{"id":1694,"date":"2019-05-30T11:48:13","date_gmt":"2019-05-30T11:48:13","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/ngtrains-com.stackstaging.com\/blog\/?p=1694"},"modified":"2023-01-12T09:47:31","modified_gmt":"2023-01-12T09:47:31","slug":"playing-trains-new-models","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/ngtrains.com\/blog\/playing-trains-new-models\/","title":{"rendered":"Playing Trains & New Models"},"content":{"rendered":"

It had\u00a0 been the plan that my next jottings would have been about my trip to Wales driving trains at the last bank holiday but, as is often the case, having skived off for a few days I came back to a load of catching up that precluded sitting at the PC and writing for pleasure. I\u2019ll include a bit about that trip at the end [so you\u2019ll either have to read the rest \u2013 or scroll to the bottom].<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a>The thing that is filling all my time at the moment and causing more than a little anxiety is the plan to launch our new Townsend Hook Body kit at the 7mm NGA Convention in less than two weeks. When we made that public, it looked like we had loads of time but with the date approaching its looking incredibly tight.<\/p>\n

Until Friday it looked like the critical item were going to be the brass castings. I had a bit of a panic when I phoned the caster to discuss timescales and the first thing he said was, \u201cI\u2019m on holiday next week\u201d.\u00a0 Anyway, a cunning plan was hatched that actually gives me next week to get the waxes done.\u00a0 Taking advantage of the 3D printer we\u2019re doing things a bit differently.\u00a0 Traditionally, you made a master, they made a mould from it, in that mould they poured wax and made many wax replicas of your master and added runners, made a ceramic mould around the waxes, burnt the wax out and poured molten metal in.\u00a0 The new way is to print the multiple waxes using a castable wax resin in the 3D printer.\u00a0 That sidestepped that critical item, at least for now.<\/p>\n

Having done the design for the parts in CAD the first thing to do was to print them in ordinary resin (cheaper) to make sure they print and fit the model when done. Attempt 1 showed some opportunities to improve the designs and attempt two printed them successfully.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a>Given that the printer normally runs unsupervised and there are other things to develop I set off two print the final iteration of the loco body and a further revision of the hopper wagons. The plan was that it would print these overnight whilst I post processed the detail parts and checked their fit.\u00a0 The printer had other ideas!\u00a0\u00a0 It also waited until support had knocked off for a long weekend.<\/p>\n

The problem turned out to be that the fingers in the left image weren’t contacting the pads in the middle and right images. The pads are on the resin tanks and allow the printer to identify and control the tanks.\u00a0It looked like printing in the standard grey resin is off the cards until Tuesday. Tuesday two things happen that should restart progress, support is back, and new supplies of resin and a spare tank arrive.<\/p>\n

Luckily, they don\u2019t get bank holiday Monday in Germany, so support was on the case on Monday and by Monday evening we were able to print in the standard grey resin. Unfortunately, the different tank used with Castable Wax resin still refuses to be recognised. \u00a0\u00a0This has been diagnosed as a tank fault and a new one is being sent but its going to go right down to the wire as to whether the waxes for the brass components for the Fletcher Jennings kit can be done in time.<\/p>\n

Launch Day & Taking Advance Orders<\/span><\/h3>\n

Plan A was not to take advanced orders for this model. There were two reasons for this: –<\/p>\n