As soon as my Feldbahn was delivered one of the first things I spotted when looking at the locomotive was the copper pipe for the vacuum brake system which very prominently stuck a long way down below the right edge of the footplate.  You can see it in the photo on the left sticking down before running back to the black rubber tube.  It looked totally out of character on the loco as well as being very vulnerable.  Knowing that I was going to have to work on the vacuum brake system to fit the vacuum limiter valve I decided that I would attempt to rectify this unsightly pipe at the same time. .

When the replacement vacuum limiter valve arrived from Station Road Steam (the original had proven to be defective during the pre delivery steam test) it was supposed to be a simple task to remove the blanking plug and fit the valve, but in practice the relevant gland nut was impossible to reach with a spanner.  In the photo on the left it's near the centre on the bottom of the T piece, and on the loco it was a long way into the narrow gap between the reversing lever stand and the cab side.  The pipe I wanted to modify was even further in down that narrow gap and obviously impossible to reach.  The only way I could see to do the job was to remove the entire reversing lever assembly and the entire vacuum brake plumbing (less the ejector).  This exercise showed why the pipe stuck down so far below the footplate; the length was needed to allow the vacuum pipe assembly to be manoeuvred to thread the pipe through the footplate.  If the pipe had been shorter I don't think the assembly could have been fitted.  You can see the plumbing assembly in the photo on the left, and the pipe in question is the long one going straight down to the bottom of the photo.  If the horizontal bit at the bottom had been closer to the footplate (where the kink in the vertical section is) it would not have been possible to tip the entire assembly to get the horizontal bit through the hole in the footplate. With everything removed from the loco I decided to connect the vacuum limiter valve into the pipe between the ejector and the brake control valve rather than in the Train Pipe where Station Road Steam had intended it to connect  In this position any leaks through the limiter valve (and my experience shows that they always leak) will not affect the train pipe vacuum when the brake control valve is in the "lap" position.  In the photo on the right of the revised installation the uppermost T piece connects to the vacuum limiter valve and ejector, while the lower one connects to the vacuum gauge and the pipe that goes under the cab (Train Pipe) which had I wanted to shorten.  Repositioned and realigned as shown the gland nut is now easily reached with a spanner so that the pipe going through the footplate can easily be connected. The photo below shows the modified pipe underneath the footplate which is no longer prominently visible and looks far better than it did when the Feldbahn was delivered.