Atlantic's works: Portable layout - Ground Signals Again

[Atlantic 3279]

I started the filing by smoothing in my rough piercing saw cuts across the upcurved front of the fairing (working to the previously scribed line), and then by taking a little off the top of the corridor within the water filler area, working from the right side with the file, flush with the top of the existing fairing.

I then used dividers to scribe a mark on the front and rear of the tender, at each corner, an equal amount below the original top edge. Using a coarse flat file, largely filing along the length of the tender body rather than across it, I then produced an initial broad bevel or chamfer as shown on the left side in this view:

Or on the right here,

or seen in perspective thus:

I checked regularly to ensure that front and rear ends of the bevel were at the same heights, and had to do a little corrective filing "across" the slope alongside the coal space - the tender sides here had tended to spring in slightly under the pressure of the file, so that my bevel hadn't taken the height down quite so much in these areas. It was actually quite a quick and easy job to get this filing done, easier than the description might sound.

[Atlantic 3279]

Having treated both sides in this way I made one more alteration before beginning to fair-in the curve by means of more filing. I raised the top of the rear coal plate by sticking on three strips of 20 thou plastikard, in leaf-spring fashion, and then filing these to shape.

Fairing-in the curve at the top of my original bevel was easy, as there is nothing in the way to prevent any rolling action of the file that you might prefer. More care is needed at the lower edge of the bevel, where you cannot roll the file over onto the side of the tender too much without catching the beading (or if you are really rough you could scar the flat side of the tender). I went as far with this process as I could, and then finished the lower edge of the cuve by again running the file along the length of the tender, but this time with file turned on its edge (where the teeth are straight-cut rather than cross-cut), very carefully rolling the file away from the beading and onto the fairing on each stroke. I found it possible with enough care to use the beading as an edge guide for the file and to smooth the curve all the way down to that beading. The straight-cut file teeth appear to leave much less scratching than the cross-cut teeth, with less need for subsequent fine rubbing-down.

Again I fairly quickly arrived at an acceptable finished shape and then refitted the body to the underframe to see how a coal load might be refitted without fouling the dummy motor block.

Yon' side again:

[Atlantic 3279]

Actually the coal load was straighforward too. After roughly filing off the remains of the original "long" raised front fairing that I'd cut away with the "coal", and filing the "coal" down to the new reduced width of the coal space, it was obvious that the load would go back in well-below its original height and therefore nicely below the top edges of the lowered fairings. All that was necessary was to curve a new rectagle of plastic to match the "coal" and stick this to the underside of the front of the load so that there would be no gap where the front fairing had been cut back.

A dressing of real coal, at least at the front, will hide the blank area.

The previous mountain of coal is nicely eliminated.

[Atlantic 3279]

Here's the (so far) "finished" profile at the front. I ought really to add the missing piece of capping above the crew door.

This is the rear, showing that my filing hasn't actually cut into the original porthole window, and if I were feeling lazy I could leave it at this (I no doubt will for a while at least, as I'm busy with other things). Filling the original porthole moulding and adding a ring of brass to represent a new one slightly lower down would be better in the long run, and a new rubbing plate to authentic shape on the gangway connector would help the appearance too.

Compared to an original Railroad tender:

I really ought to lower the top of the corridor in the water filler space a bit more, and make some other detail changes to that also. This will involve filing down from one side, destroying the top edge of the adjoining fairing but that can again be made good.
There's no denying the fact that the body is still about a millimetre too wide and that the new Hornby tender is a finer model, yet still with faults I believe. However, I reckon I've got a big improvement for minimal cost and only a moderate amount of effort - far less effort than was involved in my original conversion method.

[Atlantic 3279]

No further action on that tender yet, as I've been busy finishing off a pair of W1s. I believe I muttered something earlier about trying to find a simple DIY means of making the flangeless trailing wheels in the rear bogie rotate as they should when the loco moves, even though they are not carrying any weight and are sometimes not actually on the railhead on trainset curves. I've finished up with the system shown in the picture below. It certainly works at present, although I don't claim that it is elegant, robust or durable. Time may or may not prove the value of the arrangement. Just a couple of plastic pulley wheels, turned up by hand with V-shaped grooves in order to give the "drive belt" something to grip. The drive belt is nothing more than two turns of some sort of sewing thread, suitably knotted.

Here's a quick comparison of the three Garter Blue W1 models for which I am now to blame. My original Railroad Falcon based effort is at the top, and compared to the two latest locos its paint finsh shows up slightly poorly! It suffered from a very "gritty" initial spray coat of satin varnish, thanks to a dying sprayer and I suspect refusal of the flatting agent in Humbrol varnish to remain properly dispersed! I subsequently had to gently flat it all down again and brush over a well thinned coat of varnish to "repair" the finish. It is also perhaps apparent that the varnish has imparted a definite yellow-green tint to the blue after a year or so, although I suspect that my original Falcon model was always greener that the latest two - I had to add green to the Railmatch paint to match my loco's colour, and this was not necessary with the other two. I had no trouble at all spraying Railmatch satin varnish to a lovely smoth finish on the latest two locos. The middle loco by the way is also based on Falcon, hence the chunky valve gear and Ringfield style tender. The lower loco is based on a super detail A4 (SNG), hence the lamp irons, neat cab windows, doors, Flaman speed recorder and ready made nice tender.

[mick b]

Very nice work.

In case you want to up the detail on the others East Kent Models stock the Flaman Recorder its no more than £2 and amazing how it improves the look of the loco. I have just bought a couple for spares/ add on detail.
I might also try your solution on my W1 . I never managed to get the rear truck around curves and have now made it with flangeless wheels and a fixed truck aka Hornby . Just dont look too hard on curves It amazing how far the cab swings out even on reasonably generous curves

Mick

[Atlantic 3279]

Cheers Mick - now would you believe that despite all the attention I paid to photos when I turned out my first W1, I never noticed the Flaman! Only whilst completing these latest two did I notice it in 1938/9 photos. I'll have to consider fitting it to my loco at some time too, although I've just had an order from EKM. Maybe next time?
I think that SNG based loco at the bottom of the three has turned out the nicest looking of the lot, save for the flangeless rear wheels.

[Atlantic 3279]

I had thought of having a break from loco tinkering at this stage, or one might say a "brake" from loco tinkering since I intended to sort out some goods brake vans (and the GNR used "break van" as an official spelling so I should be excused for any alleged misuse of the English language).
It hasn't turned out that way just yet, as I've had a lot of snow to shovel, I've been rather tired with a heavy cold, and I got tempted to have a look at my now old Bachmann A4 Peregrine, which definitely looked a bit crude alongside recently completed Hornby-based W1 and 4-8-2 conversions.
I've fitted the loco with fixed outside frames at the rear in lieu of the waggling ones that Bachmann supply, and have close-coupled the re-worked tender. Eventually I plan to try to "correct" the curvature of the lower part of the parabolic lining at the front end too - I reckon the upper part of the curve may be the right shape.
In dealing with the tender, by drastic surgery as per the following pictures I know that I've changed the Bachmann "no particular LNER 8 wheeled tender" (i.e. wide tank but no corridor connection on the back?!?) into only a reasonable model of the non-corridor streamliner that should go behind Peregrine. But it is at least now narrow bodied, with straight front edges to the sidesheets, no beading and has a more nearly correct profile to the top of the front plate and the coal division plate.
I've also reduced the hideous toe-stubbing elevation of the loco dome cover - I popped out the dome-cover moulding, used very light scraping to chamfer under its outer edge and also chamfered/countersunk the hole in the boiler top, for which latter purpose a half round medium size file run acroos the top of the boiler did an almost perfect job. The cover now sits as flush as it can in the hole. Any more thinning of its rim and it would go ragged or break up.

[Atlantic 3279]

Once I had decided what to do, the bulk of the cutting and rejoining work on the tender was done in a single evening. Pictures:

I should add that the coal-load/water-filler section of the butchered tender was narrowed by about 1mm each side before reassembly, and about 2mm taken out of the rear plate, just off-centre so as to miss the lamp irons.

[Atlantic 3279]

I realise that I ought to also do something about the relationship between the tender tank and the soleplate. Now that the tank has been narrowed down to scale width, and trimmed along the bottom edges of the sides, the edges of the soleplate correctly show - but the plate isn't really wide enough and the egdes of it are too thick. An extra strip on each edge and a bit of chamfering of the underside might help. More trickily, the tank ought to sit a little further forward on the soleplate, exposing some of the latter at the rear above the buffer beam. That would mean altering the rebated joint between the tank and the plate at that rear end, and I don't yey knoiw if the buffer beam would then look too deep. Also the screws for fixing the tank to the underfame would no longer line up with the holes so I might have to glue the tank on.
Whether or not I bother to go further, I feel that whilst I haven't produced a fine-scale model of the tender, I have improved on what wasn't really a good model of anything, at only the cost of some glue, filler, scraps of plastikard and a few hours tinkering that I actually enjoyed!

[Alpineman]

I have the Bachmann Mallard in Garter Blue which has the same tender as your Peregrine. Is it as inaccurate for Mallard as it is for Peregrine? (not sure I would contemplate such drastic surgery though). However, you mention having already replaced the pony truck with fixed frames, and since the loco does look so much better, I would like to tackle this job. How did you do it please? Will the loco still go round curves OK? Thanks.

Alpineman

[Atlantic 3279]

I'll try to post up some notes and pictures regarding the Cartazzi/pony truck some time soon. Regarding the tender, I believe that Mallard also had the narrow-bodied, streamlined (i.e. no beading), non-corridor tender throughout its LNER Garter Blue phase.
If you don't fancy ripping the tender down into three main chunks as I did, maybe cosmetic changes would help to draw attention away from the width error? I would consider:
1. Carefully file and sand off the beading until all is flush and there is a smooth curve-over at the top of the sidesheets, without ugly digs or ripples.
2. Stick thin plastikard strip to the bottom edges of the sidesheets, protruding by say 1mm at most, to represent the edges of the soleplate.
3. If you dare, cut off the waisted-in leading edges of the sidesheets and stick on some firmly supported straight pieces instead, filed to profile at the tops. Blend these in well along the joints and then either respray and re-letter the tender sides as a whole, or try to just blow-in the altered areas to an invisible soft-edge. Railmatch Garter blue, possibly with a very little Doncaster green added, seems to be a passable imitation of the Bachmann shade.
4. Carve/scrape away the redundant door moulding on the side of the front plate.
5. Buy yourself a Sunbeam Tiger, more fun than an Alpine perhaps?

[Atlantic 3279]

The following describes the Bachmann A4 Cartazzi conversion:

Use of this method and my dimensions allows the loco to negotiate 36" radius or slightly less if the track is smoothly laid. Tighter curves would demand a wider space beteen the rear frames, which is likely to spoil the appearance, or flangeless trailing wheels carrying no weight and providing no electrical pick-up, so "you have been warned".

Firstly a look at the original appearance with waggling rear frames and unsupported cab/firebox...

Here's a suitable set of replacement frames from a modern Hornby LNER pacific (available as spares from EKM and others for about £2.50 if you don't have any) which have to be cut up removing the front lug, the rear stretcher, and the moulded ribs on the inside faces. You could re-process the Bachmann sideframes instead, but there are problems with the dimensions and some details making it difficult or impossible to get the correct final appearance, plus it involves a lot of work as I found when I did a similar thing to a V2 some time ago.

[Atlantic 3279]

The Bachmann truck needs to be dismantled into these parts by undoing the various screws,

This leaves a clear space under the rear of the loco, with the free ends and tag-washers from the pony truck pick-ups left in situ ready for reattachment.

A piece of thin brass sheet 43mm x 14mm with a central hole then needs to be bent up to produce a short channel 25-26mm wide, and screwed into place using the existing body-to-chassis screw.

[Atlantic 3279]

Trim back the leading edges of the Hornby frames to a vertical line 4mm from the original moulded edge. File the face of the cut parallel to the longer "straight" part of the rear frame so that when fitted to the loco the front edge of the frame will sit snug against the main chassis block.

Tin and gap a piece of copperclad (PCB) sleeper strip say 14mm long. Also cut two rings of brass tube of a size that will slip over the metal stub axles of the Bachmann trailing wheel set (which will pull apart quite easily). Tin these rings externally also, then solder them, in alignment, to each end of the PCB. The alignment of the rings and the de-burring of the cuts must allow the trailing wheelset to be reassembled through the rings and to rotate freely. Glue (epoxy) this new axle-carrier squarely and centrally into the square recess in the central spine of the old Bachmann truck