It started with a buffer

[Jim]

Dec 25, 2019 22:00:12 GMT @greenglade said:

At least you've made a start on your O gauge layout Jim. Other than building a J71, 20T brakevan and one turnout I've yet to make a start on my layout. I have 2 pacific's to build too..Like you, my concentration has been all on 4472 abd I can't see that changing anytime soon.

Pete

As Mike's layout shows there's something rather magical about creating an OO or O gauge model of a world that brings back childhood memories or recreates scenes long gone. Oops best I be careful or I'll be off on another distraction..my O gauge layout!

All the best to everyone of the New Year,

Jim

[dscott]

I got an O gauge Jinty for adding detail on my 5 inch version.
Then I got some track!!
Then I fell in love with the Terrier.
Then a Pannier turned up.
Yes Planning a mini layout.

David and Lily.

[barlowworks]

Hi Everybody

I'm finally back on the Britannia tender and having a good look at it and the drawings I thought I would fit the coal hopper next. Wrong.... Luckily I noticed that the water filter box seating would need to be fitted before that as it requires soldering to make it water tight. Firstly though, to get back into the swing of things, I made up some long mounting nuts to secure the tank to the chassis. The fixing bolts extend down from the tank and through the channel section cross members and I figured a long nut would be a lot easier to fasten up than a normal one. I also milled a hex on the end so I could do them up with a nut spinner.

IMG_2598 by Michael Cawthorne, on Flickr

The water filter box has a shaped spacer to accommodate the bottom edge of the tank. Luckily, the previous builder had made these but he was making the filters from the Perrier drawings. I was using the Doug Hewson castings and it was soon evident that these are smaller and have the correct number of fixing bolt holes so the holes in the spacers had to be filled and the shape reduced and new holes drilled and tapped. I may have been quicker making new ones.

IMG_2592 by Michael Cawthorne, on Flickr

New studding was fitted and I used Pete's trick of a turned spacer to cut and file them all up to the correct length. The spacers were then fixed to the tender tank with a countersunk screw and the screws and spacers were soldered up to make them watertight.

IMG_2601 by Michael Cawthorne, on Flickr

These are the filter box castings after a lot of fettling up. It appears that the masters were made with a 3D printer and the castings had a noticeable stepped finish which took a lot of cleaning up to get then to look something like.

IMG_2602 by Michael Cawthorne, on Flickr

This shot shows the water stop valve that I made up from scratch, there being none in the kit. This is a dummy fitting.

IMG_2608 by Michael Cawthorne, on Flickr

Also, a water outlet had to be made up. This is a copy of the real thing, the water pipe will eventually be soldered into the central collar which extends into the filter body by about 7mm. It has an "O" ring to seal it as it is removable. The filter boxes are, in effect, very complicated 90 degree bends. The filtering and stop taps are in the tender tank and are accessed quite easily from above.

IMG_2612 by Michael Cawthorne, on Flickr

Finally the bottom doors were made up and fitted, being included in the kit. There was definitely a lot of work required to get to this point including co-ordinate drilling the filter flange and the spacers to match, a first for me. Wonderful things these DROs.

IMG_2617 by Michael Cawthorne, on Flickr

I don't think there is anything else that needs to be soldered at this end so the next job will be fitting the coal hopper

Mike

[Deleted]

Hi Mike, those castings look great....good to see you back on the Brit.

Cheers

Pete

[barlowworks]

Hi Everybody, A quick progress report now I am starting to put the tender tank together. This is (in theory) the easier side of the two so the logical side to start on. There is a tender air vent on each side and these are made up from parts from Model Engineers Laser. There is one on each side of the tank sides and I thought that they were riveted to the tank side with 5 rivets. Upon closer inspection of photos of Oliver Cromwell it would appear that the rivets on the outside are actually snap head bolts as the nuts are clearly visible on the inside. I thought it would be easy to replicate this so started to check the rivet size on the drawing. This unfortunately threw up another conundrum, the rivet size on the Perrier drawings is (I think) 1/16 inch and this is what the tender has built with by the previous builders but the BR 9F tender drawn by Les Warnett uses 3/64 inch rivets which look a lot better. Unfortunately 1/16 inch rivets is what I'm stuck with ( not wanting to grind off all the rivets or make new sides). So it looks like I will not only be plagued by rivet counters but also by rivet size spotters. I will have to go round the track a bit faster so no one can get a good look. .

IMG_2620 by Michael Cawthorne, on Flickr

This is the first side soldered in place complete with air vent, you can see the nuts on the inside, a bit big but I can live with it. I also found two tapered pipes in the box of bits that came with the loco and these were fettled up and one of them soldered into position going into the vent cover. I also found a lifting ring (just the one, I wonder if it was the last thing the old guy who started the loco made) and that was also fitted and sealed on the inside with solder .

IMG_2622 by Michael Cawthorne, on Flickr

Well that is the first side done, next will be the side with the extra side supports and the two bolts at the front by the access cover. I think they may be something to do with the filler level gauge mechanism. I may as well put them on for the sake of fitting two bolts into holes in the tank side.

All the best

Mike

[barlowworks]

Hi Everybody

Here is a quick update on progress with the coal hopper on the tender. As you can see the hopper is now complete with the air vents on both sides and the second lifting ring that I had to make now in place. With it being brass the whole lot is soldered together with 223 degree solder which means I can solder things to it with 145 or 188 degree solder without the whole lot reverting to a kit of parts. This will make it easier when I come to solder on the beading and the bracket details.

IMG_2624 by Michael Cawthorne, on Flickr

This is the side with the rivets, through what I can gather the other side did not have the two rows of double rivets as the fire iron tunnel was on that side.

IMG_2630 by Michael Cawthorne, on Flickr

Next job will be to make and fit the support brackets on the inside. It looks like these brackets are riveted right through but the photos I took of the inside of Oliver Cromwell's tender do not show any rivet detail on the brackets. It will certainly make it easier to fit them without the rivets. We will have to see.

All the best

Mike

[barlowworks]

Hi everybody, just a final update on the coal hopper to bring you up to date. These are the reinforcing brackets for the inside faces at the sides and end, the end ones having rivets added, the side ones are still to do. I finally decided to fit the rivets, the pictures I have just show them under a thick layer of coal dust so they should be a bit more prominent when the loco was a few years old. The bend lines were cut with my 90 degree cutter to get an accurate bend and a "V" groove cut the full length to locate the reinforcing rib which was also filed to 90 degrees to locate it in place. The whole lot was then silver soldered together to make the brackets that I could then quite happily soft solder in place.

IMG_2633 by Michael Cawthorne, on Flickr

These are the end ones soldered on with 145 degree solder. As you can see it is possible to solder with 145 degree solder onto the hopper which is soldered together with 223 degree solder and doesn't revert to a kit of parts. I don't mind soldering these parts on as I intend to run with a protective wooden hopper in the tender anyway so the parts are purely decorative.

IMG_2635 by Michael Cawthorne, on Flickr

These are the brackets finally soldered in place and cleaned up. All that remains is the half round beading round the top edge and the fire iron tunnel and brackets but I won't fit them until the lift out tender front is complete with the fire iron hole in it for reference. Also of note are the different lengths of the bottom of the side bracket, quite noticeable on my pictures of Oliver Cromwell. Unfortunately they also show that the lifting rings are a bit further back than on the drawings, hence the shorter front bracket in the first place.

IMG_2639 by Michael Cawthorne, on Flickr

The next part on the list will be the the water scoop as this is, as far as I can tell, is the last piece that needs to be attached to the tank before I reunite the tank and chassis. So a couple of questions at this point. Firstly what should be the colour of the water scoop, I have seen them painted in inside frame red and also black and also would the inside faces of a tender chassis be painted red like the engine inner frames. Secondly, what do you think would be the best time to actually paint the tender. Is it better to paint as you go or when completed. please let me know your thoughts.

Regards

Mike

[Roger]

That's a cracking job Mike. Neat and strong, very nice indeed.

[don9f]

Hi Mike, great job!

I’ve seen the inside of tender frames painted red in the preservation era (Duke of Gloucester’s was one example near the end of it’s restoration), but I wouldn’t think that this was done in the steam days, but who knows? Normally the red engine frames were to aid visibility during the inspection and “oiling up” type activities....not so much of that required with a BR Standard tender!

Painting has never been a love of mine, but I painted my 9F tender frames (black inside & out) separately from the tank....I recall it’s first ever run was at the Sheffield track with a modified gallon can perched on the frames to carry the water!

Cheers Don

[barlowworks]

Hi Don. Painting is also not one of my favourite pastimes. At the moment I'm thinking of finishing the tender (which hopefully shouldn't be far off) then doing a complete strip down and paint. I'm wary of painting and then damaging the paint finish and having to do it again. Of course once it's finished then any damage would be fair wear and tear. 😉

Mike

[don9f]

Yes, at least you could paint the tank and frames separately, then support the tank somehow upside down and mount the frames to it, then fit pre-painted wheelsets, brakegear and all the other bits....that's probably what I did, but I can't remember....it was over 30 years ago!

Cheers Don

[coniston]

I'd agree with you Mike, finish all the work first then strip, do any last tidying up, clean then prepare for paint. You will end up no doubt with some fasteners unpainted until after assembly but I've found it not too much trouble to touch those in with a brush. Good job so far.

Chris D

[barlowworks]

Hi Everybody, another quick update from Barlow Works. This time its the turn of the water scoop, fabricated out of brass. A little tricky and not exactly symmetrical but near enough for me considering it is under the tank and between the frames. I made the sides first and soldered small lengths of L angle to the edges with 223 solder then soldered the top and bottom on with 145 solder so it didn't revert to a kit of parts. It was initially made in one piece and then cut in two and a B&Q brass hinge fitted. Finally I milled a groove in the base plate to take the scoop with my trusty V cutter and filed up the end of the scoop to match. It was then soldered on, again with 145 solder.

IMG_2642 by Michael Cawthorne, on Flickr

Here it is in place on the tender tank base.

IMG_2643 by Michael Cawthorne, on Flickr

I think the next job will be to bolt the water filters to the tank and unite it with the chassis and continue with it as one unit. The next part of the water scoop will be to fit the operating linkage and make it all work (prior to devising a method of locking it all solid for safety when running) .

All the best.

Mike

[barlowworks]

Hi Everybody, a bit more progress from Barlow Works. First of all, confession time. When I tried fitting the tank and water scoop it soon became obvious that there was something wrong. There was just no way the scoop would line up with lifting arms, it wouldn't even fit round the stretcher so something was very wrong.  I had a good look at the drawings and eventually sussed out that for some reason the scoop was 19mm too short at the flange end. No idea why or how I could have made such a blunder. Considering the flange part is well up under the frames and the amount of Anglo Saxon that went into making it I decided to extend it by 19mm and say nothing. After making the lifting arms and connecting pins the water scoop now fits and after another session of Anglo Saxon the linkage is all connected and it actually works. In the raised position there is plenty of clearance above the rail which is were it will finally be locked in place.

IMG_2647 by Michael Cawthorne, on Flickr

The other job to be done was to fit the filter boxes to the tank with 12ba nuts on the studs fitted earlier. Time for another session of Anglo Saxon as I tried to fit all the nuts onto the studs especially after I discovered that 3 of the studs had broken off while the tank was being worked on. Eventually all the nuts were fitted with a little help from Madam Battleship providing a second pair of hands and making lots of tea.

IMG_2649 by Michael Cawthorne, on Flickr

The tank and frames have now been reunited. I think the next thing will be to turn the tender back over and probably do the beading round the top of the coal hopper. All the best and I hope everyone is keeping well.

Mike

[Deleted]

That looks brilliant Mike...great work.

Pete

[barlowworks]

Hi Everybody. Just to finish off the coal hopper I have been doing the half round beading round the top edges and round the window frames. Nothing special to report about its fitting, its just sweated on with 145 solder. The hardest part is trying to get it straight and cleaning  up the excess solder after. The only thing left in the coal hopper will be the fire iron tunnel. This will need to be removable for running but I won't start it until the lift out section is done so I know the exact location of the fire iron tunnel hole. I'm also thinking if its feasible to hold it in place using magnets.

IMG_2651 by Michael Cawthorne, on Flickr

So the next thing will be to make the removable section at the front that is removed for access when running. I think this is going to be quite complicated and will require a lot of looking at and thinking before anything else.

Regards

Mike

[barlowworks]

Hi Everybody, here is another update from Barlow Works. With all the enforced workshop time I've now started on the lift out section at the front of the tender. This is a lot bigger than the removable section on the drawing which had a couple of sharp corners on the top and looked like an accident waiting to happen. I copied the lift out section that Jim in Australia used on his tender as it looked a lot more sensible than the one drawn and gave a lot better access.

I started with some Card Assisted Design and made a couple of templates for the outlines, a lot cheaper than making initial mistakes in metal.

IMG_2659 by Michael Cawthorne, on Flickr

I then started plotting the cut outs for the coal access door, cupboards and fire iron tunnel. After comparing the drawings with photographs it became obvious that the cutouts on the drawings were not accurate and I set about modifying then to look something like the real thing. Basically it was a matter of adjusting the size of the cupboard doors and the coal access door and making the hole for the fire iron tunnel much bigger.

IMG_2667 by Michael Cawthorne, on Flickr

I then cut out the holes in the card templates and used them to mark out onto sheet brass. The cutting out was initially done with my adapted bandsaw ( see below ) and my lanisher and the holes were cut out using a woodworking jigsaw which works quite happily on metal as long as you take your time. Finally the 2 bulkheads were clamped together and the cut outs for the coal access door, part of the fire iron tunnel and the top curve were done as a pair to ensure they were symetrical.

IMG_2669 by Michael Cawthorne, on Flickr

The doors actually fit flush in the hole so pieces of brass sheet were carefully cut and filed to fit.

IMG_2671 by Michael Cawthorne, on Flickr

This is the new toy I purchased to help with the filing, its an electric file and considering how much I hate filing I don't know why I didn't get one sooner, its a very handy piece of kit. For all I know all model engineers may have one and I just didn't know but its made life a lot easier in Barlow Works and that can't be a bad thing.

IMG_2684 by Michael Cawthorne, on Flickr

This is a mod I did to my band saw a couple of years ago. You can actually buy a bandsaw table from the makers Femi in Italy but they will relieve you of over £100. That bridled against my Yorkshire upbringing so I cobbled one up from some off cuts of 3/4 inch ply. it clamps up in the vice just like theirs but cost pence to make and I use it all the time.

IMG_2685 by Michael Cawthorne, on Flickr

Finally, on to the detail work. The coal access door is a concertina door that hinges down the middle. It locates against the bulkhead down one side and locks in place when the locking bars are engaged. A couple of days work and a bit of Anglo Saxon but in the end it was quite enjoyable. The hinges are dolls house items and if anyone wants some I have plenty, I had to buy 50 for a couple of quid from China.

IMG_2690 by Michael Cawthorne, on Flickr

Just to be smug,here it is unlocked, with the door open.

IMG_2693 by Michael Cawthorne, on Flickr

The next job will be the big cupboard on the right. I will have to make the hinges for the other doors as they don't come that small and, believe it or not, all the hinges on each cupboard are different sizes ( not different sizes on each door, a different size for each door ). That will be a first for me.

All the best and be safe

Mike

[Jim]

Beautiful work Mike. You must be very happy with the result so far.

Jim

[barlowworks]

I keep telling myself its just like O Gauge modelling and then it's not as intimidating.

Mike

[barlowworks]

Hi Everybody. Just a follow up on a question I posted on Rogers thread. I've posted it here so as not to manopolize Rogers thread further. During a discussion of GWR ATC equipment when fitted to the Western Region Britannias I queried where the ATC shoe was fitted. This photo I think solves that riddle. This unfortunate lady is 70026 Polar Star showing us her belly after the Milton Accident in 1955. It was taken from "The Power of the BR Standard Pacifics" by J S Whiteley & G W Morrison. As can be clearly seen the shoe was bolted to the front axle of the bogie on what I assume is the cannon box casting linking the hornboxes. Thanks to Don9F I know the routing of the cable conduit under the left hand footplate and the location of the battery box under the left hand cab and also the type of equipment in the cab from Rogers thread. All that remains is a picture or dimensions of the battery box and where the ATC equipment was located in the cab. As I intend to model my loco 70018 Flying Dutchman as running in 1955 (the year of my birth) I would like to incorparate the ATC equipment in my build. Any information on this or any further comments would be greatly appreciated.

Scan_20200401 (2) by Michael Cawthorne, on Flickr

All the best and be safe.

Mike