Member postings for old Al

There must be someone in your local club that has oxy propane. Its a pinpoint flame that can be directed straight at the leak area without affecting anywhere else

you cant silver solder over lead solder. At best it makes a mess.

Looks a simple job to machine and fabricate, but i dont know the size.

best of luck whatever way you choose

Im with Keith CuP alloys on this. Its not easy and you need the correct stuff to do the job. No short cuts or bodges seem to work , so why try.

bakers fluid is good stuff on the right material, not stainless

My first boiler attempt was a 2" traction engine boiler and i followed a similar path to you. Complete failure. As described above, the flux gave out long before the solder started to run. I also used only one grade of silver solder and had to heat almost all of the boiler material. so as i was heating one part, another part let go on me. Oh it was fun. I did learn a lot.

If your finances allow, treat yourself to an Oxy propane outfit. Loads of heat and localised.Even on a 2 1/2" loco boiler, the results are significantly different.

Silver soldering is not difficult with the right equipment , a bit of knowledge and help, good luck

you can by smaller still if you look for them on ebay. type in split pin and all will be revealed. Done it myself a year ago. cheap as well

even in the good old days , this size was never commercially available

what length are you looking for. Its a long shot, but i will have a look at what i have

For my 1" cutters and i assume their is a 25 mm alternative i have a holder that looks like an oversize FC3 holder.Still oversized for an R8 spindle so light cuts and only used when nothing else will do

I used a machine purchasing company once. they offered £10 for a nearly new british made bench drill. a few years ago, not many. I cant remember what the offered for the Boxford lathes, they were hardly used, im pretty sure it was less than £100 each.

It all comes down to how bothered you are to get rid of the stuff and how much you want/need the money

Best of luck

Regular tricks are to photo a photo and also to publish the photos upside down. Alarm bells always ring and however much i want the item, i just cant bring myself to buy the item. Its a scammers world out there. be careful of anything out of the ordinary.

If someone wants to sell their item, they should take the time to do the job properly, its not difficult to take and publish photos these days. Good photos sell products, bad photos only indicate flaws

The warwick people devised a track system and trailer so that it all could be stacked away and driven away and stored in one neat unit.

They were very happy to talk to our club with the way in which they did it. light years ahead of the system we did have.

As a wimpy 16 year old apprentice, those student 4 jaw chucks took some lifting. Technique and try and find a place for them not on the floor (so you dont have to bend down so far).

I have the Mk 1 in my workshop, good for biggish stuff. Little ML7 for the lighter stuff.

There are 3 types of student, Mk1, mk 1 1/2, mk 2. all good, but check the head bearings.

ctr drill should be run as fast as possible. Sometimes your set up dictates you have to slow down a bit and take it more carefully.

That might have been worth (almost) looking at 20-30 years ago, but their are a lot of good second hand ones now because more people are leaving the hobby than starting. I.e they keep dieing.

Only last week, i picked up a really nice 3 1/2"model and offer of a really good myford 10.(not every bodies cup of tea, but nice and compact) i took the model but not the lathe.

Restoring a lathe thats been outside can be done successfully, but its hard work. All the time you are fixing the lathe you are not building models. Everybody's different in the way in which they approach their problems. Thats not mine.

best of luck

I hope you have made 'nice' follow up calls to see the progress of your order. They are a company that i would trust with my money, but we do live in a quickly changing world.

Keep on top of them, but be polite.

try 'model engineering clearing house'

Alan

I have been caught being lazy on the mill once.I put a 1/4" or 5/16" cutter in a drill chuck to do a 'quicky'. No. the tapers dont like it and my vice will testify to that.

Use the equipment you have in the way they were designed. quicker in the long run

send the casting back

The Ayesha 2 is an excellent model to build. A lot of work was carried out to make sure the drawings did not have mistakes in them. The loco is easy to make, cost little in castings, has a boiler that can be made at home, looks good in any of its liveries and goes well. What more can you ask for.

Good luck with it and join the 2 1/2" association, money well spent. Nice bunch of people that meet all around the country with their engines that they can pick up one handed!

I went on Sunday.

Not pleased with value for money. We stopped going to the London events a few years ago for the same reason.We also spoke to some younger enthusiasts at the show and they also had similar thoughts of not going again.

Impressed with the 2 1/2" associations display and quality of stewarding, best stand there. Apart from the ice cream van, i came away spending no money and an untouched shopping list. You could even get to the blackgates stand without queing.

Time to change hobby or to down gauge!