The first stage after de-burring is to solder a screw to one crosshead half, I used 188 degree solder. I then filed the screw head down until the slot disappeared. The instructions tell you to assemble the crossheads and con. rod onto the slidebars held together with a piece of blu-tack to aid soldering the second half of the crosshead in place. All good advice which of course I ignored. I just bolted the two halves together with the con. rod between them, made sure everything was square and that the con. rod moved freely and the crossheads slid easily along the slidebars, then put a drop of flux on the screw thread, placed a tiny chip of 145 degree solder on the thread then a light touch with the iron secured the nut without soldering everything up solid. (I did try soldering the nut to the crosshead - I managed to solder the whole assembly up solid and had to strip it down and clean it up. Thank goodness for desoldering braid! I live and learn...). The thread could then be cut down and the nut filed down as much as I dared.
Here's a pic. of one assembled crosshead/con.rod and the components of the second;
It was my intention to make both up together, but I managed to lose one crosshead half when it pinged out of my pliers across the workbench, never to be seen again despite a fingertip search of the surrounding area. Brian supplied a spare, which arrived the next day! Superb service!
A side view;
Running just gets better and better, but then its done a fair mileage running around an oval of Egger-Bahn set track on the sideboard!
The piston rods are stainless steel pins and the advice is to glue the head of the pins to the crossheads with a drop of gel cyano, which I'll do during final assembly after painting.
Thats all of the mechanical work done now, time to decide which loco to model and think about the bodywork.
Paul.
It's looking great. Your description of the assembly is fascinating and helpful. Thanks also for the tip about the desoldering braid, I had actually seen this but didn't know what to expect. Can't wait for the superstructure!
ReplyDeleteI substituted brass dressmaker's pins for the stainless ones as the piston rods and soldered the joint, as I was not confident of the long term security of cyano in this application. It will be interesting to know your experiences after a time of operation (if you do follow the kit advice....)
ReplyDeleteTim Sanderson
Thanks for the comments, always appreciated.
ReplyDeleteIain - I'm still deciding whether to model an actual loco or just build it as a typical quarry loco. Desoldering braid is usefull stuff that some may not have used or know about, hence the post. It made cleaning up the crossheads easy and hassle free!
Tim - I was planning on using epoxy rather than cyano but I may just consider brass pins now. Stainless would however have the correct shiny steel finish for piston rods. Perhaps the answer would be nickel plated brass pins with the plating filed away on the heads to aid soldering?