Cab Interior Yankee Tank

Yankee Tank cab interior

The boiler backhead can still be removed for detailing, which is now complete, and for painting at a later stage. The bunker has been filled with Milliput modelling putty along with a strip of lead which I like to distribute judiciously about the engine. More Milliput will be added to build up the coal level which will then be topped with real coal.

The vacuum ejector pipe can be seen entering the cab on the right hand side, below the window, where it makes a sharp left turn along the cab front plate, then left again over the backhead to loop and join the Gresham and Craven driver's brake valve, a very fine casting I acquired from Hobby Horse Developments. On the left, under the window, you can see the operating handle for the front sanding mechanism; to its right is the handle for the rod and crank blower control which is mounted on top of the backhead.

Cab Interior Yankee Tank.

The hand brake is mounted to the left of the coal hole and the rear sanding mechanism operating handle is to the right of it. The constraints imposed on the cab width by modelling in Finescale have left an uncomfortably cramped cab with little room for the crew who will have to be carefully designed to fit. Though the large cab roof suggests a spacious cab, this is not the case, it's minute!
A metal plate to fit the floor has been inserted into the cab to which wooden planking will later be added.

Yankee Tank Backhead

This disembodied view should clarify the arrangement of the backhead fittings and its associated plumbing. The fine quality of the cast brass fittings from Hobby Horse Developments can readily be appreciated in this view. In my last post I left the vacuum ejector protruding into the cab at very much a "loose end", joining it to the driver's brake valve seemed the best and most plausible solution to the problem, I hope you'll agree.