Crook Street Works - Gladiator LNW Class C

[Allan]

Hi All,

Although Gladiator distribute this kit it has it's origins in the good old Modeller's World range dating from the early days of etched kits. I must have made all of their kits over the years although never bought from them - I was modelling 4mm when they were around.

Anyway, I started with the tender as usual. Nothing much to report here, it's the same as all the other Webb tenders I've built except to add lamp socket holes in the buffer beam, operating self-contained front buffers and my toy-like but operator friendly coupling post at the front:







I then moved on to the engine, starting with the coupling rods as they set the dimensions for the running chassis:





I then soldered up the frames, fitting Slaters hornblocks - no getting away with quick and dirty wire-sprung top hat bearings on this one as the insides of the frames are very visible on this small boilered engine. The front rods are rivetted to the second making a two rod unit - a legacy on the prototype of it's origin as a 3 cylinder compound, the cotter pinned front bearing being made to clear the outside cylinders:





It ran sort of ok, I wasn't really happy with it's very slow running and I didn't want to open up the bearing holes even more, so I'll leave it until the DCC chip is fitted and see if that smooths things out. A bit of a puzzle as I took my usual due care and attention to dimensions, squareness and alignments, which usually works but not on this occasion. Let's see how it pans out:





So I moved on to the footplate - there's still a lot of detail to add to the chassis but I like to get the main sub-assemblies built to ensure it all fits together and there's no dimensional anomalies.

I'll continue on another post to keep within the photo limit...

Cheers
Allan

 

[Allan]

Hi All,

To continue...

So the first anomaly to correct was to lugs on the chassis that foul the footplate valances. Not exactly sure what they're for - to mount rear sandboxes perhaps...?





So they were unceremonously chopped off and my favoured angle soldered to the drag beam to locate the rear of the body so it only needs one screw at the front and doesn't need a second one to be somehow disguised (I've never worked out how) in the cab:





There's no intermediate boiler formers in the kit so I made some up and the boiler was suitably tamed, this picture is before I smoothed off my chicken s**t soldering...:





...and it and the cab drilled so I can affix it after painting and lining:





so with a bit of fettling, it fitted nicely. The cut outs in the smokebox are to clear the handrail knobs and will be hidden by the riveted wrapper:





The front sandboxes are a symphony in origami and fold up as a single unit:





Unfortunately, they don't fit...!





So, with a lot of soldering, filing and cursing, I made a passable - not perfect - extension to them:





That's as far as I've got so far, as it's summer, its a fairly slow build so I'll post the next update when progress is substantial enough.


Cheers
Allan

 

[john lewsey]

I'm liking this, I have been thinking about one of these for sometime. It looks like a C already. We both seem to have a thing for 0_8_0 s Allan .
John

 

[adrian]

Anyway, I started with the tender as usual. Nothing much to report here, it's the same as all the other Webb tenders I've built except to add lamp socket holes in the buffer beam, operating self-contained front buffers and my toy-like but operator friendly coupling post at the front:

Interesting - it seems a little bit of a Curate's Egg to me. Some of the castings seem a little ropey and need quite a bit of fettling to tidy up. It would be nice to find a well designed Webb tender based on the latest methods for high end kits.

So, with a lot of soldering, filing and cursing, I made a passable - not perfect - extension to them:

10 out of 10 for perseverance, I think with that fit I'd have given up, figuring out scratch building a replacement unit would have been easier.

 

[Brian McKenzie]

I then soldered up the frames, fitting Slaters hornblocks . . . .

It ran sort of ok, I wasn't really happy with it's very slow running and I didn't want to open up the bearing holes even more,

Allan, I'm wondering if the springs used on the axles, to push the axleboxes and hornblocks outward, are too strong?

The hornblocks, being cast (although superbly from injection mouldings), don't have quite the precision a machined component might have. Any minor variation in wall thickness, flatness and alignment within the casting can transfer to the axlebox - potentially affecting the squareness of the box to the axle.

I've more recently learnt to let the axlebox guide the hornblock gently without spring pressure, and allow the solder to fill any uneveness between the back face of hornblock and frame plate. This kept the axles spinning freely.

-Brian McK.

 

[john lewsey]

Interesting - it seems a little bit of a Curate's Egg to me. Some of the castings seem a little ropey and need quite a bit of fettling to tidy up. It would be nice to find a well designed Webb tender based on the latest methods for high end kits.

10 out of 10 for perseverance, I think with that fit I'd have given up, figuring out scratch building a replacement unit would have been easier.

Like this possibly

 

[adrian]

Like this possibly

Which kit is that then?