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Website: www.slsv.com.au
Sept/Oct 2014
BIG WHEEL NEWS
PAGE 2
SEPT/OCT 2014
PRESIDENT’S REPORT
As I write this newsletter members can be enjoying the rebuilt middle road of the ground
level 5” gauge track This has been a mighty effort from all concerned and extremely well managed by Dave S. who of course did more than just manage the project but was actively involved
in the concept, design and construction. Well done to all!
Plumbing work has now become conduit installation; replacement of the old signal cable
conduits is now nearly complete (I don’t know what our Wednesday workers will do in a month
or so) and Lance is well advanced with the first stage of new signal wiring and electronics installation. This step is the first stage of installation of the rebuilt point operators and eventually
the mimic panel in the signal box
The gardens are looking good for the coming spring. Bill has been very busy with planting, fertilising, watering when needed and generally providing TLC around most of the site, as
well as consulting with the school gardening group who have almost finished redeveloping the
beds on the eastern side of the ground level track. Richard and Dave have been completing the
edging around these beds. It all looks great!
As the hot water service supplying the clubhouse and toilets decided to spring a leak last
month a decision was taken to replace the old gas storage unit with an instantaneous gas unit.
This will prove to be a more efficient system because we don’t use hot water very often
On a personal note I can report that after many years in construction my 3 ½” gauge
“Jubilee” (the Martin Evans design) has been issued with a boiler certificate. It is as yet unpainted but the plan is to run it a little to iron out any teething troubles and then dismantle it for
painting.
Chris, a recent visitor to our club gathering, gave an interesting account of his time as a
fitter apprentice in the last days of steam locomotives in the UK. His talk was illustrated with
some photos of current restoration work and some shots of how things were in earlier times.
I sign off hoping all are well and wishing those that are not a speedy recovery.
Doug
SEPT/OCT 2014
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BIG WHEEL NEWS
Lines from other Lines
Starting with the Sydney Live Steam Locomotive Society there are some good reports,
with photos, of the many running days and visits to other clubs. We then find a comprehensive
article “Boilers, Copper versus Steel” where the writer compares the steel boiler which ran in
his Fowler 0-6-2 for approximately 20 years until making a copper boiler for the same loco.
Newsletters were received from Box Hill and Loddon Miniature Steam Locomotive society, both of which contained their local news along with a few photos.
And last of a small lot is from Hornsby Model Engineers where one can take in a lot of
Switzerland in part 2 of “Swiss railways in Winter”. Following on are many photos of the club
“D Day”, the “Hot Pot Run” and finally photo at Rowans Rd on the 2½″ track.
A2’s forever,
Keith H.
BIG WHEEL NEWS
PAGE 4
SEPT/OCT 2014
A Mystery Solved
For quite a long while the club has been in possession of a 2½″ Gauge 2-6-0 locomotive. The origins of the loco had been lost in the mists of time. The locomotive, as it turns out,
had been built by the late Reg. Stamford. Below are two photos showing the loco in use. The
photos date from 1941, it is believed.
SEPT/OCT 2014
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BIG WHEEL NEWS
A Reflection on Model Engineering 1940 to 2014.
As I looked at the old photos of the 2-6-0 Locomotive on page 4 of this newsletter, I reflected on Model Engineering in the 1930’s and 40’s, compared to our present situation.
Started as research to thumb through some old copies of Model Engineer Magazine from the
30’s and 40’s.
Lathes were of simple design, almost invariably belt driven, often flat belt. Many lathes
had an overhead countershaft arrangement. Machines frequently being treadle driven. Many of
the more basic small lathes didn’t have facility for screw cutting. Brands like Zyto, Drummond
Portass and Adept. Many of the lathes still offered tool rests for the use of chisels. In Australia
we had a few brands of locally made lathes. Many of them may well have been out of the price
range of Model Engineers. We had Hercus, Blakenbury & Austin, Qualos, Advance, Primo,
Veem and Parkanson and quite a few others. Some of these machines would most likely, not
have fallen into the hands of Model Engineers until they had outlived their usefulness in industry, after which time, they were within reach of the Model Engineer’s pocket. Milling equipment was seldom seen except for vertical slides.
A Super Adept. “Super” you may ask?
Yes, this is the Deluxe version. The basic one had a tool rest. No saddle, cross
slide or topslide!
Tool sharpening was often done with the hand powered geared grinder. The quicker
you wound the handle, the faster the grinding wheel rotated. I don’t know how many of us
have attempted to grind a tool with one of these things but, it is no mean feat! They mostly had
nasty grey grinding wheels which had never seen a wheel dresser. Trying to accurately grind a
lathe tool that was being held in one hand, the other being busy turning the crank handle of the
grinder was difficult to put it mildly.
Tool bits were mostly Carbon Steel, High Speed Steel being a costly luxury. Carbon
Steel toolbits are actually as hard as High Speed Steel ones, but they cannot handle heat, and
had to be run slowly to keep an edge. They had to run at half the speed of High Speed Steel.
This works out under perfect conditions, machining mild steel at about 50 Feet per Minute.
Anyone wondering where the term “High Speed Steel” comes from, should realise, this is a
comparative term. Such tool bits are high speed compared to carbon steel!.
There were a few small hand operated shaping machines available such as Adept and
Barlow which were very versatile. I have used one of these things and it is quite hard work and
painfully slow.
BIG WHEEL NEWS
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SEPT/OCT 2014
A Reflection on Model Engineering 1940 to 2014. cont’d
An un-named anonymous
hand operated shaper.
The liberal coating of
dust truly reflects the
amount of use this machine has had recently.
Motorised bench drill were rare. Sometimes they were home made, often they had a
crank handle and were powered by the operator. Often, hand built ones were of the “sensitive
drilling machine” type.
When you wished to silver solder or braze, the Kerosene Blow lamp was pressed into
service. Soft soldering was much more frequently used in model building. A blow lamp flame
is hardly a precision flame so delicate work was difficult. For boilers, brazing hearths and
multiple blow lamps were used.
A lot of home made cutters were used, the material most often used for cutters was silver steel or other types of High carbon steel. Manufacturing your own drill bits was frequently done, generally straight flute spade type bits. In many ways Model Engineers had to
be very skilful, as, often the tools had to be made before the job could be made.
It is well worth while reflecting on the sort of conditions very old models were built under.
Many people complain about the demise of Australian machine manufacturing, but in
reality the sort of machinery we can purchase out of China and Taiwan, would have been beyond the wildest dreams of the Model Engineers of yesteryear. Most would regard an electrically powered screw cutting lathe with power cross feed the norm. Along with a bench drill
or pedestal drill. An electric bench grinder would round out a normal model Engineers workshop these days. We would have at a minimum some sort of LP gas torch and an assortment
of measuring instruments. A drill mill or better is common place.
These days it is possible to have all sorts of parts laser cut or water jet cut, fittings easily purchased of the shelf and all sorts of fasteners easily obtained, especially due to the internet enabling us to source supplies from overseas.
Many of us have opportunity to retire early to pursue our hobbies, probably a much
more common scenario than in days gone by. Maybe the pendulum is starting to swing back
the other way again. I guess that is one of the great consistencies of life, the fact we will have
to endure change!
Greg R.
SEPT/OCT 2014
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BIG WHEEL NEWS
Refurbishment of the SLSV Flagpole
At left, flag being brought down.
Below, Flagpole down.
Pole in steaming-up bay being painted.
The flag pole re-erected.
BIG WHEEL NEWS
PAGE 8
SEPT/OCT 2014
A Bit of a Rebuild. Part 3
Even though I had all the bits made the axle sets were actually done one at a time as follows. The first one done was the center driving axle. They all pressed apart fairly easily and the
only pin was a scotch key into the end to lock the cranks in place.
The wheels were refitted and then one crank was refitted. The crank on the other side was
made a loose fit suitable for loctite. The 3 axles were then replaced into the frames and the connecting rods put back on. This created a sort of jig with the cranks on the 2 old axles positioning
the ones on the new axle.
Once the loctite set the rear axle was dismantled and refitted in the same way again using
the other 2 to reset the cranks. Finally the front axle was done in the same way.
When all 3 were complete and everything was going around nice the cranks were re
pinned to prevent any future movement. Drilling the holes for the pins was interesting because
the cranks already had a half hole in them. I ended up doing it in the mill with a small end mill
going fast. It worked out OK.
With the driving wheels back in place and the bogies back on all the pipework could be re
installed. Much of it needed to be replaced as it used to run along that free space inside the
frames but that was now full of wheels so the pipework had to go somewhere else. Much of it
ended up between the wheels where there was now, more space.
The original lubricator was heavily re worked and actually got cut into two halves. It became two single pumps instead of one double one.
The pumps are now mounted to the oil tanks and are operated from a single shaft that crosses
between them. Drive is from one of the pump eccentrics via an intermediate arm that shortens
the stroke and helps support an otherwise long rod. The pumps are a bit like a sootie laid on its
side. In the picture the pump pistons are yet to be fitted. A cam pushes them in and a return
spring pushes them back out. There is an O ring gland to seal them. Delivery lines come out the
bottom of the pump body.
SEPT/OCT 2014
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BIG WHEEL NEWS
A Bit of a Rebuild. Part 3 cont’d
In the next picture all the bits are back on and the chassis and you can see the new
layout of things. I have tried to make it look like it was built this way rather than modified.
All that is needed from this point is the pipework and the boiler can be re fitted. Modifications were also made to the brake gear to enable a hand brake to be fitted. I like hand brakes.
Much more convenient than the old poker through the spokes and that is hard to do when your
wheels don't have spokes. Before refitting the boiler I wanted to repaint the top of the firebox
area where the paint had failed. The nice people at Morgan’s paint shop were happy to match
the existing paint even though it turned out to be a bit more complicated than first thought.
He did ask me to leave it and he would call me and he did call me several hours
later to inform me he had done it. I am pleased to report the new paint matches in perfectly
with the old. In the end the dome and cab, the top plate and tank inside faces also got a freshen
up. I have put a sample on the notice board if anyone is interested.
In the final picture for this installment the boiler is
back on and work is under way to alter the smoke box end
of things to allow for the fitting of a westinghouse pump.
Mine will pump water. This is the same modification that
was made to the full size when pumps were fitted for their
new braking system. In order to fit the pump you need access to the smoke box for the pipework. They achieved this
by moving the top covering plate back level with the end of
the boiler to allow the upper half of the smoke box to be exposed. The top plate was shortened to suit. I was also able
to reuse the chimney skirt which was salvaged and re
shaped to suite the curve of the smoke box.
By Steve G.
To be continued…...
BIG WHEEL NEWS
PAGE 10
SEPT/OCT 2014
Creamy Chicken and Vegetables
1 BBQ Chicken
700gm Potatoes diced
700gm Pumpkin diced
300gm Carrots sliced
420ml Can Condensed Chicken Soup
2 Cloves Garlic crushed
1 Large Onion finely chopped
300gm Bacon sliced
300mls Thickened Cream
2 Cups Frozen Corn & Peas mix
Remove Chicken from bones. Boil or steam vegetables until just tender.
Sauté Onions and Bacon and Garlic in pan, then add cream and soup. Bring to boil, reduce heat, add vegetables and chicken.
Cover and simmer for 5 to 10 minutes until heated.
SEPT/OCT 2014
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BIG WHEEL NEWS
Coming Events
Oct
5th
6th
4 ~5th
18 ~ 19th
Public Run
Committee Meeting 7-30pm
Bluescope All comers weekend.
Western Districts Live Steamers 46th Birthday Run
Miniature traction Engine and Road Steam Rally, Clare SA
18th
Gathering 12-00pm and club run
24th~26th Diamond Valley Birthday Run
26th
Working Bee
Nov 1st
2nd
3rd
15th
30th
Lake Goldsmith Steam Rally
Public Run
Lake Goldsmith Steam Rally
Committee Meeting 7-30pm
Gathering 12-00pm and club run
Working Bee
Dec 6th
7th
8th
20th
Christmas Dinner
Public Run
Committee Meeting 7-30pm
Gathering 12-00pm and club run
Jan
Gathering 12-00pm and club run
Committee Meeting 7-30pm
Working Bee
17th
8th
25th
Please Note: Committee Meetings are now held on the Monday immediately following
the Public Run.
Standing Invitations
Every Thursday - Silvertops Day at SLSV, 9.00am till whenever.
Last Sunday most months - Official Working Bee and BBQ lunch at SLSV.
But, do not forget the unofficial working bees which are held every Sunday morning (other than
Public Days and the "Official" Working Bees). You may not get a free lunch at these but some
essential work does get done and they are quite sociable occasions!
Please Note: We believe in sharing the joys and knowledge of this great Hobby so, unless
otherwise stated, the articles contained within this journal are NOT copyright protected and
may be reproduced.
Due acknowledgement to Big Wheel News will, however, be appreciated.