How I constructed one of my 3D printed Southwold Railway wagons

Since acquiring a 3D printer (see How I assembled my Anet A8 clone printer) and the skills to draw my own models (see How I drew a Southwold Railway wagon with TinkerCAD), I have been steadily drawing and assembling Southwold Railway wagons and coaches. I have made the .STL files for these models available on the Garden Railway Forum website for anyone who might be interested.

For my own sake, I have tried to make the assembly of the parts for the wagons fairly straightforward, but have decided to show, step-by-step, how I go about their construction to avoid any confusion.

Once all the parts have been downloaded, sliced and printed out, they will need some cleaning-up and the holes in the axle boxes might need to be opened up with a 3mm drill bit.

 I then start with the chassis. 

Firstly, I glued one of the spacers to the end of one solebar, in line with the headstock. I use the grid on a cutting mat to make sure the parts are square.

Then, a second spacer was glued to the opposite end of the solebar.

The second solebar was then glued to the other ends of the spacers.

If you are using the 32mm spacers, at this point you need to glue the small conversion pieces behind the ends of the heastocks on the two wagon ends. 

One of the ends was then glued to the headstock on the chassis.

I then glued the other end to the other headstock on the chassis.

One of the sides was then glued between the ends, ....

...... followed by the other side.

NOTE: When using parts printed with PLA, I use thick superglue and an activator spray to speed up the setting time of the glue (a few seconds rather than a minute or more).

I then either measure the size of the floor and cut it from 2mm thick plasticard or print out the floor piece .......

..... and glue it into place.

Sometimes, I then glue another spacer across the middle or leave this until after I have fitted the wheelsets - it depends on how much the W-irons on the solebars flex.

The wheels are then fitted into their axle holes in the axle boxes.

The brake shoe and hanger was then glued to the floor so it was positioned just behind the pivot of the brake lever and in line with the adjacent wheel.

I then glued the buffers to the headstocks. I have a simple jig to ensure that they are mounted at the correct height to be in line with the buffers on the rest of my stock. You may have different mounting heights or wish to use chopper couplings.

Once the buffers were glued on the wagon was ready to roll.

Like me, you may need to add your own couplings. I have my own, what I like to think are less obtrusive version of LGB hook and loop couplings and so mount these on blocks glued beneath the wagon floor.

I am slowly drawing and printing all the styles of wagon and coaches which were found on the Southwold - including the 6-wheel coal wagons and coaches. I will eventually make these available on the Garden Railway Forum website (once I have perfected the 6-wheel pivoting chassis to my satisfaction).