Steph's WR Workbench - Springside 2251
Col,
I'm not a GWR man either - but we need a couple of the smaller and more widely-travelled locos for the inter-regional trains that ran to Southampton. And so I find myself foundering a little over the finer details...
Anyway, it is what it is; and so to a little update. I have to say at this point that it's probably not a bad kit of its type. But there are some niggles which have come to light recently. The first one was having to mark out and drill the holes for the handrail knobs in the boiler. It's a tricky job to get them to all line up on GWR locos, so yet again defeats the objective of this kit being for the tyro. But it is buildable...
The splashers are another case in point. I assembled them by soldering the cast splashers to the etched bases and then realised that I had chunks to carve out of the middle and rear splashers to get them in place. There's a 'before and after' shot of the rear ones below. I also added splasher backs from 0.01" brass to improve the appearance; the top outline of the frame isn't correct, but at least you won't be able to see through to the backs of the wheels.
On the tender I've made a little progress having had a major brain fart when I realised that if assembled as intended the tender frame couldn't be seperated from the body, or the wheels removed. The use of screws to join it all together is completely subverted by having whitemetal castings for the water scoop and vac reservoir over the screw heads. Genious.
Anyway, once I had recovered from my incredulity I then worked up a solution where the castings are made up as two sub assemblies. The screws were then dropped in to place and the castings fitted to the chassis. The final trick was to drill through the castings in line with the screw heads, so I can drop a screwdriver through each of the castings to do the screw up. In the end a very simple solution.
I've still got the tender brakegear and frame details to attach. I think I've worked out how to make the brakegear removable on both the loco and tender, which should making painting easier. Not a bad idea from the servicing point of view either.
So this is what it looks like now. The tender body is largely complete, awaiting only details. The loco body is similarly substantially complete, I've got the feed pipes to do next and then we really are on to the finer details. Both chassis need their brakegear adding and the loco also needs it's ashpan fitted. And just for the record, the safety valve cover and chimney haven't been fitted permanently yet while I decide what to do about the livery . The safety valve cover has been cleaned up ready for either polishing or painting:
That's it for now, one last big push and it's done. I hope!
Steph