blackgates engineering

Hi every one I visited Ally Pally exhibition and collected some castings for a Clarkson L1 cylinders. On inspection when I returned home there was found that some of the castings were undersized .I telephoned Blackgates engineering and advised them of this matter and was told to return them for there inspection, that I did by 1st class parcel post the next day. Now its 2 weeks since this action and I have been unable to make contact with Blackgates Engineering as they are not returning my phones calls or e-mails, I wonder if any one had any answers to this strange behaviour as I had up to this time had no problems contacting them or buying items from them. all the best George

hi there Ive just received e-mail from Blackgates stating there was sickness and this was the cause for the delay in replying to my issue. cheers eorge

Ahh.... someone else attempting to build the L1 !!!!!!!!!!!!!

I made a general cry for anyone who might be attempting one of these as I've gained a set of the plans and am very disappointed with them. I am presently redrawing them on CAD as there is too little detail and dimensioning, and no detail at all regarding some of the items.

I've asked Blackgates for a price quote on the castings as the only way I'm going to be able to re-draw some of the items is to take rough dimensions from the castings.

Where abouts are you????

Rgds

del.

hello there what plans do you have, are they the Clarkson one's.

I am in the London area

Ive just looked at your forum posts and you have the 5 inch plans mine are for the 3.5 inch version .cheers George

I presume you are talking about the Southern L1 (Maid of Kent) I am busy building one in 5inch I have redraw about 70% of the drawings. Mine is a inside cylinder version

hi kenneth,

the clarkson L1 is the LNER 2-6-4 tank loco.

hi derek,

the clarkson drawings (and especially the earlier Jackson drawings) are what i would term 'suitable for the more experienced' model engineer. some knowledge of miniature loco construction and knowledge of the fullsize locos comes in very helpful!

cheers,

julian

The Clarkson L1 is a first rate engine and is to scale!! certainly in 5" gauge, the only drawback for me is that it is

slide valve , I am a great supporter of all the Clarkson locos and their castings were flawless, to see a complete

example have a look on the Steam Workshop web site, quite a few examples have been built and run very

successfully I am also building one, but with p.v., I cant see anything wrong with the drawings

Peter.

Hello Julian.

Thankfully I'm not a complete novice as I've successfully built my Simplex and was looking at the L1 as my next venture as I do like the big tank engines. Having spent a lot of time inspecting the plans I came to the conclusion that to ensure I'm going to do this right, I'd best re-create it in CAD.. at least that way it should all fit together.

There's alot of missing dimensioning.. and I don't quite trust trying to take measurements off the paper plans directly.. I also don't like the running position of the axle boxes when sprung (not enough upward travel).. so I'm redrawing with the axles in a lower position, but that of course changes the angle of the cylinders slightly... All has been redrawn and last weekend tested on a valve timing simulator (valve timing appeared to work better if the union link is extended to 1.5".

I'm a little stuck with regards the smokebox saddle, screw reverser, regulator and the bracket that holds the cross-head slide bar/radius link pivot.. these do not appear on the drawings.

Rgds

Del.

Edited By Derek Drover on 10/02/2015 19:37:27

hi derek,

i dont know about the L1 valve gear but the jackson/clarkson GWR KING drawings are rather scant and there are errors in the valve gear which have needed correcting.

cheers,

julian