7mm Dikitriki's Dark side: A WD 2-8-0

P A D

Western Thunderer
There's one for sale on the Ellis Clark website. Complete kit plus Slaters wheels for £400.
 

Dikitriki

Flying Squad
Hi,

Over a year since I posted here:(. I'm finally getting a bit of me time, and currently on the workbench is an A3. Some of you will recall that my great Heyside mate Clive died last year. He left 2 models in bits scattered to the four winds in his workshop. I was permitted to recover them. The A3 was one of 2 built at the same time, but while the one was finished (and now owned by another Heyside member), this never was for some reason. All the component parts were painted, but the years in the workshop had taken a toll and there was all sorts of mould/blemishes over the surface. I'll deal with all the parts as I get to them but first up is the footplate. It cleaned up well, except for a couple of places where the varnish had lifted, and there were witness 'rings'.

Now, I already have a A3, and I wanted to retain as much as possible of Clive's work, so I was not aiming to do any additional work, except where I felt Clive had got something wrong, or that which was necessary to make it work. The footplate did not present any problems other than the fact that he had (incorrectly) painted the tops of the splashers black. I knew which green (and I don't just mean 'BR green') he had used, so I rubbed down and brush painted the splasher tops. I knew I had to revarnish it, so any brush strokes were going to disappear.

And that is the current state of play. The varnish is drying.

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Knight of Thistle for those interested.

Richard
 

Dikitriki

Flying Squad
Hi,

I mentioned that the model was covered in 'mould' or some such. Probably too strong a word, but I don't know what it is.

Here's the cab roof. It's been given a really good brushing, so it now needs some more effort. I shall start with washing up liquid and then move to BarKeepers friend liquid. With luck, that will suffice, but it's not a major job to respray just the roof.

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Clive put a lot of thought into his models. An example of this is the glazing of the spectacle plate. He cut a clear piece of glazing material to match the shape of the spectacle plate, masked off for the window and then sprayed the inside. Unfortunately he sprayed it black, so I have overpainted it green. Absolutely flush glazed! It is held in place by the firebox backhead, but I shall glue it in with canopy glue.

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Richard
 

Dikitriki

Flying Squad
Hi,

Cab roof needs another go:

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Smokebox door is fine, though just a little bit of touching up is needed.

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The spectacle plate glazing attached well, as did the side window units with Canopy Glue. I have the driver's and fireman's pedestals to spray as the weather is good, and then to weather the backhead.

Richard
 

Dikitriki

Flying Squad
Hi,

The second go on the cab roof worked fine, so that's a job ticked off.

Tender chassis and underframe; at the time of building, Clive was using Walsall wheels, a choice I could never entirely talk him out of. Further, he was using the American pick up system. Sure enough, when I tried the tender through my pointwork, it wouldn't go. There were two issues; first the back to backs were not wide enough, and second, the flanges were both too wide and too deep, hitting the chairs as it bounced along. The disc wheels themselves looked good, and being screwed in on the axles, were easy enough to put in the lathe and skim the backs, though they were tricky to extract between the pull rods. I shortened the axle length to make it easier to get them in and out. I have a flange form tool so it wasn't difficult to reprofile them.

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Otherwise, the chassis was a straight kit build. I did have to reprofile the brake shoes to give a little more clearance, and I took the opportunity to just tidy the whole thing up and respray it.

The underframe washed up well, and all I have done here is tidy up the red on the buffer beam, and go round blackening a few chip and standing marks.

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The tender body needs another look at. There were a few difficult to remove marks that I'm not sure about. The model will be weathered, and I'm fairly sure they will disappear under the weathering. Another look in daylight is required.

Richard
 

Dikitriki

Flying Squad
Moving on, the boiler unit was in pretty good shape after a clean up. Clive had been a bit lax on the inside of the cab where there was insufficient and incomplete paint coverage, but some green brushwork sorted that. I need to weather the pedestals which are screwed in, then I can add the backhead and roof and screw it to the footplate.

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I note that I still need to pick out the safety valves and whistle.

And here's the back head. I haven't added anything, but I have picked out the pipes and controls and generally weathered it back.

P1010555a.jpg

Richard
 

Dikitriki

Flying Squad
I'm continuing to tidy up the paintwork, and the tender and engine body are pretty much there. Clive managed to get the cab inside beading on the wrong sides, which meant the door hinges were on the wrong (ie outside) side of the door. I managed to get the doors off and remove the door hinge straps. I had to strip and repaint the doors, but they are now back on. I have test fitted the chassis, and while it does fit, it's just a bit too snug and needs a bit more clearance in a couple of places.

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I will have it all together for the Doncaster show so it will be on the F7 stand.

Richard
 

Pencarrow

Western Thunderer
Not a prototype I have much interest in (they weren't seen down around Wadebridge, Padstow and Bodmin) but can appreciate the amount of skilled work involved in getting the kit completed. Very nice.
 

Dikitriki

Flying Squad
Hi,

Nameplates have arrived. Clive already had some, but the radius did not match the splasher properly, so I ordered a replacement set from Severn Mill Plates which fitted exactly, surprise, surprise.

How to fit them? The A3 plates had brackets cast in to the back of the nameplates which bolted to the splasher top. There was no bracket on the splasher. It matters because from the side, the triangular fillet on the nameplate end bracket is visible. Now, I wasn't going to spend a day scratchbuilding all the gubbins on the back - that was too much even for me, but I did put 4 of the cast brackets on. In fact, there should be 3 intermediate (smaller) brackets which actually had the bolt holes, and framing top and bottom. Really, really not worth the effort. So the back of the plates are a compromise, but with a smear of Araldite will hold firm. I have blackened them prior to painting.

P1010576a.jpg
Richard
 

LarryG

Western Thunderer
I used to catch trains over the Pennines to Leeds and York at the beginning of the 1960's when going through a phase of LNER-itis. Because of the A3's prominence on top trains, it barely occurred to me they were an early 1920's design like the the B16's which I was very nostalgic about at that time. All the LMS "express" motive power around my home base was far too modern to be nostalgic! :cool:
 
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