1/32 Gauge 1 'City of London' and Carriage Builds

Locomodels

Western Thunderer
good luck when you come to silver solder the mild steel frames together, not the most pleasant of jobs, although proven to be doable. cheers Rob





There is no luck to silver soldering, like all types of soldering preparation is everything. Having a good 'hearth' to do it in and flux and solder to hand. Plus a blowtorch that will give you sufficient heat. It will give you a great feeling of satisfaction when you see the silver run for the first time, all shiny and bright. Once you have done it you will wonder what the fuss was all about. And the flux (EasyFlow) washes off with hot water.

You will need a couple of refractory bricks, or similar, to form your small hearth. Do please resist the temptation to use ordinary house bricks as these can explode, with possible disasterous consequences, when heated.

Have a go and aquire a new skill, you will never look back as you will need to use silver solder more and more as you build increasingly more complex models.
 

Steve Cook

Flying Squad
Some cracking images there Steve.:thumbs:
The viaduct looks very impressive. Do you know how it was made?
Cheers Rob. The viaduct was bought in pre-cast sections and then mortared together on some decent concrete footings...from what I can remember. Its been a while since I asked, what I can remember is that the chap isn't keen on building another one :)

Steve
 

Steve Cook

Flying Squad
D28? or maybe C28? I shall look up those composite diagrams to see the styles of the corresponding coaches.

Definitely D28 in the notes Graham. And in the wood too :)

LTB 1.JPG

Not my best photo by a long shot, but it gives a good idea of what scares waves at me over the horizon :)
Steve
 

Steve Cook

Flying Squad
There is no luck to silver soldering, like all types of soldering preparation is everything. Having a good 'hearth' to do it in and flux and solder to hand. Plus a blowtorch that will give you sufficient heat. It will give you a great feeling of satisfaction when you see the silver run for the first time, all shiny and bright. Once you have done it you will wonder what the fuss was all about. And the flux (EasyFlow) washes off with hot water.

You will need a couple of refractory bricks, or similar, to form your small hearth. Do please resist the temptation to use ordinary house bricks as these can explode, with possible disasterous consequences, when heated.

Have a go and aquire a new skill, you will never look back as you will need to use silver solder more and more as you build increasingly more complex models.

Thanks for the advice Paul, much appreciated.
I just need to go tool shopping now....shame :)
Steve
 

Ressaldar

Western Thunderer
Hi Steve,

good luck with the build, like others have already said, I too am settling down for a right riveting - and soldering, read.

Now seeing the coach kits, would not Cynric be drooling at the prospect of warming up his lazer to produce an up to date version - and his favourite GWR as well:thumbs:

Enjoy yourself, we, your audience certainly will following the progress.

cheers

Mike
 

JimG

Western Thunderer
Steve,

This is seriously scattergun. :) I started building some live steam in G1 about thirty years ago and I might have to go and dig the bits out again sometime. :) It should be an interesting build and John Barrett's locos have a reputation for working very well. I do remember helping out on a G1 layout at the Birmingham Model Engineer exhibition in the 1980s and John gave me charge of one of his pannier tank locos to run on the layout. I had a great time, and for several hours. John had gone off from the layout for an hour or two and was a bit surprised to see his loco still steaming when he came back - the boiler and fuel tank had been refilled many times. :)

Jim.
 

Steve Cook

Flying Squad
Thanks Mike
Now seeing the coach kits, would not Cynric be drooling at the prospect of warming up his lazer to produce an up to date version - and his favourite GWR as well:thumbs:
He was really up for the paneling work, albeit after some good natured banter about modelling in the wrong scale :) We never actually settled on what the paneling was going to be made from, but we had agreed the laser was the way forward.
Enjoy yourself, we, your audience certainly will following the progress.
I'll do my best :)

Steve,
This is seriously scattergun. :)
Its mostly G1 at the moment, its just all flexible in terms of motive power and scale :) The scattergun is being reloaded ready for winter :D
I started building some live steam in G1 about thirty years ago and I might have to go and dig the bits out again sometime. :)
Please do, I'm interested to see what you got up to :)
It should be an interesting build and John Barrett's locos have a reputation for working very well.
It all seems pretty straight forward from the instructions...and I know the end result has the potential to be spot on...it just has to get through me first :D
I do remember helping out on a G1 layout at the Birmingham Model Engineer exhibition in the 1980s and John gave me charge of one of his pannier tank locos to run on the layout. I had a great time, and for several hours. John had gone off from the layout for an hour or two and was a bit surprised to see his loco still steaming when he came back - the boiler and fuel tank had been refilled many times. :)
It bit you too then :) Thats a good effort, I made 3 hours on the Thursday before Larkrail but only in one hour chunks. Somebody was heard to mention 'Oi, we are getting bored of seeing the green one' :D



Steve
 

taliesin

Western Thunderer
There is no luck to silver soldering, like all types of soldering preparation is everything. Having a good 'hearth' to do it in and flux and solder to hand. Plus a blowtorch that will give you sufficient heat. It will give you a great feeling of satisfaction when you see the silver run for the first time, all shiny and bright. Once you have done it you will wonder what the fuss was all about. And the flux (EasyFlow) washes off with hot water.

You will need a couple of refractory bricks, or similar, to form your small hearth. Do please resist the temptation to use ordinary house bricks as these can explode, with possible disasterous consequences, when heated.

Have a go and aquire a new skill, you will never look back as you will need to use silver solder more and more as you build increasingly more complex models.

hmmm, i was only wishing a friend good luck, not suggesting the job cannot be done, nevertheless silver soldering mild steel is not most peoples favourite job, as ever cleanliness is critical :), cheers Rob
 

jamiepage

Western Thunderer
Have you progressed at all with City of Truro, Steve?
I have recently resurrected an old shelf queen - another 10mm GWR 4-4-0 (albeit ex MSWJR).
It now runs quite sweetly on air, so may go a bit further with the build before it disappears back onto the shelf.
Yours
Jamie
IMG_0001.JPG
 

Steve Cook

Flying Squad
Hi Jamie
No further progress to report I'm afraid. Too much time running the Castle and working abroad finished off last summer, then I got distracted by the G3 Brake Van, I've no idea just how many hours the latter has swallowed up. If I remember correctly, I reached a point where my 80W iron wasn't man enough for getting heat into the mass of the front bogie. I need to come up with a way of mechanically holding everything in to place whilst I get big bertha on it, alas I'm easily distracted and as the weather closed in, the desire to build outside locos diminished somewhat.
Hopefully I'll get back on with it in the not to distant future.
I like the look of your chassis though (congrats in getting a good run on air :) ), is it another 'Jamie Scratchbuild Special'?
Steve
 

jamiepage

Western Thunderer
Hello Steve,
Yes, it's very much a true 'scratchbuild special' in that it got started a few years ago on a wave of enthusiasm, then stalled and ended up at the back of the shelf.
Design of the working bits was based on G1MRA's Dee project, but it will be finished (!) as a meths burner.
After the weather shenanigans and subsequent lumberjacking of last weekend, a burst of sunshine on Monday turned thoughts to the outside running season again, so out it came. Mind you, it's raining again now.
Jamie
 

ScottW

Western Thunderer
Great work there Jamie, very impressed. Have you thought about starting your own thread? I for one would be interested in following the build.

Following Steve's posts on WT I have been bitten by the Gauge 1 bug and decided to splash out on a Barrett LMS Jubilee. Unfortunately I'm still waiting for the kit to arrive as I chose to receive it all in one go and save on postage cost.

Keep up the good work.

Scott
 

jamiepage

Western Thunderer
Thank you, Scott.
You will enjoy the Barrett kit- I am very tempted by the GNR/LBSCR Atlantic.
I will put some photos on a separate thread in the future if any meaningful progress gets made on the 4-4-0, but it is competing with too many other projects at the moment, I fear. Still, it was nice to see it run on air.
Yours,
Jamie
 

Dikitriki

Flying Squad
I really, really wish Barrett engineering would produce 1/32 kits. I'd have a Jubilee or a Black 5 without hesitation.

Unfortunately, I really can't bring myself to do 10mm stuff. My loss, I know.....:(

Richard
 

Steve Cook

Flying Squad
Hello Steve,
Yes, it's very much a true 'scratchbuild special' in that it got started a few years ago on a wave of enthusiasm, then stalled and ended up at the back of the shelf.
Design of the working bits was based on G1MRA's Dee project, but it will be finished (!) as a meths burner.
After the weather shenanigans and subsequent lumberjacking of last weekend, a burst of sunshine on Monday turned thoughts to the outside running season again, so out it came. Mind you, it's raining again now.
Jamie

Thanks for the info Jamie, I look forward to its progress (!) as you build it to your usual standard :) Good choice of base components, I've seen a couple of Dee's run and aside from them being one of the better proportioned locos ever IMO, their running qualities make them a very tempting proposition. One day I would like to build one in 1/32 rather than 10mm so I have collected all of the related books and drawings, I just lack time. And I'm easily distracted. Anyway, as the sun is out today, are you back on with it again :)

Following Steve's posts on WT I have been bitten by the Gauge 1 bug and decided to splash out on a Barrett LMS Jubilee. Unfortunately I'm still waiting for the kit to arrive as I chose to receive it all in one go and save on postage cost.
Good man, welcome to the club (and I apologise for the temptation) :) I hope it meets your expectations, its a lovely looking model when its finished and I'm quite sure you'll enjoy the build. I'll have an ask around my local group and see if anybody has any pointers / useful information that relate to that particular kit. Having it all in one go is no bad thing, it is apparently quite frustrating getting a piece-meal delivery, even if it spreads the cost.

Quick one, Jamie, were you tempted with coal or spirit fired for the Atlantic? There are a few known 'moments' when building the kit, not least of which is that you cannot remove the grate from the finished loco if built as a coal firing example. I know a couple of people who have built / are in the process of building and would be happy to gather some observations if it would help in your decision, going in eyes wide open etc.
Steve
 

jamiepage

Western Thunderer
Steve,
That's very kind of you, thank you. I would be keen to hear of other's experiences, particularly of the meths fired version. I know there are some who can coal fire these small models superbly well, but it seems a bit too much of a faff to me. Mind you, the smell can't be beaten.
Richard, I do wish I had cut 1/32 frames etc for the 4-4-0 instead of 10mm, and am fairly sure the scale issue is acting as a drag on enthusiasm now. What's really annoying is the fact that the drivers would actually be marginally more accurate dimensionally to 1/32 than 10mm, and I cannot for the life of me remember now why I chose 10mm.
G3 is on firmer ground here it seems to me (And Mark Woods now does a G3 wheelset for this loco!) .
Jamie
PS Steve, two rather large turnouts have arrived, so tracklaying for the Baldwin can start if it ever dries out in the garden.
 

taliesin

Western Thunderer
I really, really wish Barrett engineering would produce 1/32 kits. I'd have a Jubilee or a Black 5 without hesitation.

Unfortunately, I really can't bring myself to do 10mm stuff. My loss, I know.....:(

Richard
I think hell has to freeze over before Barrett go 1/32nd, we have this strange situation where most kits are 10mm but rtr tends to be 1/32nd. There are some 1/32nd kits, Aster being the live steam option, cheers Rob
 
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