Atlantic's works: Portable layout - Scenic details next

[Woodcock29]

Looking very nice Graeme.

Andrew

[Atlantic 3279]

Thanks Andrew.

[Rustynuts]

Certainly interested in a couple of self trimming tenders when they become available.

regards

Paul

[Atlantic 3279]

Latest:
https://www.rmweb.co.uk/community/index ... nt-3819149

[Horsetan]

Certainly interested in a couple of self trimming tenders when they become available....

Likewise.

[iainkirk]

Certainly interested in a couple of self trimming tenders when they become available.

regards

Paul

Another potential purchaser here...

[john coffin]

Nice fix Graeme, and so simple, mind you as the BBC "other biros are available"
I would guess that wire insulation would also work quite well too?

Paul

(Comment refers to post BELOW, which was originally placed in the wrong topic)

[Atlantic 3279]

Although this has already appeared in error elsewhere:

Now this cannot be a new idea, but it only occurred to me yesterday as a means of ruling out a possible short circuit on a metal model between the bogie wheels and the tail / spring / split pin of a scale coupling. I didn't want to make the coupling rigid by removing the spring and split pin and then either bending the tail of the coupling nor by gluing or soldering it into its slot. I kept part of the spring, and retained that by pushing a tight fitting insulating sleeve over the coupling tail - a piece of tube cut from the inner part of a BiC pen! Had I wanted softer spring action, I suppose I could have stretched the coil spring somewhat before cropping it, as simply shortening the supplied spring firms up its action....

If the idea is of use to anybody else who hasn't thought of it, then this contribution to the forum will have been worth the effort.

[Atlantic 3279]

As Paul suggests above, any kind of tight fitting plastic sleeve would do, wire insulation or other, and various makes of suitable ball-point pen are available.....

[Atlantic 3279]

I'm still alive and I'm not lying low waiting for the police to lose interest in my case, although I have been busy with annoying demands of the day job, wife briefly unwell, and some detailed correspondence with the designer of the etches for the GC self-trimming tender that I test built.

I have nonetheless managed to do a little practical model making. I've added some cast resin axlebox and spring units to that tender, For a change, these are not some that I made as I wanted to see if I could excuse myself from that particular job. I was pleased their shapes and the general representation of details, although because I'm "fussy" I did feel obliged to fill some minor defects caused by trapped air bubbles in the moulds, hence the grey bits in the pictures. In fairness, I know of somebody else who had a set and his were free of any noticeable defects, so I don't think my experience was necessarily typical.

The 'boxes and springs don't match the profiles of the half-etched recesses in the frames. It remains to be seen whether the mismatch will be highly apparent once some black paint goes on. I've deliberately avoided filling the recesses in order to find out!

I've also replaced the fire-iron stand. a highly observant soul had kindly drawn my attention to the fact that I had fitted the original etched part in the wrong place, sprouting from the root of the side flare. It should in fact arise almost from the top of the flare. There was spare one on the test etch, so I should have had no difficulty in solving the problem. The trouble was, I decided to try to be clever, but I didn't think sufficiently. As I'd been supplied with a photograph to show exactly what shape the fire iron should be, including the foot or bracket that is fastened to the inside of the flare, I decided to try to shape the spare etched item to be "spot on". All I succeeded in doing was to snap it at the only point where it is half-etched! I was also fairly sure that the original one would break if I tried to remove it, because it had been bent a couple of times and was very firmly soldered into a hole I had drilled in order to try to give it a strong seating. Hence I bent up a new stand from 0.45mm brass wire, notching the wire only where the cross needed to be formed, thus avoiding any half-thickness weak-spots at the bottom of the main stem.

On reflection I do not think there's anything really wrong with the etched part by the way. Instead of trying to make the etched part mimic the curved foot of the real stand, I should simply have folded its "foot" back at 90 degrees and soldered it parallel to the top edge of the flare. A separate piece of curved wire soldered in front of the stem to represent the exactly correct foot would have been quite a simple addition, if considered essential......

I've also at last started making a mould for what I hope will be my "improved", easier-to-use, GNR / ECJS clerestory carriage roof. I must thank Mr Sutton of both this parish and another, also of joinery and bacon fame, for an idea which I think has simplified my mould making task in this case. The use of a layer of cling film inside a Lego moulding box with a loose base appears to me to be a technique that might save time and effort in two or three ways.

[Dave S]

I've also at last started making a mould for what I hope will be my "improved", easier-to-use, GNR / ECJS clerestory carriage roof. I must thank Mr Sutton of both this parish and another, also of joinery and bacon fame, for an idea which I think has simplified my mould making task in this case. The use of a layer of cling film inside a Lego moulding box with a loose base appears to me to be a technique that might save time and effort in two or three ways.

The tender certainly looks the part.

I'm interested in how the roof mould comes out, I made an error on mine and would have done it differently a 2nd time. I've managed to get enough out of the mould that are workable but they've taken quite a bit of cleaning up.

[iainkirk]

The tender gets more tempting all the time
The design has a certain finesse...

[Atlantic 3279]

Useful Info:

Today I needed to re-order the Rampf fast-cast resin that I've been using for some time. John Burn & Co, in Birmingham, my usual supplier in recent years, now seems to have been absorbed fully into the Ellsworth Adhesives organisation, of East Kilbride. As a private customer with no account, I've previously had to phone Burn to place an order. On trying that today, I think I got the Ellsworth automated switchboard instead and on selecting the "orders" extension found that nobody was available and I that could only leave a message - no option to simply wait for somebody to be free. Not wanting to hang around for a return call I looked up Ellsworth Tooling "Solutions" (apparently their preferred new style) on the web and found a full new on-line ordering facility, with the size and type of resin I wanted easily found. It all seemed to work very smoothly, including the credit card processing, with a very pleasing lower carriage cost than I've paid on most recent previous orders.

[Atlantic 3279]

As well as struggling against reality in the rest of life, I have managed to make some further progress on resin parts for 12 wheeled ECJS clerestory coaches over the last 5 or 6 weeks. I now have moulds in which I can produce the sides for the D.30 pantry-third in one piece. I've also improved the original mould for the generic clerestory roof with apertures in the clerestory sides, simply to make it easier to produce roofs of consistent and suitable thickness. In addition, I've produced a new mould for half-roofs, with new features.

I mentioned a while ago that I'd like to produce those roofs with transparent sides to the clerestory, so that any layout of window frames could either be added as thin overlay or simply painted on using a bow-pen or similar. None of the clear resins that I noticed on the web had advertised characteristics that persuaded me to even order some for trial. Strong fumes, slow curing times and/or highly critical and very uneven mixing ratios seem to be the order of the day! Hence I decided to try a different approach, making a mould whose shape would accept pre-cut strips of thick (and therefore strong /straight / flat/ stable) transparent plastic as tight-fitting inserts in the clerestory sides at the time of casting the rest of the roof. I put quite a bit of time and thought into the matter of getting those clear strips in the right places and firmly bound in the final casting. Rather annoyingly, a couple of attempts to produce such a casting showed that the tight fit in the mould of the clear plastic inserts simply wasn't enough to stop the white resin from creeping over the faces that were supposed to remain clear. It wasn't a quick easy job to flake off the hardened surface film without damage to the clear plastic either. A change of approach seemed advisable, so I made some expendable "space holder" pieces that could be cast-in and then removed after curing to leave the entire clerestory side open in such a way that clear plastic could then be glued in place. That gave slightly better results, but the job of gluing the plastic strips into exactly the right positions in the voids without fogging the plastic wasn't easy, and the task of cutting lots of strips of clear plastic to the correct dimensions was slow and tedious. I felt I was wasting time that I could not afford at that stage, so I have abandoned the clear-sides idea (for the present, at least) and have simply used the new mould to produce some roofs with soild, smooth, flat sides to the clerestory, with a view to painting the sides a suitable shade of murky-grey gloss to suggest "glazing" and then paint the frames and panelled areas in "teak", as I did on my previously illustrated test-piece.

This is how the currently viable roof castings compare, plus a reminder of the painted flat-sided test piece, whose dummy windows probably ought to have much darker tone and a glossier finish:

[Dave S]

I found the clerestorey roof awkward as well. I tried moulding it in 2 parts, the lower roof and the upper so that I could use a strip of etched brass for the windows/glazing.
The result has been 'ok' but I think the problem lies with my mould making rather than the idea. For mine as there were only 4 coaches it's not a hardship to fill and rework the roofs to achieve a good result.