On the basis that you can't have too many parcels/newspaper vans and the fact I picked one of these kits up S/H for a very good price, here we go with a JLTRT GUV.
I'll start with the bogies. Included with the kit are a pair of cast whitemetal BR1s .
After a bit of fettling to remove flash and to get the axleboxes to fit in the guides, these are the components
I'm not normally keen on adding the extra level of complexity that is working suspension but it looked like this was provided for so I decided to give it a go. The axleboxes have a little indentation in the top surface as a guide to drilling out a hole for a coil spring and a little pin under the leaf spring to locate it.
Once the castings are fettled, which includes drilling out any holes that need clearing and all parts are checked for fit, assembly takes little more than a few minutes. I used 145 degree solder and a rather weedy 12watt soldering iron!
A quick trial fit of the wheels/axleboxes without springs
I used Slaters buffer springs. To maintain constant springing all round I drilled right through into the axle bush holes, clearled the swarf out, fitted the bushes then rested the springs on the bushes.
Seems to sit OK leaving about 1.5mm of travel. This will probably disappear once the body is on so may need tweaking.
The keeps are cast a bit out of register and a re just pushed on for now. Once painting is finished they'll have a length of N/S wire soldered between them and be superglued on.
Heres the pair of bogie frames painted with Halfords black primer then Matt black.
More soon (honest!)
Jon F.