Nick Baines

 

 

 

 

Originally I was assured that the tender was pure North Western, but Harry Jack put me right on that. What we know of Liverpool's tender did not correspond to LNW tenders of the time. It, like the loco, is unique, but much less obviously.

 

From a model point of view, the tender is quite simple to construct. The only real feature of note is the tank sides and ends. The tank is formed with round corners everywhere, including the coal space. I made a skelton for the tank, comprising the top and bottom, separated by various spacers, and tried to wrap the sides and ends around that. Initially, I cut the sides and ends as a single piece, which in the flat was nearly 18 inches long. Over a long session, I impressed more than 1000 rivets using my riveting tool, and then tried to bend it to shape, starting from the back forward, intending to make the final join at the back of the coal space where it would eventually be hidden by a load of coal. The first few bends were quite successful, but gradually, small but accertable errors started to accumulate into large, unacceptable ones, and the whole thing became so unwieldy that the last few bends became difficult to do at all, and even more difficult to do in the right place.

 

So I ended up cutting the whole thing into three pieces, with additional joins at the front of the tank, where there was a join between separate plates on the actual thing, of course. I disguised the joins as best I could, but they are still evident as can be seen in one of the photos. They are, however, less obvious when the tender is coupled to the locomotive.

 

The flare at the top of the tank was cut in two pieces, joined at the rear of the tank. The pieces were initially cut flat, and wrapped around a cone to form the flare. Working out the various angles is not as difficult as it might seem, and I will add some details of the process to this site when I get round to it.

 

To get some more traction on to the driving axle, some of the weight of the tender is transferred to the loco, by making the rear axle of the tender rigid, and allowing the other two axles to float vertically. The tender was also fitted with well tanks between the axles, and the forward tank was filled with lead (after the photos had been taken) to assist in this.

 

The photos show the tender complete except for the axleguards. I used some commercial castings for these, which, with a bit of filing, reproduce the prototype quite well. The spring hangers are a rather obvious and characteristic shape, and these were cut separately from nickel silver and soldered in place on the solebars.

 

   

 

 

Liverpool is now complete and passed its first proper track test without a hitch. Roy Slaymaker's track at Fawley comprises six ovals of varying radius from above six feet to below five feet. Liverpool was designed to handle a six foot radius. In fact it managed the five foot radius track without complaining, although I noticed that the second axle of the loco, which carries no weight, was lifting slightly on the outside rail. Now it is off for a track test at its its final destination where the minimum radius is six feet. Then it will be ready for the paint shop. Following some research by a couple of friends, we are fairly confident about the colour scheme, and the excellent Guilplates have already provided the name and builder's plates for me.