Crank pin holes

To line up the crank pin holes and get them the right distance from the axle, I have created a little jig out of 1/16 x 1/2 inch brass. Using relatively heavy material like this should keep wear to a minimum, at least long enough for two or three engines. The jig is pointed at […]

Crank pin proof of concept

The M0.6 screws and nuts arrived just before the Railway Modellers’ Meet, and now that most of the dust has settled, I’ve spent a part of a glorious spring morning trying out my idea for a crank pin. When the weather’s as nice as this, progress on the locomotive has to slow down. Vancouver winters […]

622 ready for the show

Well, I didn’t quite make the audacious goal, and now I am almost out of time. The Railway Modellers’ Meet starts on Friday, and there isn’t a nanosecond of free time between now and then. So, I am unlikely to make much more progress. What we see is what we get. Having said that, it’s […]

622’s boiler roughed in

The plan for 622’s boiler is somewhat experimental. Because the engine is a split frame design, and the running boards are connected to the frame, the boiler needs to admit both polarities too. At the same time, these little engines are mostly air, and so, we need to fill the boiler with as much weight […]

622’s Cab Takes Form

I tell you what: this business of starting with etched parts is really a lot faster than forming parts yourself. I spent about an hour this morning laying out and forming the four key-holes that I use to screw the cab to the frame, and which somehow I forgot to include in the pattern. If […]

Engine truck good enough for now

Rebuilding the engine truck wheels, including one tyre that went missing (but is not missed as it wasn’t my best work) took a morning. This time I soldered the half-axles in place before casting the spokes. So all the wheels are nice and solid now, even the one that came apart in the heat and […]

Engine truck: two steps forward, one step back

Obviously, things were going too well. Parts were literally flying off the frets and attaching themselves to the frame. I was hopeful of actually hitting my deadline. The optimism continued as I folded up the the engine truck. Even tacking the bottom chord onto the side frames worked reasonably easily, despite being a flawed design […]

Bearing guides and kit design

I never know what to call these things. The Brits call them “hornblock guides,” but North American engines have no hornblocks and have no need to guide them. We unimaginative North Americans call the bearings, well, “bearings.” The parts on the engine that guide them are pedestals and their wedges. There is no room to […]

Frame for 622

The framigami idea paid off, and compared to #10, the frame for 622 went together very quickly. Of course, it didn’t go perfectly according to plan. There are a few things I will change if I re-draw the etching artwork, and a few things I would remember to do differently next time. Things for next […]

Firebox

I felt a mild surge of anticipation as I cut the firebox free of the fret and set to embossing the stay bolts and rivets from the back. Others are able to use half-etched rivet holes to make convincing, even rivets. Beautiful, even. So far, this is not a skill I can count on. Maybe […]