Tanat Valley 3 by Peter Drost
Dapol Mark 1 Coach Conversion by Richard Carr
The original article source on Western Thunder is Dapol Mark 1 Coach Conversion
I received my Dapol Mark 1 Coach today, a green BSK. Green as this is the only livery available at the moment and the main point of obtaining one is to see how easy or difficult it is to convert to S7.
I'm sure though that plenty of you would like to see one even if it is going to stay fine scale.
I have to say that I think the coach body is excellent. It really captures the look of a Mark 1.
There is some good interior detail, probably more than I would put in a kit built one and the side profile is very good.
Get to the under frame and it's not quite so good.
It's not bad - the dynamo is good size and the brake detail representation isn't bad either.
But get to the bogies and it's not so good. It is ok from the side but there is little of the frame details. For the price I'm not complaining. I think these are excellent value for money and it has working lights too.
The main reason for me posting this though is “how easy is it to convert to S7?”
That depends on how you do it. I tried some Peartree wheels first. This would work except that the distance over the centres of the wheels is about 1mm too wide so although you can force the bogie back together the wheels won't turn.
For the bogie on the right I have reused the supplied finescale wheels. These are reasonably close to S7 being 3.5mm thick with a 1mm flange. They run ok through my test track, so this is an easy cheap conversion as you can easily change the back to back to 31.2mm and this nicely removes what I consider to be excessive sideplay in the bogie for finescale.
I then tried some Slater’s wheels. These need some additional bearings and the pinpoint part of the axle needs to be cut off. I made my bearing from some 2.5mm outside diameter tube drilled out to 1.9mm internal diameter; these need to be about 4.5mm long. These then slip over the ends of the cut down Slater’s axle and fill the bogie bearing nicely. Ideally it would be nice to get some proper bearings machined up, but these will do for now.
I'll certainly be getting a good few more of these in maroon and blue and grey.
Or you could use the Dapol-Slater's axle from the S7 Store which is a Slater's axle with the pinpoint cone and axle length of the Dapol axle. Fit the D-S axle with Slater's S7 wheels and the resulting wheelset ought to fit into the bogie without further work. I say "ought" because there is no guarantee that the Mk1s have followed the design specification of the wheelsets which are fitted to the GWR Autocoach, the current PO wagons or the BR standard wagons/vans.
Item X710040S (Dapol replacement wagon axles) is in the online catalogue.
To recap, the item is produced by Slater’s for the S7 Group (so not in the Slater's catalogue) and is available only from the S7 Group. The axle has the same pinpoint cone and overall length as the axle made by Dapol and fitted to (at least) the GWR Autocoach, the BR vans and opens plus the PO wagons which use the Lionheart underframe design (rocking beam behind solebar). The centre portion of the axle is the same length as the standard 0-FS/S7 axle from Slater’s hence fitting Slater's S7 wheels to the D-S axle gives a S7 wheelset that fits Dapol stock (as noted previously) without modification to the Dapol product.
Cautionary note - the D-S axle is not usable with either the HAA wagon or those Dapol wagons which were designed before the merger of Dapol and Lionheart. I have no knowledge of compatibility of the D-S axle and the Dapol bogie bolster/Turbot/brakevans.
Since the first post I have now converted one bogie by drilling out the Dapol brass bearing to 2.6mm so that the Slater’s top hat bearing will fit inside it. Just drill gently through the bearing into the side frame by say 1mm you will see the swarf change colour to silver.
You then need to chop off 2mm from each end of the Slater’s axle so that it fits. Don't waste your money paying for additional axles that you don't need.
I would also advise you to check the back to back of any Slater’s coach wheelset with a GO gauge as they tend to be a tiny bit on the narrow side.
A couple of maroon BSKs turned up this morning.
I wouldn't read too much into the colour as the phone camera I have used has not captured well at all, it is quite a bit darker than this and a bit more maroon, to my eyes anyway.
Some more lovely coaches though, I just need half a dozen SKs to go with them.
My BSK in green arrived earlier this week.
Green not quite right in the photo but, to my eye, spot on in the flesh.
For those contemplating converting these to S7, I decided to convert the 2 maroon BCKs by adjusting the back to backs and retaining the existing wheels. This is how to do it.
I couldn't move the wheels while still in the bogie so I had to take off the bogies and remove the wheels
The first thing to do is to remove the 2 nuts holding the electrical contacts in place.
Then remove the big screw and you can take out the bogie, the brake wire will pull out of its location hole with a gentle tug.
Then remove the screw on bolster that is holding the sideframe in place and the wheels will then drop out.
Once you have the wheels out use a decent sized pair of pliers to hold the axle and the wheels can be pulled further apart. I prefer to overdo it and then use a back to back gauge to set the correct back to back distance.
I like to put everything in a vice and press the wheels firmly together to get the correct back to back.
I then tried running these on my layout through a cross over with a single slip in it. Both coaches ran through OK a little bit jumpy in a few places and not as smoothly as the green BCK which has Slater’s S7 wheels fitted, nothing derailed either being pulled through or pushed through.
Personally, I think fitting replacement Slater’s wheels is the best option; the green BCK did run noticeably better than retaining the finescale wheels.
I've just received a couple of these coaches, very pleased with them.
Here's another approach to converting to S7 using Peartree wheels and bearings.
File the top hat bearings already fitted to the bogie sides flush with the frames. A Peartree top hat bearing will fit into the hole but, before fixing, shorten the length so that the top hat is flat against the bogie frame. Do this for all four and then glue them in. I used Loctite retainer fluid. The Peartree axles are a little wide. I removed about a millimetre from each side so that, when inserted into the bearing, the hub of the wheel just makes contact with it.
Reassemble and check for free running. You may need to shorten the axles a little more.
Done!
I took a couple of my Dapol Mk1s to the Love Lane layout yesterday here are few pictures.
The first thing to say is that I have not weathered the roofs yet. I concentrated on the underframes and ends.
I also added very dilute dirt mixture to the door frames and then removed most of it, a similar thing with the opening windows.
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