davey4270
Western Thunderer
101. A Start on the Barry Railway F Class.
I’ve started this blog in the 100 series to differentiate from my CWM MAWR blog.
Early days for this one, I’m making a start while Dai the Paint’s “studio” is closed for the holiday as it’s being used for festive purposes. It’s a Redcraft “kit” and if you can persuade Derek to sell you one you’ll get a set of etches with some turned brass and cast white metal fittings. It’s left to you to source the likes of buffers, handrail knobs, wire, motor, wheels & gears, couplings etc. This is not so easy these dark days devoid of open shops and shows!
Anyway, to the build:
The bearing holes in the frames were wider than the spare bearings in hand but I remembered the frames from my Mercian Peckett 1147 needed quite a bit of reaming to allow the supplied bearings to fit and as I only used 2 had some spare. I checked these and they were a perfect fit! Strangely I could only find 2 of the 4 spare but must have used 2 of them for its gearbox bearings. I fitted bearings through the 2 frames to align them then used a couple of bolts through various holes in the frames to clamp them together. The etch marks on the frame edges were then filed flush giving an identical pair of frames. There were no marks for the Slater’s horn blocks so I estimated their position on the safe side and using a piercing saw cut them out. The frames have etched underhung sprung leaf springs and as the frames are rather shallow, I’ve left them in place for the time being for strength. I intend to cut them and solder to the axle keeps later.
The footplate has been similarly cleaned up along with the valances and buffer plank laminations. For some reason there are 4 valances supplied and the instructions suggest laminating them in pairs but I’ve never seen this with previous kits so will only use a single piece. The prototypes have the valance on the very outside of the footplate level with the edge of the buffer plank and early versions of the prototype have a straight valance without the downward curve to the bottom of the buffer plank. There is a mark on the etched valance to cut off if modelling the early version. The 2 buffer planks have been laminated together and cleaned up.
This model is going to be somewhat bigger than CWM MAWR and is about 1” longer than a Collett pannier.
If you’re wondering why I’ve chosen this somewhat ugly mother which looks like it’s been made up from spare parts, it’s ugliness is what’s attracted me.
I’ve started this blog in the 100 series to differentiate from my CWM MAWR blog.
Early days for this one, I’m making a start while Dai the Paint’s “studio” is closed for the holiday as it’s being used for festive purposes. It’s a Redcraft “kit” and if you can persuade Derek to sell you one you’ll get a set of etches with some turned brass and cast white metal fittings. It’s left to you to source the likes of buffers, handrail knobs, wire, motor, wheels & gears, couplings etc. This is not so easy these dark days devoid of open shops and shows!
Anyway, to the build:
The bearing holes in the frames were wider than the spare bearings in hand but I remembered the frames from my Mercian Peckett 1147 needed quite a bit of reaming to allow the supplied bearings to fit and as I only used 2 had some spare. I checked these and they were a perfect fit! Strangely I could only find 2 of the 4 spare but must have used 2 of them for its gearbox bearings. I fitted bearings through the 2 frames to align them then used a couple of bolts through various holes in the frames to clamp them together. The etch marks on the frame edges were then filed flush giving an identical pair of frames. There were no marks for the Slater’s horn blocks so I estimated their position on the safe side and using a piercing saw cut them out. The frames have etched underhung sprung leaf springs and as the frames are rather shallow, I’ve left them in place for the time being for strength. I intend to cut them and solder to the axle keeps later.
The footplate has been similarly cleaned up along with the valances and buffer plank laminations. For some reason there are 4 valances supplied and the instructions suggest laminating them in pairs but I’ve never seen this with previous kits so will only use a single piece. The prototypes have the valance on the very outside of the footplate level with the edge of the buffer plank and early versions of the prototype have a straight valance without the downward curve to the bottom of the buffer plank. There is a mark on the etched valance to cut off if modelling the early version. The 2 buffer planks have been laminated together and cleaned up.
This model is going to be somewhat bigger than CWM MAWR and is about 1” longer than a Collett pannier.
If you’re wondering why I’ve chosen this somewhat ugly mother which looks like it’s been made up from spare parts, it’s ugliness is what’s attracted me.
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