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Manufactured by: Just Like The Real Thing, Pete Waterman Ltd., The Open Studio, County Hall, Belvedere Road, London SE1 7PB. 07939 014069 http://www.justliketherealthing.co.uk |
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Built by Raymond Walley © Raymond Walley - All rights reserved |
Contact me here.
In May 1998 at an exhibition I bought, on a whim, the Malcolm Mitchell kit for
the Manor. Propelled by an urge to build something bigger after completing the
517 and remembering my own experiences of these superb engines working hard in
BR days.
I also invested in having the boiler pre-rolled, the firebox ready shaped and
Malcolm's lost wax brass prototype crank pin nuts, all well worth the little
extra cost. Consequently, a large package arrived a few days later with the
parts for the Manor and 3500 gallon tender.
Resisting the temptation to begin building I put the kit of parts away and spent
a couple of weeks simply studying the construction notes and gathering
information about the class.
A letter duly went off to the late proprietor of Len's of Sutton for photographs
and a copy of "Locomotives Illustrated No:114" dedicated to Granges and Manors
was obtained. I spent ages going though every book I possess (not a small
number) cataloguing pictures of Manors at work. A drawing from the NRM was next
and set of Slater's wheels came after that.
All this money and not an iron turned on in anger yet! However, this was only my
second foray into 7mm locomotive building in almost 30 years and I wanted to build a model of an
actual locomotive, as I did with the 517, and to get it right. Eventually I
decided upon 7805 Broome Manor because I had pictures of it from both sides at
about the same period.
So what does one get in the large and sturdy box?
The engine comes as one sheet of nickel silver for the frames, motion and bogie
and three of brass for the remainder. (The tender is all brass and is really a
separate kit with its own book of instructions and exploded diagrams.) A
comprehensive booklet of instructions, a couple of bags of lost wax brass,
copper and white metal castings, various screws, washers and bearings and a
collection of various gauges of wire. There are also four sheets of exploded
diagrams and numerous detail drawings in the instruction book.
The instructions contain a parts list and it is well worth checking that all the
items are present. With several hundred parts it is easy for a couple to be
missed. However, my experience of Mitchell Design kits is that missing parts are
speedily and courteously despatched.
How does it compare for dimensional accuracy? Every dimension I have checked
against the drawing is spot on, especially the boiler so that its slender shape
and large gap between it and the foot plate are faithfully preserved. It is the
only kit I know of for the Manor that is a truly accurate portrayal and not a
compromise. A sadly underrated kit in my opinion. Particularly when one
considers the chequered career these locomotives had in BR days.
Eventually I got around to actually starting work and began with the frames as
recommended in the instructions. I made the rear axle the driven one since the
chassis is designed to take a Portescap RG7 motor vertically in the firebox and
I happened to have one in stock.
I had originally intended to use my preferred method of power using a 6 volt
motor, batteries and infrared control and got as far as mounting all the
necessary batteries in the boiler. However, my chosen period keeps receding into
the past and is now to circa 1910, in those circumstances a Manor would clearly
be an anachronism. Instead I decided to build it using conventional track power
to a Portescap, with a view to "letting it go" one day. It actually did go,
unexpectedly, at Telford 1999.
I dislike pickup's, wire pickups are fiddly and get bent out of shape, while
plunger types introduce unnecessary drag. Doug Thomas suggested using an
American method of picking up from one side of the loco and the opposite side of
the tender with an insulated coupling between them. To do this required
committing violence to the wheels by shorting half of them out. This was
achieved by drilling into the back of both the rim and the boss and carefully
soldering a wire between them. Very easy really and it worked a treat however, I
have since discovered, for a different project, a product called Electolube
silver conductive paint that does the job excellently.
The chassis was started first as per instructions and it really does go together
very well indeed. All the parts fit where they are supposed and in no time at
all it seemed I had a smoothly running compensated chassis. It would be just as
easy I suspect to use full springing and the chassis also has sufficient extra
parts to build to Scale 7 standards. The bogie is an excellent representation of
the real thing too
The ease of construction of the kit is, I think, largely down to its excellent
design. This is not to say of course that one shakes the box and it all falls
together. It requires serious work and attention.
I made the cylinders removable because otherwise removing the front drivers is a
fiddle and it simplified removal of the motion as well. Fitting the full brake
gear is straight forward and it was worth taking the trouble to fit fine chain
retainers to the beams as well. I used some fine silver chain obtained for a
couple of pounds in a cheap jewellers, just be careful how you solder it!
The instructions suggest soldering the smoke box, boiler and firebox solid onto
the foot plate but I was concerned about how the painter would cope. Instead I
modified the construction so that the boiler barrel, soldered to the smoke box
was separate from the firebox.
Holes were drilled in the end pieces of the boiler barrel and the firebox before
building those parts and 10BA bolts soldered in the boiler side. This allowed
for the firebox to be bolted in place with 10BA nuts. The firebox and boiler
barrel are then bolted as a unit into the back of the cab. However, for this I
soldered some hefty brass strip to the inside of the outer firebox former and
tapped four 10BA holes that matched holes in the cab back. Bolts then hold the
firebox fast while their heads are hidden behind the back head.
The smoke box mounting was also similarly beefed up with 2mm thick strip and
tapped so that it could be bolted to the footplate. Some rearrangement of the
fixing holes was required on this frame stretcher since it was necessary also to
bolt the cylinders in place as well as provide a fixing for the bogie. It made
for a little extra work but the more components I can make removable the better.
This made subsequent assembly/disassembly work and painting very easy.
The only down side to this is that the when disassembled, the footplate is
somewhat vulnerable since it is a delicate set of etches but it is unlikely to
be taken apart very often.
I experienced no problems with this kit and replaced very few parts (Carl Legg
loco screw couplings for instance) but had fun making the buffers between tender
and engine sprung.
Anyone with a modicum of patience and determination could build this kit,
indeed, I am surprised to find so few of them on BR/WR layouts. Despite being
few in number I remember seeing them all over the Western region in my spotting
days, usually, unlike the one I built, very dirty and unkempt.
It was sent in works grey to Ian Hopkins (Click this link to see more of his
work Ian's Gallery) who painted and lined it for me in
ex-works BR lined green livery (in Great Western days they were plain green) and
so it was at last finished in September 1999. I no longer own this engine
since it was sold that very same September. The photograph gives some idea of
how impressive the finished kit looks. If you model God's Wonderful,
particularly BR period, then go and get one and give it a try.