October 2025 Forth and Clyde Area Group meeting

Late autumn sunshine greeted Alisdair, Alastair, Alastair, Simon, Graham, Jim, Stuart, John and northern visitor Tony at Almondell for the monthly 2mm group meeting. After the flurry of the Scottish mini-meet two weeks ago, this was a calmer occasion, with quite a lot of work apparently under way.

Alisdair proclaimed Mearns Shed was open for a running session... except that nothing would run. Nothing for it but to get busy with the tools and multimeter. Point blades seemed to be a repeat offender.

Once normal service was restored, Alistair took the opportunity to do a bit of route (and controller) learning.

Stuart was working on a Peco bridge kit.

Alastair had Solidworks open - no, it's not Templot! - laying out a turnout for his South Queensfery project. His mojo was apparently fortified by the mini-meet, to the point of joining MERG in order to make his own DCC controller. 

Chris has moved on from his Raithby 4F to a L&Y 2-4-2T kit (Nigel Hunt, I think) on which he planned to made a start. The first problem was to tell the fold lines apart from half-etched features. This took some puzzling over prototype photos. By the end of the day, however, he'd satisfied himself which were which.

Jim worked on his own etch for a signal post for Dunallander. Overetching had caused a pivot plate to fall off the post, so he set about fabricating a replacement.

Simon had started on a rake of Caledonian bogie coaches picked up at the mini-meet Bring and Buy.

He also had had a response to his plea for Gresley observation car prints and was working on two of them.

Much concentration evidently required. Or was it brute force?

Some running of locos on Mearns Shed did actually take place.

Meanwhile, Graham worked on extracting dimensions from photographs for a station building, and John asked questions about his planned J39 chassis build. All in all a busy meeting.

Graham had also been to the North East Area Group's recent monthly meeting at Bournmoor, which featured Nick Mitchell demonstrating use of his Chinese watchmaker's lathe and gravers to turn 2mm parts - for the demo, he chose a bogie pivot. The demo was much enhanced by the video camera projecting his actions onto a large screen. The camera also almost entirely blocked Nick's view of what he was doing, which made it all the more impressive. Nothing bad happened and the part was successfully produced!

The lathe is a China-branded version of the same design sold in Europe under the "Vector", advertised as an inexpensive precision lathe (a complete setup costs over £5k). The China version requires some fettling but costs much less, and the accessories can be acquired over time. Nick mentioned the importance of a smooth motor - he uses a Chinese example, but the countershaft which transmits the drive to the lathe headstock is second-hand.

Nick explained how to grind (with an oiled India stone, which is grey, and a roller guide to get the correct angle) and hone (with a dry Arkansas stone, which is white) the graver to the correct lozenge shape, with a slight top rake on one edge (that's it next the red mark: the graver is upside-down in the photo):

He makes a quick dimensioned sketch of the planned part, with a work sequence, so he can refer to it as required and concentrate on the machining. The work is roughed out using a conventional lathe tool in a lantern toolpost, then the graver is used to slowly finish the part to the required dimension, working with the graver on a smooth-edged flip-over toolrest and its "lozenge" face towards the workpiece, plus a loupe to see detail when required. Dimensions are checked with digital calipers and once satisfied, the workpiece is parted off using a Swann-Morton scalpel blade (repurposed for the task with a grinder, then honed). The use of saliva as lubricant on brass, and 2.4mm-shank drills held in a collet in the lever tailstock, was noted.

Things finished with the famous NEAG Big Tea, which was Graham's real motivation for going to the meeting. And it were champion! Munching and chatting took priority over snapping, so no photographs. Go for yourself and see.