Member postings for Chuffer

Many thanks Fowlers Fury for sharing the details of your experience. I was unaware that GM castings had potential porosity problems. Fortunately, the GM cylinders on my second loco don't seem to have this problem. I didn't build it but as the loco has a history of being started in the late 1980's, finally being finished in 2012 would GM castings in those days be better quality or were you just plain unlucky? What process took place to seal the porosity in the GM cylinders and did it last?

I like the idea of screwed plugs in both ends of the cylinders but some purists would soon throw their hands up if they were not hidden behind covers on a scale model. As mentioned earlier there are screwed plugs in the slide valve chest cover on my first loco which make getting oil into the cylinders easy. The slide valves are on top so any oil pumped into there will work its way into the main cylinders.

I'm finding this discussion most enlightening. What started out as an enquiry into rust seizure prevention over winter has developed into a very interesting discussion on the merits, or otherwise, of the material for cylinders and pistons etc. And that's without going into the subject of built up ones being silver soldered or welded!!

Chuffer

Hmm, that's a potentially interesting solution to the problem. However, having absolutely no idea about the compatibility of steam oil with this product is there a tribology expert out there who could give some advice on this subject?

Chuffer

There has been some interesting and thought provoking replies to my posting. It seems to me that for a loco with cast iron cylinders, steel pistons and cast iron rings the general consensus is to get as much if not all water out of the cylinders, get loads of oil in and then move the loco back and forth fairly often over winter to stop rust taking hold.

Luckily only one of my 5" gauge locos has the above configuration, the other has gun metal cylinders and my Gauge 1 locos both have bronze or brass cylinders. As I will occasionally run Gauge 1 during the winter months, subject to the weather, this also helps overcome any problems of seizure due to lack of use!

The whole subject of cast iron cylinders, steel pistons and cast iron rings rust seizing up due to lack of use got me thinking why gun metal cylinders are not used as often as cast iron. I know that gun metal is expensive (eye watering in some cases) but the additional cost spread over the total cost of buying the material, boiler etc etc and the time taken to produce the loco seems to me to be potentially good investment. At least it would do away with the problem of rust seized pistons, or am I missing something fundamental here?

Chuffer

As we are well into Autumn my thoughts turn towards the winter storage of the two steam loco's I own. I am hoping that the collective wisdom of those on this forum should provide good advice to both novices as well as those like me with a few years of running under their belts.

One of the loco's has cast iron cylinders which I replaced with new steel pistons and clupet rings a few years ago after binning the original steel and graphite yarn pistons. Since owning the loco and laying it up for winter I have always pumped steam oil into the cylinders via the slide valves. Luckily the chap who made it provided screwed blanking plugs giving direct access into the slide valve chest. I then put half a cocktail stick into the drain cocks to stop the oil leaking out! Crude but it works for me. The question is, is what I'm doing the best practice considering I suspect that the majority of loco's have this cast iron cylinder/steel piston setup?

The second loco I own has gun metal cylinders with stainless steel pistons and silicone 'o' rings. Apart from ensuring that I get all (or as much as I can get) of the water out of the cylinders by keeping the drain cocks open and pushing it backwards and forwards I do not attempt to pump anything into the cylinders. After the pushing backwards and forwards I close the cylinder drain cocks until the start of the next years running season. Again is this the best practice?

Incidentally, when I replaced the piston/graphite yarn setup in the first loco there was quite noticeable pitting in the bottom of both cylinders probably caused by water lying there over successive winters despite me pumping lots of steam oil in after each time the loco ran. I had to do a lot of honing to reduce the pitting to an acceptable level.

I look forward to learning what others may do, and of course this would be transferrable to anything which is steam cylinder driven not just loco's.

Chuffer

Well, I've managed to upload these photos - I hope. Progress has moved on quite a bit since I took these.

BTW for those of you who may have built a Class 20 the reason for the new buffers stocks is that being a member of the GL5 Main Line Association after making the 2 bogies and assembling these to the chassis I found the centreline of the buffers was about 3/8" too high. After much head scratching and looking at full size pictures of Class 20's the penny dropped that the buffer stocks on the aluminium chassis casting were cast in the middle of the buffer beam where on the protype there is a marked bias of them being towards the bottom of the beam. Mystery solved but involved cutting off the cast in stocks and making new ones.

Chuffer

Dave,

Thank you for your advice.

I've had the moulding some 15 years since I bought it and the castings following a smallish football pools win. I collected it from Dan at his home in Kidderminster where he showed me the electric driven City of Truro and Prairie models he was working on. These were kept in a genuine hovel (so he said) which was his workshop/storage building at the bottom of his garden. A quite memorable visit.

I'm sure I'm not the only model engineer who has bought parts for a model and had them collecting dust for many years. In my case the fibre glass body moulding and aluminium chassis casting were both stood on end in the workshop and were religiously moved when I wanted to get something out of the rack of drawers they stood in front of! Lockdown was the catalyst for me to make a start.

The moulding is a sort of self coloured BR Green but I've done quite a bit of work on both the nose and cab ends as I want it to be an early example of a Class 20. As standard the moulding had a headcode box but Dan had my moulding made without this and I've added to it. It is shiny so I can go over it with 1000 grit to take the shine off of it, like I've done on the ends I've worked on. I have tried to insert photos of both ends but met with no success apart from losing all that I had already typed. I might have another try after I've posted this.

Chuffer

Michael,

Many thanks for the link which I have accessed and read.

I was rather hoping that an etch primer would be available in a ready to use spray can as I never seem to have much success when having to thin paints and the Class 20 body has lots of uneven surfaces.

Having used Upol Acid 8 etch in a spray can which adhered well with no runs straight out of the can I was disappointed that they don't seem to make one suitable for fibre glass. Do any other forum members have experience of painting a fibre glass loco body moulding and if so what did they use?

Regarding the enquiry about rattle can colours suitable for the grey roof and red buffer beam - are there any recommendations of suitable car colours from forum members?

Chuffer

A short while after lockdown started some 2 years ago my wife suggested to me that I make a start on the Class 20 electric loco which I had bought the castings etc from Dan Jeavons some 15 years before!

I'm now at the stage of painting before installing (with help I may add) the control system purchased from Mtroniks. Both bogies have been painted using Plastikote Metal Primer and Satin Black which I find is one of the few rattle can paints where runs are few and the coverage is good. The chassis is an aluminium casting which I sprayed with Upol Acid 8 Primer followed by the Satin Black.

Now, I need to spray the buffer beam and buffer stocks red but although there is a model railway forum detailing car rattle can colours it doesn't seem to list a car colour for buffer beam red. Similarly, my loco will be an early example where the body is BR Green with the roof being grey so are there any suggestions for a car colour for this?

The model railway forum lists either Rover Brooklands Green or Ford Laurel Green for the body but with it being a gloss green fibre glass moulding I can't seem to find any advice on what primer to use.

Any advice or recommendations would be most welcome.

Chuffer

Thanks to all who have responded to my query.

I have attempted to look for the indexes at the bottom of the front page of the ME website but have had no joy. I assume that the link mentioned is the one to Indexes to MEW? Clicking on this link I found at the bottom of that page a number of links. The link to Colin Ushers site didn't work - on my computer my firewall came up with very red warning stating it was an unsafe phising website! When I tried the Dias Costa site and read the instructions on how to extract the files my brain went into shutdown mode. Far too complicated for me to interpret as an average user rather than computer expert.

I have pulled out and filed all the volume indexes separately for all the volumes I have but as time goes on from the easy to search online index already mentioned which ends at volume 213 this will become increasingly more difficult to search through.

Looks as if this is going to be a problem that will get worse as time goes on and this may well have an effect on future sales of the magazine? Why buy and keep a magazine if you can't find that elusive article you know you've seen but can't remember when?

Chuffer

Quite recently I wanted to find some articles in volumes of Model Engineer which I have going back to about 1968. In the past I have used both the website www.itech.net.au/modelengineer/ or www.groundlevel.demon.co.uk/me_index.html

Unfortunately the former website stops at volume 213 and the latter website comes up with a message that the IP address could not be found.

I realise that both websites were a labour of love for those who compiled and maintained them for no return and which we have probably taken for granted all these years.

The questions that spring to mind are:-

1. Am I looking in the wrong place (a Google search didn't come up with any alternatives)

2. If there are no alternatives how are we going to find that particular article we seem to remember seeing without physically searching through every issue we have since the first website index stopped at volume 213?

3. How can that information from that one index that still exists be preserved for future reference - better to have it available up to volume 213 rather than not at all.

Regards.

Chuffer

I currently drive a 62 plate Mondeo Titanium X Sport Estate Automatic which I bought from a Ford dealer with 6K mileage, having been registered by Ford themselves - part of the ploy where manufacturers register and run their own cars in order to artificially boost sales figures.

This replaced a Mondeo Ghia Estate which I bought through Tradesales, Slough (remember them) who bought pre-registered cars from Europe with low mileage - I was the second owner and the car had 7 miles on the clock!! I did 175K in that car before giving it to my daughter who ran it for another year or two before she was told it wouldn't get through another MOT. It was ideal for carrying my 5" gauge loco', driving truck etc etc and it was the main reason I went for another Mondy. Both were/are petrol engine.

However, I won't be buying another Ford after the appalling treatment I have received. The new one is comfortable, goes like a rocket when you need to put your foot down but 9 months after the warranty expired the auto' gearbox started playing up. The result was that Ford agreed to pay just over £2.7K of the cost of replacement but I still had to stump up just over £1.5K and wait a total of 5 months before they could get a gearbox!! It turns out that Ford don't make the gearbox themselves - made by a German company called Getrag.

The reason I wont be buying another Ford is after the gearbox was finally fitted I sent a snotty email to the Head Man in the USA complaining about lack of customer service. I didn't expect to get a free replacement but after waiting so long you would have thought that they might have reduced the amount I had to pay. This email promptly got bounced back to the UK and I ended up speaking to a woman in the Ford Of Britain Executive Office. She said had the matter come to their office they wouldn't have been as generous as the Customer Relationship Centre had been ..........what!!

Now comes the quandary - what to buy as a replacement. After my recent experience I wouldn't buy anything with less than a 5 year warranty, it has to be an estate or similar, petrol or hybrid, have a flat floor which is solid enough to take a 5" loco and tender plus wagons, coal box and box with all the other stuff we need when running. So, fellow forum members I/we eagerly await your input, advice, recommendations.

Regards.

Chuffer

Hi Andrew

Apologies for the delay in responding - been very busy over the last week and only just now catching up with emails.

I hope you and your friend had a good time at Old Warden. I would have liked to have gone to it but we had a social event of a dinner in our house with 22 friends celebrating our 40th wedding anniversary. Not many places to sit down with that number of people but we just about managed.

I went to the Wings & Wheels Model Flying Event at North Weald in June and had a great time. By coincidence Old Warden is just up the road from me as we live in North Hertfordshire and we were there the week before for the Bedfordshire Steam and Country Show. My wife and I went on the Friday with some good friends and our just under 1 grandson. As we had a weekend pass we also went again on Sunday to see what we had missed on the Friday. After the very heavy rain on Saturday parts of the site had been reduced to a quagmire!! I hope things had dried out for you and your friend.

Regards

Nigel

Hi Andrew

Many thanks for the idea of an introduction. If your friend is happy to email I would be pleased to hear from him.

I tried flying radio controlled aircraft many years ago but couldn't get my head around which way the stick should go when the plane was coming towards you!! I had a very patient friend who I used to go with and I built (and still have) an electric powered glider which I enjoyed flying as it was much more sedate. Unfortunately, he moved away so my flying days came to an end.

Chuffer

Gordon, Andrew,

This is exactly the type of information we are after. I've driven from Orlando to Key West and back in the early 1990's when the children were young. That was my first experience of an automatic and cruise control which not surprisingly is what I have now on my car.

I've had a reply from Train Mountain Admin who advise that the forum won't be operational until after 1st October. In the meantime I'll start searching flight costs - and prepare myself to be shocked!!

Andrew, it will be interesting to learn what your friends from Oregon would advise.

Chuffer

I don't have a Kingscale locomotive or one on order, but if my memory serves me correctly when Winson and then Modelworks bought out their self assembly locomotive kits forums were soon set up.

So, like Alan, I'm surprised that one hasn't been setup to swap information and tips on setting up and running these loco's. It's rare for a loco' to run 'straight out of the box' so sharing via a dedicated forum is a good idea.

Chuffer

Gordon,

Many thanks for the response. As we will want to make a holiday of going to the States driving from either of the two destinations is certainly food for thought. Now accommodation is another thing all together! We've visited both the USA and Canada in the past either visiting relatives or a package holiday so I've no great experience of booking accommodation from this side of the pond. Has any forum member got advice for a novice.

I understand that Train Mountain will have a forum for the 2018 Triennial but the link on their website doesn't work. I sent them an email advising them of this a couple of days ago but the link is still broken at present.

Neil,

If Hurricane Irma didn't get your tickets I expect Strom Aileen tonight will.

Chuffer

Next year between Monday 25^th June and 1^st July 2018 the Train Mountain Triennial will be taking place. For those who may not know Train Mountain is a 7½” gauge track and is located near Chiloquin, Klamath County, Oregon, USA. It is recorded in the Guinness World Records (according to Wikipedia) as being the “Longest Miniature Hobby Railroad” in the world.

I’ve watched the online videos available on You Tube and have always fancied visiting when a triennial is taking place. The thing is Oregon is not exactly a main tourist destination so I would welcome any information from forum members who may have been there. Where to fly into, hiring a car, where to stay etc etc. With the £/$ exchange rate not being in our favour at the moment it may well prove to be a trip which my wife and I have to delay but with advancing years it might be now or never!

Chuffer

Thanks guys for the additional suggestions & link.

I liked the idea of the Puffin Models Universal Joint. It's a pity it isn't available in a larger diameter as I think 1/4" or 6mm would be the ideal diameter.

I'll have to make my mind up what I'm going to do as I want to be in a position to run as soon as our track has finished with the winter maintenance we are doing at present.

Regards.

Chuffer

Thank you Julian and Clive, you both make a very valid point.

At present I can reach both injector valves and regulator on my loco' and fire on the run as well - on a raised track. We regularly run for the public for 3 hours at a time, but by the time you finish the back knows about it!!

However I also run ground level, not hauling passengers, which necessitates a different sitting position with my backside at the front of my ground level driving truck and feet on rests sticking out of the tender frames. Not possessing arms the length of a Oranutan does require more bending of the body which fortunately I can still do but if I can make it easier then I'm going to at least give it a go. I can always revert back if necessary.

Some ground level drivers sit on the tenders of their loco's but being just over 6 feet if I did likewise I'm not sure driving with my knees up around my ears when bending forward is going to help my physical wellbeing.

Regards.

Chuffer