Grist for t' Mill

So having stripped the paint from Skarloey I've been looking at lots of photos of the original Talyllyn locomotive to work out what I need to alter to make the model look more realistic. One thing I did notice was that while the model has goal on top of the drivers side bunker this never appears to have happened in real life. In fact having looked at photos that show inside the cab it's clear that the reversing lever stands in front of the bunker meaning that even if it did store coal you'd never be able to get at it from inside the cab. Having spoken with one of the locomotives drivers (he's a fellow NGRM forum member) he confirmed that the bunker now contains the air brake equipment and before that was fitted it was just an empty space. So that means the coal had to go. Here is the casting before I started to do anything with it and you can clearly see coal both sides of the boiler.

My first, rather unsuccessful, attempt to remove the coal involved using a razor saw and files but it was impossible to remove much without the risk of damaging the rest of the casting. I was a little stumped until I realised that I could use the milling attachment for the lathe to cut it out. The downside was that I had to wait a few days for a 3mm milling cutter to arrive (I picked this one as I could get it quickly from Amazon without having to pay postage). I still don't own a machine vise or milling table though, so the casting was rather precariously held in the 3 jaw chuck bolted to the lathe bed.

In the close up photo you can see how little I'd managed to remove using a file before starting with the lathe. In the overall picture you can also see I've fitted a cheap swarf tray from the lid of a tub of Anchor spreadable that nicely fits between the feet of the lathe by the headstock. Not much use when milling though, but should catch most of the swarf when turning on the lathe.

I don't currently have anyway of setting the depth of cut with the milling attachment so made I set the depth by eye to make a number of passes each taking off a small layer of the casting. It took quite a while as the lathe can't be run continuously as the motor gets hot so I left it to cool between each pass. The other problem was that while I tightened the 3 jaw chuck properly it wasn't gripping much of the casting and with the way it over hanged the edge of the chuck it wasn't very stable. This means the cuts were not very level, and it did spin slightly at one point as well. All problems that would have been solved by a machine vice, but I'm still pretty happy with the result.

It's not pretty but it did the job and gave me practice of using the milling attachment and I'll be fitting a cover to the bunker, as on the loco currently, so the surface will be hidden anyway.

Dismantled and Stripped

While I might have bought one of Bachman's new Skarloey models I knew it was going to stay as a cartoon character for long and here we have the proof.

Yep the model has been completely dismantled and stripped of it's paint, at least as much as I can without damaging the plastic parts. I use neat Detol as a paint stripper as it's safe enough to use in my study and is cheap and easy to buy. Leaving the cast parts to soak for an hour or so and the paint just falls off. Unfortunately stripping the paint off the plastic parts is much harder. If you leave the plastic parts to soak too long not only does it soften the paint but it softens the plastic as well. My approach to this is to soak the parts for about ten minutes and then gently rub off the softened paint with a cotton bud, and then repeat the process until most of the paint has been removed. I then use a fibreglass pen to remove some of the more stubborn paint before using T-Cut to ensure the plastic surface is still nice and smooth. As you can see this gets rid of most of the paint although leaves traces in some hard to reach spots. Once I figure out exactly how I want the reassembled model to look I'll probably have to cut into some of the plastic parts which might make it easier to remove a bit more paint, but we'll have to see how that goes.

You might notice that I haven't stripped the paint off the cylinders. This wasn't an oversight, I know I'm going to replace these so it didn't seem worth the effort to remove the paint given that they are pastic parts.

Skarloey

One of the things that originally attracted me to OO9 modelling was that I would have to build all the locos and rolling stock as nothing was available ready-to-run. The advantage of this was that everything would match and I wouldn't be trying to paint kits I'd built to the same standard as a factory supplied finish. Since I first started in OO9 though (two years ago now) a lot has changed and now there are a number of ready to run wagons, carriages, and locos available to buy. Until recently none of them had really appealed but I've now bought my very first ready to run OO9 loco......

Yes, I've succumbed and bought a model of Skarloey, Bachmann USA's new addition to their Thomas and Friends range. Technically it's not a child’s toy as the box says 14+ and believe me it isn't going to look like this for very long (in fact it already doesn't but that's for another blog post). As many of you will probably know Skarloey is based on the loco Talyllyn of the Talyllyn Railway built by Fletcher Jennings in 1864. Originally the loco was an 0-4-0ST but was soon altered to give a 0-4-2ST which is how it is today and how it is depicted in the model of Skarloey.

Over the years as well as the addition of an extra set of wheels it's had a number of body work changes and I'm not entirely sure which version I'm going to model, but I'll definitely be replacing the face with a proper smokebox door and the over sized cylinders will be replaced with something a little more prototypical. While I figure out exactly how I'm going to butcher the model for parts here it is running around my test track. Hopefully it will still run this smoothly once I've taken it to pieces and rebuilt and painted it.

If you fancy one of these models yourself they can be a little tricky to get hold of in the UK due to licencing issues. In the UK Hornby hold the exclusive license to 4mm scale Thomas products so Bachmann are not allowed to sell the model here. You can probably buy one direct from the states but you'll have to factor in import tax etc. A number of online stores in the UK are managing to import them and I bought mine from Tootally Thomas which seems to have the best price and excellent customer service. Stock is limited though so you'll need to e-mail them to reserve one from the next batch they can get.

Practice.... May Eventually Make Perfect

I've now owned a lathe for over a month, but until Saturday all I'd done was strip and clean parts of it, I hadn't actually tried using it to turn or drill anything. Part of the problem was not really knowing where to start. You can read books and watch videos for hours and still miss really obvious things that can be the difference between success and frustrating failure. Also having made the investment the last thing I wanted to do was damage the lathe on my first attempt at using it. Fortunately Paul very kindly agreed to visit at the weekend to help get me started. So in between copious mugs of tea/coffee and slices of cake I finally turned the lathe on in anger to cut some brass.

Sensibly we didn't just shove some brass and a tool into the lathe we spent quite a bit of time checking it over and figuring out if it had any little quirks; like there is a bur inside the headstock which stops larger bits of brass sliding cleanly inside the shaft and which I need to look at sorting at some point. When we did make a start though we didn't mess about and went straight to turning a 7mm diameter wheel. This isn't as daft as it might sound as it turns out that the basic steps in making a wheel form a nice introduction to turning. You need to make some drawings first to figure out dimensions, then there is some facing and turning down to different diameters, then the use of a profile tool, then some drilling for an axle, and then parting of the wheel. In other words a nice introduction to lots of the common tasks I'm going to find myself doing on a lathe.

I didn't take any action shots, but these two nicely show the drawings and jottings as well as the finished wheel and a brief experiment in taper turning. I did make a few mistakes as we went along, so the wheel is far from perfect; mostly I didn't lock the tool post tight enough when parting off so it slipped slightly meaning I lost part of the flange. Of course the real test will be to see if I can repeat the process without Paul around to help, but that will have to wait. One of the problems we did discover is that the parting off tool I bought is huge in comparison to Paul's. Mine is just over 3mm wide whereas Paul's is closer to 1.5mm. Given the size of things I'm turning losing 3mm of brass is wasteful and will also put more strain on the motor. Fortunately Paul has kindly taken mine away to grind down so it's more useful as well as grinding more clearance on the left hand turning tool.

As well as turning we also fitted the milling attachment to check it also worked, which it does. Here you can see it in place and also see that I've bolted the whole machine to a chopping board (it was the best thing I could find), although from using it on Saturday I need to fit some rubber feet to stop is sliding around.

As well as showing me how all the tools and accessories I have work Paul also brought some of his tools with him so I've now seen how an indexing attachment works, as well as a collet chuck and some interesting step chucks. I can easily see all of them being really useful but I'm not going to buy any more tools until I've learnt to use the ones I have, or have a specific need for one, otherwise I'd quickly end up broke!

So, thanks again to Paul for driving over (and back in the snow). I really enjoyed meeting him, talking modelling, and learning to use the lathe. Hopefully he enjoyed himself too, or at least the cake!

3 Jaw Chuck

So far this year I have had almost no time for modelling as work has been rather crazy because the project I'm currently working on is drawing to a close. Hopefully once we get into February I should have a little more time. This also means that I still haven't had a chance to do anything with the lathe I bought just before Christmas. In preparation for having more time though I've just spent about 15 minutes stripping down the 3 jaw chuck on the lathe (which will be used to hold the things I'm working on), cleaning, oiling, and putting it back together. Given I haven't anything else to blog about I thought I'd show a couple of photos of this.

The first step is to remove the chuck from the lathe. To do this I had to remove the plastic cover over the belts to expose the pulleys and the end of the spindle. A 4mm bar is then inserted through the hole in the spindle and another into one of the holes on the edge of the face of the chuck (not the hole in the ring on the chuck). Holding the pulley steady with one bar I applied pressure downwards on the other to rotate the chuck ant-clockwise. Once it starts to turn it's easy to unscrew the rest of the way by hand.

Once the chuck is removed from the lathe then next step is to remove the 3 jaws. This is done by turning the ring anti-clockwise which opens the jaws. The more you turn the further out the jaws move until they can be removed. Each jaw is numbered and number 3 drops out first, followed by number 2, and finally number 1. With the jaws removed everything was carefully cleaned using whitespirit and left to dry before a few drops of 3-in-1 oil was used to lubricate the mechanism.

To reassemble the chuck you need to turn the ring until the edge of the screw is just to the right of the gap for the number 1 jaw. Slide the jaw in and then turn the ring slightly so it grips the jaw. Repeat for jaw number 2 and then 3 before then continuing to turn the ring clockwise until the jaws are as far in as you need. The chuck can then be screwed back onto the lather headstock spindle ready for use.

An Investment

When, much to my surprise, the first batch of Hudson-Hunslet kits proved so popular I decided that I'd invest at least some of the profit in some modelling tools. So far I've worked purely with hand tools, I don't even own a Dremel or similar tool. While there were a number of options I considered (such as a Dremel), in the end I decided that what I really wanted was a lathe. Unfortunately I knew nothing about either buying or using a lathe. Fortunately Paul does and has been very patient with me as I bombarded him with lots of questions. The upshot of our many e-mails is that I'm now the proud owner of a Unimat 3.

As these lathes aren't made anymore I had to wait until a suitable one popped up for sale, in this case on eBay. This one was very reasonably priced although it didn't come with any tools, the milling attachment or even a manual. Fortunately free scanned copies of the original manual (plus the manual for the other Unimat models) are freely available here.

I now have a few tools on order (also thanks to recommendations from Paul) so as yet I haven't tried using the lathe although I have replaced the belts (they were showing serious signs of age) and checked it runs okay. Next up will be to order some brass so that I have something to practice on when the tools arrive, that and tidying the garage so I can set it up in a slightly more sensible environment.

How Big is a Bee?

Given we are now into 2016 I only have eleven months left to build my entry for the NGRM Online challenge. If you remember my previous post then the challenge is to scratch build a loco and I'd settled on modelling Bee from the Great Laxey Mine Railway.

Before I can make a start on the model I needed to decide on the scale I was going to model in. My gut feeling, given the tiny size of the loco, was to jump up another scale from my previous modelling and work in 16mm to the foot scale. To check out how sensible this looks I scaled the side on drawing I have to 4mm, 7m and 16mm scale.

The driver figure is a 7mm to the foot scale model to help give some idea on size etc. As you can see trying to model in 4mm scale would have been insane. Working in 7mm scale might have worked if I was 3D printing or etching parts but I think it is still too small for a scratch built model. The jump to 16mm scale though gives me lots of space for a nice sized motor (either horizontally or vertically) and should let me go to town on the details etc.

Having settled on a scale I've also been thinking a little about the track I'll need to build to show the model running. The prototype is 19" gauge using 20lb rail. If my maths works then I think that means I need to produce track with a gauge of 25.33mm using PECO code 143 rail, although I've yet to figure out the size of the sleepers that will be required.