Even slower day today, very unproductive in fact.
The good news was that the correct crank axle turned up, the bad news is that I've completely lost all of the inside motion sprues, I've still got the cross head and slide bars from previous work but all the motion....which I carefully put in it's own bag to keep safe..... has totally gone, four hours upending the whole workshop and nadda.
I rang Dave and after he stopped laughing and asked had I checked the fridge......it's an old yarn where upon I ventured into the kitchen to make a cup of tea once, no kettle, but the milk was left out, searched high and low for the kettle and then decided to put the milk back (assuming the kids had left it out) and lo.....there, in the fridge, was the kettle
.
Anyway, for a nominal fee he's shipping replacement sprues along with some bogie spring shackles, one of which made a bid, and succeeded to escape. On top of that he mentioned a development etch he had worked up as a carrier for the DCC chip and bits, was I interested in a trial build, yup, sign me up for that
So on to today's dabbling, mostly fitting work, the sand boxes need to be tapped 14BA, Pahh, broke my third tap (broke two last week, my first two ever) and then sheared one of the 14BA brass screws in the sand box fitting. In the end I drilled the three good holes out and added pegs, I may add another single centered 10BA nut in a scratch built plug like the dome later.
It is suggested to add tube to the fittings that need removing for paint, specifically the clack fittings and Roscoe's, the Roscoes were easy, a bit of thin wall tube and job done. You also need to move down the damper fitting, so I plugged the old hole and re-drilled lower, that fitting stays fixed so no problems there.
The clack fittings have a giant spigot of 2.5 mm, so a 3.0 mm tube is a monster to fit in the boiler, I could just see the drill bit snagging the thin wall and damaging something so opted for plan B; cutting off the spigot and replacing with a 2.0 mm hole.
A corresponding sized rod was then fitted to the boiler, knowing the thin wall would not support two single stubs very well I opted to make it one rod that runs right across the whole boiler, much more solid.
The last part was the smoke box door, it needs to be fitted after paint and the polished brass ring is inserted behind the smoke box (it has it's own screw at the back of the smoke box).
Reading Raymonds build I liked the idea of making the dart a screw fitting, and thus it was so, a simply strap of nickel silver with a 12BA nut accepts the end of a 12BA screw inserted into the back of the dart. The dog leg on the strap allows it to flex and thus ensure there is enough give to ensure the dart is correctly aligned when tightened.
The running plate up front has been filled and blended in, as have the other slots poking out from under the smoke box wrapper; once the clothing band cleats are added to the base of the boiler it'll be time to fix the smoke box down.
The plan for the rest of the day is to add the beading to the splashers and cab and then all the steps.
......
