Stuart Firth
Well at last we are nearly ready for paint. The chassis took me a lot of fiddling time, chasing down the odd intermittent short and working out how to secure the motor. Then there was dremelling inside the body to make enough clearance for the flywheel. The trailing axle runs only with its own weight, which seems to be enough on my 3′ radius curves. Some lead in the smokebox brought the centre of gravity close to the middle of the coupled wheelbase. Brakes are from the scrap box, as was the smokebox door wheel. Bowen Cooke buffers by Gibson. Safety valves are Tri-ang. The other odds and ends slowly added up, and there is a simple cab interior from a London Road Models casting and some plasticard. Time to quit while I’m ahead and the loco is still running. A prototype has been identified which was at Edge Hill in 1947 and wasn’t motor fitted as far as I can tell. I have never gotten the hang of soldering white metal so that front buffer beam is super-glued on and I will forever be expecting it to fall off!
