Craster

[Richard H]

Well saved, Richard

Ingenuity displayed yet again with the home-made jig. I’ve never seen it done before, but a great money-saving device.

I’ve been toying with purchasing the LRM Jinty for some time, despite building a GWR themed layout. Why?

Well, in the late BR period in the NW of England in which it’s set, there’d have been a real mixed bag of locos about, so that alone would have justified it’s presence. The ficts are there for all to see.

But I’m thinking further ahead, here.

Despite a couple of lukewarm attempts, I’ve yet to seriously broach the subject of P4 or even build my first kit. The problem I’ve found with say the GWR from this aspect is that while there’s a host of locos to choose from, the same can’t be said for coaching stock. With LRM, this part of the problem is solved (there’s also a wealth of motive power to model the railway in its earliest days), so all I need to do now is cut my teeth on that first kit and here I feel the humble Jinty is the ideal subject to introduce me to this ‘black-art’ side of the hobby. I hope.

With this mind, I now have another reason to enjoy your already enjoyable thread.

Best regards,

Jonte

(Apologies for the absence of the full-stops in respect of the abbreviations but I’m just being trendy ).

Thanks Jonte. The chassis support I made did prove useful, and I think it did the job but it doesn't have any way of clamping the axles in place once they are located by the LRM jigs. Using the aluminium strip seemed an easy way of get a reasonably straight and level support - I don't know that it would meet real engineering standards, though.

I think your Jinty idea sounds great - I haven't much experience of recent kits but the Class B seems fairly well thought out although there are still odd things that need a bit of fettling, but that seems fairly normal with all kits. The last loco I built (something over 30 years ago, I think) was in P4, but I've reverted to EM as a practical compromise for me at this stage. I haven't regretted doing this build (so far!) and I can't imagine that you wouldn't find enormous satisfaction in tackling the Jinty. I think I'd enjoy reading a thread called 'Jonte's Jinty'!

 

[PaulR]

I really like the way that you've worked out the fiction with such detail - it's completely convincing and has lots of potential for you. My 'back story' seems to be in a state of constant flux! The chassis looks very neat too.

Great stuff Richard!

 

[Richard H]

I really like the way that you've worked out the fiction with such detail - it's completely convincing and has lots of potential for you. My 'back story' seems to be in a state of constant flux! The chassis looks very neat too.

Great stuff Richard!

Thanks Paul - perhaps like a difficult jigsaw, your back story will only show the whole picture when all the pieces are finally in place - until then the parts you can see are likely to be misleading and you can only guess about how the different elements interlock. I quite enjoy the fun of thinking up the ficts, though ...they eventually form parts in a rather disconnected overall 'narrative' that can helps make the layout coherent and explains things that might appear on it. I suppose it's a peg to hang imagination on. It also helps to prevent me from taking the whole thing (and myself) too seriously.

 

[Richard H]

Interlude: A Cautionary Tale
This posting is not, after all, about the locomotive’s gearbox and drive. The gearbox went together like a dream and I will describe that and the drive later, but while working out the drive train and considering the way footplate fitted the chassis I realised that I had a problem.

In accord with the instructions I had fitted the valances and buffer beams to strengthen and protect the footplate during handling. This included a mild challenge, as the instructions state that the valances under the footplate should be 0.075mm from the outer edge of the footplate. That’s three-quarters of 1/10th of a millimetre, and I can’t work to that level of accuracy, so I decided to use a piece of thin manilla card as a spacer when fixing the valances. So far, so good.

I cunningly used a tight roll of paper to align the buffer back-plates on the buffer beams (note the footplate overhanging the buffer beam, though):



My mistake was in assembling the valances to length – I now realised that I had cut them too short, with the result that internal length between the buffer beams would not accommodate the chassis. It took me a little while to work out what had gone wrong, and I then decided that had no choice but to dismantle my footplate and re-assemble it properly – quite fiddly!

Before correcting the valances and buffer beams, though, I checked prototype photos – something I should have done more carefully before I soldered the footplate in the first place. This chastening re-learning experience reminded me that mere instructions are rarely sufficient in themselves and must be supplemented with additional primary evidence wherever possible.


The pictures above are cropped from photographs in the superb North Eastern Railway Association Image Archive, both showing the front right-hand corner of the footplate/buffer plate of engine No.855 at different times, one from the NER era and one from the LNER era. They show minimal overhang over the valances and what seems like none at all over the buffer beam. This can also be seen in numerous other photos of this class of engines, although some did have some degree of overhang.

Translating this into 4mm scale:



The underside of the footplate seen from underneath shows the minimal overhangs. The buffer beams are only set back from the end of the footplate by the thickness of the buffer backplate.



Detail of the front end (above) and rear end (below).



Because I had cut the valances too short, there is now a gap where the two parts of each valance overlap (I shall remedy this later, using an epoxy putty filler) and behind both weak joints I fitted a reinforcing strip made from waste around the etchings.

Onward and (hopefully) upward! Gearbox and driving axle next time, all being well.