The sand pipes are now fitted without interfering with anything. I did get them fitted a couple of days ago but when I added the front bogie they stopped it from moving. I removed the two front ones and moved them slightly further back which did the trick.
DA Princess Sand Pipes FittedDA Princess Sand Pipes Fitted
I mentally kicked myself up the backside and got the sand pipes installed a couple of days ago so yesterday I took a break and made up another couple of Joe Pie inspired tools, which he shows in use in one of his videos.
These were an additional tap spinner which has an aluminium knurled grip but a steel inner so it shouldn’t wear with use. I also made a depth stop to fit over the tap if I wish to only tap a hole to a specific depth.
Miniature Tap depth Stop
The two fit together as above, or you can use them independently as below.
Miniature Tap depth Stop
In the video, Joe showed that he made his in pairs. This is so that he could have a taper tap in one and a bottom tap in the other. Having made the initial example, I still had a bit of material left so I decided to see if I could make a combined tap spinner and depth stop.
Miniature Tap depth Stop
It turns out I could, in the image below you can see the steel core inside the aluminium grip.
Miniature Tap depth StopMiniature Tap depth StopMiniature Tap depth StopsRemains of Die holder after using one handle and part of the casting
Just in case you are wonder what I used to make them I used the remains of one of the handles on the scarp die holder. I put it in the lathe and carefully parted the aluminium where I thought the steel roughly ended (as it happens I could have gone a little further) then having noted how securely the aluminium was attached to the steel core I realised that I could turn the remains of the casting attached to the bar into a round usable piece to make something from and the idea was born. I also have the other side to do something similar from. I can see more tools for even finer taps in the future. Unless I think of another tool to make instead.
Well I have the replacement sand pipes assembled ready for fitting let’s hope I have more luck in fitting these. One pipe is soft brass and the other slightly thinner one is copper.
DA Princess Replacement Sand Pipes
Below are the first ones that I made earlier in the build. I made myself a rod for my own back (if you will pardon the pun) by using hard brass rod for the thicker of the two pipes which when it came to it, was almost impossible to bend where I needed it to go.
Well after fitting the brakes, I have spent far too much time in the last week trying to fit the sand pipes. What’s so difficult you might as yourself? Well they fit inside the frames and they also need to fit in such a way as to allow the wheels and brakes to be removable (the wheels won’t come out unless you remove the brakes). the key issue has been getting the pipes to bend in a tight enough bend to allow them to fit without touching the next wheel along.
In the end I have started again by stripping all the pipe work off the brackets and the plan is to reinstate them with finer soft brass and copper wire. I have cut all the parts and I will share picture when I have them reassembled ready to fit.
Those who joined me for my Gauge O Guild an Evening With Session will have heard me mention YouTuber Joe Pie as someone whom I have learned a lot of techniques and in the past I have made a couple of his shop project tools
Needing a distraction from my current endeavour which has been quite frustrating I decided to follow this video and make another small tap handle. I have previously made one similar to the one that he shows at the start of the video but I made the hole in it a bit big so it’s more suited to larger shanked taps.
As regular viewers of my posts will know I am a great believer in recycling and early this year I bought a job lot of vintage tools from eBay for the princely sum of £7.50 I really bought them for the 3MT-2MT sleeve that was included but there was also a very well made large tap wrench a Moore and wright imperial ruler, a set of sprung external calipers and a couple of 1″ die holders. Of the latter one was very well made and as I have a couple of 1″ dies will come in very useful. The second was a bit battered and had an aluminium casting for the die holder with a couple of 1/2″ steel bars as the handles. This I consigned to the useful bits box and so part of one of the handles became my material for making the miniature tap handle.
Recycled Die Holder
I popped the whole thing in the lathe and being very careful of the large lump in the middle I parted of approx 65mm (just over 2.5″) this allowed a little to tidy each end up bringing it back to a finished size of 62mm or a whisker under 2.5″ .
Then I followed Joe’s steps. I adjusted my hole dimensions to suit an M6 cap head screw so I drilled 5mm for the tapping size, 6.5mm clearance and then 10mm to recess the head of the screw. I drilled until the head was just proud of the end of the handle and then used a 10mm end mill to flatten the bottom of the hole and allow the screw to just sit inside the handle when fully screwed home.
Miniature Tap WrenchMiniature Tap WrenchMiniature Tap Wrench – 12BA Tap
I drilled a 4mm hole in the centre which will take up to a 4BA tap (It might take bigger but that’s the one that I measured as I mostly use smaller than that). Shown here with a 12 Ba tap inserted.
Miniature Tap Wrench
Lastly I heated it up and dropped it into some olive oil overnight to give it a nicely blued appearance – Although I had cleaned it with IPA I went back and did a small adjustment from which I didn’t clean the oil inside out again before the heating. Although I couldn’t see it, this must have created a bit of smoke, which set the workshop smoke alarm off. At least I know that it works.
This seems to be the only shot that I have of the X axis scale in place with it’s chip cover.
Then I mounted the display – you will note that the bottom Z Axis display is reading al zeros this is because at this point I was still awaiting the longer replacement scale.
There are quite a few options for mounting the display you can angle the bracket out from the side of the mill if you have somewhere to mount it. I chose to fix it to the bench alongside.
Then it was onto fitting the Z axis scale. This was reasonably straightforward in that I was able to fasten the scale itself directly to the rear of the column. I confess that I did initially get it slightly too low which reduced the amount that I could raise the head of the mill. Meaning that I had to redrill one of the holes higher up to get maximum height.
I was also able to finally use some of the brackets and mounting plates that came with the scales again fitting to the yoke which raises the head was reasonably straightforward.
What did find was that I had to turn some spacers from aluminium bar to get the alignment between the read head and the yoke so that it ran up and down smoothly without rubbing on the chip cover.
In conclusion, I am really happy with the DRO and now feel confident to do something similar on my lathe at some point. I do agree with Nick Baines comment that having that level of accuracy does tend to get you a little hung up on hitting 0.005 of a millimetre…
Inner cab roof. I didn’t attempt to roll the outer roof without rolling bars I managed to do the inner with just manipulation between my fingers and the edge of the cutting mat.
Connoisseur LNER N10 – Cab Floor and Lockers
Cab floor and front lockers/rear splashers
Connoisseur LNER N10 – Frames
Frames. I had marked and cut out roughly for the horn guides and was painstakingly filing them when I thought it would be much easier to mill them slightly but accurately over size so that I can use my chassis jig to fit them. I also invested in a set of Premier joined rods.
Wow quite some time since I updated this particular topic (June 2019). My N10 has been out to numerous shows since then the last one being the recent Wensleydale Model Railway show at Leeming Bar.
The loco build has moved on quite a way since then.
First as often happens when talking to people at shows – a step in the wrong direction. In my last post I had fitted the smokebox wrapper and I had done a lovely job of it even if I say so myself. However do pop back and have a look you will notice a half etched recess low down on the side. This is meant to be on the inside… Sadly I made a bit of a mess taking it off so had to make a new one from nickel sheet.
The Princess is keeping me entertained to the end.
Almost the last thing to fit are the sand pipes but in order to do that I needed to refit the brakes so that I can work out how the sand pipes will fit around them.
Previously after fitting the 3D printed shoes I had fixed the hangers to the frames via soldered pins with the top of the hanger slipping over a square rod (the holes were etched square) for mounting. Having come back to it I wasn’t happy with that arrangement so I removed the pins and substituted some lengths of 12BA stud instead (cut down screws) next I soldered the square end into the hanger brackets. Then I enlarged the holes in the frames so now I can insert the studs through and put nut on the back to hold them.
A bonus to this approach is that not only will it be easier if a little fiddly to get them on and off the studs will rotate in the frames before being fully tightened so that positioning of the shoes against the wheels will be more adjustable.
Not feeling at my best since the bank holiday I have let this thread slip a little.
So where were we?
The only possible mounting for the read head on the X axis is the end of the Y axis table. To do this I employed a couple more offcuts of aluminium angle these slightly deeper in section than that used on the Y axis read head.
The brackets needed to fit around the Y axis lead screw so needed a bit of shaping
It did take a couple of tries to get a range of adjustment available in all the different elements of the Z shaped final mounting.
Having got this far with the mill assembled I couldn’t put off taking the mill to bits any longer to drill the end of the Y axis table.
As many of you might have guessed by now I am quite keen on recycling/upcycling and recovering usable parts before putting things in either the recycle or waste bins.
This thread has given me a suggested use for some items that I have been collecting from Pump type soap dispensers. I usually strip them down because they usually have a useful spring in them.
Springs recycled from pump dispensers
The springs themselves are not the star of the show here though. As well as a spring most dispensers also have a glass bead, which sitting at the bottom of the spring creates the siphon when pumped.
Glass beads recycled from pump dispensers
What do glass beads and Vallejo paints have to do with each other? Well if you drop a glass bead into your paint bottle they make great paint mixers.
Taking the top off to add the bead is quite easy, take the screw cap off them gently grip the top of the bottle with a pair of pliers and pull. the top will come off.
These are the drawbar options as supplied. I have a confession to make at this stage. I couldn’t find them and had asked a couple of fellow modellers who have the same kit for dimensions. As it happens one was able to supply part numbers and the other the key dimensions.
Then as is often the way, I opened a box where I keep useful bits (actually looking for a piece of plug pin to see if it would be suitable to make a draw bar from) and there on top of all the bits and pieces was the square of etch containing the two missing drawbars.
DA Princess Drawbar – As supplied
While I completely understand why they would be supplied as etches I wanted to see if I could make something more 3 dimensional.
I made a complete hash of my first attempt due to getting the machining operations in the wrong order. I had started by milling and drilling which left the part too weak when I attempted to turn the dog bone section.
Broken Drawbar
This was at the end of the turning operation on the second attempt.
This is the end result greatly enlarged of course. The insulated bushes were made from knitting needles. Sadly the only one I had of the right thickness was green. I did think that I had a suitable grey one but having turned one and subsequently dropped it, it landed with a decidedly metallic click. Further investigation revealed that it was in fact aluminium not plastic so not much cop for insulated bushes…
I took a couple photos of my display stand over the weekend. I reassembled the Princess and took it along. She still needs brakes and sandpipes but she’s getting there.
Demo Display Stand 2024 Wensleydale Railway MR ShowDemo Display Stand 2024 Wensleydale Railway MR Show
The X axis was a bit more involved in that it was harder to get access to even with the mill unbolted from the bench.
First job I found that the slots in the mounting plate were a bit tight for the M5 screws so I opened the slots with the mill.
I also milled the second slot to have vertical as well as horizontal movement as it’s important to have the scales both level horizontally and parallel to the travel of the table for the highest accuracy. As they come one slot is vertical and the other horizontal but being aluminium they are easy to modify with the mill.
After bluing up the rear face of the table I was lucky in that I had recently bought a couple basic C clamps to use for clamping one of my vices and my rivet press temporarily to the workbench when I need to. These fit quite nicely edge on in the T slot so I was able to clamp the mounting plate in position allowing me to move the table to either side of the column so that I could mark it up without removing the table at this stage.
Again, it was a bit of a squeeze but I was able to drill and tap the table without removing it.
The next task was working out how best to mount the reader but I will cover that in another post.
