The second project was the upgrading and enhancement of a Maxitrak steam lorry.  Interestingly it is fitted with a marine boiler and a slightly modified Puffin engine, found in many model boats.  It has been fitted with a attenuator valve to conserve gas.  It doesn’t do too well on any sort of textured surface but it runs around quite happily on a very smooth surface, such as the polished wooden floor of the drill hall where the steam toy show is held.  I wanted to make the lorry into a mobile boat repair shop, that would typically travel around the local boat yards completing repairs and maintenance on the boats.

This is the lorry I bought, again over twenty years ago:

The lorry came with the trailer but I added the boat, which was got me into thinking of the idea of a boat repair lorry.

And what I ended up with.

The scratch built workbench is mainly fitted out with doll’s house bits and pieces but I scratch made the finishing plane.  The floorboards are also doll’s house wooden flooring, given an enamel wash and distressed with a pan scourer.

The grinding wheel and the table saw are both powered via the drive shaft which is turned by the Meccano motor.  The battery pack is inside the wooden cabinet with the on off switch being turned on by moving the tool box.

The rack contains stock wood and a ladder at the bottom so our workman can get in and out of the back.

The transfers were all printed for me by a specialist company after I created the original design in Microsoft Word.

The boiler was clad and then weathered and the lamps are all operational.  The ones on the chassis from the receiver power pack and the ones on the cab from another battery pack under the driver’s seat.

Figures are doll’s house resin figures but repainted.  The roof rack was fitted with tie down rails and the chest on the roof rack is scratch built from coffee stirrers.

Many thanks Colin.  I must admit I’ve never looked at the Model Engineer Forum.  I might have a browse and post the pictures.

Thanks Tim.

Colin, interesting reaction on the Model Engineering forum.  I spend a couple of hours putting together a thread that shows a project that I have been working on for around 20 years and one of the moderators could only come up with three examples of things that he describes as “offensive to the eye”.  I think I’ll stick with Model Boats, a much friendlier bunch.

Hi Ray,  I agree there certainly are some characters out there.  I must admit though I have always been very careful to ensure that feedback is given in a positive way.  Someone has tried their hardest to make something and, even if looks an absolutely awful mess, they deserve to be encouraged to try to do something a little better next time.  I have always believed that we are all at some point on a learning curve.  We all started at the bottom, we are all at different points on it, and none of us will ever reach the end.

One of the hardest tasks when running a large team of engineers is trying to get them to hold their direct reportees accountable  for poor performance.  Performance appraisals were hated by most because none of them could get the hang of discussing those difficult aspects.  I put such a lot of effort into trying to get everyone to put a negative message across in a positive manner.  I still believe that is one of the most important lessons to learn in life.  If you can provide feedback to someone and get a negative message over while putting it across in a positive manner then your message will be received positively and acted on.  Sadly many either simply don’t get it or they don’t think it applies to them.

Over on the ME thread our old duffer is now claiming credit for my own initiative while conveniently ignoring anything I said in my post answering his criticism.  I will forever maintain that “Offensive to the eye” is not putting a message across positively! But there we go, we live another day and move another notch up the learning curve.

As for those who criticise from behind a keyboard but produce nothing themselves, I simply smile and wave at them.