mickoo
Western Thunderer
Peter, the rocker grate castings are/will be, available on demand
Radius, cough, hurumph, well yes you see it's like this.......
Before I answer that it's probably important to step back a little, the generally accepted radius is 6 foot and models have been built to accomplish that, generally that means narrow frames, 26 mm or so over outside faces. How or where this radius was deemed the golden rule I don't know but it's something we're stuck with.
The W1 pushes the frame width out a little further to 28 mm over faces, 28.5 mm over rivets, that's not an issue, many large engines have already been built this wide and squeak through 6 foot curves. The original front end was a little tight so I've added a little more side control and beveled the outside cylinder a little more, the real engines are beveled here anyway so I wasn't overly stressed about doing it a little more.
The rear end is different, it's not the Cartazzi as it's closer to the rear axle than the standard Pacific, it's actually the trailing truck way out back. There are two areas where it is tight, the actual outside frame work is scale width as is the inside drag beam assembly. At the moment there's a radial slot in the trailing truck.
It is inhibiting the amount of throw we currently have, I can widen that slot very easily in CAD, however, doing so presents two other issues, the inside of the wheel now impacts the centre drag beam and will short out, the other wheel will now rub against the inside of the outside frames, it won't short as the boss is touching, not the rim.
All of this wouldn't be a problem if Slaters wheels were the correct thickness, they're not, the rims and bosses are too fat, I think it's about 1 mm too much from memory.
The simple solution would be to skim the wheels, but it's not a practical solution so we have to compromise somewhere else. That's the bit that really really pi55es me off! I have to compromise because of someone else.
As it stands the W1 will just go around a 6 foot curve but there is a higher than acceptable risk of the rear end derailing. This leaves two choices:
Set the radius higher, not going to be popular with punters.
Widen the rear end frames (with correspondingly very narrow cab steps, which is what DJH did and it looks a pigs arse) and reduce the width of the centre drag beam. No one will notice the centre drag beam reduction but everyone will notice the frame width when the tender is coupled up, there will be a big offset between the two sets of steps and frames....not popular with punters.
As it stands, 6 foot is not a reliable commercial figure I'd commit to right now.
I need to get the injectors on and then run some detailed examinations to get accurate figures for minimum radius and then make a decision on where we go from there. I have my own personal views which probably should not be aired publicly
Radius, cough, hurumph, well yes you see it's like this.......
Before I answer that it's probably important to step back a little, the generally accepted radius is 6 foot and models have been built to accomplish that, generally that means narrow frames, 26 mm or so over outside faces. How or where this radius was deemed the golden rule I don't know but it's something we're stuck with.
The W1 pushes the frame width out a little further to 28 mm over faces, 28.5 mm over rivets, that's not an issue, many large engines have already been built this wide and squeak through 6 foot curves. The original front end was a little tight so I've added a little more side control and beveled the outside cylinder a little more, the real engines are beveled here anyway so I wasn't overly stressed about doing it a little more.
The rear end is different, it's not the Cartazzi as it's closer to the rear axle than the standard Pacific, it's actually the trailing truck way out back. There are two areas where it is tight, the actual outside frame work is scale width as is the inside drag beam assembly. At the moment there's a radial slot in the trailing truck.
It is inhibiting the amount of throw we currently have, I can widen that slot very easily in CAD, however, doing so presents two other issues, the inside of the wheel now impacts the centre drag beam and will short out, the other wheel will now rub against the inside of the outside frames, it won't short as the boss is touching, not the rim.
All of this wouldn't be a problem if Slaters wheels were the correct thickness, they're not, the rims and bosses are too fat, I think it's about 1 mm too much from memory.
The simple solution would be to skim the wheels, but it's not a practical solution so we have to compromise somewhere else. That's the bit that really really pi55es me off! I have to compromise because of someone else.
As it stands the W1 will just go around a 6 foot curve but there is a higher than acceptable risk of the rear end derailing. This leaves two choices:
Set the radius higher, not going to be popular with punters.
Widen the rear end frames (with correspondingly very narrow cab steps, which is what DJH did and it looks a pigs arse) and reduce the width of the centre drag beam. No one will notice the centre drag beam reduction but everyone will notice the frame width when the tender is coupled up, there will be a big offset between the two sets of steps and frames....not popular with punters.
As it stands, 6 foot is not a reliable commercial figure I'd commit to right now.
I need to get the injectors on and then run some detailed examinations to get accurate figures for minimum radius and then make a decision on where we go from there. I have my own personal views which probably should not be aired publicly