How many parts?

Norman's version of The model

Inspired by our friend, Norman Brown, who recently built an immaculate red/green version, of this model, first built by  Burt Love and featured in his book Model Building in Meccano published forty-two years ago! Norman's version is pretty much a faithful representation of the original. As ours is to be the subject of a guess-the-parts competition, it has been strip built. The competition, to be held at the NELMC Exhibition next weekend, details HERE.

The other competition we will be running next weekend is the guess the number of brackets in the jar challenge more details of this can be found HERE.

Strip-built beam engine, front

I set Ralph to work on the boiler. The original used the Meccano boiler but that would have been too easy. The boiler is built around two 12-hole rings, each made up from two 7-hole strips bent into a semicircle and overlapped by one hole at the joins. 9-hole strips were then bolted around them to to form a cylinder. This is then capped top and bottom with wheel flanges to make the top and bottom of the boiler.

Strip-built beam engine, back

While Ralph was busy with the boiler, I set to work on the main body and frame of the model. I set the flywheel one hole higher than the original and used a small bush wheel instead of a double arm crank as the strip building method of construction meant the clearances were reduced. I might have a go at rebuilding that end after the exhibition but a lot of unseen support will be needed and that would make estimating the number of parts used much harder and I think a little unfair. As it stands most, and probably all, parts are visible. My model is not powered as it stand but I my fit a motor when I have a go at rebuild the base after the exhibition.

Sue.