Here is a very interesting little chassis. It has sat in my workshop for a couple of years while I decided whether to keep it or not. I came by it when a very kind gentleman in the Swindon area responded to a request that I had placed on my website for castings for Les Warnetts 3 1/2" gauge 'Lew' design. I have an incomplete set of castings for that loco which I have had for a number of years and I was hoping to find the missing castings.
The gentleman gave me a call saying he has a chassis that had been started by a fellow club member who, as so often happens, had sadly passed away. I went to view the chassis and as I looked at it in his garage my initial thought was that it looked a little short compared to the frames that I had.
My instinct proved to be correct as when the chassis was measured I found that it was about 20% shorter than the original design in all dimensions. All of the castings that have been used are also smaller than the original design so there was nothing from this model that I was able to use to further my collection. This does of course make it a little more manageable for those who are short on space or who have tighter radius curves to contend with.
The cow catcher and coupling have been removed from the front buffer beam as the chassis has been stood on end for storage. A lot of the links for the Joy valve gear have already been made so I dont think that there is too much machining left in order to have an air running chassis.
There is rust on most of the bare parts but these has been regularly coated in WD40 and as one of the bottom pictures shows the connecting rod cleaned up very quickly with a quick brush with one of those nylon matted scrubbing pads available from all good supermarkets. With the connecting rods in place on both sides of the chassis it rolls along nicely with no tight spots. The pistons are stiff in the cylinders and require attention. A water pump runs off of the leading axle and there is another eccentric which is probably there ready to be connected to a lubrication system.
