Twin Tanks

Now the Covid rules have changed for (almost) all of Scotland we are allowed to poke about inside each other's houses once more, and I've had the chance to inspect what Himself's been up to in his den.

A project I haven't featured on the blog for quite a while is a number of 3mm scale kits he's building for the Engineering Consultant.

This pair of ex-GWR 2-8-0 tanks are made from different kits (sorry, I can't remember what they are) and represent two varieties, the 42XX and the 5205 classes.

Swindon aficionados will be able to tell you all the differences, starting with the obvious one which is the outside, or not, steam pipes.

They do look really rather good and remind me again what an attractive size standard gauge 3mm scale models are.

2020 Review

I expect you're probably already heartily sick of reading posts about how **** a year it's been - but don't click away, because this is not one of them!

One of the few Christmas traditions that isn't being altered this year is that I like to take a look back at all that we've achieved in the last 12 months on our respective workbenches.

I always find I'm surprised by how much we've got done and the things I'd forgotten about.

January

At the start of the year I was working on the latest WHR Pullman observation carriage Gwyrfai which I was scratch building mostly from styrene except for the curved front and roof which were to be bent from brass.

Himself was having an adventure in 3mm standard gauge building a very complex chassis for a GWR 2-8-0 tank for the Engineering Consultant.

February

A few weeks later and the body was at an advanced stage with a very crisply cast boiler and that classic huge bunker at the back.

And by this time Himself had also bent and soldered up the front for the Obs which was being offered up to test.

The idea was that once we were happy with the shape I could apply a thin plastic skin and beading to make it match the styrene body sides.

March

We'd been closely following progress on the rebuild of 130 at Dinas, and as reports were published on the web Himself would add more bits to our Backwoods kit build which had been started the year before.

In this picture of the boiler bands have just been fitted.

This was the point in the year when we entered the first lockdown, and Himself starting looking around for other projects to keep him busy and hit on the idea of doing something with an ancient white metal England engine body and a knackered Ibertren chassis from the bits boxes.

In the next post I'll show you what he ended up doing with it....

Rolling On

With Himself locked away in his box for goodness knows how long I suppose at least there’s the chance to work through the backlog of unfinished projects.

(Who knows, he might even line out Conway Castle which was last touched before he moved to Scotland!)

In the meantime the 2-8-0 chassis has been getting more running in using the rolling road I bought him a number of years ago.

Glad to see it getting some use.

Non-Prairie Primed

Himself has begun painting the 3mm 2-8-0 tank, which means stripping the whole chassis down again so it can be sprayed black.

He’s not a fan of the ‘spray it as it runs’ technique because of a fear it might get gummed up!

The body has had a coat of grey primer which really shows off the lovely detail in this kit.

2-8-0 To The Paintshop

The large 2-8-0 tank - so synonymous with the South Wales valleys - is just about complete.

Himself is planning to strip all the motion and wheels off before painting the frame, which is why the crank pins are not cut to length yet nor the rods secured.

Painting shouldn’t be too much of a hassle - the Engineering Consultant wants it in unlined black.

It’s not the end of our adventure in 3mm standard gauge, however.

Himself has two more carriages and an (allgedly) simpler 2-8-0 kit to build after this.

Tanks & Bunkers

You’ll have gathered from more ‘not-a-Prairie’ pictures that there’s precious little happening on my own workbench, about which I am feeling increasingly guilty...

Now the chassis is sorted Himself has moved onto finishing off the detailing on the side tanks and the cab.

The one thing that does really impress me about this kit is the quality of the resin casting of the boiler and there’s some lovely detail at the back of the cab too.

There's Lovely!

I missed a day’s posting - sorry about that, there was some minor constitutional tinkering which was keeping me occupied on a professional level - but I hope you’ll agree this was worth waiting for.

The pride of the Valleys is moving at last!



Himself has completed the slidebar / crosshead assembly on the other side and worked out a method of fitting pick ups (again no I instructions).

This is the only stretch of 12mm gauge track we have to test it on, so it’s not a fair assessment of it.

The crank pins still have to be cut back and the motion secured, but at least we’ve proved it works.

Hopefully the remainder should be more straightforward.

Improvise, Adapt, Overcome

The challenges continue to appear along the track for Himself with the 3mm scale 42XX.

The slide bars have been made up and attached to the cylinders and he's also soldered them to the bracket which connects to.....ah....that's interesting....

At first glance you wonder where the problem is, don't you.

The bracket is quite firmly held in position, with the bar along the top sitting in a slot in the top of the frames, and the cross head has been slipped onto the slide bars, with the connecting rod attached, and it all just squeezes past the bracket with a fag paper clearance.

So just the leading driving wheel to slip into place then.....ah.......

That helpful bar on the top of the bracket means the wheel no longer fits.

It's just a construction aid and will have to be sliced off with the cutting disc.

And what's supporting the slide bars and bracket then?

Answer: not a lot.

It's not so much of an issue with the 7mm version of the kit because the slide bars are a white metal casting, but a flimsy brass etch is quite a different proposition.

Unfortunately there are no suggestions about what to do here in the instructions, so Himself will have to make it up as he goes along.

I'm sure he's secretly enjoying it, even though that's not what he says every time I pop over to see how he's getting on.....

Backwoods To The Rescue

A solution has been found for the cross head conundrum on the GWR tank engine - and it took a Backwoods kit to make it happen!

Working with no instructions, and relying on his practicality, Himself has worked out how to assemble one of the cross heads and fashioned a piston from brass wire, and it bends in all the right places.

He still has to decide which of the slide bars to use.

This was the point where another problem with the kit was revealed - there was no rear cylinder cover in which to insert the non-existent piston.

However, some rooting around in old Backwoods kit boxes revealed some spare Fairlie cylinder covers, and would you believe they are a perfect fit for a 3mm scale 42XX!

Trouble In The Valleys

Himself is a man in need of a plan.

He reports that he was getting on well with the 3mm 2-8-0 GWR 42xx tank for the Engineering Consultant until progress ground to a halt.

Note to self: NOT a Prairie - doh!

He had the brakes attached, connecting rods made up and fitted (very fiddly) and all working.

But because the kit is shrunk from a 7mm version the cross heads and slide bars - which were white metal parts in 7mm - are too small to copy in 3mm and a common etch has been supplied in place without much guidance.

So he has some head scratching to do to find out how it goes together correctly.

As as aside, he says it makes putting together an NGG16 look like a walk in the park....

Moonlighting Again

Himself has been waylaid again and has been working on more 3mm scale standard gauge models as a favour to the Engineering Consultant.

Currently he’s building up this GWR 2-8-0 Prairie which is mostly etched brass with a very neat resin casting for the boiler.

He was explaining to me that it bears a similarity to the Mercian kit for our Welsh Pony in that the etches are scaled down from a 7mm kit and as a consequence the motor doesn’t fit!

It also has a very agricultural drive with the motor mounted vertically with a worm driving a big gear mounted on the axle - no reduction gearbox here!

Surfice to say he’s overcome this issue and the build is progressing nicely, but counting and pressing out all the rivers on those tanks was a thankless task apparently....

Smaller But Bigger

I let Himself out of my sight for a week and see what happens?

While he was in Wales volunteering on the FR he got nobbled by the Engineering Consultant who succeeded in bribing,  or blackmailing him (I’m not sure which) into putting together some etched brass 3mm scale standard gauge kits.

Having reached a unavoidable dead end with both the Fairlie and NGG16 builds - waiting for Blodge and Dinas to finish the real ones - he has made a start on the first of these kits which is a GWR Hawksworth Carriage.

It’s rather odd to be making something in a smaller scale which is actually bigger than the models he usually works on.