Table of contents for Issue 4718 in Model Engineer

Great Central Railway The Great Central Railway is trying out a new timetable for its award-winning heritage trains. The aim is to encourage visitors to visit the locomotive footplate and meet the driver and fireman. Trains run between Loughborough and Leicester North and when they reach their destination, the heritage steam or diesel locomotive moves to the other end of the train for the return journey, a process known in railway slang as ‘running round’. General Manager of the Great Central Railway Malcolm Holmes said, “We know so many of our visitors now have no direct memory of steam locos when they ran on Britain’s railways but are still fascinated by them. By changing our timetable and allowing trains to wait for longer at Leicester North we want to encourage…

Continued from p.701, M.E.4717, May 19 We will now make a start on machining the cylinders. Obviously, I have not done this myself so the photos are all supplied by others. The full size cylinders are blind bored from the front and, as I said in my last article, I am making mine bored straight through. You can choose for yourself what you do with yours. I have co-opted the assistance of Geoff Whittaker for the photos of the machining as his were much better than mine. The B1 cylinders are not the same as my Class 4 but the methods Geoff used were, I thought, very good. Before I get into that, a few words on tenders and I would just like to illustrate the tender which John Bruce…

Introduction Fire Queen was designed and built using modern boiler manufacturing techniques, which may be daunting for some builders or, more likely, club boiler inspectors. When our esteemed editor asked me to scribe a piece on a copper design for Fire Queen I was delighted to sharpen my pencil and draw up a few sketches for the readers. It's a matter of pride that when I put pen to paper for a construction series, it is to describe something I have actually built. This specific boiler, I must confess, I have not built, simply because I don't have any spare body parts to sell for the silver solder and copper. All the tips, tricks and methods, therefore, are either hard learned experience from one of my earlier copper boilers or…

June 1 Guildford MES Open day, 10:00-13:00. See www.gmes.org.uk 1 Sutton MEC Bits and Pieces evening 20:00. Contact: Paul Harding, 0208 254 9749 2 Rochdale SMEE General meeting, Castleton Community Centre, 19:00. See www.facebook.com/RochdaleModelEngineers 4 Bradford MES The Big Lunch, Northcliffe, noon-15:00. Contact: Russ Coppin, 07815 048999 4 North Wilts MES Public running at the Coate Water Railway, 11:00-17:00. See www.nwmes.info 4 Small Model Steam Engine Open meeting. 14:00-17:00. See www.gmes.org.uk 4 Taunton Model Engineers Public running, Vivary Park, 14:00-17:00. See www.tauntonme.org.uk 7 Bradford MES RC loco competition and evening running, Northcliffe, 19:30-22:00. Contact: Russ Coppin, 07815 048999 7 Bristol SMEE Talk: Lynton and Barnstaple Railway, Begbrook Social Club BS16 1HY, 19:30. Contact: secretary@bristolmodelengineers.co.uk 9-11 Cardiff MES Welsh Rally at Heath Park, Cardiff. Contact: secretary@cardiffmes.co.uk 10/11 LittleLEC 2023 Hosted by…

Continued from p.675 M.E. 4717 May 19 Creating vacuum The heart of a vacuum brake system is the means of exhausting the air from the train pipe and reservoirs. This is readily achieved using a steam driven vacuum ejector. The principle of operation of this device is shown diagrammatically in fig 8. The author has developed ejectors to operate at 21 inches Hg in various sizes and they can either be made or obtained from trade suppliers (fig 9). These are reliable and economical on steam. Air compressors For an air brake system, the choice of air compressor is more of a challenge. It depends upon either being mechanically powered from the prime mover or being battery driven. Compressors for the electrically driven option can be purchased and, although not…

My visit to PEEMS - the Pickering Experimental Engineering and Model Society - was an eyeopening experience in as much as I have never before had such a wide variety of engineering artefacts and equipment presented to me by club members as I did here. Indeed, I had a veritable model engineering exhibition put on just for me, such that I did not know what to look at first! It was an incredible display of everything from full size vintage motor cars down to small oscillating engines, all presented in the most professional way. Before we get onto the details, a little about the club itself would be appropriate. PEEMS is a club that does not own any land or buildings or have any sort of railway track on which…

Introduction Why again I hear you ask, well this is the third round of articles I’ve written on the subject in the past 40 years or so. Not that I’m obsessed, but I do find them fascinating, and Mr Gates keeps on changing things making it difficult to get some old computer models to run. The earlier articles were either flawed (ref 1) or full of complicated maths (ref 2). With more widespread availability of CAD software a lot of the design can be done very accurately by drawing, although some maths will be unavoidable. For the more difficult bits little standalone computer programs are available. I have also included some more obscure valve gears. Terminology Figure 1 shows a schematic cross section of a double acting locomotive cylinder with…

Published by The Crowood Press, 2022 ISBN 978-0-719841-20-0 £19.99, 175pp, hardback Small stationary engines never lose their fascination for model engineers and Steward Hart has written a step by step guide to making three attractive examples. These designs have previously featured in Model Engineer and are reproduced in book form for the first time. The author trained as a toolmaker and then worked as a manufacturing engineer. He uses some of the methods used in project engineering, notably work planning, that could benefit model engineers too. That’s a subject not much featured in other instruction books and articles. There is an early section on steam engines introducing the main types with a guide to the common parts. Details of different types of valve such as piston, slide, rotary and Corliss…

Photographs and Drawings: Theo Aerts, Thierry Fayt, Cris Vande Velde Continued from p.708, M E.4717 May 19 Materials We dismantled our old railway track and all 6 m rails were recovered, while an extra 120 m were bought. Many meranti wood sleepers were also reused, as well as the fish-plates. Screws, bolts and nuts were not recovered. New fish-plates were laser-cut as necessary. With the exception of the switches, all tracks of our railway were equipped with steel rails and meranti sleepers (10 per meter). The four rails are transversely connected to each other every half meter with an M8 threaded rod and accurately cut tube spacers. At these points they are also attached to the concrete beams by means of a bracket. The beams themselves are cast in weather…

As in the lost chord, I am seated this day at the keyboard, weary and ill at ease, when all at once light came streaming through the window, it is the East (and Horncastle is the Sun). Also spracht Zarathustra, practising his preamble for this edition of Club News. In this issue: food to go, pink Meccano, another auction, a tram, a garden railway? a rood screen and a Vauxhall motorbike. UK Men’s Sheds Association sets the gears meshing in their March issue, with ‘Where’s Jack?’ If a member misses two meetings, someone will contact them to ask if they are OK, would like help? I know this happens in many model engineering societies but it is a useful programme for general adoption. They also briefly mention the Rail Stay…

Continued from p.711 M E.4717 May 19 In the late spring of 1985, the Uckfield club’s new railway at Bentley Wildfowl Park and Motor Museum has officially opened for business. With his Rob Roy also finished, and the O-Level examinations a fastreceding memory, and with the school summer holidays now in session, the sixteen-year-old author had settled down for two months of late mornings and intensive lethargy. This, however, did not last long. Summer holidays I am, it appears, utterly incapable of relaxing; at least in the sense that most people interpret the word. Do nothing? I can’t. Sit still? I fidget. Empty my mind? A thousand thoughts run through it. To reiterate, I am not one of life’s relaxers, at least not in the classical sense, and by the…

Continued from p.680 M E.4717 May 19 QR Code 6 - www.youtube.com/watch?v=XPZ9uNM4DyM Cylinder and cover Now you are going to create the cylinder and cover. Dimensions of these parts are shown in fig 36. To help drawing these parts I suggest watching the video from QR Code 6 or search for 'Onshape offset tool' on the Internet. Step Cy1 - Create a Part Studio and sketch fig 37. Use Top plane. Step Cy2 - Extrude 26mm from your sketch leaving the hole for the piston. Step Cy3 - Create a new sketch on the port face to locate the steam port and pivot holes - fig 38. Step Cy4 - Use the Hole tool to open the steam and pivot holes as shown in fig 39 and fig 40. Let's…

Introduction It all started when I rewound an old washing machine motor to give me a two speed motor of nominally 4-pole (1500 rpm) and 8-pole (750 rpm) speeds, which was described in a previous article (ref 1). Once I had rewound it and it worked, I built a dynamometer to test its performance (ref 2). Having then installed it on my lathe (photo 1) I decided that I really should fit a proper nameplate to it, to give the illusion that I had designed and built it properly. The nameplate design I had carefully drawn the layout of the nameplate using a low-cost drawing package (DeltaCad® - usual disclaimer). The only problem with this is that the package does exactly what it says on the tin (well, in the…

Continued from p.691 M.E.4717 May 19 The BHLR has lower-quadrant semaphores, shunt discs and colour-light signals. Semaphores and shunt discs The ten semaphores and four shunt discs are operated by 24V DC 12 watt solenoids from RS Components (stock number 346-356 - now discontinued and superseded by 905-9941). These have a resistance of 48 ohms (photos 7 and 8). Arm 'on' proving Each signal is proved in the ‘on’ (danger) position by a small microswitch operated by a cam-plate fitted on the spindle. If the arm is more than 10 degrees below the horizontal, the proving circuit is broken. For fail-safe reasons, the microswitch pops out when the signal is on, being pressed in when the arm moves away from horizontal. Colour-light signals Until recently, the lighting was by 24V…