Leek & Manifold Kitson 2-6-4T

[tedp]

Wheels!

A few days ago the wheels I ordered from Markits arrived. They are 16.5mm gauge 10.5mm diameter solid disc tender wheels on 26mm pin-point axles, live on one side.

My first impression was they ran true and were very tight on the axles, both the live and the insulated wheels. After consulting with Rod about the best way to tackle conversion to 9mm gauge loco wheels, today I converted all of them. This proved to take about an hour's work.

To convert one wheelset, I first supported the insulated wheel on pliers. I opened the jaws of the small vice I use and supported the plier jaws on top of them with the live wheel below and the insulated wheel on top. Then I took a small hammer and lightly tapped on the pin point of the axle, just using the weight of the hammer and letting it fall. The axle dropped a little after only a few light taps and I could press it out of the wheel by supporting the flattened pin point on a hard surface.

Next, I tried tapping the live wheel back on its axle, so a long enough stub would protrude for me to remove the pin point at the live end:



Again, just lift the hammer and let it fall on to the axle end by itself. The jaws of my vice are lined with brass to prevent the steel from scratching the wheel or the axle.

A few taps resulted in enough of the axle stub protruding from the wheel face to be able to saw off the pin point. I use a Roco track saw for the purpose. Note that the axle is gripped between the brass-lined jaws of the vice - these will not close quite parallel so you need some force and mind the axle may slip a little whilst sawing. The Roco saw is lightly applied and the entire length of the blade is used:



The stub end of the axle is then trimmed by clamping it in a minidrill and applying a file to the end. First the end is trimmed flat, then a slight chamfer introduced to the edge:



Next, the other end is sawed off after carefully measuring 18.7mm using calipers. The other end is clamped in the vice without using the liners and tightened up. The end will be discarded, so a bit of damage won't matter. Note the saw cut made after marking out the axle. The end is trimmed similar to the one next to the live wheel:



Now the length of the axle is checked in the calipers - it should not be less that 18.7mm to leave enough for the cranks to go on.



Using the back to back gauge, and after pressing on the pinion, I re-fitted and set the insulated wheel, resulting in this:



I repeated the procedure for the other wheelsets, and now I'm left with three pairs of wheels which I expect will run rather better than the old ones:



To be continued!

[tedp]

... and I'm pleased to show the loco is now on its wheels again!



So now we can go on completing and balancing the body, and add the pony truck. To be continued!

[tedp]

Yesterday night I had a go at modifying the front end of the frames. Here a cut-out is needed for the front truck. Before I did anything I beefed up the frames using the same square section brass pipe used at the back of the frame, and I added a cross brace in the slots meant for the cylinder block of the L&B loco kit. This made the front end quite rigid.

For the cut-out I used part of the half etched circle on the Backwoods frames. This is intended for the pony truck of the L&B loco when used on sharp curves. The half circle was extended in a straight line to end up at the bottom of the front buffer beam. Here is the result, which still needs a little tidying up. Note the vertical cross brace inserted in the frame slots just behind the fixing screw:



The pony truck wheels are underscale which is necessary to clear the frames on my sharp hidden curves. Outside frames will be added to the truck - castings are included in the Meridian body kit.



To be continued.

[tedp]

I have been wrestling with the bogie and the leading truck, not so much making them swing, but how to attach a coupling which has to swing even more and stay within the frames. The overhang on my minimum radius hidden curve (9") is ridiculous.

The Markits wheels are much better, and yesterday I received a package from Jeff Bissonnette, who kindly made up a beautiful set of cranks and balance weights for me, including some to spare:

[tedp]

To answer a query about minimum radius etc here are a few photos of the model positioned on the 12" curve around the headland outside Dunalistair. I temporarily put on the whitemetal roof and bunker parts which will be replaced by styrene. You'll see there is some overhang but it doesn't look too bad.

Yesterday I completed the bogie and a fixed coupling, which proves to track well through all the curves - I pushed the chassis through about half of the main line using another loco.

The front truck will have to be reconsidered. I thought of using a complete N gauge truck with coupling. It works, but it is too short and too light, and the coupling had to be replaced by a long one which I don't like.

[tedp]

I used fixed Arnold K

[tedp]

Meanwhile, I completed the front truck, which called for some trial and error. For reasons of weight I decided to use the whitemetal parts in the Meridian kit. I packed the sides of the truck frame so the wheels wouldn't have too much slack and help them track properly. Then I locked up the wheels in the frame by gluing the cover on. Note that I had filed down the pinpoints on the axle first.

The hole in the truck frame was too big for the pivot screw, so I made up a bush from a bit of brass tube, which I filed out using a dentist's drill. Long ago I made friends with my dentist, who supplied me with a number of worn bits which I still use. The bush was superglued into the hole. Next, I bent a piece of border strip from the N/S etch in a U shape so it would cover part of the wheels, with about 1mm play so it wouldn't touch. This was superglued to the front of the frame as a base for the axlebox castings.

The axlebox castings were then cut down and lightly fixed to the N/S strip using neoprene glue. This enabled me to check on clearances and adjust the castings before flooding the join with superglue. Then a piece of N/S strip was glued on top of the truck frame to support the N gauge coupling, which just clears the slot in the bufferbeam. This is how it looks from above:



... and from below:



Next, the chassis with the truck in place, showing it clears the frames by a fraction. I had to do a bit of fettling to the castings and to the frames to enable a clear swing:





Finally I ran the chassis over the layout, pushing it with another loco. This brought a few minor problems to light which were solved by more fettling to the truck, the bogie and the chassis.



To be continued!

[tedp]

Meanwhile, since outside it has been raining all morning, I decided to have a go at fitting the cranks using Jeff Bissonette's quartering tool.

Actually, this is a very accurate press tool that uses the crankpin to position the crank. You first clamp the tool on the axle using two hooks to press it down on the bed of the centre unit of the tool. This has a space for a pinion to go into. The double hook attachment is tightened using a small screw on the back, as can be seen from the photos:









The centre unit slides on two rails that are fixed into one end piece. Each end piece has a number of crankpin holes at different throws to suit various cranks, and a machined stud that will press the crank into place. The fixed end piece has one crank fitted with the axle hole positioned against the axle end. The other end piece then is slid on to the rails with the crank fitted in place. Very carefully you press the two end pieces together so the cranks engage on the axle. Then the tool and the chassis are put into the vice, which is then carefully tightened:



During tightening, the cranks should be observed to slide on to the axle ends. A slight chamfer on each axle end helps to get them on without hesitation. The tool and the chassis can be taken out and the tool taken apart to observe whether the cranks are fully on. In one case I found a crank hesitated a little before it went home, but as I found it was part of the way in, I could tighten the tool a little more without risk.

One thing to watch for is that you fit the fixed end piece always to the same side of the chassis, so one crank on each axle correctly leads the other.

The end result is a perfectly quartered chassis. I checked with the coupling rods, still devoid of brass bearing bushes, and it revolves perfectly:



Thanks to Jeff's excellent tool this job took only about 45 minutes for the entire chassis. It has taken a lot of worry out of chassis building. Thanks, Jeff!

To be continued!

[Krizzy]

Ted

I see from the first photo on page 2 with that hammer reminds me of my marine engineering background and what you probably learnt in the ship's engine room workshop's you sailed on.

Excellent work though, Ted, well done. You are answering one of 009's worst nightmares, getting a quality chassis under the Centre Models cum Meridian L&M loco.

Roger

[tedp]

Thanks, Roger. It is indeed a complicated project, but we will persevere! The engineering bit - you mean the brass lined vice jaws? That's what the ship's engineers taught me. But I didn't sail as an engineer...

Anyway, here is another photo of the loco with a coupling rod temporarily in place on the cranks:



On to fiddly things

This morning, with a planned sailing day cancelled due to the wet conditions forecast, instead of sleeping late I woke up remembering I might have shot myself in the foot with fitting the cranks like I did. I should have shortened the axles slightly more, as now the cranks are about 1mm from the frames. I feared I wouldn't have enough space for the motion and especially the crossheads relative to the forward crankpin. So I took the ruler and did some measurements, comparing to the RM drawing. I found the cylinders on this loco are set very wide - outside the cylinders it measures 31mm. If I cut off the wedge shaped 'ears' from the footplate (hiding the valve covers) I could set the cylinders far enough apart to have all the space I needed. The valve covers are very thin after all, so a piece of thin sheet might do.

Having the whitemetal cylinders out I wondered about the crossheads and piston rods - these are notorious causes for valve gear binding, so they need to run absolutely free. I drilled out the cylinders and found there was too much slack for the piston rods (a one-piece lost wax casting including the crossheads which came with the Backwoods chassis). I found a piece of 1.6mm brass pipe which I drilled out to 1mm and inserted this into the cylinders. Then I cleaned up the piston rods and I was left with two smoothly running piston rods fitting the cylinders without too much play.

An afternoon filled with rather fiddly work and some experiment produced the left hand motion of the Kitson. I modified the slidebar etch that came with the Backwoods Manning Wardle chassis, made the crosshead run in it as intended and I made up a baseplate which will go under the footplate. The baseplate has two cut-outs to clear the balance weights. The slidebar etch was folded to shape and soldered to the baseplate after determining the position of the cylinder relative to the wheels. Eventually when I fit the assembly, this will be positioned so the crosshead will follow the connecting rod without locking up. Think of about 1mm either way. A bit of material was removed from the crosshead to ensure the longest possible travel - about 5.5 or 6mm.

Then, after some careful measuring, parts were taken from the RT Models etch. There is one part which is a combined radius rod and valve spindle. The valve spindle on the prototype went behind the footplate valance, so this is cut off. The remaining radius rod has two holes: one for the combination lever next to the crosshead, and another for half the expansion link. The radius rod is inserted into a small slot cut into the slidebar support - I merely opened out an existing slot. I first tried using the rivets provided by RT models, but these didn't splay properly, so I reverted to the rivets in the Backwoods chassis and soldered them to the back of the rods, using paper barriers.

The idea is to glue the cylinder to the baseplate. The slidebars slot into the cylinder. The cylinder will be glued to the loco frame and the baseplate spot soldered to the frame, so it lies flat under the footplate and the footplate can come off as intended.

The photos below show the unit temporarily assembled (minus the connecting rod) and a few component parts for the right hand motion.





Some notes on the parts I used:

The slidebar assembly from the Backwoods chassis is made for the Joy valve gear of an L&B Manning Wardle. Some parts have to be removed, and there is something probably intended as a valve spindle which sprouts from the top slidebar. This is cut down and used as a second support for the top slidebar which is soldered to the baseplate in two places. It can clearly be seen in the photos.

The RT Models etch is well to scale when compared with the RM drawing and in consequence the parts are fragile, although strong enough when fitted in place. The holes in the parts must be opened out to 0.8mm, the size of the rivets supplied. Not having a 0.8mm drill means you have to judge it with a reamer and test with a rivet, rather a risky business. The big end in the conrod has a doubling piece and I fitted a washer underneath by threading all parts on to a toothpick and soldering them together.

Here is the motion put loosely into place to show you what it will look like:



Note that the coupling rods are still absent, and the front and centre crankpins are still too long so I can't turn the wheels. The little end bearing in the crosshead is a small brass pin which I turned down in the minidrill. I will have to remove a little more from the rear of the crosshead and open out the big end pinhole to give a trifle more space on the rear crank, but it seems to work out all right.

Apart from the trial and error approach which means you have to feel your way along, it went reasonably well. Note that the first thing to do before fitting the motion units is to complete and fit coupling rods so we have a rolling chassis!

Done enough for one day, I think! Now I'm off for coffee and a book.  :)

[tedp]

I just completed the other set of valve gear, 2 hours start to finish and a much neater job than the other side now I knew exactly what to do.

I also took opportunity to show how the paper barrier is applied to two parts of the valve gear under construction. The rivet is threaded through one rod, the paper snippet, then through the other rod. Then a tiny amount of flux is applied and the tinned soldering iron is used to touch the rivet and the join. The solder flows in and you're ready for the next one:



After completing the assembly I ground down the protruding stubs of the rivets on the back and soldered the radius rod to the slide bar support.Both sets of valve gear run very freely. The available stroke is about 6mm, but the combination lever at the forward end strikes the boss on the cylinder. A tiny corner of this has to be fettled away:



Next is fitting the coupling rods, which will include grinding down the front and centre crankpins so they clear the motion. To be continued!

[tedp]

Coupling rods

Yesterday evening I made up the coupling rods and fitted them to the chassis. Instead of using the brass bushes included in the Backwoods chassis as locking washers I decided they would be better as bearing bushes. The intended use is a narrow nickel silver surface on brass, but if used as bearing bushes they would be brass on steel and much more durable. I expect the idea by Pete McParlin of Backwoods was to reduce the space needed for the coupling rods, but the Kitson chassis has ample space behind the crosshead.

So I reamed out the coupling rod holes and fitted the bushes, as shown below:



The bushed coupling rods look pretty solid. I carefully ground off the protruding ends of the bushes on the rear, leaving only a narrow rim. I tested the rods on the cranks and thought they revolved freely, but I was in for a surprise later... Here is a close-up:



Following this I fitted the coupling rods and soldered washers on the crankpins, fitting a scrap of paper under them to prevent everything locking up solid. I used low melt solder to avoid disturbing the Loctite bond where the crankpins are fitted into the cranks. The rear cranks were left without a washer as these will take the connecting rod big end, and a return crank for the valve gear. The protruding end of the crankpin and the excess solder was ground off:





Then I tried turning the wheels and I found a single binding point! I couldn't understand why, but I think that the cause must be the axle bearings, the bushes in the coupling rods and possibly the flexing of the frames which in the middle don't yet have any support. Possibly the tiny amount of slack left when quartering the cranks with Jeff's tool added to the problem. However, the binding I found was slight so I expect it was a tolerance question - with all the tight bearings you need only one percent error when fitting a bearing bush in place. But I wasn't prepared to let this beat me.

Curing a binding chassis

As long as a bind is slight and the chassis is all metal, the answer is to polish off any offending bearing surface material that is in the way of a smooth movement. In 'Atlantic' I used Cif polisher, but this time I had a tin of 'Commandant' car cleaner to hand which I smeared liberally round the crankpins and the axle bearings. Turning the wheels now produced a slight grinding sound. Then I applied a fibre disc clamped in my minidrill and spun the wheels with it. The assembly rattled and clattered as the wheels and rods spun. I applied the disc to all the wheels and spun them both ways.



Drops of old oil and cleaner went everywhere, but gradually the noise changed and I could turn the wheels without feeling much resistance. I checked on rod play and there seemed little increase.

So I cleaned the chassis using turpentine applied to the bearings with a brush, then washed it in a basin of lukewarm water with detergent. I spun the wheels again to get rid of most of the water before applying a hairdrier with the chassis held in my hand so I could feel how much heat I applied. Then I oiled the bearings and the crankpins, and lo and behold, the chassis ran smoothly!

To be continued.

[Tigger]

Well done Ted - this is looking excellent!  I've always wanted one of these on the L&TR and one day I might even get around to building up the bits I've got!

[tedp]

Thanks, David - glad you like it. It is rather a pig of a kit to begin with though, and making up a near scale chassis makes it more so!

Anyway the chassis has become very smooth, to the point I decided to fit the valve gear units. I first soldered a tiny bracket to the outside of each frame to support the base plate of each valve gear unit. This is a discarded piece of the Backwoods frame etch:



Then I fitted styrene packing behind the cylinders (superglue) and tried to fit them against the frames. However, the washers on the crankpins proved to hit the baseplates, so I enlarged the cut-outs using the grindstone and a file. Also, the boss on the back of the cylinders was in the way - I should have removed the @#$% things to start with. Out came the file again. In the end I managed to fit the cylinders against the frames, about 1mm behind their scale locations, as the slidebars are too short to allow a longer stroke of the crosshead. These are tolerance problems due to using components from different sources.



In the photograph above, note the way the connecting rods wriggle about. Either they are too flimsy, or I have been ham-fisted. I had to straighten them time and again. Luckily it isn't apparent from a normal viewing angle. The valve gear baseplates were soldered to the brackets on the frames using low melt solder, so the brackets wouldn't come adrift. Eagle-eyed readers will have seen the return cranks etc. are already assembled in these views.



Some parts may still need a little cleaning up - fitting the return cranks as you must appreciate is not something I would like to do every day. I reamed them so they would fit the axle ends, which left a very thin wall of material standing, then I bent them in a Z shape. First they were fitted on to the return rods. I went a little too heavy on the solder, but it went all right - just. Then, after checking for true running of the connecting rods, I put a paper scrap on the crank pin and soldered the return cranks on, with a tiny trailing angle. Again, the solder flowed a little too fast and I almost locked up everything. The tiny grindstone came out again to remove some of it.



In close-up it looks terrible, but I assure you it runs true. I spun the wheels at high speed to see if anything would fall off, and it didn't. Finally, a few photos of the entire running gear assembled and the loco on the track:





No motor yet, but here is a video of the loco being pushed into view by the Garratt.

The truck and the bogie don't seem to track properly by the way - they catch on a point blade. And I need to move the radius rod up a little, so the halved expansion link moves up....

I hope I may now be excused for a while!  :)

[Frank]

Ted,

I have been watching this thread with fascination.   I don't have anything to add to your excellent description of the work, and the results speak for themselves, but I feel I have learnt a great deal just watching.

Many many thanks for posting this.

Frank