Is this related to the Frisco? Or another railroad? What does one call this unit? It's not a doodlebug. Or a Galloping Goose. But sort of in between. Boxcab E50
More information on this is at: http://www.geocities.com/themessagetree/bluebirdoctnov2002.htm My cousins husband is some sort of writer and he does a site at http://www.themessagetree.com Charlie
I would also guess this is a railbus. To me it looks like a kitbash, a trolley body mounted on a truck frame. Charlie, that picture is a gem.
Charlie, can you email me the address (email) for your cousin's husband? He just might be able to help research the old DK&S RR for me. Thanks. The single rear axel on the Blue Bird would preclude any sharp curves, so it would appear the Bus may have been standard gage instead of narrow gage. Note the width between the rails behind the bus. The type cast iron wheel shown is one that had small clamps all around the rim to hold different kinds of tires. Most "tires" for these wheels were a "Hard" solid rubber bonded to a steel rim that slipped over the cast iron wheel and up against a small flange on the back side. The wheels were spaced just right to fit railroad tracks if a steel flanged rail tire was clamped on! All the small clamps were then tightened which held the tire in place and alignment, and also prevented the tire from slipping around the cast iron wheel under torque. This appears to be a standard cast iron spoked wheel Mack used on most medium duty tracks and busses of the day. There were wheels for heavier duty, without spokes, called "Disk Wheels" that were made wide enough to hold two of the rubber tired rims to make a Dual wheel, similar to the ones you see on trucks of today. These same wheels were still used with the new fangled Pneumatic Tires that had bladders (called tubes) made from red rubber like a balloon placed inside and could actually be pumped full of compressed air! For light duty, like delivery around a city, there were some cast iron spoked wheels that the rubber tires had holes molded through them horizontally across just above the steel rim, about as big as a broom stick. These holes were equally spaced around the circumference to make the tire more resilient to bumps in the city streets. You could hear these tires coming down the street because they had a tendency to "whine" as the holes collapsed under load. If you saw one of these trucks coming toward you on a rainy day, you got out of the way fast, because mud and rocks would squirt out of the holes in those tires as the tire rolled along the dirt streets. The Pneumatic "Air-Ride" tire replaced all most all of the hard rubber and wooden tires for open road street use, leaving only a few hard rubber and wooden tires for use in scrap yards, mines and the like. But those cast iron spoked wheels remained in use up into the late 1960's and 70's when they were replaced with sheet metal rolled steel wheels that contained the tire rim all in one wheel. Because the sheet metal wheels are not solid and stiff enough for use on rails, the old cast iron wheel is still around when needed.
Wayne, His name is Ed and you can contact him at: http://www.crabtreeinternet.com/tmtadmins/tmtmessageform.shtml Charlie
I sent a note to an "Ed" on the link, Charlie, but he may not have got it, or may not have had time to let me know. No word yet. I didn't see anywhere he was listed to receive mail, and I don't know his last name.
His name is Ed Crabtree and he has that form for submitting comments. That keeps his e-mail off the page like we do here. Did you submit to him through that form? I can try to get in touch with him if you like. Charlie
I will try again. Thanks. UPDATE: I sent him another request this morning. I am not sure my messages are going through to Ed, because the site shows what you typed, and the "Submit" instruction note again after you clicked to submit it; then there is nothing to click on there, so the only way out of the site is to "X" off. Strange way of doing it I think. [ 08. March 2004, 17:26: Message edited by: watash ]
