A4 Pacific Sir Nigel Gresley, O-scale

[Diderick A. den Bakker]

Admirable!

[Marcin Jakubiec]

So far so good In my country people used to say:
Good designer designs models which everyone are able to build, bug good modeler is able to build model designed by anybody.
You're definitely good modeler Erik

[Erik Zwaan]

Thank you Diderick and Marcin. I feel honored . This part of the model has been great fun but it's good to resume work on the rolling parts again.

Erik

[alzictorini]

Erik

Nice work buddy. I love the coal effect and the detail work in the cab. When you fill the boiler with water, won't the paper leak?
Having moved to Spain, Im stuck with a pants left hand drive car from the uk. When will the rest of Europe convert to the correct side!?

It must have been a site seeing that boiler being moved on a truck for repair from York. It's huge.

Loving this thread.

[Erik Zwaan]

Hi Carl, thanks for checking in. I have coated the inside of the boiler with water resistant liner, in this way it can be filled with water. Also the fire box is lined with hot face refractory to withstand the high temperatures . Just kidding, but the coal in the tender is real coal.

Times are busy and the working days are long. Little time for working on the Gresley unfortunately so herewith a small update.

Worked on the driving mechanism of the third cylinder, which is connected to the center set of the driving wheels. The cylinder itself was already installed at the underside of the chassis and I slightly shortened the length of the piston rod to have a good fit, and also reinforced it with 1mm thick board, rather than laminating it as per the model's intention. In this way the assembly is stronger and looks more realistic. For the pair of off-centered "blocks" (can't think of the correct description right now) I used internal reinforcement to be able to glue the edges in an easier way. It all fits nicely.

Then came the leaf springs, which require minor alteration as I have to correct for the thicker chassis beams, resulting from the use of the laser cuts. No big deal. As the pictures show, this part of the work is not finished yet.

Next are the leaf spring block details, which is a lot of repetitive work....

Erik

[ricleite]

I confess that my eyes were getting TOO open when reading the first paragraph! LOL!
Good work, as always!

[Erik Zwaan]

Thank you Ricardo, I wish it would be possible to have this engine running for real .

I must confess there hasn't been much progress lately, too busy with work and other matters in life. The refinery I work on is gearing up for the biggest turnaround in its history and I'm part of it.

I'm working on the other leaf spring suspension parts and have detailed them a bit. Luckily these parts are laser cuts but need to be laminated by the original prints.

Also, it's time now to finalize the chassis edges and that's almost done by now. I hope to finalize this all in the next few days and then to start with the driving wheels. In the last picture you can see the dry fit of some of these wheels, thank God they're based on laser cuts.

Cheers,
Erik

[romanmodels]

looking good so far Erik

[Erik Zwaan]

Thanks David....

It's been a while but after a more than two months break (filled with building Sumato's DC-9-31) it's time to resume the mighty Gresley, and finish it. The suspension parts are finished now, including the brake shoes, which at this point of the build need to be installed. Luckily the laser cuts assist in this but it remains a tedious job to cut out all the printed parts, laminate the cardboard cores and to paint the edges.
However, now they're in place I foresee problems with positioning the driving wheels later on. The flanges at the wheels will make it impossible to properly position them as the brake shoes are in the way and I'm afraid of having to cut them away again and to place a spacer in between, allowing the flanges to fit in the gap. This will also enable the braking shoes to sort of "rest" on the outer rim of the wheels.

Unfortunately the model has this kind of surprises in store at regular intervals and that's in fact the major reason I needed a break from it, to prevent impatience and irritation taking over and spoiling the whole thing.

Anyway, let's move on. I had prepared the rear bogey already some time ago and now it's time to install it. I put it away in a cabinet for a few months and was surprised to see damage to the print of the wheels, which I still need to restore with paint. Hardly can believe the paper eating bugs did this. They don't dare to enter my workplace as there's capital punishment on this offence. Acidity?? One thing for sure, I need to apply varnish asap when done with this part of the model.

Finally a note on part 31k - very difficult to cut out when laminated on 1mm thick board so I used a thin brass rod (soft metal so easy to bend) and pieces of a plastic rod to recreate it. The end product consists of paper, board, metal and plastic. Finis mediis iustificat, the goal justifies the means, or something like that. That's all for now.

Erik

Herewith a few pictures to prove last week's progress.

[Tim Crowe]

Great work

And good pictures too

Tim