Spent half the day trying to drill out the chassis to mount a lead truck. Danged metal chassis must have been made of depleted uranium. Even my diamond drills had a time getting through. But now have a 4 wheel lead truck from a long since defunct Atlas/Rivarrossi Pacific that suffered from Zmackatitis. And spent part of last evening heating and forming the window section of the cab. And the scotchtape is my way of keeping the drive rods out of the way while I work. And a little better shot of the semi whaleback tender which is still under construction.
Seriously? I tiny cab forward?!?!?!biggrin: Holy crap! I can't wait to see more of this so I can blatantly copy it!!!!
Next issue was to solve the problem of getting wires to the now back, used to be front, of the loco for tender pick-up. So after some study, test fitting, more study, I noticed a slight gap between the bottom of the cab front and the plastic sub base containing the wipers and motor contacts. Just enough to run the wire from the base of the motor contacts and under the running board to the smokebox. There is an airtank under the walkway at the smoke box area on both sides. I used a razorsaw then the Exacto saw blade to create a narrow channel between the air tank and the bottom of the walkway that the wire tucks into nicely which will now get the wire to the former front pilot area to connect to the tender. The underneath shot of the other loco, another LL 0-6-0T, show where I used my own, fabricated from brass stock, lead and trailing trucks. On the current one I had a lot of metal work to get that 4 wheel lead truck under the chassis and then had to extend the pilot slightly to clear. The previous one I had far less metal to remove to get the 2 wheel trucks under it. Big problem with these chassis is the short area for pick-up and unless you have powered frogs slow speed through a switch is almost impossible, unless you do tender pick-up, or give it lead and trailing trucks with pick-up. Another shot of the chassis wire run and the top side of the logging critter I mad out of one quite a few years back.
Probably the first cab forward in this country was the North Pacific Coast. It was based on a 4-4-0. Back about 1970 or so it was probably running across a photo of it that inspired me to build my first from a docksider. It was a 2-4-0 when I finished and ran like crazy at warp speed. Alas it is no more, but I do have parts for a docksider laying in the bins here and there. However I can't claim the first for this because I believe there was several more built around the same time in other scales. And somebody took a 4-4-0 in a larger scale and built a North Pacific Coast loco. There are probably several better candidates for a loco like this in todays offerings that would result in less frame modifications and several come to mind. The Bmann 2-6-2 newer version with tender pick-up, and the Model Power 4-4-0, although the danged wiring between the MP loco and tender would be a small nightmare to re-route. Probably the easiest would be any loco that has tender pick-up from drawbar and post wipers rather than the wiring, and already has lead trucks that can now become trailing trucks. Fabricating a new pilot and lead trucks shouldn't be too much of an issue depending on what you have in the parts boxes and your level of skill. About the only thing remaining would be to fabricate a new drawbar post and wiring from the tender to the motor leads. The thing about both the docksider and the saddletanks is that they are basically dinosaurs and all suffer from pick-up issues. Some while back I went through my collection of steam and culled out all the poor performers but didn't throw them away, but rather consigned them to the parts bins. Now that I'm retired, and have a wee bit more time, I'm pulling some of these back out on a rainy day, and playing around with making a silk purse out of a pigs ear so to speak. If you are inclined to try one of these I would look for these on sale and I really would not pay more than $15-$20 at most for one.
Ok, what is the secondary tank over the boiler? The thing is huge and it looks like it is already pulling a water tank.
That was where the dry pipe collected steam much like a steam dome does. This was adapted from a marine type water tube boiler.
Went to the parts bin for a drawbar and ended up using a drawbar from one of my sets of FTs that was a spare. Trimmed one end and shimmed with styrene so it would fit in the original loco coupler box without drooping. Drilled out tender chassis platform for a 1/16th styrene rod seen in the photo sticking through the platform before trimming. Then it was test fit all to determine turning radius and clearance and how much to trim the wires. I'm going to try and use Soundtraxx mini connectors and mount them right by the smokebox.
Photo of my styrene walkway for my automobile bridges that cross the yard. I'm using Faller #272404 handrails. The difficulty was deciding on the process. I have elected to create the whole walkway and then glue it all on at the same time. I was building 4-5 inches at a time but I had trouble getting the ends to mate. Hope this works. Should be okay.
After suffering a case of heavy ten thumbitis I rebuilt the pilot and finally started the cab front. Window section is from a piece of 34 ft Overton from the scrapbox sanded down to fit and then bent using hot water. Quarter round trims the edges.
This A.M. added two airtanks from styrene rod to roof along with a Pyle generator and a set of airhorns. Headlight on the original cab back cut off and added to new front just below middle window. Also added an oil fill hatch to front of tender. original water fill hatch stays. Now looking at replacing stack with either a Bear Trap stack or another stack, or maybe just adding a spark arrester to the original stack.
Last parts added to the shell. Decided on the Bear Trap spark arrestor stack assembly and added a feedwater heater to the fireman's smokebox side. Mounted air compressors on cab front. And another logging critter is born for the Turtle Creek. About time to think about paint. Favoring going with the same paint scheme of the last two Turtle Creek locos with the dark maroon and black.
Here is an on and off project that I have had on my work bench for some time. Have to do some repairs to the front section (notice it's pointing slightly skyward) due to and unfortunate mishap with a HO SD45T-2. The trucks beneath it are Z scale trucks provided by ddechamp71. I can't thank him enough. Still have so much more to do before they can be connected to the chassis.
I finally got a decent version of my HO scale 1952 Henry J shrunk down to N. Here is the rough HO scale version with some of the rework - you can see how I moved the front wheel wells and extended the width of the roof at the rear: Here is the N scale version, ready for paint. (Note to self - start off with higher quality masters): Here is another vehicle that was a lot of work - a 1946 Ford 4 door sedan.
These four were all shrunk down from HO scale - a 1952 Cadillac 2 door: A 1941 Studebaker 4 door: A 1942 De Soto 4 door sedan: ... and a 1946 Chrysler 2 door:
Finished the 0-6-0 conversion to a 4-6-0 cab forward logger. Parts added to the LL 0-6-0 were as follows: Four wheel pilot truck from an old Atlas Pacific. Detail Associates compound air pumps, Pyle generator, feedwater heater and a set of Sunrise airhorns to cab roof. Cab front from a section of a 34 ft Overton, styrene rod for roof tanks and an MV lense in the relocated original headlight. Tender is from a beyond repair Rivarrossi Vandy cut and sectioned and mounted on a Kato caboose chassis for pick-up. Flat sides at bottom are styrene. SoundTrax connectors used between tender and loco. MT caboose end rails used on tender and the steps from the Kato caboose. Couplers on tender and loco are Z scale. Loco weight when done 2.75 oz. Tender weight 1.0 oz. Test track results give 15 cars on a 3% grade without wheel slippage and starting on grade. Max projected grade this will run on is 2%. Water level grade test results 32 cars without wheel slip. Turtle Creek Central now has thier 3rd loco painted in Lehigh Valley Cornell Red and black.
