William Thomas
New Member
Hello, my name is William and I am 11 years old. I have always been very enthusiastic about railways, no matter what their size. My dream has always been to be involved with railways and one day I would love to be able to exhibit my own layout.
A year ago I started going to a model railway club with my dad, in the hope of learning how to build different types of models.
A fellow member of the club, “oldravendale”, asked me a few weeks ago if I would like to learn how to solder and build kits. Of course I said yes, because it would be fantastic to learn about soldering and kit building.
I would like to thank the member of Western Thunder, who gave oldravendale the kit at Telford for me to build with Brian’s help. When I’ve built this it will be used on our club layout.
The picture below is of one my first creations using solder to join brass pieces together. I learnt that if you solder it in the right way you can make a joint which can be almost impossible to break.
How I created my first masterpiece (ha ha!)
My tools
In my next post I will write about how I am getting on with the wagon kit mentioned above.
A year ago I started going to a model railway club with my dad, in the hope of learning how to build different types of models.
A fellow member of the club, “oldravendale”, asked me a few weeks ago if I would like to learn how to solder and build kits. Of course I said yes, because it would be fantastic to learn about soldering and kit building.
I would like to thank the member of Western Thunder, who gave oldravendale the kit at Telford for me to build with Brian’s help. When I’ve built this it will be used on our club layout.
The picture below is of one my first creations using solder to join brass pieces together. I learnt that if you solder it in the right way you can make a joint which can be almost impossible to break.
How I created my first masterpiece (ha ha!)
My tools
- Soldering iron
- Solder
- Emery paper
- Flux
- Sponge
- Small leather cloth
- Nail files
- Abrasive mesh
- A small machine vice
- Gathered my tools together so they are at hand when needed.
- Warm up the soldering iron so it’s ready to use later on.
- Clean the brass with sand paper so the solder sticks to the brass. If there is any grime it could prevent it from sticking.
- Put the flux along the joint which is going to be soldered. This is to protect the brass while it’s heated up by the soldering iron.
- Next I melted some solder onto the iron and put this onto both pieces of brass.
- Slowly move the soldering iron across the brass to create a smooth joint, between the two pieces of brass, without exposing to much solder on the brass.
In my next post I will write about how I am getting on with the wagon kit mentioned above.