gjdale

Hmmmm…….can I persuade you to re-think this Kevin? A few hours spent now fixing the problem would be well invested…….. I’d hate to think that not fixing this now might cause the build to hit a wall later on.

If you want to use the draw plate method Floyd, I’d suggest leaving the stock longer while passing through the draw plate and then cutting to length later - that way you can discard any damaged ends from gripping with pliers.

Thank you Chuck - very kind of you to say so. I’m still waiting on a reply from Model Expo - a week after sending my email to them. I have had an email from them every single day telling me all about their sales - just not a word even acknowledging my email to them. I know people here rave about M.E.’s excellent Customer Service, but from where I sit, I ain’t seein’ it. I did get an immediate response (within 24 hours) from Ken Foran (the kit designer), who I copied on my email to M.E., and have since exchanged further correspondence with him - such a gentleman as well as being an awesome modeller. I just wish M.E. would do me the courtesy of at least an acknowledgement - if you can spam we with junk mail on a daily basis, at least acknowledge when I write to you about problems with your quality control. In the meantime, I have received my third party sourced plastic rod so have been able to complete the Boiler Water Level sight gauge. No pics at the moment, but may post an update pic on the weekend as I have some new photographic lights I want to test out.

I’ve always understood that LoS was for use with Copper, not Brass. For Copper I use LoS in a gel form and just put a little in small pallette and add some water next to it. I then use a paint brush dipped in the solution where the water and LoS gel are meeting and rib it onto the part. It works extremely well. For Brass you need one of the Selenium based solutions such as Birchwood Casey Brass Black. The other one that I’ve used successfully with Brass is Jax Pewter Black - gives more of a gun metal finish than black, but very easy to use. Again, I’ve found that rubbing it on with a paint brush works better than dipping the part.

Thank you Popeye.

Floyd, Here's a picture from my log showing the shaping of the oar blades. They both taper in thickness as they proceed from inboard to outboard and also have a very slight curve. The tapers/curves are fairly subtle but they make a big difference to the finished look.

Hey Bug! Great to see you back my friend. I look forward to following your next build.

Looking good Floyd. Shaping the oar blades is easier than you might first think. I achieved this with some soft curved sanding blocks but you could do the same thing by just rolling some sandpaper into a sort of tube to provide a curved but not rigid sanding surface.

Fabulous work Yves.

Thanks Bob and Kurt, I copied Ken Foran on the email I sent to Model Expo yesterday and have had a reply already from him, confirming that some of the early kits did ship with the thicker walls - so I guess that confirms my suspicion (I can’t actually do a check measurement now that everything is built). Wish I’d done some extra research to discover this before I started building - I might have been able to get a replacement for the boiler walls. Thanks also Kurt for you reply to my PM query and your advice, which aligns very much with Wefalck’s observations above.

Thanks Wefalck for that insight. I think it must be the latter (pressure hose) that is meant to be simulated in this kit. If you look at the box art picture in the very first post, it shows the hoses flattened (two per side).

Thanks Mark. I've just finished writing up a document with all of my observations on errors with parts and/or instructions and have forwarded that off to Model Expo. I've asked for a replacement for the hose material, so I'll see what they come back with. And thanks Egilman for the link - some interesting discussion there and some food for thought about alternative material. Will wait and see what Model Expo have to say before deciding on the way forward.

A number of small tasks remain to bring the model to completion. Finishing Touches…..almost First up was the installation of the brake pedal and spring mechanism. The spring joins the brake pedal to the seat. The other end of the brake pedal slips over the crossover bar that passes through the bottom of the water box. Once this is in place, the End Caps are added to either side of the crossover bar. Then the forward Hose Brackets are added, with the lower ends (complete with faux bolts) attached to the forward end of the water box and aligned with its front edge. The next task is to prepare the Head Lamp and Hand Lamp Lenses. These are provided as laser cut clear plastic pieces – four large round ones for the Head Lamp and one smaller round one and two rectangular ones for each of the two Hand Lamps. These all need to be shaped by adding a bevel to the outer edge of all the round lenses and shaping the rectangular lenses to match the contour of the sides of the Hand Lamps. My weapon of choice for this task was a series of sanding sticks. I recently discovered this product from Ultimate Modelling Products called “Thinny Sticks” and they are really good. The have a hard centre core with a softer foam on either side and then the sanding grit on top of that. They also have a shape that provides for a wider end for general work and a thinner end for smaller spaces. I find the shape to particularly good ergonomically too. Each stick has the same grit on both sides and the centre core is colour coded so it’s pretty hard to get mixed up as to which grit you are using. Having used them throughout this build, I can highly recommend them. The grits below are 240 / 400 / 800/ 1200 and then the larger one is a double-sided buffing stick, again colour coded for 3,000 and 12,000. The buffing sticks also come in the same size as the Thinny Sticks. Working through these grits on both the Britannia Metal and the clear plastic, I was able to achieve a mirror finish. Here are the round lenses showing on the right after initial shaping with 240 grit and on the left after final buffing. I didn’t feel the need to go as far as polishing compound. The camera doesn’t do the final product justice! And here are the rectangular lenses Two untouched lenses on the left, a shaped lens and then a finished lens on the right. The Head Lamp lenses were then inserted into the Head Lamp (I used aircraft canopy glue for this to avoid fogging caused by CA), and the Head Lamp epoxied in place on top of the Large Expansion Tank. The Large Expansion Tank was then epoxied in place on its supporting bracket. (The whip holder and whip were also added around this time). And here are the Hand Lamps temporarily installed. They won’t be fixed in place until the model is finally completed. The Spark Arrestor was then added to the Smoke Stack Section and the Smoke Stack Top added to that. The Boiler Top was then added to the Boiler Cap Ring: And the Smoke Stack assembly placed atop that: An almost final task was to add the tires. These are provided as laser cut gasket strips. After cutting the free from the carrier sheet, they only need a light swipe with a 240 grit Thinny Stick to remove the remains of the connecting nubs and then gluing in place around the rims of each wheel. The wheels were removed one at a time for this and the task proved much easier than I first imagined it would be. Once the wheels were replaced, the hub caps were added. At this point, I discovered yet another disappointing quality control issue with the provided kit material – the Fire Hoses. These are supposed to be provided in the form of tubular shoelaces. The idea is that the end of the shoelace is opened up to insert the Hose Nozzles before shaping the hoses and attaching them to the model. A neat idea, except that the kit provided shoelaces are not tubular – they are flat, with nothing to open up for the nozzles. This is another of those extremely frustrating and totally unnecessary errors on the part of Model Expo. I now can’t finish the model until I source some sort of suitable replacement, either from Model Expo or elsewhere. I’m also still waiting on the delivery of the part I need to complete the Boiler Water Level Gauge – held up in the postal system at the moment. Other than these two items, the model is complete. I can do nothing now except wait for replacement parts to finish this off. In the meantime, here are some overview pics. I’ll save the final “glam” shots until the model is finally complete. I'll be back when I have some more finishing touches.....

Looking fabulous Kevin - you are sneaking up on the finish line!

Wefalck, If you follow this link, http://www.scalemotorcars.com/forum/horse-drawn-vehicles/57939-article-1-12-scale-1869-allerton-steam-pumper.html it will take you to Ken’s build of the prototype in brass. Within that log are many pictures of the original, which is in a museum very near to Ken’s home. Towards the end of that log, he shows a test build of the production parts that were cast from his original. In reviewing that log, I saw at the end that a couple of people had found some of the same issues I have had with the kit. Prime among them was forming the boiler walls. Apparently the design was changed and the wall thickness halved - I think I must have an early production kit though with the thicker walls (I did buy this kit as soon as it was released back in 2014).

Apparently not Wefalck. As I mentioned in an earlier post, I believe that the kit designer (Ken Foran) was very faithful to the original, to which he had access.

Another successful day at the “Fire Station” today, with no major issues encountered - for a change! 😊 First up today was to add the Steam Regulator. There was some fettling to do to fit this as the shaft that goes to the Boiler is deliberately left long and needs to be filed back to make a snug fit against the Boiler wall. The Adjustment Arm (on the right in the picture below) is attached to the Adjustment Arm Link (which was installed way back when the Flywheel assembly was added to the Main Frame) with a 00-90 Bolt and Nut. Some dexterity challenges again, but no major drama. Now we start to fill in all those holes in the Boiler Wall, starting with the Rear Boiler Wall. First up, the Boiler Grab Bar: Next is the engraved Boiler Shield and the Brackets for the upper end of the Hose Nozzles. The Nozzles are now fitted. And that completes the Rear Boiler Wall. Now we continue with the Frame Parts, starting with the Water Return Pipes. There is one of these on each side. They are indexed into the lower hole in the side of the manifold, while the other end is simply glued to the face of the Boiler wall. Now the Flywheel Arm and Links are added. Again, there are two of these, and each is comprised of two parts that index together before being glued using the locating pins – one end to the Flywheel shaft, the other to the upper hole in the side of the manifold. I departed a little from the sequence in the instruction manual, only because I thought that access might be easier for some of the parts. So next up, I fitted the Pressure Release Valve – it goes very close to the Steam Regulator. Then it was the Rear Hose Brackets and the Hand Lamp Holders: A series of four Valves are now added, taking care to align the angle of the drain spouts (pointing down and to the left). And then the Boiler Pressure Gauge is added: The Steam Whistle is next: And then the Frame to Boiler Braces. It’s a little hard to see in this photo but the Brace is the diagonal Red bar going from top right of the picture where it attaches to the Frame, to the bottom left where it attaches to the Boiler wall. We now move our attention forward and install the Small Expansion Tank: And then we add the Large Expansion Tank Support and the Seat. These are a little tricky as the Support is indexed into a hole in the Seat and the Seat Legs index into holes in the front of the Water Box. Because these parts will carry the weight of the Large Expansion Tank, they are glued with 5-min epoxy. And finally, here is an overall shot of where we are at as of close of play today. Still a way to go yet, but we are closing in on the finish line.

That’s interesting Wefalck. Given that the instructions for painting these parts called for them to “leather brown”, I’m guessing that they were indeed a stack of leather discs as you noted. When Ken Foran (Xken here at MSW) designed this model, he had full access to the preserved original. I’m pretty sure his design is faithful to that original.

A successful day at the “Fire Station” today, although not without it’s challenges. The Brake System The next step is the installation of the Brake System. Here are all the component parts: We start by removing the wheels, propping up the main frame and front axle, and inserting the Brake Crossover Bar (second from left in the above picture) through the holes in the bottom of the Water Box. These were test fitted when the parts were being painted, so no unwelcome surprises here. We then take connect the Brake U-link to the Brake Link using a pair of 0-80 nuts on the threaded end of the Brake Link. These will be used later on to adjust the length of the Brake Link. The U-link is then connected to the Brake Crossover Bar on the right-hand side of the vehicle using a 0-80 x 1/4” bolt from the inside and securing with a 0-80 nut on the outside. Then we add the Crossover Bar Link on the left-hand side of the Crossover Bar and repeat the connection to the U-Link. Not particularly difficult, though something of a dexterity test. We now need to install the Brake Lever Pivot Arms, Pivot Arm Braces, and the Brake Lever Arms. The Pivot Arms and Braces form a triangle that is bolted to the boiler wall using 00-90 bolts and nuts. They are positioned toward the bottom of the boiler. In this photo, you can see the length of reach required inside the boiler to be able to attach the nuts. Here I decided to depart from the instructions and carefully inverted the entire model so that it sat on the boiler cap ring and was supported at the front end of the water box. This allowed me to access the bolts from the underneath of the boiler. I retained this position for the remainder of the installation. Here is the triangular bracing in place, along with the Brake Lever Arm. Once both Brake Lever Arm assemblies had been attached, we are instructed to add the Brake U-connector to join both Brake Lever Arms to the Brake Link using 0-80 x 1/4" Bolts and Nuts. One problem with that…..the 1/4" bolts are not long enough for the job, as seen in this photo. I had a dig through my leftover bits and pieces from my Pocher car build and found some suitable alternatives. They were slighter larger in diameter at 2mm, so I had to re-drill all the holes, which in turn meant dis-assembling some of what I’d already assembled. Here is the result: While the bolts may now be a little too long, I’m not going to worry about cutting them shorter as they can’t be seen that well anyway. At this point, the misalignment issues discovered earlier came back to play and a little judicious bending of the brake arm assemblies was required. The Main Drain was also inserted while the wheels were off. The pre-drilled hole in the boiler wall was a little too low for it to sit correctly, so I elongated the hole somewhat with a small needle file until I could get it to sit correctly. The wheels were put on, at which point we find another error in the Bill of Parts. The wheels are held on with 1-72 nuts. The parts list indicates that 8 of these are supplied and indeed that is what was in the kit. Only problem is, 9 are required to build the model. By happy coincidence, the replacement nuts I used for the U-connector were just the right size to fit on the axle stub I had previously broken and re-glued. The remaining provided nuts all went on to the cast threads without issue. Here is an overall shot of where we are at today:

Love the home-made tools! Great addition and well done.

Happy to be of service my friend! 😉 And a belated Happy 75th

Nice progress Mark - must feel good to reach that particular milestone.

That’s my intent Mark. Not so much to bleat, but to provide some constructive feedback to help them fix the errors. That’s one reason I’m putting them in my log as I go - will make it easier to pull together at the end.

Thanks again for all the input (and also for the "likes" following along). A somewhat frustrating day in the workshop today. What the…? Prior to tackling the Brake System, the instructions call for three small jobs to be done: finishing the Hoze Nozzles, constructing the Boiler Water Level Sight Gauge, and making the Brake Spring. All three should be simple, straight forward tasks. All three had issues… Hose Nozzles The instructions call for wrapping the Hose Nozzles in the rather nice red thread provided using a Common Whipping. We are advised to take a 36” piece of the thread for each Nozzle to do this. I cut the thread in half and noted that each half was very slightly longer than the prescribed 36”. Good, I thought… Then I discovered that no matter how frugal I was in allowing for the ends and the loop, there was no way that a 36” piece of thread was going to cover the entire Hose Nozzle. After some experimentation and a lot of cursing, I managed to make it cover all bar about 3-4mm at the handle end. Why Model Expo couldn’t have made the supplied thread a couple of inches longer is beyond me. It is not something that I can duck out to a local store to replace either. Very annoyed by this totally unnecessary error. Anyway, here is a picture of in progress showing one Nozzle wrapped and the other pre-wrapping. And here they are completed. You can see in the photo where the wrapping stops short of the handles. It should go all the way to the handles per the instructions and included photos. Boiler Water Level Sight Gauge The Boiler Water Level Sight Gauge is made of a top and bottom cast part, four connecting brass rods and a clear plastic rod. Here are the parts laid out (and yes, one of the top/bottom parts is facing the wrong way). It’s quite a clever construction design, but … The issue here is the diameter of the clear plastic rod. The parts list in the written instructions for this component call for a 3/32” diameter rod. The separate drawing sheet for the clear plastic components calls it out as 0.0625” (1/16”). The part that is provided is 1/16”. The recesses in the cast components are sized to accept 3/32” (as confirmed by test fitting a piece of 3/32” brass rod I had on hand). Really guys? What happened to proof reading and quality control? The most frustrating thing about this error is that I don’t have stocks of clear plastic rod to hand. Using the provided 1/16” rod is a non-starter as it will both look wrong and be difficult to actually construct. I have managed to track some down of the right size through one of my ‘go-to’ Hobby Stores, but it is costing me $10 for a pack of 5 rods, each of 250 mm length (I need one piece 25 mm in length), and then it’s costing me another $14 in postage and a wait of about a week or so. Again, totally unnecessary and very frustrating. Brake Spring The instructions call for you to make the Brake Spring from the provided wire. A simple enough task – what could possibly go wrong? Well, first up, the instructions for this appear in two places in the instruction manual – once on pg 25 and again on pg 42. And these instructions are actually different to each other! On pg 25 it calls for using a piece of 28g brass wire and on pg 42 it calls for using 0.020 brass wire. Well, I looked up some tables and 28g is 0.0126”, while 0.020” is 24g. What is provided in the kit is 0.015” which is equates to somewhere between 26g and 27g. It would appear that the instructions were revised at one stage and one version of this section should have been removed but wasn’t. At least they could have provided the right size wire for one set of instructions instead of neither! At least this was an easy fix. The kit provided wire felt a little too thin for the purpose, so I dug through my stash and found some 24g Copper Wire. The advantage of using the Copper Wire is that instead of painting it black, I was able to chemically blacken it with Liver of Sulphur. The technique is dead easy – just insert a 1/16” drill bit in a pin vise with the smooth end sticking our about 3/4” and then wrap the wire around the drill bit. Form a couple of “U” hooks on the end and job done. Here is the result, test fitted between the Seat and the Brake Pedal Arm. Okay – now I’m ready to tackle the Brake Sysem…

Hey Bob, any progress on this beauty lately? Or did you start another build that you are keeping from us?