rotation of the trailing axles in the W1s, as I haven't had time yet to try anything beyond the simplest of ideas, which failed miserably.

[Tom F]

Brief update on the last week's modelling: Two more W1 conversions are now getting body details refitted ready for final painting. I imagine this news comes as a relief for those who patiently await the locos. Also, that "easier" Railroad corridor tender upgrade perhaps turns out to be even easier than I had expected. It sometimes pays to be delayed so much that you have time for ample thought before actually starting a job. I'll post an explanation and pictures eventually.

Still no success with linking the rotation of the trailing axles in the W1s, as I haven't had time yet to try anything beyond the simplest of ideas, which failed miserably.

Watching with great interest Graeme

[Atlantic 3279]

Only enough time at present to post an updated image of the latest W1s, but I have now processed the sequence of tender conversion images ready to show the method and results in due course:

[Atlantic 3279]

Here's how I'm getting on with my "easier" upgrade of the Hornby Railroad corridor tender for my previously shown never-was 4-8-2 (well it is easier so far in as much as I've not had to cut off and then refit the curved fairings/copings as I did for my first W1 and I haven't yet sorted out all of the final details and the paintwork.......)

I began by making a pattern for the upswept curve of the fairing behind the front coalplate using tracing paper, pencil and my previously converted tender, then I "pricked" out the outline on the longer front fairing of the new tender and scribed in the curve. After this I drilled a hole in each corner of the coal load and cut this out with a piercing saw, working across the curved front just on the waste side of my previously scribed line.

The cut top of the moulding turned out to be thicker than I thought it might be, as were the sides, which was slightly encouraging as it suggested there might be enough thickness in the shoulders of the moulding to make it possible to file these to the desired new profile without having to add any extra material to the internal angles. However, I couldn't be sure that the file would not either break right through, or reduce the shoulders to an unstable wafer-thin mess in one or two critical areas, so some selective precautionary internal beefing up still seemed a sensible prelude to use of the file. In any case, I wanted to make the fairings wider in certain places, to agree with my personal interpretation of the post-1938 cut-down fairings on these corridor tenders (which may be right or wrong - I'm not arguing that point here) and that meant I had to add some strips of plastikard. Where I chose to add material internally it was not necessary to resort to filler or resin, as the surfaces requiring reinforcing layers are all accessible flat ones, not obscure nooks and crannies with wavy edges, under the coal load. So all I had to do throughout was to bond on strips of plastikard, which was a quick, easy job with a tidy result and no mess on the workbench.

[Atlantic 3279]

That last picture shows that I added a couple of strips of 40 thou and one of 20 thou to widen the fairing above what should be the corridor top within the coal space. I made sure that these strips initially stood well above the intended finished surface of the fairing. I similarly added material to widen the fairing on the left side of the tender over the water filler area. I also had to patch in a nick in the other side of the coal space where my saw had wandered....
Here's the same stage of the work seen from yon' side.

And here you can see my "chicken" precaution of adding a similar amount of strip plastic inside the raised corridor moulding, including the bit across the rear, as I thought I might want to file this down quite a lot.