P Class history

A few weeks ago, I was approached by the guy who runs out local club second hand stall to advise him on a couple of kits he'd had passed over for sale.

One was a bit of a surprise - an original P Class tank engine. Just like the one I completed recently.

I think this is an original Wills production from the 1960's. While the body appears to be the same, underneath the modeller is expected to use a cast whitemetal chassis.

The theory is that it's a good idea to supply the scary bit of construction as a ready to use part. The fact that it looks a lot like the solid chassis found under contemporary RTR engines is a bonus in the "not scaring the modeller" stakes too.

On the face of it, this is good. Look, the axles holes are even ready-bushed with brass bearings. How fab is that?

Fabness depends on the lump of metal. Whitemetal shrinks as it cools and although an expert toolmaker can work out how much shrinkage will occur, (using a Shrink Rule) it's not easy. Nor is it an exact science as different thicknesses will change different amounts. To make things worse, even if you unpack a perfect chassis from the box of bits, being a soft metal, twisting during construction, through something as simple as over-tightening the body retaining screws, will turn a sweet runner into a bag of nails pretty much instantly.

Finally, for good running to occur, the holes in the con rods should match the centres of the axle holes. Making the two parts out of different materials just makes this match harder to achieve.

All this explains why we now tend to find etched chassis. While they require construction and effort, the chances are the results will work properly.

The kit? Well, I understand it will be on the L&WMRS second hand stall for about £35, with room for negotiation.

Dirty little tank engine

Parker's rule of painting railway engines says that plain black chuffers lack character. It's only when they show a bit of dirt that the engine comes alive. Arty types would probably go on about pure black not being a natural colour or that to see an engine that small, we'd be separated from it by some distance and this would impart all the colours a bluey tinge thanks to atmospheric stuff.

Personally, I don't care why, all I know is that weathered locos look better than clean ones. Especially if they are black.

My usual methods applied for the P - airbrush fired up, a coat of Humbrol earth colour and a bit of rust under the footplate, Railmatch underframe (in leiu of track colour, come on Humbrol, get a move on with it) dirt all over and then some dark grey and black over the top bits where the soot lands. A bit of weathering powder (the ones you get free with a Hornby mag subscription) on the footplate and smokebox door to add texture and finish with a little gunmetal dry-brushed on the handrails and step treads.

Clean the wheels, glaze the windows with Krystal Klear, add a crew from the people box, coal with real Welsh steam stuff and the job is done.

Freshly painted P

Fresh out of the paint shops, the little P Class is looking rather lovely. The contrast between a satin finished body and matt painted smokebox is particularly pleasing.

The satin is Humbrol satin black, varnished once the transfers have been applied. Looking at my stock of the later, I dug out some old Pressfix which looked about right and for a change, were free of annoying transfer film.

31325 was chosen as the number simply because I found this picture on the web:

Photograph: Mike Morant collection from the Southern e-Group website.

 

It looked about as dirty as I wanted my model to be and while the idea of painting a full pre-grouping livery had crossed my mind, in my hands that was just the path to a world of pain. Anyway, I have far more use for a BR engine. Except if I want to run it on Hellingly anyway but I can live with that.

 

One important point to note is that 31325 received its BR crests early and so got the version where the lion (or ferret) faced the front of the engine on both sides. At some point the international heraldry overlords pointed out to BR that if they wanted to do this, they had to register two different heraldic devices. BR couldn't be bothered to fill in the forms twice for this and anyway, it halved the numbers of transfer designs required so they decided that the beasts head would always face left.

P Class ready for paint

The chassis runs under its own steam. All the bits have been glued to the body. well, apart from the cab roof which is seperate 'cos I'll need to poke a paintbrush around in there.

Those buffers coulds do with a few stokes of the file too. Hadn't spotted that until I looked at the photo. I should get points for fitting the correct set though.

Then it's time to break out the Humbrol.

A OO chassis problem

At the back of the P, there should be a couple of cylinders tucked under the bunker. Casting are supplied for these but I've hit a problem.

A OO guage chassis is quite a bit narrower than scale. The two cyclinders are scale width. Something has to give. Either they breathing in a lot or one of them goes in the spares box.

Sadly, the long horizontal cyclinder will be left for the P4 modellers. It's width is about the same as my chassis narrowness. I don't think anyone will notice.

Making clock hands for steam engine noses

If there is an area of disappointment with the P Class kit, it's the face. A set of moulded clock hand on the smokebox door don't do the model any favours at all.

You've probably guessed that I'm not much of a perfectionist if you've been reading for a while. I'd rather finish a project than have it stall forever waiting for perfection. I'm too impatient to be a great model maker and this loco is being built faster than most as I just want to finish something quickly.

I can't let the cast lump stay though. Normally I'd shell out 4 quid for some smokebox door adornment from Eileen's Emporium. It's not much of an other on it's own though and I won't see them at a show for a few weeks so I'll bodge something nearly as good up myself.

Finescale modelers will tell you different but for most of us, clock hands (Look, I know it's not the right term but it's what everyone calls them) made of the three bits of 0.45mm brass wire will look fine. I know they should taper to a ball at the top of each hand but in 4mm scale this is a tiny matter and if you are looking closely enough at a model to spot this then I'm telling you to get your greasy gricer nose off my train set.

Construction is eased by holding two of the three bits of wire in a set of "Helping hands". One of those tools we all have but rarely find a use for. A dash of solder and flux completes the job. Then the wire is cut roughly to length and glued in a hole drilled where the cast lump was. Finally trimming happens on the loco.

Result - a much nice face. Both on the little engine and on mine as I grin with the pleasure of saving some money.

Boiler fitings

A few minutes with the Zap-a-gap glue and my P Class loco is looking far more like a steam engine.

The castings are pretty good quality. There aren't any serious moulding lines to be dealt with. Nothing more than a quick scrape up both dome and chimney and then a polish. I drilled the later out a bit as although it's not supplied blind, I like some depth there. Perfectionists would probably replace it with a turned brass example but I'm too stingy and not that bothered. It looks all right to me.

At the cab end a little more work is required. The safety valve lever (not the right term but the bit on top) should poke though the front and a hole has to be drilled for this. A square hole would be preferred but I don't have that sort of drill bit to hand.

Either side there are some things with valve wheels on the top - or at least there should be on one side and not on the other. I didn't spot this to start with which is why I have an excess hole in the cab front. I've found the right casting now and fixed this.

Either side of the smokebox, the instructions show some oilers (I think, castings that I can't identify) but photos of both the preserved P on the Bluebell and a Southern example don't show them so I assume this was an early change. A drop of superglue to fill the holes and that's that job done.

Not a Westinghouse

On the front bunker of the P Class is a pump. The instructions point out that this is most definitely not a Westinghouse air pump, even though it looks a heck of a lot like one.

Apparently, it is a steam reverser and is accompanied by complicated pipework and linkages, none of which I have any idea about.

The exploded diagram is not help and the poorly photocopies photos showing this area on the prototype aren't that much more use. It doesn't help that the tiny white metal bits in the box are odd-shaped lumps. Nicely cast odd-shaped lumps with very little flash, but still a bit of a mystery to me.

Squinting at the photo on the box front, I can see that the pipe appears to terminate (on the model) in a handrail knob. I suspect purists won't be happy but I was able to make this work and reckon that a few strokes of the file should see it less knob-like.

The operating linkage is even more of a mystery so I've bodged it as best I can. There's quite a lot of detail going on in this area. Detail that would be easier to fit if the reverser fitted behind the steam pipes without needing to have both back and front thinned with a file. I'll be honest and say my version is fine for a layout loco but were I to build the model for anyone else, it wouldn't satisfy me.

And for those who read yesterdays post, yes I did break out the soldering iron. Those tank handrails weren't going to stay put any other way so I did my new pipework at the same time. I'm done now though.

Soldering - Done

I've reached an important point in building the P Class tank - the time to turn off my soldering iron. No more smelly, hot fumes for me. Just wafts of glue.

The sharp eyed will notice that I've not attached any of the boiler fittings, parts most people would manfully fit with hot metal. There is method in my madness. Superglue makes a decent strong joint, at least if you use good stuff like Zap and not something from the pound shop. The joint can be broken if required, or more likely, if the model is dropped or badly knocked.

Then, the part will come lose and be easily re-fixed. Normally I don't even have to repaint the affected area.

Of course, this is a bit of an excuse. Truth is, I've got fed up with soldering. This is a hobby and so if I want to glue bits on then I will. Sometimes, I'll do the whole thing with the iron, other (like this time), not.

What a rebel I am.

P Class cab

Wills have endowed the P Class with more than the usual number of location aids. Despite this, when I started assembling the locomotive body, I still managed to get the tanks slightly out of line with each other.

The great thing about whitemetal kits is you can usually put the bigger bits together dry to see if they fit. Then a little tack soldering will make sure you are right. Finally, the joints can be made properly with a seam if you feel the need.

From all this I concluded that it made sense to make the cab up as a sub-assembly. A couple of pegs were nipped off the bottom and the whole thing built up on my soldering slab.

One of the problems with this material is that on emerging from the mould it shrinks. Skilled modelmakers allow for this when making the master. Someone didn't do it right with the bunker back and I found if I wanted everything square then this was just under 1mm too narrow.

Not to worry. With everything else in place. a good fillet of low melt solder filled the gap. There's more work to do but it's all together. Even if I were gluing this kit together, I could have filled the gap but solder just makes life quicker, if a bit more "entertaining" when working with thin and meltable materials !

Will the motor fit ?

That's the question that I always ask when building a small model locomotive. The P is tiny and yet the gearbox seems massive. Before progressing the chassis too far, I thought I ought find out.

Fitting the footplate ought to be easy but it seems that there has been a bit of design tweaking in the kit. That chassis is about 2mm too long. Not to worry, there are some half etched lines on the frames where it should be shortened.

This done, everything went together. Then I noticed that the drawing showed the front bufferbeam should be opened up to accept the underframe. A new beam is supplied to cover up the hole. I will never get to be a finescale modeller...

Anyway, the very detailed backhead fits nicely into the back of the boiler. Place the unit in position and one end is floating in mid air. Look at the drawing and realise that the cab floor has to go in to provide support. Fit this and all is well.

The extended shaft sticking out the back of the motor has to be shortened. Proper modellers use a cutting disk or needle file. I use a big pair of Zebra wire cutters. OK, so the cut shaft pings off around the room at Mach 2, but otherwise I can't see a problem. Indeed, the disk or file will heat up the motor shaft and right next to the plastic end of the motor too. Any comments on why I should do what I do would be appreciated.

After all this, the motor and gears will fit nicely. Once the firebox sides are in the chassis, I might trim the gearbox a little to hide it but otherwise there is loads of room. I don't know what I was worried about.

A running P Class chassis

The Hobby Holidays jig shown a few days ago might seem like an extravagance. It's hardly cheap and you really can do without it. Railway modellers of yore happily soldered locomotives together with irons heated in the hearth with nothing more sophisticated to aid alignment than the Mk 1 eyeball and a try-square.

I don't care.

I have assembled chassis the same way and at the point you see me, I'm fiddling with things trying to make wheels rotate without tight spots. Not this time.

Maybe it's practise. There is still some skill required even when using the jig. Who cares, the chassis worked first time. I built up the gearbox, which required no adjustment (a rare thing to be honest) and dropped it into the chassis. Drive in in the rear axle because there is a chassis spacer in the way of the gearbox if I want to use the middle. That might change depending how well the motor fits into the locomotive body.

Anyway, I built it and it worked first time. If I sound smug then that's because I am. Don't care who knows it either, regular readers will know this doesn't happen often so I plan to enjoy it!

Not losing little bits (hopefully)

This is me being clever. Working in a plastic box lid while assembling a model railway gearbox.

This is fiddly work involving very losable screws and bearings. While I obviously can't solder in there, at least anything dropped should stay and not vanish into the deeper recess of the workbench. A gurbscrew, especially one from a gearwheel, is a real b****r to find even on a reasonably tidy bench. Well, I imagine it is, my work area can only dream of being tidy...

Did it work?

Sort of. I still managed to lose one of the motor grubscrews but that had performed it's usual trick of attaching itself to the motor thanks to the laters magnetism. It actually worked inside the thing which meant I couldn't find it for a while despite expecting this.

Never mind. As a plan, it worked. Perhaps perfection is a padded box. Or room maybe.

What's that bracket doing?

Just when I thought things were going well with the P Class, there is a snag.

The instructions were followed. I was impressed with the chassis design. Then I put the wheels in and the rods on.

And when I spun them, the rods clonked a bracket.

After a bit of head scratching, I couldn't see where I'd gone wrong. Surely that nice Mr Rice, who has written much about kits being assembled before they are inflicted on the paying public, can't have messed up can he?

Whatever, the simple solution was the unsolder the offending bracket and chuck it back in the box of bits. If it's absence offends me later, I will modify it and put it back. For the moment, scale fidelity loses out to rotating wheels.

Now, why did they allow so much side-play?

Being a project butterfly

David asks: I follow your blog with great interest and note that you are starting another loco build. What happened to the TT gauge class 25 diesel that was on your blog ? The chassis and most of the bodywork were described but it would be nice to see it painted.

Good question.

At the moment the loco is sat in a box with all the other bits of the kit. A box it's sat in since January. As you can see from the photo, the model isn't looking bad.

So why have I started something different ?

Because I am a project butterfly. I flit from model to model, alighting on each one for a few moments before fluttering off to have a go at something else. I've always been a bit like this - juggling projects both as hobbies and work. If I stay too long on one job I get bored and since this is (mostly) a hobby, I flit when I feel like it.

I know this isn't the way to get anything done and I apologise if you've been reading and wish I'd crack on with something. Mind you, if you feel like that, do drop me a line as David has bumped the 25 back up the list. Sometimes it's nice to know people are interested. Also, it makes me take another look. I'd forgotten just how good the 25 was looking and how close it might be to completion. A bit of underframe, some grilles and it could go into primer and then paint.

The P Class has been kicking around for a while and I think it will be a pretty quick job. At the moment I need something that gets done and gets done fast. There is pleasure top be had from doing a job like this fast. Hopefully I'll see some changes pretty quickly and that will spur me on to do more.

The other, duller reason, is that it will get me ahead with blog posts. I've had a few magazine projects floating around for a while and there are more to come. Some of these will pop up hear but most won't. Thus, if I want to keep posting daily (it's a good discipline for me) then a project that progresses fast will help me out.

So, sorry if you are waiting to see me finish something. I know that the right hand sidebar contains a few stalled builds. I will get around to doing them. Railway modellers should consider themselves lucky. There is a Brede lifeboat that I planned to complete over 3 years ago. And then the Beetle 7 years ago. And my campervan needs to get MOT'd...

Getting jiggy with the P Class chassis

First job on the P - make the mechanical bits work. If the wheels don't go round then anything else is a waste of time.

Setting up the Hobby Holidays jig requires the conrods to be made up. Interesting as there are several options for this. I've gone for the simplest, a fixed rod with no flex. You have to break a few bits off the etch for this but they are half-etched for ease of removal.

For a simple 6-wheel chassis, there is a lot to this beastie. I'd expected 2 or three spacer, I've got 7 including replicas of the inside cylinders. By the look of it I can even represent the slide bars and stuff is they don't interfere with the axles.

The bolt sticking out of the top is a clever addition, access for the screwdriver is via a hole in the bottom of the cylinder block. In fact the whole design, by Iain Rice I think, is pretty clever. There's some good thinking gone in to this and it's accompanied by a reasonable exploded diagram. I think I've got it right but time will tell.

P Class

It occurs to me that I've not featured a loco build on the blog for a while. It's also been a while since I've built a model for me and not with the intention of it appearing in print. Sometimes, it's easy for this not to be a hobby.

Anyway, my chosen subject is a Wills Finecast P Class tank. I bought the model years ago. While not something I'd normally consider, the P's were the only class of steam loco passed to work over the Hellingly Hospital Railway.

I think they were only passed at a time when BR was trying to explain how much work would be required to bring the line up to scratch if they wanted real engines rather than lines own electric one to handle services. As far as I know, a P never traversed the hospital tracks.

Anyway, the kit is whitemetal with a nickel silver chassis. Wheels are Romford and there is a motor and gearbox in the packing. At the time I bought the model, probably because it was cheap, I picked up all the bits to make it work. With a bit of luck, this will be a fairly quick build and a bit of fun. It's a lovely looking little loco anyway.