The Home Machinist!

Hello Jack,
To see, understand and build as a model - that it is The idea how to do the job is another story yet,
Keep on going your way and please show it to us - we modelers are strongly interested

Best regards
asteamhead

Thank you Harold and Andy! Yes, we are still well here but things are going at a slower pace now due to my age of 75:( Just now I am doing some maintainance work. First I changed the blast pipes of 9 mm diameter in favour of a pair of reduced diameters of 7 mm. This measure should increase both draf...

Helo friends! Work will not end any soon! Many of the numerous parts of the tender's clasp brake were made by water cut now :D. Some bolts are to be welded to the ends of the cross bars yet. Some more levers are to come. The brake shoes will then be made as prints or of oak wood (as done before for ...

Thank you Steamchris, Berkman and Jack! Indeed, we had a lot of fun there :) . No difficulties nor derailments with the brand new tender trucks occured :D. And we were glad to show the HT-stoker working continously to the swiss steam friends once we found the right mix of anthrazit and soft coal. Th...

Thank you RussN! Hello steamers, With both trucks ready now and mounted under the A tender, I traveled towards Bouveret CH with my friend Raps last week. They held their anual international meeting (www.swissvapeur.ch), a generous combined 5 " and 7 1/4 " track. The tender now equiped with...

Jack,
Almost crazy
asteamhead

Hello friends, All parts are done, just 2 leaf springs are missing yet. The axles were finished by turning the tappered shafts before the covers were mounted. The first truck is ready for use now :) . A load test by about 300 pounds showed some spring action but very low side motion for good stabili...

Hello friends, Some more photos how I built the SKF cover plates of the axle boxes. Maybe helpfull to other modelers? The (sand-) casted covers made of bronze needed some final precision work. They are sealed by means of an O-ring and hold the outer race of the ball bearing in position. Like the pro...

Hello friends, I´m so sorry for I used wrong nos. :? : The used fits were 10 times bigger than written in my last post of coarse, meaning more standard - 20 to 30 µm resp. + 10 to 15 µm. The press fit for the wheels by the way is + 20 to 25 µm (about 1 / 1000 of the shaft diameter). The smallest pre...

Hello friends, Time again to report some progress. Now, the axle boxes are completed. The axles are turned with precise fits for both the wheels and the pair of ball bearings. I decided to construct slide fits (- 2 to 3 µm) for the outer races and medium press fits (+ 1 to 1.5 µm) for the inner race...

Hello friends, Time to show some progress. First, all the 12 axle boxes were turned, milled and tested by use of some tools in several steps from raw rings of bronze. Starting with the fit for the ball bearings of 32 mm diameter and the front surface :idea: , they were turned and centered again. Thu...

Hello Jack,
What an achievement to construct, prepare and not at least have produced all those superb investment castings
I envy you to have all those parts in stock now
Please have us informed this way regarding your progress in making parts, thank you!
All the best by
Asteamhead