Jon Nazareth's G3 workbench

[Jon Nazareth]

The braking system is now complete and the brakes actually work even if the guard will bark his knuckles every time he turns the handle. I'm sure he'll sort out a way to stop the pain, as they say, practice makes perfect . I haven't cleaned up any of the fittings yet as I wanted to take these pictures before I stripped it all down for tidying and none of it will go back until the body has been painted. When fitting all of the several parts, I thought that some of it was a bit over scale but looking at these pictures, it doesn't look too bad after all well I think not but then, I would. The next item will be the hand rail that runs horizontally on both sides. It appears to be a series of very long U shapes joined to the fixing plates with, what looks like, a single bolt. I can see a lot of waste handrails coming out of this next step but, you never know, I might crack it first time.

Jon

 

[jamiepage]

Jon,
That really does look excellent.
Jamie

 

[john lewsey]

Very very nice indeed

 

[Jon Nazareth]

Thank you, Jamie and John.

Jon

 

[Jon Nazareth]

With reference to the handrail and the photo of the original Brake Van on page 10, does anyone have any idea of what diameter this should/could be? A 1/2" handrail scales at 0.022" which seems a bit small to me.

Jon

 

[jamiepage]

Jon,
My guess would be at least 3/4in.
Here's a cruel closeup showing a grab rail made using 1mm rod

 

[jamiepage]

I've been through various drawings and can see only minimum 3/4in diameter where quoted- with one exception.
A detail drawing for LNWR 6 wh. coaches quotes 5/8in dia for some horizontal grab rails, but 3/4in for other rails.

 

[Jon Nazareth]

Thanks, Jamie, I'll go for the 3/4" version.

Jon

 

[Jon Nazareth]

The last fiddly things to make for the brake van were a pair of pins and chains and here's a picture of one of them. This model is almost finished now apart from the roof and I'll need to go into the shed to sort that out. At the moment it's far too cold in there so, that job will have to wait for it to warm up a bit.
It's a little fuzzy but you can see one of the lamp brackets and this is where I would like to hang a lamp but I'm afraid that no body sells a good LBSCR or even a Southern one. Still, one may come along one day , ever hopeful.

Jon



P.S. The pictures always look better before I post them, mmmmm.

 

[Jon Nazareth]

That's better!

 

[Jon Nazareth]

I attempted to roll a roof for the brake van today without success. The first one, I scored and tried to roll by hand but that I found too difficult. Then I remembered that I bought a set of geared rollers (yes, I did forget that they were there ) and tried those, three times, all to no avail. What was happening was that the 1mm thick aluminium was bending along it's length of 274mm as well as curving where it was supposed to. Can anyone tell me where I'm going wrong? It's bowing at about 3mm along it's 274mm length. I've tried to adjust it by hand but that just puts a kink in the metal . I'm fast running out of sheet ali but still have enough for two more goes.

Jon

 

[geoff_nicholls]

Is it because the rollers are bending? How about trying a thin piece of card outside the middle of the roof? That may counter the slackness of the rollers in the centre.

 

[Jon Nazareth]

Geoff
The rollers are just over 1 1/4" so, don't think that there is any deflection. Thanks for the answer all the same.

Jon

 

[geoff_nicholls]

I suggested it because I get the same problem, but my rolling bars are of a much smaller diameter. Might be worth a try, though, with that piece in the photo, perhaps with a thin sheet of brass outside it instead of card.

 

[simond]

I’m trying to work out why it should have done that. It seems unlikely that a 1.25” bar is going to flex much with 1mm ally.

Are your rolling bars pinch or pyramid? If pinch, did you pinch a bit too tight?

I’m not going to be too optimistic, but try putting it back through, the other way, in the hope that the set on the wrong axis will be cancelled, as the curve in the right axis is reformed in the opposite direction. Maybe putting a card or brass layer through might help. I’d guess it’s worth a try as the ones you’ve made aren’t much use anyway.

Certainly interested to understand what happened.
Best
Simon

 

[Jon Nazareth]

Here are the rollers in question and in the very basic leaflet that came with them, they are called pinch rolls. In the left hand picture there is a much smaller bar that the two black arms are attached to, these are to help line up the sheet. Thinking that this bar could have had something to do with the problem, it was catching the sheet, I removed it completely for the test. I then stuck on some masking tape as one line in the centre of the sheet to a thickness of .015" and tried again. The lengthwise curve appeared again and the thickness of the tape kinked the edge of the sheet both entrance and exit edges. I tried another sheet with out the tape but the lengthwise curve was reproduced as on all of the previous sheets. The 'instructions' are in translated Chinese consequently, these don't make much sense. There is an exploded diagram which shows the smooth roller at the rear but the picture shows it as above. In the background of the second picture is what looks like a longish cylinder. It is in fact half that length as it sits on a piece of clean ali and it's the reflection that makes it look longer. This was a strip that I experimented with to see how it would roll up and it did that okay so, I'll be okay for G3 smokeboxes but not carriage/van roofs. . I'm going to drop a line to Stakesy's to see what they have to say.

Jon

 

[Overseer]

Have you tried rolling steel or brass? If they also curve (in the wrong direction) it must be a problem with the rollers but if not the problem is with the aluminium sheet. Not sure what alloy you have but softer aluminium may also work.

 

[Mike W]

Having got the basic curve, can you tweak it back straight gently by hand?

 

[Jon Nazareth]

Overseer
I'll have a look to see if I have any brass or steel and come back to you.

Mike
I tried tweaking but I found it difficult with the roof ending up with a very badly misshapen roof!
I've now sent an email to the suppliers, I'll let you know what they say when/if I get an answer.

Jon

 

[Jon Nazareth]

For the record, I tried a piece of hard aluminium, (aircraft grade?) and a piece of .026" copper and both reacted in the same way as the sheet in the above picture.

Jon