Model engineering specialist Markits is not quite a cottage industry, more a semi-detached house vocation (in Watford), as Mark Arscott has a top-specification sliding-head turn-mill centre in his extended double-length garage, which was made bigger in order to accommodate an automated bar feeder.
By making full use of the flexibility of the 14-axis Citizen M16 machine from Bushey-based Citizen Machinery UK Ltd
(www.citizenmachinery.co.uk), Mr Arscott has turned his hobby as a railway enthusiast into a thriving enterprise supplying very accurate and authentic model-train parts that span N-gauge (9mm track width) to Gauge-1 (45mm track width). These parts are frequently sent to enthusiasts world-wide — including some high-profile celebrities.
Mr Arscott is particularly well-known in his field and has often been called in as a consultant by model manufacturers of international repute to advise on engine and carriage design — such is his knowledge, his access to historic records and, in particular, his very strict attention to detail. “I feel very fortunate to have one of the very few businesses that is almost recession-proof. Anyone interested in model railways can really cut themselves off from day-to-day problems and still enjoy their pastime, even when things get very tight.”
Mr Arscott is so busy — and enthusiastic — that his Citizen machine is run unmanned through most nights, as well as the early hours of the morning. He is also fortunate in having a supportive wife, who helps with the books and fulfills orders; he also has understanding neighbours. “That said, the Citizen is so quiet that — apart from the occasional rattle of protest from a bent bar — no-one outside of the garage knows when it is running, even in the absolute stillness of the Watford night.”
The machine produces hundreds of different train and rolling-stock parts, including assorted bearings of different shapes and sizes, buffer housings, axles and crank pins — in batches up to 100,000. Last year, Mr Arscott produced a batch of 70,000 crank pins; and with stocks of these depleted, he ran off another 27,000 to complete an order. He says he could not produce these parts effectively other than by using the Citizen.
An early interest
Mr Arscott has not been a turner — or even a machinist — all his working life. He started work as a farmer, went to Australia in 1967 and then joined the merchant navy as a steward, returning to the UK in 1972 to gain his ‘ticket’ as a radio officer. Spare time at sea enabled him to continue his railway-modelling hobby, which started in his train-spotting days in the 1950s. While at sea, he used the on-board machinery and ‘borrowed’ material from engine-room spares to produce various miniature components. After some 20 years at sea, he joined BT and spent the next decade devoting his spare time to the preservation of main-line steam locomotives.
It was while seeking to replicate a particular pattern of miniature-locomotive driving wheel in 1993 that Mr Arscott had the opportunity to create Markits and market diecast model-railway wheels. By 2001, Markits was expanding fast and Mr Arscott’s wife indicated that she would appreciate the return of her dining room and hall; this resulted in the construction of a new two-storey garage/workshop, with an office and stock-room upstairs.
When designing the workshop, Mr Arscott had not envisaged investing in machinery for production, which meant that the workshop had to be extended to accommodate his first machine — a Citizen K-16 CNC sliding head turn-mill centre with bar-loader.
The 3.6 x 10m extended garage workshop also houses many rare and historical drawings, which Mr Arscott often uses to produce CAD drawings of components such as driving axles, bearings and crank pins, as well as ‘cosmetic’ parts such as hand-rail knobs, safety valves, whistles and smoke-box door handles.
Mr Arscott says that while the K-16 was fast, the need to produce more-complex components meant that he was out-growing the machine’s capabilities. “Basically, there was not enough power in the driven tools, so in 2009 I upgraded to a new Citizen M-16; this took me into another world.”
Application support
From the beginning of his venture to become a machinist, Mr Arscott went on training courses; he also drew on the help of Citizen’s application engineers to get him going. “They were even calling in for tea and a chat on their way home. Within weeks of installing the M16, my ability to make parts was transformed, with productivity increasing without any greater input or effort. Moreover, the turning and milling capability, combined with the flexibility of the control and different ways I can apply the tooling, has so far meant that if I can visualise a part I can make it.”
Indeed, for one part, Mr Arscott has been able to combine into a single operation what had previously been five separate operations undertaken by a sub-contractor. “It’s just amazing what I can do now. I can build very intricate part detail into the machining cycle with total ease; and with regard to quality, once I run the first part, I know it will be the same throughout the batch, so I’m more than happy to let the machine ‘purr’ away through the night on larger batches.”
Focus on finish
The materials machined include brass, nickel silver and stainless steel; and while tolerances tend to be held within ±0.012 mm, it is surface finish that is of prime concern. “That’s the first thing any customer will see as they open a Markits package,” says Mr Arscott.
The parts vary in size from a 3mm-long N-gauge hand-wheel knob with a 0.82mm spherical diameter (and a 0.35mm-diameter hole drilled through the ball) to a 17mm-diameter 40-tooth helical gear-wheel, which is engraved to identify the number of teeth and left- or right-hand helix. The gear-wheel is cross-drilled and tapped for a grub screw that breaks into the component’s 3/16in-diameter bore. Mr Arscott also machines an assortment of engraved gears and mating worm-wheels.
Also produced are miniature high-precision door handles for Orient Express coaches, 3mm-diameter hand-wheels with four very smooth milled curly spokes and a 1mm spigot, miniature crank-pin bushes, and air-horns in 7, 4 and 2mm sizes with internal and external trumpet shapes, as well as 0.5mm-diameter cross-holes for mounting on locomotives.
Such is the attention to detail that Mr Arscott even mills the chequer plate on certain buffer housings (where railwaymen would have stood in real life). Another benefit he has achieved by installing the Citizen M16 is that he has been able to maintain most of the prices established in 2008.