7mm Dikitriki's Dark side: A WD 2-8-0

[Dikitriki]

Hi

Time for a laugh (2).

I now have a kit for the loco body



I only lost 4 pieces - the whitemetal sandbox shields/filler covers, but those may be better scratchbuilt from brass anyway. I managed to get the smokebox front/door off, but I may scratchbuild a new front from brass and retain the door. The front is a bit thick in whitemetal. The circular boiler ends I have already put in the lathe to true up and I hope to build the boiler this afternoon.

The one downside in disassembling this was the flux that had originally been used. It must have been a paste of some sort because it left vast amounts of sticky brown goo everywhere. Horrible stuff.

Onwards and upwards.

Richard

 

[Ressaldar]

best wishes for a safe journey through that little lot Richard, the swear box would be getting healthier if it was me at the controls of the soldering iron and more likely, the Birmingham screwdriver

cheers

Mike

 

[lancer1027]

Good luck Richard although im sure it wont be a problem for a man with your skills..

Hope to see a re-built kit soon

Rob

 

[dibateg]

The fun to be had with a blowlamp on a rainy Sunday afternoon!

 

[7mmMick]

Looking forward to seeing this one come back together Richard. The cab looks the most worrying, I'm not sure if its just shadow but it just doesn't look true ?

ATB Mick

 

[Dikitriki]

Hi

Mick: you're right. The cab was not well formed at all. Wrap over cabs are not easy at the best of times. I've started cleaning up the cab and spectacle plate, but I may be gone quite a while

I have however made the boiler, which is about as easy as it gets being parallel. I cut a rectangle of 15 thou n/s to shape - the same length as the original, and pi x d for the width, rolled it, seamed it and plugged the formers in. I have also rebuilt the firebox - front and back formers attached to a u shaped etch to form a cage, and the wrapper formed to shape. I backed all the various wrongly placed holes to make filling easier, and reinforced the front corners with 1.25mm copper wire so I could shape the shoulders. After checking very carefully that all was square, the boiler and firebox were soldered together.







Cheers

Richard

 

[alcazar]

It already looks ten times better.

 

[Len Cattley]

Looking good Richard, can't wait to see the rest put together. Will you be using the original valve gear or will you be making your own?

Len

 

[7mmMick]

Looking good Richard, great foundations there, the making of a lovely model

Mick

 

[alcazar]

Looking good Richard, can't wait to see the rest put together. Will you be using the original valve gear or will you be making your own?

Len

Or using milled bits and cast bits from other suppliers?

 

[Bob]

Superb workmanship Richard. Looking forward to seeing how it turns out.

 

[Dikitriki]

Looking good Richard, can't wait to see the rest put together. Will you be using the original valve gear or will you be making your own?

Hi Len

I haven't yet looked (literally) at the etched valve gear. I'm expecting to use that provided in the kit where if can, but if I can better it by using cast components from other sources, then I shall. I don't have any problems using the etched components, except where they don't look anything like the real thing. The combination lever always seems to be a weak point in kits, as does the expansion link (woeful in the Gladiator kit), but the pictures I've seen of the completed kit look very good.

Or using milled bits and cast bits from other suppliers?

Hmmm, I may be getting a bit of a reputation here

I managed to batter the cab into submission last night - a very long night - so pics later!

Richard

 

[Simon Dunkley]

The one downside in disassembling this was the flux that had originally been used. It must have been a paste of some sort because it left vast amounts of sticky brown goo everywhere. Horrible stuff.

How did you remove it? Hard labour/elbow grease, or something chemical?

 

[Dikitriki]

How did you remove it? Hard labour/elbow grease, or something chemical?

Hi Simon

I tried Cif and Barkeeper's Friend under hot water, but while they shifted some, it wasn't entirely succesful. In the end, wet and dry, fibreglass brushes and elbow grease did the trick, But my hands were filthy after every modelling session.

I've processed the photos from this morning.

The cab is square, but I had a battle getting the fold lines at the cab roof/sidesheet joins in the right place (more or less) as the positions were conflicting with the previous folds. Much manipulating with long smooth nose pliers and work to remove the witness marks.







I've still got some work to clean up the cab cut outs before reinstating the beading. There's also a tiny gap between the spectacle plate and the roof which I shall back with 0.3mm brass wire, and then solder fill.

Cheers

Richard

 

[Steve Cook]

Nice to see a restoration job Richard, the results certainly look like its worth the effort, even at this early stage.
Hope you don't mind, but I think I'll just sit here and watch quietly in admiration
Steve

 

[lancer1027]

Nice to see a restoration job Richard, the results certainly look like its worth the effort, even at this early stage.
Hope you don't mind, but I think I'll just sit here and watch quietly in admiration
Steve

+1

 

[AdamF]

Great work - it's really informative to watch a restoration progress

 

[Dikitriki]

Hi

Yesterday evening's work was centred on fitting the smokebox. It needed a lot of cleaning up - flash betweeen the many rivets mainly - and then again making sure it was square.

The difficulty I have with this build is that it's being done top down, instead of bottom up. Normally, I would have a footplate and valance unit built, and then the smokebox/boiler/firebox would be built on that. Easy. I can't do this with this build as the footplate is in too many pieces and the valance on its own is flimsy - the original kit had a cradle on which to build. So I have to be certain that all the components are exactly and correctly oriented as there is no obvious datum. I can't even put the boiler on plate glass as the bottom of the boiler is below footplate height. So. lots and lots of checking with steel rules and Mk 1 eyeballs. Fortunately, the original builder had incorporated a threaded rod through the smokebox to the firebox, so I could tighten the smokebox in position and spend a long time checking without it moving position.

Eventually, I was confident enough to solder it in position - C&Ls 100 degree solder and a blow torch to make sure the solder was pulled in to the smokebox ring.



Time to fill the holes now!

Looking further ahead, I started to clean up the main footplate halves, and left one as I had blowtorched it apart so you can see before and after.





I just have to rivet round the splashers and the first side is good to go.

Cheers

Richard

 

[Dikitriki]

Hi

One thing I was puzzling over was how to get the footplate in the right place, such that the splashers aligned with the wheels. I came to the conclusion that I had better start the chassis in the hope that there were mounting points such that I could work from the cab forwards. So the body was put away, and the chassis commenced.

I have been wanting to try split axle pick up on an engine for some time now, but I don't want to (= can't be bothered to) spring all the wheels using Slater's insulated componenets. I normally make the leading and trailing axles fixed, and spring the other axle (s). So I had to work out a way to insulate the fixed axles, and this is what I came up with....



Bottom left is a tufnol bush turned on the lathe. The bore is such that a normal brass bearing fits through. The idea is to open out the chassis bearing to take the tufnol bush, inserted from the outside, and to then insert the brass bush from the inside. Once the tufnol bush is glued in place, the brass scrap at the top of the picture is placed over the bush which is then filed back flush with the face of the plate, thus guaranteeing a flat surface to glue the brass bush to, and an insulating space of the thickness of the brass plate.

But first I had to make the coupling rods. One of the extras in the package I had was some articulated Premier rods. Very nice. They come with steel rivets....which I hate. So I turned the gradient pins from nickel silver (bottom right above) placed a washer over the back, and soldered pin and washer to the rear of the coupling rod.



The front face is the top, the rear face the bottom.

I set up the Hobby Holidays jig, only to find that the kit's wheelbase is 1mm longer than the rods. OK, kit centres filed to suit keeping the centre wheel in the same position. The front and rear bearings were glued in as described using Loctite 480, and the centre bearings prepared using the Slater's insulated hornguides.



This is the outside face of the mainframes, and the face of the brass bearings will be filed back when I know how much sideplay I need.



And this is the inside of the mainframes. I have soldered wire tags to all the brass bearings for the pick up wire.

All in all, it went pretty much according to plan, though you do need access to a lathe and a chassis jig, especially as you're using a pretty quick setting superglue.

Cheers

Richard

 

[3 LINK]

Hi Richard,

Enjoying the build as usual, just one question regarding as to how you will form the rivets around the splashers. Will you be using scale hardware rivets ? As the half etch indents look to close to the edge and may cause distortion if using a riveting press.

Regards,

Martyn ( still without mojo ).