Terrier Progress - some gears

I have now received a new set of wheels of the correct diameter (8mm) and I have given them a quick spray of primer (one set black for my second Terrier and this set grey for painting green and black for my Southern livery Terrier).

The next job on the chassis was to drill out the 0.3mm holes for fitting the brakes and the 'Simpson Spring' axle pickup wipers. Two of the brake support holes require drilling into the side of a glass fibre PCB spacer. Typically, my drill bit broke doing the last hole. I had to unsolder the spacer, remove the broken drill bit, put the chassis back into the jig and resolder the spacer. Then I had to redrill the holes with a fresh drill bit.

Now I was ready to start fitting the gears to the accurately turned 'muffs' and fit them in the chassis temporarily with some long pieces of axle steel. The muffs needed a little triming to length, and drilling and reaming to give a tight push fit on the axle steel. I also drilled across the centres of the muffs to let air escape and to insert superglue if required when the wheels are finally fitted. The gears were deburred with some fine emery paper and then fitted to the chassis. They would not turn. The main worm gear was fouling the axle muff. I took the axle muff, inserted a length of axle steel and mounted it in the jaws of a mini-drill. I then used a good small file to reprofile the muff to give room for the worm gear to rotate. Once refitted, everything turned freely. The turned muffs do appear to be better than the old ones. I might return to the '09 Diesel Shunter' I started building previously that suffered from non-concentric gears, to see if they improve things.

Well, that was it for the evening, the broken drill bit and gear-muff interference problems meant I did not have time to fit any wheels. Hopefully next time ...

Fiddling with the Fiddle Yard

Not much progress to report on my Freshwater layout itself, as various projects have stalled for one reason or another. However, with some exhibition bookings a couple of months away, I had to make some progress somewhere. I turned to the fiddle yard.

Originally, in the rush to complete the layout for the 2mm Scale Association Golden Jubilee Challenge, I just roughly laid a few 60 foot track panels on double sided sticky tape across the fiddle yard and joined them up electrically. This single line has sufficed so far, but it did mean a passenger train had to be taken off or put back on again when required.

Five years later, and the sticky tape is not as sticky as it once was. Track panels started coming loose. I decided to take the opportunity to add a point while I was relaying the track. This would pretty much double the capacity of the fiddle yard, although slightly reducing the train length. So I built my very first EasiTrac point, with a 1:6 crossing so it would be as short as practical. The point, and track panels, were glued down with EasiTrac glue this time.

I laid the plain track straight, at the diverging angle from the crossing, for several reasons:

1. There was room to do so
2. it is easier to put stock on straight track than on curved track
3. it is easier to put stock on when another track is not too close to it

I decided on a low-tech approach to point operation, similar to that used on my previous layout 'Brunswick', in complete contrast with the Merg CBus controlled servos and under-baseboard tie-bars used on the layout itself.

A piece of glass fibre PCB is used as a tie-bar, and an electrical toggle switch, mounted on a bracket from the DIY superstore, provides both the mechanical movement and the electrical switching of the frog. The switch is connected to the tie-bar with some Plastruct pieces (the outer tube section being glued to the baseboard with a smaller rod section free to move back and forth inside) and some pieces of wire guitar string.

A Terrier for Freshwater

As anyone who has seen my layout at exhibitions can tell you, so far some very unlikely motive power has been operating the Freshwater line of the Isle of Wight. I do intend to rectify this, but getting the layout operating smoothly, and scenery added were higher priority. I have acquired some Dapol A1X Terriers (one at least with the correct extended bunker) ready to be converted to 2mm finescale. Many months ago I started work on modifying the original chassis, as per an article in the 2mm Scale Association magazine. I even 3D printed some replacement gears incorporating axle muffs, to replace one of the originals that I ruined while reaming the centre hole. The hole had drifted off-centre. Just a couple of weeks ago, I had the chassis running, although its starting speed was about 40mph. I even got as far as connecting a small DCC decoder, and this actually improved it, with much better starting and stopping. However, electrical pickup was still a bit hit and miss.

Then, the long awaited replacement chassis etches appeared on the 2mm shop lists (3-661). A couple were ordered. There are no specific instructions for the Terrier chassis, just the generic build instructions, plus a couple of drawings hidden away in the 2mm VAG files area. After a couple of emails to Chris Higgs,I put together a parts list:

• 6x crankpins and washers (3-107 & 3-109)
• 1x 30:1 worm and gear (3-364)
• 2x gear muffs (3-102b)
• 2x axle muffs (3-100)
• 1x 14 tooth M0.3 gear (3-390)
• 1x 22 tooth M0.3 gear (3-394)
• 6x 8mm driving wheel (3-005)
• 8x frame bushes (3-113)
• PCB strip (3-156)
• Nigel Lawton 8mm dia x 16mm Midi Motor

The Terrier chassis etch has some differences from the other chassis etches:

• There is no fold up gearbox for the worm assembly
• There are frame reinforcers to be 'sweated' to the insides of the main frames to strengthen them.

So, for my first evening working on the chassis, I started by folding up and soldering the chassis building jig. With luck it will survive long enough to be used for the second chassis.

Then I started on the chassis frames. Unfortunately, the reinforcers are not arranged on the etch as a 'fold and align' arrangement like the coupling rods and bosses are, but need to be cut out separately before attaching to the main frames. Where the idler gear axle bush cutout is on the frame reinforcer, it dissects the top edge leaving a very thin piece of metal keeping the two ends of the reinforcer together, so must be handled with care. It might be possible to use some fine rod in the brake gear holes to align the reinforcer and the frame when soldering them together, but the rod would probably get soldered into the holes at the same time. I therefore aligned them by eye. Alignment needs to be accurate, or the frame bushes will not locate properly into the frames.after sweating them together, I inserted the frame bushes into their holes and soldered them in. The holes needed to be reamed a little to get them to fit. This requires a slightly larger reamer than found in the usual, cheap reamer sets.

The PCB tabs were then folded at right angles. The tabs with holes in, I folded along the wrong fold lines, so I will have to rectify this later. The frames were then fitted into the jig, and axle rod inserted, as shown. This completed the evening's work. Next time, the PCB spacers need to be added, then I can try it with wheels and gears, and add the coupling rods. Then I have to ponder fitting the motor and worm.

On show at Portsmouth

Someone asked for more photos of the water tower, so here are some I took during the exhibition

Water Tower and some more trees

With another exhibition looming (actually, tomorrow 9th May 2015 in Portsmouth) I felt I should do a bit more work on the layout. I had mostly been working on some more suitable motive power and rolling stock for the layout (none of which is finished yet). I had been making a few more trees in spare moments, including a large Elm tree that I am particularly proud of. These have now been planted, but lots more are still required, plus other ground cover.

The old Ordnance Survey map shows a water tower at the end of the station throat, and I have a couple of photos showing it in the distance. They show it to be a rectangular tank on a brick base, but it is not possible to see any details. I purchased a Knightwing kit a while back as the mouldings for the tank looked nice, although I had not intended to use the stone base. In the event, I did use the base, in modified form. I removed the window section of one side by cutting horizontally above and below the windows. I then glued the top section directly to the bottom section. I removed a similar sized piece from the end above the door, and cut a section off the bottom of the other two plain walls to match. Once glued together, I clad it with brick paper (Scalescenes). I filed down the base of the tank so that it fitted inside the tank sides, and the tank now sits nicely on top of the brickwork.

After painting, I cut some transparent acrylic sheet to fit as the water surface. I added an overflow pipe, but I did not know what the filling arrangements are for a water tank, so I have left them out. I added a depth gauge and float from scraps, wire, and a spare cartwheel from an etch. This is too big, but I could not find anything more suitable.

The Railway Shed

When I moved to a new house, I purchased a shed to house all my model railway stuff. Initially all sorts of junk got stored in there, until I could not even get in the door. After 5 years, some of the junk was removed, and it was used to house some computer servers, poorly cats, spare furniture, etc. Finally, enough room was made to set up Freshwater to work on it (still no room for a chair though).

So, nine years later and the original paintwork was starting to look tired, so I finally fulfilled my original plan. I found the BS381C shade numbers for BR(S) green and stone, as used for wooden station buildings, and found on Ebay a source for exterior paint mixed to any shade. This was duly applied and I think it looks good. The rest of the household were a bit alarmed at the shed turning bright orange though.

The surprisingly bright 50W LED floodlight is for dealing with the chicken enclosure opposite in the dark mornings and evenings, but the neighbours complained that it lit up their bedrooms when the local cats passed by, so I had to make up some form of baffle plate for it. After some thought, I made up a board to emulate the 'Next Train' boards used at stations. Some vinyl letters, also sourced on Ebay, completed the ensemble. The 'Private' sign on the door is my one, real, artifact that I obtained in my teenage years. Hopefully, I can now complete my model of Freshwater before the shed needs its next repaint.

Look out, its the copse

Freshwater will have more trees than any previous layout I have built, so I wanted to get some planted in time for the Farnham show (and 2mm Scale Association AGM). Previously I have used plastic tree armatures from Heki and Woodland Scenics. These start off as 2D trees, the branches of which need to be bent to produce a not very realistic 3D tree before attaching bits of foliage.

This time, I wanted to try new techniques. I had purchased a tree-making kit from Ceynix many years ago, and I have collected some old mains leads to source copper wire for soldering together. I would build one tree using each technique and decide which I liked best.

The soldered copper method involves stripping mains cable (multi-core) and then twisting, bending and forming branches. The result is then soldered together, requiring a big iron, clips or pegs, or asbestos fingers. I got as far a the second branch before I gave up.

The Ceynix method uses short lengths of florist's wire (a fine stiff wire with green plastic coating) bundled together and bound with florist's green sticky tape. Branches are formed with two or three wires bound together. Branches are then gradually bundled together until a complete tree is formed. The tree then needs to be coated with air drying clay. This is a long slow process. I used a wooden tea stirrer and a pot of water to aid the procedure. When dry, the tree is painted, a quick spray of grey primer and then thin washes of grey-brown shades. The fine twigs and branches are represented by what is called folinet. This is a fine black jumble of synthetic fibres which has to be teased out before gluing in place. I have been told that this is no longer manufactured, so an alternative solution will have to be found soon. To finish off, a spray of aerosol mounting glue is followed by sprinkling with fine foliage.

I found this method much better, and liked the results, and managed to complete 12 trees in time for the show.

No matter what method is used to make trees, a good book of tree pictures is essential to produce realistic trees. Would anyone build and paint a loco, coach, or even a wagon, just from memory? Getting the general shape, density of branches and colour tones right really brings a tree to life.

The first photo shows a sycamore tree, with the taped bundles of florist's wire formed into branches. The last few millimeters of each branch is a single strand of the florist's wire without tape. The oak tree in the background is the real thing,

 The next photo shows the coating of air drying clay on a couple of smaller trees.

And finally, the small copse of 12 trees planted on the layout. The sycamore is in the centre, with a coppiced silver birch to the left, and several small hazel bushes behind. Below the canopy of the main trees, some small alder saplings (single pieces of florist's wire with foliage added)  are poking up through the ground cover.

 So, 12 trees do not go very far on a rural layout. I will be building trees for many weeks to come.