I have been enjoying myself today working at my watchmakers lathe.
I made the chimneys for four of the Sharp Stewart 2-4-0T/2-4-2T locomotives on the Southwold Railway.
The chimneys are very slender; very tall and with a slight taper - the locomotives look somewhat as if designed by Rowland Emmet (The Early Morning Milk Train cartoons).
I have already completed one of these locos barring a few details and together with these new ones I will have the stock for my narrow gauge 'pi' scale model railway.
The photo shows the chimneys on a standard cutting mat with a 1 cm square grid, to give an idea of size.
Domes
This shows the four domes in varying states of completion. I start by flycutting the base to make the surface match the boiler top. I bore a hole and mount the blank on a stalk (bottom left). Then I form the shape of the dome using the cross slide and then a graving tool to form the shape. The dome is then soldered onto a piece of bar the same diameter as the boiler for shaping the flare with tapered round and half round needle files. Following that a section of round bar the same diameter as the stalk is turned down to form a spigot (top left) and soldered into the mounting hole to locate it on the boiler (bottom right).
Tool boxes
These were made by milling the ends of short sections of bar held upright in the milling machine and then parted off on the lathe.
All the turned parts.
These are now ready for fitting on the loco bodies. The large flat cylindrical parts are the smoke box doors which plug into the etched front of the smoke box and through into the boiler. Also included are the safety valve bases with 14BA screws to represent the springs. The columns and levers will be added when I attach them to the locos.