Mossys 3D Models

Rob

I did a test print 2 days ago it looks pretty it's just the underside that needs a total rebuild, all the classic hallmarks of a beginner messing about.

 

I have this to finish off, No 2 son is back in Manchester it's at the point of 90% done, 50% to do. Piccie is of Saturday evening, got rained off Sunday afternoon, decking done but lots to finish off. A classic case of my daughters "dad could you just", fortunately no 2 Son did most of the work I was just a labourer but ache where aches shouldn't exist.

 

Brian that's all wood decking which needs oiling when we have a better forecast before which there are probably 2-3 hours of finishing off. Todays forecast was poor so I decided I was having the day off, chilling and listening to TMS, of course it's been sunny all day. It's size was determined by my daughter, of course when she saw it her first comment was "ooh I didn't think it would be that big". $%^%$£*(^

 

My Son's suggestion on the possibility of reducing the size were significantly best agricultural Anglo-Saxon followed by a shame faced apology.

 

Still precious little (NO) time for assembling wagons, the P3 and P4 are sat in salvaged curry trays awaiting. I have decided since I now have P1, P3, p4 and P6 models sorted, P5 can easily be sorted from the R3 Coke which uses the P5 body, I decided to go for a full set P1 to P7 (ok the P7 crosses the millennium line but only by 2 years so is still Victorian-ish). Looking at the photos from my Beamish trip and relistening to an NERA presentation on wagons I decided to go for an early Central Division P7 wagon, conventional 4 shoe brakes with a central brake V but operated by end brakes. Single inside W Irons which proved to be to weak so rapidly braced by extra outside W irons, I haven't decided on 2 or 4 W Irons yet. Early morning drawing sessions have got me this far:







I'm glad Rob showed me the pattern on a path function in Fusion as there are nearly 280 nuts and bolts on a half wagon (side, end, headstocks and solebar), rain stopped play but now going back to that decking, grrrrrr.

 

Win some lose some.

Wednesday, granny day care and they are having a day out with a friend of the wife - building time, sort of. I got so engrossed in build the end brake gear of the P7 it was lunch time before I knew it, so only a short build day. I planned building the P3 and P$ in parallel, learning from one and applying it to the other. The P3 hopper doors were fitted using .7mm wire, which was an epic even after reaming out as many of the holes as possible, they worked but were very stiff so I switched over to .5mm wire for the P4, a much better result and after chewing the fat stripped the P3 down and fitted it with .5mm. Step 2 build the monkey hangers, these were always going to use .5mm wire but for a frustrating hour or more I couldn't get consistent results and decided I need to print a bending jig to aid the process so moved on to bending up and fitting the the handrails, not a taxing job but slow (I hate bending up accurate 90 degree bends). Job done axle box assemblies next so into the pre-printed stores box and guess what no type 1 assemblies. I had just set the print running when the team arrived back. With any brain cells I would have drawn and added a bending jig to the print but didn't. All play is stopped for the day, all I to look forward to now is an hour of ritual humiliation, ballroom dancing (got to keep swmbo on side) but at least some progress. The state of play is, a ready to test print a P7 possibly, and a P3 and P4 with the hopper doors and handrails done. At least more building than I have done for the last week or more.

 

More P7 bits

The end brake lever and it linkage to standard 4 shoe brake gear is also ready and looks like this:



The support 2/3rds on the way along the operating rod is serious small and malnourished (1mm wide, .4mm thick), it will be printed with the body but also as separate components an excersie in pushing 3d printing to it limits which can be abandoned if it doesn't work, while the 2 operating rods wont be printed they will be .7mm wire, and hopefully will link to the various components using these:



Again they are seriously tiny and may or may not work but you have to give they a go don't you, if they fail it will be just 90 degree bends in the wire. I'm now debating been modifying the R3 Coke to create a P5 hopper or starting work on the only other one in the series the P2 hopper.

 

Converting the R3 Coke to an early P5 Coal provide slightly more difficult than I thought mainly because I wanted to improve the hoppering which can now also be used with the R3.



So now I have the P3 and P4 to finish off building, both a P5 and P7 to print and a pretty much complete R3 Coke but should I reprint or not.

 

Paul

Your a naughty man, etch!!!! where the fun in that?

 

First build of the P3 and P4 hoppers, on reflection I give them 6/10. What wrong, well relatively minor bits but annoying.

The major flaw is that I used the geometry of the S2 hopper when setting out the hopper doors, latches, hinges and mountings, so they don't line up, which on both these wagons have been glued shut with the monkey tails glued in rather than pinned in so they can be swung open.

The second problem is the buffer mounting holes are 3mm wide and the actual base of the housing needs a clearance of 4 - 4.5mm to sit flush with the end which means a cut out in the side-end reinforcement plate (all know from previous drawing) - I forgot to do so. Both these problems can easily be fixed before and subsequent prints are run off.

The last problem, is quite simple the P4 brake gear doesn't fit, which it is missing from the photos - I still have to figure out completely why and the solution, I could bodge a solution if this wagon was going to be kept something which hasn't been decided yet. Fortunately I haven't printed the P5 yet a I suspect it will have some of these faults in it's design.

The monkey tails are made by fixing the head of a handrail stanchion on wire which is then set into a hole cut vertically into the latch and bent to shape. I buy the cheapest possible stanchions as most of it is waste. I also have a nice drawing of the NER mineral buffer mounting but don't know the diameters and cut depths to enable me to try fitting commercial sprung buffers into them. The final observation is that a normal 3 link coupling is very tight, since the P3 started life with 5 link coupling I may well have to add an extra link to it's couplings.

P3 8 Ton on the left P4 10 1/2 ton on the right.

 

You know the old sayings about Yorkshiremen "If tha dost owt fer nowt do it fer th sen" and "Short arms long pockets", well a tale of thrift. 3D printing reduces the cost of producing a 7mm wagon significantly but you still need to shell out the thick of £30 for wheels, couplings and buffers. Now I like sprung buffers but at roughly £10 or there abouts a bit steep and it's difficult to clean up variable quality white metal buffer housings.

So when I first started 3d printing one of the first things I drew were the NER short wagon and mineral buffers, housings etc, designed to work a la the big Jim Mc's method. These I have tested and work fine but given I also use a 3 point suspension system there's a problem with wagons under 14-15ft. I have to chop almost half the coupling hook bar off and redrill holes to make them work. I also have a few commercial sets of sprung buffers which get used as sparingly as possible and I am running out.

I also have a number of buffer rams where I have lost either or both of the spring and nut to the great carpet monster. A while ago Rob kindly sent me some springs and nuts and I decided to try modify my 3D buffer housing to fit them. Out came the el cheepo digital calliper and the inner rod measured 1.1mm dia the outer rod 1.8mm, the depth of the 1.8 cut was a guess. Go 1 used these measurements and nope a buffer ram didn't fit, up them to 1.3 and 2 and reprint, nope didn't fit but with a bit of reaming out with taper broaches I got them working, final punt, 1.7 and 2.2. These will have to wait to be tested as tomorrow is booked up. So calliper error or 3nD printer error, who knows.

In conclusion, if I could find a supply of buffer rams with spring and nut, I can reduced costs but also use much neater 3D printed buffer housings. Has anyone got any ideas of a supplier of such items? Rereading this half an hour later, a different approach would be to modify my buffer ram print to produce the shouldered rod and simply buy the springs, they can be fixed using my Big Jim end caps. I reckon I have enough bits to make 3 more sets of buffers.

Yep short arms long pockets long live god's County - Yorkshire!

Mossy

 

Rob,

Thanks for the suggestions, I tried Chris at Invertrains a while ago, he couldn't do them, Salters £10 jobs save nothing so I will try get in touch with Geoff at Haywoods and see what he comes up with. I have two working sets using the springs you sent me and a lot of work with the taper broaches, sadly one spring was eaten by the great carpet monster but poking about I have two more sets which I will try with the increased diameter housings when I mange to get them printed.

 

I have been trying to sketch the P2 hopper last of the P1 - P7 hoppers to be drawn and having resolved the what am I doing wrong question (see dabbling in Fusion #284-287) an early morning session has got the wagon this far, obviously a lot more to do including bucket full of nuts and bolts but that's for another morning.

 

The revised buffer housings with increased diameters now 2mm and 1,5 printed over night, this morning I have washed and cured them and the buffers fit perfectly. Even if i can't get steel buffers and fittings I have at least got vastly improved housings, though am still hoping someone can supply them, fingers crossed. The next step is to repeat with my NER short buffers, I have 3 sets with white metal which will get replaced, I may even draw up an NER wagon long housing although haven't any use for it just now.

Mossy