So, let's try this again shall we?
In light of realising I needed larger wheels on the Jones 8T van, I decided to revisit the brake gear. There's items available on the market for the later style 'long lever acting on a single shoe' set up but I have yet to find anything that represents the earlier Jones style of brake rigging.
In my previous attempt I had spliced together a Highland shoe and a North British push rod - The reason being I had erroneously used a photo of a model for a reference and this model had a guide just behind the shoe, which I took to be integral and so tried to represent. The finished item was, as you'll see, a bit big and so the brake lever was then too short. It didn't look right, but I left it until I could figure out a better solution.
Having looked at drawings of this van and the Jones sheep vans, I realised my mistake and so decided to attempt another cut and shut job using the same donor parts:
On the left are the parts used, in the middle is the "original" part removed from the van and on the right is a cut down (and more accurate) version of the part and this is what I shall now be using both on this van and the sheep vans.
I feel it looks far better with this tweak and, with the larger wheels also fitted, I'm much happier with the look of the model now. Hopefully someone else will agree with me!
- James
