Brass Knobs

After finishing the smokebox door I was going to take a small break from modelling, but I made the mistake of leaving the bits sat on my desk. It turns out that they were way too enticing to leave alone.

Just like the handrails on the cab sides, the moulded version that ran around the boiler was fairly horrid looking, but improving this handrail was going to be a bit more involved though; I was going to need some handrail knobs.

Fortunately along with the smokebox door handles I'd ordered a set of medium brass handrail knobs from Eileen's Emporium. So just like with all the other improvements I drilled holes for each handrail knob and then cut away the moulded version. Fitting the new handrail knobs was more difficult though. I used a small offcut of brass wire to fit and align the knobs down each side of the boiler. I then formed a piece of brass wire into the right shape to fit around the boiler. On to this wire I threaded the final handrail knob which fits above the smokebox door. The wire was then threaded into each pair of handrail knobs one at a time, until it was in position and the final knob could be slipped into the hole. For a first attempt I'm really happy with it, although the photo shows that the wire has ended up quite badly kinked. Fortunately this doesn't real show when looking at the actual model.

The eagle eyes amongst you may also notice that I've trimmed the smokebox door handles slightly. I felt that they were a little long, and I also wanted them to be slightly different lengths to better match the original moldings.