Atlantic's works: Portable layout - Scenic details next

[52D]

I know you have enough on your plate with castings but this might be of interest to you and others http://www.bouldercreekrailroad.com/blo ... r-modelers

[Atlantic 3279]

I'll watch that, ta.

[Atlantic 3279]

I think I may be able to suggests a simpler and more reliable way to get the third bend in the correct place on those etched P2 reverse rod bracket strips. Before I write it into the final section of the instructions / suggestions, I'll discuss it with fellow modellers at our local gathering on Thursday evening. If any suggestions ideas appear on here in the meantime I shall consider those too.

[Atlantic 3279]

Pending further thought and final decisions on the P2 reversing rod, I've been staying out of the rain having a further tinker with that Millholme B5.

With only moderate sizes of coupled wheels and a relatively high pitched boiler, the bright treads and flanges of the "narrow gauge" OO wheels showed up quite strongly, inboard of the splashers. Ideally I would have kept the splashers to scale dimensions and found another way to hide the wheels, but I looked into blackening possibilities for the wheel tyres (which would have to be dull, hard wearing and electro-conductive all at the same time) without finding anything that I liked, and the "old school RTR" dodge of blanking off the space under the boiler with skirts clearly wasn't on!

Slightly reluctantly therefore I decoded to try widening the splashers to cover the wheels fully. I considered simply trying to add material to the inner edges of the existing splashers, which would present the challenge of getting a strong joint and a flush finish, or I could have deliberately set the top surface of the extensions a little lower than the original splasher surfaces in the hope that they would either not attract the eye or would not be interpreted by the eye and brain as parts of the splashers. Those ideas didn't seem very practical because the wheels were a very close fit within the inner edges of the splashers, those edges having been thinned down greatly out of necessity in order to avoid electrical short circuits! In the end I decided to try some shim overlays, wider than the original splashers, and I think that the black livery of the loco is now my best friend as it seems to do a wonderful job of hiding what would otherwise appear to be ridiculously wide splasher tops.

I started by cutting some paper strips 8.5mm wide and trimming these very carefully to create individual templates that would fit almost perfectly over the leading and middle splashers. I then cut and rolled some 0.003" brass sheet to match the templates. At the same time I was also using the parallel-sided rule to get a clearer idea of which parts of the loco and tender really sits level, as food for later thought.....

After test fitting the overlays "dry" and adjusting shapes and curvature to get as perfect a fit as possible, I gave the abraded and de-greased parts a coat of U-Pol No 8 aerosol etch primer and a top coat of Halfords aerosol satin black. Little rolls of masking tape, sticky side out, held the feather-weight parts in place on a card while I did the painting.

One side of the loco, with wheel tops naked beneath the boiler and painted overlays lying in wait:

Comparison with painted overlays simply placed over the splashers:

Other side:

The fit is so close that I should be able to fix these in place with a thin smear of epoxy and have no need for remedial painting. The pictures also show that the wheel nuts are concealed once again and the rims/ axle-ends of the new bogie wheels are painted to match the rest of the model.

The top of that tender cries out for correction.....

[JASd17]

Hi Graeme,

The B5 I think can be a bit tricky.

Am I right in thinking that the boiler height depends on superheating/valves? And furthermore that superheating changes the look of the loco significantly?

An excellent idea to try and improve the running of a well-finished model. I think I have a B5 lurking somewhere in the depths of a not-recently-visited cupboard, if I was to attempt an EM version, your fix is even more relevant.

John

[Atlantic 3279]

Hello John,

I don't know whether valves come into it but superheating, or more precisely boiler type certainly does. The fish engines were built with their own specific version of the 4' 9" dia. Belpaire boiler, with a fairly shallow firebox to fit over the rear axle, but same barrel and firebox length as their contemporaries in what became class Q4. The Q4s had a deep firebox. Gorton's boiler standardization plans, conceived before grouping but mostly implemented afterwards, saw the Q4 boiler adopted as standard for the B5 fish engines and the B9 "small wheeled fish". On both classes it had to sit much higher than the original boiler because of the deep firebox.
Mostly, the Q4 boilers fitted to the 4-6-0s were superheated ones (hence a change to piston valves at the same time?) but in one or two cases locos got second hand saturated Q4 boilers first.

It occasionally amuses me to hear references to the "larger boiler" rebuilds of the B5s and B9s, an illusion (in all but one case) caused by the higher pitch of basically the same boiler type on the B5s, or on the B9s a higher pitched boiler 3" smaller in diameter than their originals. Only one B5 ever got a larger boiler, as an experiment, carrying an O4 type 5' 0" dia. boiler between two overhauls in the early twenties. If there were any advantages they were considered to be outweighed by the drawbacks, such as the long firebox filling up a lot of the cab.

[Atso]

Hi Graeme,

I've just been catching up. I'm glad that the etches have worked out more or less OK so I'll start breathing again.

The B5 does look tasty despite a few issues and it is giving me ideas; as though I don't have enough to be getting on with!

[Atlantic 3279]

I note that the coping plates seem to be rather a long way back on the tender, they must have been added by the builder given the kit comes with coal rails unless the builder has plated over the coal rails he placed too far back - presumably you'll replace those in due course. The thing I dislike most about the Millholme tenders is the heavy cast band around the top of the sides and back. When I built the B5 I removed that. I've still to add the extra side bit to the water pickup cover on the tender on my B5 though!


Regards

Andrew

The same thought about the coping plates having initially struck me rather strongly, I started checking photographs and drawings. At one stage I even doubted the obvious, and almost started to think the copings were correctly placed compared to one photo showing the early type of tender with short coping plates. I then I remembered I had a scan of a drawing of the even earlier 4000 gallon version with water pick up and coal rails. The coal rails of course are exactly where the coping plates would be on the first versions with plates. This drawing conforms that the Millholme tanks sides are about 1.5mm too long (Beyer-Peacock works drawings reproduced in Johnson's GC locos book, for the final 4000 gal tenders with longer copings, show the same tank length dimension preserved, further confirming the Millholme error). The Millholme tank extends too much at the rear, not revealing enough soleplate above the rear buffer beam area. The lip of the cornice on the top rear edge of the tank sticks out about 0.5 to 1mm too much too, so that the coping plates are sitting on top edges of the side cornices that are about 2 to 2.5 mm too long. The copings themselves are about 2mm too long compared to the early type (50mm compared to a correct figure of around 48mm along the straight portion of the top edge), so are in proportion with the tank side lengths anyway. Once I had identified those errors, I could safely interpret the positions of the copings. On the early tender types the top corners of the copings should be 15 mm back from the tank front edge, and 15 mm forward of the outer lip of the rear cornice. The B5 model has been built with the top front corners about 17mm back, and the top rear corners only about 13mm forward from the cornice lip. So I do need to move them forwards by about 2mm, even if I don't change to open or plated coal rails. First instincts were therefore correct, but checking the details for confirmation is, as ever, a bit of a chore

[Woodcock29]

Hi Graeme
Your comments are quite interesting as I must never have measured a Millholme tender to identify that it was too long in the tank.
I knew the Ks tenders were shorter in the tank and had (wrongly!) assumed they were incorrect.
Since the time I last built a GC kit tender I have acquired Isinglass drawings for B7, B8, B9 and O5 - all of which on the drawings have the standard 4000 gallon tenders. These drawings confirm that the Millholme tender is incorrect.
I think I might have said previously elsewhere that the best GC tenders are now those made by Bachmann, if one can find spare tenders, the J11 tenders being the best as they have the brakes in line with the wheels, well at least for 16.5mm gauge!
I have 4 spare Bachmann O4 tenders but the mate that got them for me with some for himself unfortunately only received bodies, including soleplate and steps, but no chassis - so I'll have to improvise for chassis - in most cases I'll use a Comet 6'6" + 6'6" chassis and have to cobble together some frames - I have Alan Gibson axle boxes for 2 of them.
Andrew

[earlswood nob]

Good morning all

Dave Alexander used to advertise a GCR 4000g tender. I don't know if it's still available.

Alan Gibson Workshop do GCR tender axleguards (as mentioned above), and the set that I have look pretty good.

Sadly, the Mainly Trains brass footstep etches are no longer available, as they were useful when scratchbuilding tender frames.

I use the Comet 6'6+6'6 tender chassis for many white metal tender kits, as they seem to run better and it's easier to add brake detail.

The DJH J10 kit has an early type of GCR 4000g tender. I don't know how accurate it is. It was also supplied with the D6 (Pollitt) kit, but they are like hen's teeth.

Earleswood nob

[Woodcock29]

Hi Earlswood
Interesting that you mention the old DJH kits for J10 and D6. I'm actually building a J10 at the moment - a kit I've had stashed away for a long time. I've had great difficulty deciding which loco to actually build with the features provided in the kit, riveted smokebox and the pattern of rivets on the cabsides - in the end I've removed the lovely rivets off the smokebox and also some off the cab. Having Yeadon Vol 45, Greenie Vol 5 and a wide range of other books only helps in so far as they provide a wide range of photos at different times but none that ideally suited what I actually wanted to build! Anyway progress is being made.
The tender with these kits is an older Pollitt 4000 gallon tender covered in lovely rivets on the sides. Trying to match a loco for my area with this tender was impossible as most J10s were on the western side of the ex GC area in LNER days.
Once the J10 is finished I plan to complete a Q4 I started many years ago but never finished. I also have a D6 stashed away along with a lot of other kits - too many in reality. Once these are done I need to get back to the GN locos I had planned to work on first!
Andrew

[UpDistant]

Judith Edge does an etched GCR 4000 gal tender. It can also be cut down to one of the smaller capacity tenders, 3250 gal, IIRC. It's not listed with the rest of the kits but available if you ask nicely at exhibitions. Mine is going behind a D49.

[Atlantic 3279]

Quick thread update:

With a view to conserving the original builder's work where possible, in order to save myself the effort of re-finishing, I've started a cautious re-styling of parts of the Millholme tender for the B5. Pictures later perhaps.

The instructions, or notes for guidance, to accompany the P2 parts are almost complete now too, I believe. I could have rushed them out sooner, but with plenty of other things to do and most people (I imagine) having similar "interests elsewhere" in the summer months it was difficult to find the time and motivation, or to see the need, to get them done more quickly. The slower progress has given me plenty of time to think about points that might otherwise have been missed anyway.
I have a fair idea of P2 parts costs now too, so I'll start letting provisionally interested parties know fairly soon so that those wishing to confirm interest can do so. By mid-September, with a holiday out of the way too, I may at last be in a position to start supplying P2 parts to those who have waited so patiently....

[Woodcock29]

I saw the GC tender produced by Mike Edge at Railex at Aylesbury back in May when I was in UK. I would have bought one if they had any left but they sold what they had on the Sat morning before I saw it (I was too busy buying from other stands!). It was coupled to the B9 they now produce, one of which I have to build, purchased as a series of etches 4 years ago. Mine will be coupled to a revamped Bachmann O4 tender which should look very nice.
Andrew

[Mersey508138]

Can I ask what your preferred forms of payment will be for the parts as I am more familiar with postal orders than things like paypal.