KIT 12

[paultomlinson]

So kit 12 arrived last Thursday, that's three kits within a month! The cylinders again have been made exactly as the Breeze drawings and again the quality of the machining is to a very good standard. I shall be putting a lot of additional work into these cylinders to make them look more realistic and report further once I have done so. Otherwise any comments from any other Duchess builder?
Paul.

[vapor]

Hi Paul, must agree the standard is very good, apart from smoothing out the ribs where the cylinders have been machined on the outside what other improvements do you plan to do, also was it you that was changing the drain cocks if so do you have the suppliers details and any part numbers.
Ian

[paultomlinson]

As mentioned the machining of the outside cylinders is generally to a good standard however the bores are not finished as well as the inside cylinders, just look at the pictures on MW's own website to see what I mean. Therefore I spent quite some time honing etc to get a satisfactory finish. As stated these parts are exactly to Breeze's design and I suppose is a little disappointing. The cylinders as built from the box look more like a Simplex cylinder rather than a Duchess, so the mods so far.....
1. Top....the steam inlet boss has been reduced as much as possible and hopefully will not be seen under the running board, this could very easily have been modified by MW.
2. Front.. the whole cylinder has been clad in brass with 3/16" brass strips along the side held in place by 12 BA hex screws. The elongated cover plate has been held in place by 14 BE hex screws.
3. Bottom..The cylinder drain cock holes have been bushed 3/16" by 40 and an additional one added for the three Dave Noble LMS type drain cocks. Operating levers also fitted.
4. Front..The external part of the piston sleeve has been beefed up to the correct scale dimensions by an (eccentrically machined) sleeve. The valve spindle guide has been remachined to a scale size and 12 BA studs/nuts fitted.
aluminium end covers have been machined and fitted with Hewsons relief valves fitted. The vac relief valve hole has been drilled and tapped 5/16" by 32 and Nobles valves fitted. A curved plate has been fitted in front of the brass exhaust block to simulate the cover around the cylinder castings.
5. Back..The bosses on the piston covers has been reworked extensively and now incorporates the correct LMS square block on the end plate (complete with 10 and12 BA studs/nuts) and an O ring seal. Aluminium covers fitted.
6.. I am reworking the crossheads , with 1/8" slots on the face and 12 BA studs/nuts etc. The slippers have been milled to a good fit so the do not protrude outside the crosshead. Think I'll fit slippers to the inside cylinders whilst I am at it.

This represents approx 50 hours of work so far, so not for the feint hearted!!

[Deleted]

Hi Ian,

The cylinders on my Britannia had ribs from the milling process on the outer face and I spent a lot of time filing and polishing them out, only to discover that Modelworks supplied brass cladding a couple of kits later. Having got a mirror finish on the cast iron I didn't have the heart to cover it in brass. You might therefore check with Modelworks before investing a lot of effort in this particular aspect.

Paul, your improvements sound like a work of art!

Regards,

John

[paultomlinson]

Back onto the Duchess having spent a week or so finishing a Manor. Anyone tried mounting the outside cylinders on the frames? If so you will find that the exhausts from the cylinders don't line up with the holes in the frames, another little milling job required. This is where MW have modified Breezes drawings and didn't allow for this discrepancy.
I have also just bought a set of frames in 1mm steel from Malcolm at Modelengineerslaser. There are no holes drilled in these and I shall be using these as an overlay on the existing frames to cover up all those unsightly screws. These overlays will stop short of the running boards so the frames will still look 3mm thick. (Reminds me of my 4mm/7mm modelling days)
Looking at the lubricators I feel that one or two mods are in order. Occasionally the lubricators will need maintenance but you will see that one of the mounting screws is behind a driving wheel erim. So in order to take this screw out you will first have to drop the rear wheels which will mean disconnecting the coupling rods, dismantling the brake gear etc, etc. So whilst at this stage I shall be moving the location of the mounting screws. As thes lubricators are inside the frames and below the boiler it is going to be very difficult to see when they are full and at what rate the oil is being used, need to give this a little thought, any ideas out there?

[paultomlinson]

Just a further thought about the lubrcators, there are four silvertown lubricators on the running boards, four cylinders...that was an easy solution. I shall now turn the existing lubricators into oil tanks which will feed the axle boxes-more work!