Clarkson 5" Stirling Single

Hi

Has anybody built the clarksons engine. Black gates have the castings but the drawing seem low on detail. Is it an easy engine to build? Any thoughts?

Many thanks

Hi, David Piddington of Reeves produced a revised set of drawings for that design. David's drawings I have are well detailed. He also produced new patterns for the castings I believe, still obtainable from Reeves. I have seen several models of this loco at exhibitions and one running. No crankshaft and only one driving axle for simplicity. Laser cut parts available too. Chris

Hi, Other points to note are, that the boiler is a domeless design with pull out throttle type regulator. Also the frames are cranked in the cylinder mounting area, which may require some consideration as to method of manufacture. At the end of the day all designs have aspects to consider, none could be described as easy to build. It depends on one's level of ability, workshop facilities, and determination to build a particular prototype. It may be of interest that the Stirling No.1 at York museum has been fitted with a later GNR standard pattern of tender so looking more like it's pre 1914 condition. David's drawings are of No.664, one of a production batch with more standardized features. RCTS published a history of GNR loco's including this type in pt2 I think.

Hi, I bought a Stirling single 5in. gauge project about a year ago from Station Road Steam. It was a running chassis with completed tender and a boiler, The boiler turned out to be good ,although its not to the Reeves design, and am currently making the regulator. I have completed all the body work other than the boiler cladding, and am considering making this as one piece. I am hoping I can open out the end of the rolled tube to go down the side of the firebox. I am quite new to this model engineering so any help anyone can provide would be gratefully received. I think my model may be a Clarkson design, although I am working from the Reeves (Joe Scarth) design, the valve chest design is certainly different

A friend of mine started the Reeves/ Scarth model of the Single soon after they introduced it to their range. I picked up the drawings and castings on my then frequent visits to Birmingham.

It was a frustrating model to build. The drawings were riddled with errors, causing a lot of wasted effort.

Reeves were apologetic but really couldn't give much help. He eventually bought a set of Clarkson drawings to help him make progress. I've an idea that he also did some re-drawing of his own.

Presumably the Piddington drawings were a later result of this.

Edited By Clive Brown 1 on 04/08/2017 14:45:39

Hi Clive thanks for responding to my message, and yes, there are several errors on the revised Reeves drawings by David Piddington, one of which is the thread size of the blast nozzle, there are two different thread sizes, for the nozzle and the exhaust manifold. There are also a lot of items not mentioned on the drawings an example of this being a bush that supports the regulator gland inside the steam collector tube this also involves an O ring.......... Being new to all this is quite daunting, however, I am a member of the Nottingham S.M.E.E. and get a lot help from them. I am now able to turn things on the lath and my project Stirling is not a million miles away from completion. I may regret saying that Chris 5/08/2017

Hi to all, continuing with boiler fittings on my 5in. Stirling single. I have completed the regulator block and am now moving on to the valve, but have also looked at the plumbing for the axle pump. As there are no barrel bushes in the boiler I am planning on the feed going into the lower clacks, although some say this is not a good idea? I also will put the injector feed into the other, apparently many loco`s have been fitted like this, is this such a bad idea. I have been advised not to attempt putting bushes into the boiler as re-heating it might cause damage as its been around for a long time and is amateur built .Could anyone also advise me on the size of pipe to use the O.D. on the axle pump fittings is 3/8 x 32 but the backhead clacks are only 1/4 x 40 and the largest pipe fitting is 5/32 that I have found. Many thanks to anyone who can help, Chris 13/10/17

The OP is referring to the Clarkson drawings not anything else!

My 3.5"g GWR King is built to Jackson/Clarkson drawings. The drawings are very difficult and a great deal of knowledge of the fullsize locos is required to interpret same.

I think any Clarkson drawings are really only for the experienced model engineer with a detailed knowledge of the fullsize loco in question.

Not sure if this helps.

Cheers,

Julian

I am trying to identify the maker of my 5 inch Stirling single. I dont think its a Reeves. My one uses proper leaf springs in the bogie whereas the Reves I understand used a solid casting. The tender does not have coal guards fitted. Can anyone identify it.

Cheers
Ian