ACME Bullied light Pacific kit

Yes something along those lines. To be honest it's not as far on as it looks. Boiler barrell is formed but just resting on the loco. Currently trying to plan how to put the smokebox saddle together.

 

Thank you. This one is certainly a challenge. As much as i like assembling the better quality kits these bargain basement scratch aids are very satisfying if you can bash them into something resembling the prototype. i've build a few locos with resin/plastic or cast parts and always feel the finished article is more a Testement to the designers skill than of my own. My bargain basement kits sometimes arnt 100% with slight mishappen bits but they are my ugly ducklings.

 

Small amount of progress to report. I have the smokebox formed around the whitemetal. The two parts of the boiler are soldered together but not yet attached to the smokebox or firebox. Other than that i've just done a bit of tweaking on the tender chassis as it was nodding slightly. its nice and square now.
Next will be fitting the washout plugs to the inside of the firebox and boiler followed by the fitting of the ashpans.

 

Small Amount of progress to report. The boiler came pre rolled so wasn't too difficult to form. i used jubilee clips to keep it round while i soldered the seam across the bottom. There are severel detail inserts soldered behind for clack valve entries to the boiler and washout plugs. I feel these give the boiler a more 3d feel.

Here are the ashpans attached to the underside of the firebox. There appears to be no mud hole cover for the lower firebox. This means that you can see right inside. unless there's a casting i've missed i will have to make something myself.

 

Some more progress with the cylinder wrappers going on. No problems to report. I have also tracked the boiler in place. The smokebox is not yet fixed and the casting are just balancing to see how they fit. The boiler to firebox joint is pretty terrible. I have used small tab of waste etch to join the two parts together. The gaps will need filling with a combination of castings, more waste etch and filler

 

Little and often seems to be the way to keep progress and interest going. I know have the motion brackets on. I must clean those wheels.


The loco is to be powered by a premier components 2 stage 30/1 helical gearbox. I ordered it one day and it arrived the following afternoon. I can't ask for better than that. the motor is a canon.

 

I haven't got much modelling done lately, but I have just received some coupling rods from premier. As they are solid and drilled for slaters crankpins they are much quicker to use than the kit ones. There's nothing particularly wrong with the kit coupling rods. The premier ones negate the need to laminate etchings and ream out the crankpin holes.

 

Sometimes, when trying to improve things we create other problems and this is no exeption. The premier rods have a slightly different wheelbase than the kit and the etched rods included in it. rear wheel needs moving forward about 2mm. I did this by plating the old holes over and re-drilling. It has cured the problem of the rear wheels hitting the front of the firebox.




all sorted

 

I believe that the merchant navy was one of Jim's latter kits and he rectified some.of.the mistakes made in his light pacific. It certainly has a better reputation than the kit I'm making

 

I have not heard about it on the Merchant navy but the West country I am building certainly sufferers from cab droop. The front is too low. I solved it by soldering a double thickness piece of waste etch to the underside of the roof. once soldered and cleaned up the join is invisible. The most difficult part is forming the firebox as there are no formers on the older kits

 

on the west country kit (assuming the merchant navy cab is designed the same on the kit), the cab sides continue up and over into the roof. the centre section where the ventilator locates is a separate piece and the window frames are whitemetal castings. The cab itself is easier than it first apears to construct but the window frames are difficult to fit. the centre section of the roof might benefit from being cast rather than etched to get the curve correct

 

I've done very little modelling recently. I'm now no longer working from home and the shock of having to commute every day makes.me have little appetite to get much done. I did manage to find an hour this morning and have fitted the coupling rods. I've never been keen on the 12ba nuts and bolts slaters use for crankpins so I've upgraded to 10ba bolts and tapped the bushes to screw on. All very easy to do. I tapped the wheels 10ba and counter sunk the back to recess the screws. I then tapped the bushes using a tapered 10ba tap. They dont need drilling out which is handy. It's the first time I've done this and it has resulted in a very smooth if slightly tight chassis with no binding at all. Its probably the smoothest running chassis I've made straight away. I'll certainly be doing this again in the future

 

I bought this handy cordless tool from Ebay. seems reasonably well made. Certainly better than the old Maplin one I had which cost twice as much.



Im not sure how visible these springs will be but they add some weight to the chassis.



This kit needs a lot of filling. The gaps where too large to use low melt solder so Ive gone for Extra fine milliput. The above tool has been usefull for shaping it. Still some work to do to neaten it up



Castings now on the tender underframe