5/5/17 - Pansy

Today's work was to silver solder the backhead on the boiler and the get the bushes soldered in. It has come up well.

There is a 1/4" dry pipe bronze brazed to the backhead to supply steam for the turret.

Happy steaming!

Nigel

28/4/17 - Pansy

The regulator flange, stuffing box, and steam supply for the manifold was designed in such a way for function and resembling the full size counterpart.

The outer wrapper finishes at the cab front wall and there's no room on top for a bush, and so a design was thought of to screw the manifold into the top of the flange...the GWR Pannier tanks have a design where the manifold and the backhead flange is all one piece, but leaves us with fewer options so we've opted for what you see here.  It was machined from LG2 round bar.  A 1/4"  copper dry pipe bronze brazed to the backhead will feed the manifold and locates in the top hole and the flange is to be silver soldered to the boiler.

Happy steaming!

Nigel

26/4/17 - Tram

Well hello again...been a big break for us over Easter, and getting some needed rest.  However the rest was shortlived as I have managed to complete the Toby tram for my mum in that time. It has plenty of power and regenerative braking.

See below pictures

Happy steaming!

Nigel

7/4/17 - NSW 6 wheel bogies

Yesterday the milling of the remaining 124 spring chairs was completed, the quantity in total being 240 plus a couple of spares.

Hunter Valley steamfest at Maitland is on this weekend, and next weekend is the AALS Easter convention at Lake Macquarie Live Steamers so plenty to see in the next 2 weeks!

Happy steaming!

Nigel

Repairs to digital readout

The digital readout on the mill decided to pack it in this morning, although powered up it was skipping numbers and not giving accurate readings. The usual beep when it starts up had become a feeble squeak and the LED display was pulsating. Discovery found the build date was 1998.

In the last couple of weeks it was becoming noticably sluggish to turn on but would come good after a while.

The unit was pulled off the mill and box opened up to see what's inside...the suspicion was an electolytic capacitor may have had its day, and best to change them out now incase they are all crook.

The circuit boards were pulled out and a necessary trip to Jaycar was made to get some replacements. There were 16 to replace plus the onboard battery. 

After some mucking around replacing all the capacitors, the battery was removed from the board and was seen to be breaking down releasing some powdery substance. This was replaced and also the keypad was given some repairs being glued back onto the front of the box.

Some of the original capacitors looked suspect and deformed, not sure whether it was a rough install to begin with or signs of damage.

All went to plan and the unit was re powered up and now remembers the position after being turned off and back on again...something it didn't do before.

Happy steaming!

Nigel

31 - 4/4/17 - NSW carriage bogies

Over the last few days some progress has been happening on the NSW carriage bogie "spring chairs".  This is a repetative milling job previously described on this blog, milling part of it away to fit rivets and to clear the leaf springs...another 60 done of the 120 to go!

Happy steaming!

Nigel
 

30/3/17 - Britannia

Today the whistle valve was put together...it is the result of quite a few hours work, both in design and manufacture as the bits are tiny and at all angles. Trying to prepare a suitable setup for silver soldering was frustrating as I tend to go for a minimum of jigs to not waste heaps of time on that if not absolutely necessary...I tend to risk it moreso!

The body was silver soldered up in a very crude system. I suppose an old hand would spy out what went wrong first up, the very very light squeeze of the vice still  bent the body of the valve once it was hot and silver soldered the angle underneath in the bent position! To fix it, a bit of bar was threaded and screwed into the end and the job reheated and straightened. A few fittings moved a little but were put back in place.

The lever clevis at the front end was made from a couple of scraps of 1/16" brass strip and silver soldered with a bit of 2mm brass spacing them apart. They were then profiled by hand and set up in the mill to drill the 1/16" hole.

It fits well on the smokebox, being secured by 12BA screws. The bulkhead fitting supplying the real whistle looks good and will not be noticable after the dummy whistle is fitted. The valve is a little over an inch long all up.

To assist the silver soldering I found it easiest to beat a stick flat and cut it in half with the tinsnips to bring it to a fine point.

Happy steaming!

Nigel

24/3/17 - Tram

A bit more on the tram last week! Wiring and the switches! A couple of test runs up and down the floor at 2am!

Happy electricing!

Nigel

28/3/17 - Britannia

Time for a bit of an update. We are trying to get the Britannia smokebox jobs done. The Britannia's whistle valve on the drawings we had was completely wrong, but served as a bit of guidance with the design of the internals. Scaling off photos helped produce a set of working drawings.

The steam line to the real whistle will be concealed behind the valve and go via a bulkhead fitting through the smokebox to a chime whistle between the loco frames.

The bits are machined from brass and will most likely require a jig to assist when silver soldering.  The copper rivets keep the fittings aligned with the holes in the body and will be drilled out afterwards.  The whistle cord goes up the hand rail.

Also a locking collar was machined up for the regulator spindle to prevent it disengaging off the valve.

Happy steaming!

Nigel

22/3/17 - Britannia

This morning was busy on another task but this afternoon another quick job was to add the rivets either side of the smokebox for the superheater header support brackets.

Happy steaming!

Nigel

20/3/17 - Britannia

Today's work was to make up the regulator spindle crank.  This was made from 5mm flat bar CNC routed and milled down to 4mm thick  The clamp bolt is a 10BA screw and nut.

Happy steaming!

Nigel

16/3/17 - Britannia

Today's work was to mount the regulator stuffing box on the side of the smokebox. Also a drive rod was made with a 5/32" stainless spindle.

The position was determined off the spindle and a paper template to help centrepunch the oval shaped hole in the smokebox.  There was an additional challenge to dodge the existing holes.  These were plugged up with some 3/32" copper rivets.

The bottom four 10BA screws hold it to the smokebox, the top four are dummies screwed into the oval flange only as there was going to be minimal depth of thread in the smokebox.

Happy steaming!

Nigel

15/3/17 - Britannia

After yesterday's research and design work today a regulator stuffing box was produced for the LH of the smokebox.  It also incorporates a gland follower.

It's a little over 1" long and the bolts/studs are 10ba

Happy steaming!

Nigel

14/3/17 - Britannia

A couple of jobs done today...the smokebox rivets needed peening over on the inside and the regulator access cover plate needed some 12BA screws.

A bit of time was spent assessing the design of the regulator stuffing box, the info I have is minimal and the supplied plans don't look right when laid out on CAD. A bit of rescaling based on some photos helped get a larger diameter than the supplied plans (still needs to be made oval), as it looked too small and the gland arrangement was not correct. It's a central feature of the smokebox so a more correct version will pay off in the long run.

Happy steaming!

Nigel

9 & 10/3/17 NSW 6 wheel bogies

Enough milling on the bogie spring chairs for a little while, but only halfway there overall!

Britannia is the next job on the bench to progress.

Happy steaming!

Nigel

8/3/17 - NSW 6 wheel bogies

Today's work involved more milling of the spring chairs to make room for the leaf spring and the 4 rivets.  Below you can see the spring chair on the bogie, and the before/after milling to make a left hand version. 

A right hand version will be required for the other end of the leaf spring.  So far it's taking 10 minutes each to set up, mill down to shape with a 1/4" slot drill, and deburr.  Lots of time to be contemplating solutions for the loco problems!

Happy steaming!

Nigel

7/3/17 - Pansy

Last night the front tubeplate was silver soldered in place. Here you see the final result after a clean in the acid.

Happy steaming!

Nigel

7/3/17 - NSW 6 wheel bogies

Maybe a new job to the blog but we're building 20 off 6-wheel bogies for some NSW passenger carriages.  The job today was to finish making up a jig to mill the spring chairs down on one side to make room for the leaf spring and 4 off 1/16" rivets.  These will be left and right handed.  The spring chairs were CNC machined but needed some finish off work to make them usable. 240 of these to do!

Happy steaming!

Nigel

6/3/17 - Pansy

After the inspection on Saturday (an overall positive report) a few touch ups were required around the firebox door plate adjacent to the crown sheet and a row of stays on the inside of the plate.  This was done by applying some heat on the inside of the firebox and for the stays some heat and solder in the water space.

After pickling, the front tubeplate was drilled and prepared for soldering the main steam flange to it.  A ring of silver solder around the flange did the trick.

Some other bushes and threads were machined for various parts of the boiler, the safety valve and regulator.

Happy steaming!

Nigel

3/3/17 - Pansy

A couple of pics of the work so far... it fits the loco which is a good start!