On the Bench - HOn3 Madness Pt 3 06/21/2020

Happy Father's Day to all of the Dads out there, I hope you had time to relax and enjoy. This evening we are back at Making Couplers Fit. First, the low bar: the Stock Car. 

Since I only need to make draft gear box lids, I'll repurpose some of those recently purchased.

As it will be held in place with only 1 screw, a couple of dabs of white glue to keep it from rotating. Why not just screw it down tighter? Makes the coupler bind....but it all fits, clears, and works with little modification. 

How about the Tender for #375?

I needed to carve out the end sill I fabbed for the kit to allow the box to remain at the correct height after shimmimg with one layer of Styrene sheet. I can only use the rear screw as the foreward one risks breaking outvthe top of the aforementioned sill. And once the truck is mounted, will that brass wiper hit the screw and cause a short? Hope not, fingers crossed. 

Rotary OM Tender next.

It already needed some shimming, and also suffers from the same sill clearance issues as 375. 

And of course, the screw I CAN install is directly under the axle,  so much so that....

Yes, that's daylight under the wheels. I see some dremel grinding in my future, but not tonight.

High side gon. This needs more than just shims. You need to fill in the space between the center beams to give the screws something to bite. Sheet styrene to the rescue.

Now to layer some larger pieces to get the height right.

Of course, I went too thick, ruined it trying to thin it down, and will have to start making a new shim from scratch. Tomorrow. 

On another note, I might have found a product that could work on the caboose, but that will be a separate post.