Thank you Don and Elliot, I'm relieved that this project is nearing completion....
I will not have much time in the coming days to work on the model, unfortunately, so herewith an intermediate update on the cab/tender floor height differences.
There's a height difference of almost 3 millimeters between both floors, with the tender floor being the highest level. In reality there is no difference, and with a narrow coverplate to bridge the gap between both floors the engineer could freely and safely move up and down with his coal shovel.
I can only partly explain the difference, as approximately 1mm was caused by the assembly of the tender rolling chassis and body. At the moment I do not have a picture at hand to illustrate this properly so I will indicate next time where to focus on when gluing the chassis to the body as this will save you this contribution to the total height difference. For me that's something that cannot be corrected anymore.
In order to correct the other 2 mils I first cut away the movable connecting plate at the rearside of the cab, and the doors which were not aligned properly with the ones of the tender (2nd picture; 1st is starting situation). Then I inserted a 2mm thick piece of cardboard of the right shape to increase the height of the cab floor, reinstalled the (new) connecting plate and laminated the floor with a copy print of the part concerned. Then the doors back in position. I also modified and reinstalled the buffer block at the locomotive rear end. You may notice in the pictures that some minor corrections still have to go.
A few remarks:
- There still remains a slight difference in height which I leave like that as I didn't want to fill up the entire cab floor
- The connecting plate is too big in my opinion, especially when you carefully examine the GA drawing (which once again proves invaluable). I will try to cut it smaller into the right proportion, which will also minimize the visual effect of a slanted plate
- The model provides a narrow buffer block at the locomotive rear side but once again after looking at the GA drawing, there seems to be a mismatch with reality. The drawing doesn't show such feature and I am considering to remove it. Why bother you may think? This will namely reduce the distabce between tender and locomotive by which the tender and loc doors will overlap, just like in the real situation. Now, they are just barely touching each other as you can see. If you look at actual pictures you will notice the overlap between the doors
So the final result will be shown next time....
One other thing which I corrected. The lower steps at the rear side of the locomotive have been bent and come off already so many times during handling of the locomotive that I decided to reinforce them. And now they stay in place.
Last thing for today: I detailed the handrailings at the cab with thin plastic rods. There are vertical railings visible on actual pictures (and yes, also in the GA drawing), which have not been printed on the model, so I added them. Herewith a picture of the situation as is and painting has yet to be done.
And, before I forget, I originally intended to have the loc in maintenance mode and put a warning sign in the "cockpit", saying "boiler empty". In the mean time I have changed my mind as the model has become a loc in full operation. So, mind the change in sign: Boiler full! Thanks Diderick for sending the pdf of the page concerned.
Long story, again, so that's it for now.
Erik