Paul_L's Connoisseur 4F build

10 months ago I said I would post up picks of the footplate mods to gain a bit of extra clearance.

The two sides were opened up inside firebox by a couplr of mm. you can see the rough cut at the top.

Bit more work done on the front end

Side frame extensions. front cover plate with handles and the chest cover.

Not sure if any more progress will be made for the next couple of days tho'.

Paul

 

Toto,

I seem to remember your 4F was further advanced than mine, however next time your up bring it along and we'll form a plan of action. I know the tender is good to go, and you will need a new driving wheel axle, but it should be easily fixable, just may be dependant on the amount of elbow grease and cleaner involved.

Paul

 

Now, over the last week or so I have been playing with my new bested friend - my LRM Resistance soldering iron.
I've had this for some time, but never got brave enough to use it on something other than test brass, which was always on the thick side, so never really showed its true potential.

But boy am I impressed ........

I use it in two ways, first grounded on a steel plate which is great for laminating parts together.

Then secondly attached to the loco body - and this has been a game changer for me.

Using the chassis retaining screw, I cut a scrap of brass with a hole in it to act as a clamp.

My first victim was the boiler band adjacent to the fire box. As per normal I tinned the rear of the band with 145 solder using the normal iron. Then tagged one end to the under side of the boiler, which was fairly easy as the probe is used to hold the end in position before, during and after soldering. Ensuring the band was in the correct position, and maintaining tension on the band further tags were added. Once the final end was tagged, the tip was run over the length of the band to complete the soldering. The result required almost zero clean up. Previous boiler bands were troublesome, and required a lot of cleanup afterwards, not difficult but time consuming.

Same for the lamp irons, on the tender I almost gave up on them using a standard iron.

These were a doddle - bent and tinned with the standard iron.

The located in position with the probe, hit the pedal as soon as you hear the sizzle, release the pedal - simples. The two pics above are without any cleanup.

Final tasks were the steps and handrail for the front steps (which are actually in the center of the loco).

Well according to the instructions that brass and nickel silver work completed. Time to start working on the detail parts.

Paul

 

Wow this boys bravery is moving to another level

White metal soldering, and whitemetal to brass / nickel silver and plated copper wire.

Now the instructions say to use 70C whitemetal solder, I have some but not a great lover of it, so .....

I used some 100C solder to secure the ventilater to the cab roof, then removed the pip and cleaned the whole lot up. (forgot the piccies )

Again I used 100C to secure the cab roof to the cab front and sides.

Now to hide / fill the joint soft wire (plated copper wire) is soldered into place, with plenty of extra solder to fill the gaps, this time I did use the 70C solder.

Trimmed to length

And cleaned up with fibre brushes and scalpels

Starting to take shape.

Paul

 

I'd always fancied an RSU for over 30 years, but could never justify it. But with pending redundancy / early retirement with permission from SWMBO, I clubbed all my christmas money together to get it in preparation for all this free time I'm supposed to have . Uptil now I hadn't really used it seriously

Now a wee competition - nae prizes - lived in Scotland too long and passed through Yorkshire getting here



Above (as stated at the start of this thread) is my victim.

Now, I have two domes and chimneys's to pick from

The original Midland Pattern

Photograph has the Chimney backwards so that the capuchin is less noticable.

And later Stanier types

Which ones look nearest to the prototype ?

I will need to drill the firebox to later mud plugs and clamps.

This starting to get serious

Paul

 

Cheers Rob

That was my guess, especially with the later mud plugs and clamps. I placed the Midland Chimney with the Capuchon towards the rear as the prototype photo didn't look like it had a Capuchon.

Time to start polishing up the Stanier whitemetal castings.

Gives me time to fit the handrails - or in this case really should be called hand pipes..

Paul

 

Well it does have a rear cab on the tender so you never know, or maybe the Caley and Highland engineers thought the 4F was a backwards move from thier preferred loco types

Paul

 

A bit more progress

Started on the handrails as they were next in the instructions - Hey Toto, seemingly you're supposed to follow the instructions in numerical order, now that's a novell approach

Jim of Connissuer, is a proponent of copper split cotter pins. I've not really used them in O gauge before - in 4mm they always seemed oversize hence my prefference for handrail knobs. However these have tuned of quite nice, and for my future reference certainly cheaper in price than hand rail knobs.

Firebox and Smokebox holes were drilled 0.8mm clearance for the split pins.

The handrails are made from brass tube and 0.7mm wire. The split pins are too small for the tube, and too large for the 0.7mm wire.
On the wire the split pin is placed on the wire then nipped tighter with a pair of pliers.
For the tube, the split pins were enlarged by inserting one leg of the taper nosed pliers. Once large enough to thread on to the tube, they were nipped to size as per the wire.

The right hand side is the simpler, the tube was cut to length, then a length of 0.7mm wire was soldered into each en of the tube.
Split pins added then the fun part of getting them all into the holes. A secured with solder - then the enevitable clean up.

The left hand side has an injector casting as part of the assembly, but essentially the same process, but this time 100C and 70C solders were used to secure the castings.
100C solder to tin the brass / nickel-silver, 70C solder to attach the whitemetal castings.

While doing this a couple of time I managed to bend the steps, each time at the middle step on the half etch portion. Now this was probably my general clumsy nature, but this had potential disaster written all over it, so I decided to brace the rear with a piece nickel silver from the etch sprues.

I dont bend now ......

Paul