The addition of the 1/2 etch lines in the cantrail will help get a better curviture and the cab interior bulkheads can be used to assist the fold. The top of the cabs need to be pulled in gentley but that's actually quite easy with carefull use of long nose pliers.
I'll bring them down when I come down for the show Paul. Hopefully Dundee will remember the former. The white metal should follow reasonably soon after that once I've had my visit to Grahams two weeks later. Toto
Dundee has just got to add something onto to the former... some sort of clamp I gather, I was a bit tired to take it all in last night but basically the plan sounds good. I'll get the bench cleared of equipment and leave the big mag lamp so there is plenty of room and light to work.
Been busy the last few days - feels longer, modifying the bulkheads, to include the handrail recesses. York Paul found the construction of these three parts troublesome trying to keep them all aligned. Hand here is the result This is where the bulkheads fit The original design was flat and prone to warping - something to be wary of with resin printing as the finished print are soft until fully cured. To counter this I also added additional supports to the rear, this and adding the pockets at the side stiffened the whole printed part. Perfect fit anyone would think I measured up the parts Paul
That's nicely simplified the bulkhead and rear handrail pocket assembly and overcome the warping issue at the same time
York paul advised doing the chassis frames before fitting the body ..... so here we go There is a upper and lower side the the chassis, the lowerside has the half etch around the edge. Lower side Upperside - no half etch around the edge First to be fitted is the buffer beam, these were cut off the frets and cleaned up. The chassis was also pinned down to a flat stell sheet with magnets. The buffer beam was gently bent to shape Then tag soldered in the center Then the two ends, finally ran the seam between the dots Repeat for the other end. Next up the bogie bearing plates Again with the chassis held flat additional magnets were used to help hold the side frames in place Then each end was tagged in place And again a fillet ran along the length, the second side was added This was repeated for the other end. These provide vertical surfaces to help retain the side frames These were gently tagged in place - holding a soldering iron too long in one place would cause the side frame to expand and bow. I found the best way after tagging the side frames in place, was to run the soldering iron tip along the chassis main frame, with the edge of the tip touching the side frame. Next up was to fit the bogie bolster tops. There are two locating tabs in the middle, that the top fits over. The top has half etch lines and slight bends were made to the plate. I first soldered the centers, then held the ends in place on the side frames and solderd them. The completed the solder along both sides. Much filing later And there's more .........
Next the cross beams for holding the Water and fuel tanks were soldered in place, following the diagram in the instructions View attachment 13032 The note is for the Class 27 which has an additional lower height cross beam - not required on the Class 26 (the confussing bit for me was I had the wrap as part of the standeard etches, but no reduced height beam, remember I have the Class 26 and this is the proto type build. Next the support plates were added to the buffer beams, I didn't add the cross beam here as Yorkie found it restricted the bogie movement. After all this. it is still flaf,and all the holes line up with the skeleton and the body Time for a well deserved brew Paul
Great work and great progress there Dundee, we seem to have made the same conclusions on this part of the build. I do think those bodyshell curves need annealing to get on nice flowing curvature otherwise that will throw you out on the rest of the build, cabs in particular.
Good work guys - quick reminder of the 24/25 development side - few questions raised over the weekend and a couple of suggestions? Feedback on respective thread please ta!
These horrendous big long solder joins on the long thin brass etches are a nightmare. They are a common theme on a few loco kits and could be changed to a fold up section with half etch. They are on the 15, 16 and 17 as well. Possibly some of the others too. I want to design these out going forward. It will maybe mean reorganizing etches but would certainly make the build easier and possibly aid in giving a neater overall result. ........ take that as a hint of what's to come Steve ...... there are maybe other parts that can be joined together and lend themselves to folding as opposed to soldering. If it means less efficiency with the number of etched sheets ..... So be it. lets investigate the possibilities.
Hi Steve, I'll get a look tomorrow. Thanks for the reminder. Could you summarise the points that you have attended to to date as you have been beavering away there. Cheers Toto
I'll have a look at those as the designs move on. Nothing's impossible. I'd like to get at least the Class 24/25 Bogie finished this week and into the etchers with ideally the Class 24 as well?
Myself and the Paul's will be together on Friday night and can maybe use that time to ok these for sending out to the etchers by the weekend. Would I be correct in saying that the 15, 16 and 17 use the same bogie arrangement ?
The 15 and 17 Share the Type 1 Bogie - the Class 16 is different being a development of the 10800 one.
I'll keep that in mind Andy. I'm just looking ahead a little but when these kits come into play, we'll maybe give you a shout.
I have been busy working on the pick-ups, I did think of plunger pick-ups but was a bit wary of drilling holes in the chassis frames, especially as I had built up the inner bogies as part of Toto's test build. So I decided to go for wiper pick-ups, and came up with the following design The larger hole is a passthrough for the securing screw to join the inner and outer bogie assemblies - that part will follow - Yorkie is way ahead of me. The channel is for a piece of OO gauge copper clad sleeper, which is super glued in place, then drilled through via the holes in the mount for the pick wires to passthrough , and finally Phospour Bronze strip is soldered to the copperclad and bent up behind the wheels the wings acting as insulators. The print came out a little dodgy, I used the black resin, which may need a bit of playing with cure times, but good enough to test. Then with the copperclad fitted and a test fit Now where did I put my phosphour bronze strip. Paul