New Techniques = New Potential/Opportunities

I recently had the opportunity to try my hand at building a 3D-printed log car and a flat car designed by a friend. These even included Russell car and foundry trucks. I've constructed a few cars based on other's designs in the past, see the On2 KC boxcar, the On2 KC gondolas, and the On30 hopper cars. My previous efforts were from scaling up HOn30 designs. While the prints came out exceptionally well, they are rather thick-walled for the scaled-up version. These two cars were also more complete, with coupler pockets, truss rods, etc., already built into the design. Amazing detail and fun to build cars. Very interesting technique of using metal rods in the middle and side sills for weight. I enjoyed building these; I think I just like building cars..........And, of course, provided feedback on the designs. My friend is an amazing designer both at 3D CAD and at making new ideas work. A pleasure to have the opportunity to give these a try. A different experience from building with wood and styrene. What the future holds...........

Tribute to the Cairo and Kanawha RY

As I plan for the future, I need something to haul passengers with that wold be less fancy than what would be considered for busy, larger scale narrow gauge passenger service. Something that would represent what would be used in a mixed train that had low passenger volume. Reaching out to one of my favorite narrow gauges, the Cairo and Kanawha, I decided to model the likeness of one of their combines. The car was clearly modified from an older, less fancy passenger car. Note the narrow baggage compartment door and the boarded up rear window. Oddly, this car has no lamp vents on the roof. Their second combine did have such vents. 

I used a Bachmann On30 passenger car to capture the likeness. I say likeness as the letter board is clearly too tall, the need platforms to short and the steps the wrong type. Maybe I will modify those steps.....

The prototype car clearly was lower to the ground. Many of these style cars used less expensive arch bar type trucks and smaller diameter wheels. I guess to lower the cost? I'm sticking with modified Bachmann trucks (widened to On3) for now. Despite having the same number of windows and what appears to be reasonably window spacing, my car still seems short compared to the prototype.

For now, I am happy with the end result. I think it will look good behind my short mixed trains and captures the essence of a wonderful West Virginia narrow gauge. 

Donkey Assembly Line

A friend has been working hard on developing a 3D printed model of a two-drum American Hoist and Derrick donkey engine. I've been having so much fun building one, that it has turned into 4 in various states of completion. Amazing detail and amazing assembly. Quite the joy to build. Keeping me occupied at the workbench lately. 

DC&L Shay No.3

 It has been a long and difficult journey to get this locomotive up and running. I've been working on it for at least 8 years. 

I had it built up in about a year, see posts from 2014 and 2015

Shay running

10/27/15

 

Shay Update

11/2/14

 

Early in the journey

10/13/14

After the initial paining, I blew a decoder, broke off the generator stand, among other things and put the locomotive away for quite a while. Recently, while working on another shay project, I pulled it out. Certainly, I should give it another go? Blew another decoder in 30 seconds, wire touched the metal speaker. This time I persevered and finished the difficult sound install by moving the speaker to the firebox and making a plastic housing for the decoder, keep alive in the tender. I installed glass in the windows, used a weathering technique suggested by Jeff Kracker, and made an ok looking coal bin to cover the motor that sticks up rather high. The locomotive runs well, sounds good. I'll add a toolbox, re-railing frog and some details to the running boards as time permits. I also need to get the sound timing down and improve some of the sound effects, like remove the nonexistent air airpump. Right now I want to just sit back and enjoy getting this far. And onto the other project.....

Hauling Bark with a Stone Boat?

Merry Christmas! It has been a while since my last post. Over the last week, I have been working on a little scene for the logging railroad - a horse hauling a stone boat. What is a stone boat you ask? It was a very simple "sled" used to haul stones out of early farmers fields. 

These simple sleds were then adopted for many other purposes, such as hauling extract bark to landings at logging operations in the Appalachian mountains. Below is a team working on pulling a stone boat with bark extract on the logging operations outside of Richwood, WV. Several operations also used single horse pulled stone boats, which is what I decided to model. One less horse to paint.

I scratch built my stone boat with stripwood left over from other projects. I carved the sled runners and added the stakes. The horse is from Aspen Models, where I removed the blinders. Most horses used in for log skidding and bark hauling did not use blinders. Now all I need is someone to hold the rains.

See you in the New Year!

41st Narrow Gauge Convention, Hickory, NC

Last week, I managed to attend two days of the 41st Narrow Gauge Convention in Hickory, NC. A wonderful time with lots of cool models, vendors, and clinics. Due to my short time there, I did not get to see all the wonderful clinics or travel to any of the home layouts. I did, however, manage to present my two clinics, one on the Albion module and one on the Cairo and Kanawha and the Mountain Central. I actually met two folks interested in the history of the Mountain Central and one modeling the WW&F in On30!

Highlights included hanging out and catching up with modeling friends I haven't seen in a long time, attending Pete Leach's backdrop painting clinic and buying some WW&F kits that I didn't know were out!

Here's some photo's to give you the flavor of the event.

Two nice On3 2-8-0's

West Virginia Midland Baggage Car!

The EBT On3 Module

Pete Leach's Backdrop Clinic

My backdrop completed with a few comments from the peanut gallery

The contest room

If only these were used in the mountains!

Tom's 2nd place train!

Another EBT car and Starting Portland Locomotive Works RPO

While I am still working on painting several of the kits that I built over the summer, I recently started a kit that I have long been putting off. Not exactly sure how I decided to start this kit, regardless, I did and managed to get it finished without the expected major difficulty.

A few years ago, I picked up some PSC EBT hopper car kits for a friend that was looking to pass them on to another Eastern narrow gauge modeler. At the time, I was very concerned about the heat flow through the pieces and that what I had soldered would come un-soldered as I worked on other portions of car. 

I used a standard, large soldering iron tip for the majority of the model. Interestingly the large tip put a lot of heat in the think metal exactly where I needed it, without having it transfer to other areas. This worked so well, that I even used the large tip for most smaller details. I did use a small round tip for some of the brake details and twice used a resistance soldering unit. I'm guessing this worked well due to the small size of the parts and the thinness of the the brass sheet parts?

The most difficult parts were the steps for the brake wheel and the supporting brakes. I may redo these at some point. The car is essentially finished except for more cleaning of overdone soldering joints. I'm going to take a breather before the finishing touches. 

I think the car came out fairly well; however, I would say for the price, the pain and the time, the Bachmann On30 cars convert to On3 MUCH more easily!

This weekend, I started the Portland Locomotive Works WW&F RPO. The assemble has gone VERY quickly, as it is so similar to the passenger car kits that they produce. Waiting for the paint to dry for the next coat, then the gloss coat. The roof needs the trim over the doors that prevents water running down. More soon.........

A Plastic Shay?

 Yes! A plastic On3 Precision Scale Shay! I picked this up for a steal on eBay a few years ago thinking, well, if it doesn't work I at least get a Falhaulber 50:1 motor. I recently completed another GrandtLine Porter, this one for On30 and had such a fun time assembling it that figured it would be a great time to try my hand at this project. The Porter is disassembled in the paint shop, photo's eventually.......

Generally, (note not always) the instructions are excellent. You definitely want to read a few steps ahead to see what else they say before doing anything. The trucks are the first assembly. I found them easy to construct, using plastic model building techniques. Make sure you don't make a mistake with alignment or parts orientation as you don't want to have to take them apart (there's no way to unsolder as with brass). The person I bought the kit from had started the trucks and made a MESS. They used ACC glue instead of a plastic specific glue. Knowing this, I ordered some new side frames from PSC before they changed hands. You'll note in the picture that I started the frame at the same time. One thing about plastic models, you often have to really wait till the glue has dried completely before proceeding, therefore, I had two to three components being assembled at the same time. Glue a part, move to the next assembly, etc.

Here are some of the sub-assemblies moving along nicely. I added a Wisemann Model Services sand dome as most of this sized shay had the more modern domes.

 

 

 Here is what I have ready before painting. The decoder, speaker and headlight bulbs have not yet been added. I figured I would paint it first. Handling this thing difficult as the plastic is very fragile and flexable. In my humble opinion, the frame is too flexible. I added a second screw to hold the boiler on. There was only one, in the front! Yikes!

 

Huston, we have a problem! I've used this style of drive on all my shays, it was designed by GrandtLine and works fairly well. On this model, the gear is already mounted on the axle when you open the kit - DON'T TRUST THE MANUFACTURER! They put mine on backwards! Yup, after assembling the entire model, I found out the gears didn't align!

 

Note the large gap between the gears. The small brass mounting does not have the plastic gear centered, it is slightly off centered and needed to be mounted the OTHER WAY! But wait, this model was GLUED together.......

So, I carefully added some solvent glue to the cross bracing, brake hanger and bottom tie hoping I could remove the drivers without braking the whole thing. Well, all those little hanger broke, but sheared off, which meant I could glue them on again and hope for the best; however, the main bolster and rest of the truck stayed together.  After disassembling, pulling the driver, re-orienting the drive, I put it all back together and IT WORKS! I'm happy that it worked but was I not happy that I trusted the folks who put these together at PSC, maybe they contracted that to someone......

So, plastic shay a good idea? Hmm, easy to build using typical plastic model building skills. Build a model tank or something first. A few problems: plastic breaks easily. The frame is very flexible. There is little weight but lots of room to add weight. I added lead bird shot in the boiler and some small lead strip in the truck bolsters. The hardest parts to build - the fine detail with the eccentrics for the engine was tough. One of my eccentrics had a broken tab, making the fit impossible. I drilled and glued a brass rod on but it wasn't fun. The second hardest part - the universals that attach to the engine. The ones for the trucks were easy but the ones for engine were a bear.........

These originally sold for $275, if you can find one, it's worth the build. I wouldn't pay more unless you are a real fan of this engine. Save up and get a brass one. Once I get this painted, DDC, sound and lights, I'll post on it's running qualities. 

Cheers!

New Gon for the DC&L

I recently finished a Leadville Designs Bill Meyer and Small gondola kit that I received for Christmas a few years back. Bill Meyer and Small made equipment for narrow gauges here in the east as well as the more famous ones out west. I really like the look of these 28 foot cars and built one from plans back in high school. 

Below is the Leadville Designs kit as built. A nice kit with underbody detail. I modified it slightly, adding through bolts on the sides.

Here are the two cars side by side. The Leadville Designs kit was nice, being a laser kit, most of the parts fit well without much work. The exception being the stake sides- that WAS a pain and mounting the couplers. There is a nice slot in the car ends for Kadee couplers or some kind of couplers. However, the instructions did not cover their installation and I had to heavily modify the Kadee's to fit. The kit, priced at $79+ shipping is nice and has more appropriate stake pockets, 3D printed and a pain to clean out. However, I think my scratch built car from 20+ years ago looks pretty good and given I cut all my own strip wood, was  a real bargain! They'll both run on the DC&L. Stop by sometime and compare for yourself.

DC&L RY Number 3 and 4 Back in Service

 I have been very slow to replace/return the two WOW decoders in two separate engines that I have. Both were purchased and installed at the same time and both failed at the same time. The fist is a GrandtLine porter that I build when I was 1in high shcool and rebuilt several times adding DCC in the last rebuild. Tight fit for the speaker, decoder, and stay alive. The Flying Zoo Climax also has a very tight fit for both the decoder, stay alive and small speaker. They were a BEAR to get in there. All those blasted wires and tight spaces! So, when the decoders sound failed, I checked with the folks at TCS about the issue, sure they are under warranty, just send them in. Problem - taking them out and putting new ones in was likely to cause breakage on the models and require more effort than I wanted to put in. So, they have sat for, well, a long time. 

So, instead of removing them, sending them in, and then installing them when they came back, I ordered new decoders and decided to swap them out. Get it over with in one difficult time. 

 The Porter

No. 3. is a plastic GrandtLine porter. I replaced the TCS WOW decoder with a new Tsunami 750. Soundtraxx decoders work so much better with those German Faulhaber motors. I think the 50:1 gears in the motor make them difficult to control. No idea but I have similar problems with PSC shays that use the same motor. The Tsumani 750 is slightly smaller than the WOW decoder and accepts the TCS stay alive. So, having slightly more space allowed for a much easier re-install than expected! Up and running in a little under an hour!

 

 

Flying Zoo Climax 

Replacing the TCS WOW decoder on the Climax was even easier! I forgot that the wires on WOW decoders have a wire harness for both ends! I just unplugged each and plugged the new one in. Very easy. The biggest problem with both of these installs was getting the wires just the right length. Not too short, not too long, and getting them all soldered together in a tight space with them moving all around. Since I didn't need to cut any wires or solder for this replacement - BIG SIGH of relief. Back up and running! Sounds GREAT. Amazing sound for such a little speaker. I think TCS has improved their motor control, as the engine ran great with no changes to motor control CV's. 

 

Bottom line. I'm really happy that I dug into this project. I'm happy to get both fine looking and fine running engines back up and running. Now, to send those two TCS decoders back for warranty, hope they will still fix'em, I have two engines waiting. 

 

Here's a short video of the engine on a runby

 

 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=b1lEa7BGdCg

 

Cheers - Brian