Hello,
Now that Barry has closed his Business Operations,
who is the Barry’s Big Trains Replacement ?
Norman
Yes, some of us playing along at home would also like to know.
Someone with a small machine shop? For an exact replacement one would need to purchase the dies or the right to use the dies for the custom aluminum extrusion that was Barry’s basis. A good Bridgeport mill and some fixtures and the frame is a no brainer. Figuring out haw Barry altered the Bachmann drive wheels might take a bit of head scratching, but again it isn’t rocket science. The biggest issue is that Barry consumed the vast majority of the market of the older stock, and Bachmann is finally making a drive worthy of spending money on. Best bet will be to watch Ebay for used ones.
I’m afraid that all the “tools” are gone. Long, terrible story about this I don’t wish to share.
Greg
If you need the side rod, I’ve prepared the file for laser cutting and even made some for a forum member.
Greg, several years ago I had an long chat with Barry about his operation and quite honestly, it was a pretty simple affair. The back bone of his drive was his custom aluminum extrusion that made up the bulk of the frame. Cut to length, a couple drill bushing fixtures to assure the axle holes were in the correct location and press in the brass/bronze (I forget which) bushings and the frame was done. There was some initial cost in the dies for the extrusion and a minimum order for same. I believe he paid a machine shop to generate the fixtures for the drill press to locate the axle holes in the frame and a small arbor press to press in the bushings.
I now own three BBT drives, and beyond what I described above, they are all different. Different motors, gear cages, weights and mounting methods. All have Bachmann original wheels, some have been altered, other not. Reverse engineering the BBT drive would take me about 2-3 days and another week to generate the drawings for the dies and fixtures necessary. Very doable, but as I said above I don’t think there is sufficient marked left to even recover the initial costs to set up shop.
It would be somewhere in the 1-2K cost for the initial dies, most likely a one time expense. The minimum order for extrusions (last I checked) was 2,000 lb of material (one billet I would guess). I don’t know what the final price would be for the material as it is a function of the raw material cost plus a factor for the complexity of the die. When you consider those two factors alone with out looking to have custom machining fixtures made it would take multiple years to recover initial cost with out considering any profit.
Additionally, i would find a brass caster and make much better drivers that the ones provided by Bachmann. If I were to sell a product it would be a top drawer product.
FWIW
I agree 100% on all your points. There are some people that have some spares lying about, even the “custom” weights.
Barry was a bit of an experimenter, but everything is gone… sad story… looks like NWSL is going to end up the same way, no one purchasing it…
Greg
And Split Jaw too?
I left out split jaw on purpose, since someone is making exact copies already, i.e. the product is still available in some form.
Greg
I was aware of Barry and NWSL but what happened to Split Jaw?
Split Jaw was for sale for a number of years, but there was no interest in purchasing the company. The owners are closing up shop by November.
Joe, I have heard that they were up for sale a year or so ago. The ‘no interest in the company’ statement begs the question…Was there no interest in the company, or was there no interest at the asking price? Personally, I found the SplitJaw clamps a bit pricey for my budget, and for what they were. Looking at the product itself, it appears to me that they were produce 'en mas in a high volume production machine shop - meaning the price per part is going to be low. No one making that type of product looks at small quantity runs, it kills the margin. I am sure there was a price point where the business would sell, apparently the owner was not willing to negotiate to a real world price point.
I would agree no one wants the asking price is the best guess. But none of the quality clamps were ever cheap, like the Hillman ones.
The ones from aluminum extrusion with just 2 holes drilled are cheap of course, but still priced kind of high.
I just ordered another 100 SJ all stainless ones, to go with my over 10 year old ones that are still doing fine on my layout.
The good thing is just what you said, they can be turned out in a high volume machine shop, no special extrusions needed.
Greg
Does anyone know if someone in the hobby does custom work, such as re-gearing locos?
Ray Dunakin said:
Does anyone know if someone in the hobby does custom work, such as re-gearing locos
Ryan at Tripe R can do almost anything, but whether he wants to work on plastic/electrics is doubtful. http://www.realsteamservices.com/site/
Ray, I would look for a complete mechanism from a different loco and adapt. Custom creation of gearboxes is not cheap.
Greg
Ray Dunakin said:
Does anyone know if someone in the hobby does custom work, such as re-gearing locos?
Yes
Could Rooster further elaborate with the Contact Information to his answer of " Yes "
to the question
" Ray Dunakin said:
Does anyone know if someone in the hobby does custom work, such as re-gearing locos? "
Mr. Curmudgeon , Barry told me that you knew each other and were friends.
During the last year of Business Operations, Barry told me that his Large Scale Business Volume had reduced greatly being caused by the higher prices of Bachmann New Product.
The thing about Barry is that Barry understood gearing and Barry understood the Double Worm .
Barry had solved engineering problems for Bachmann that Bachmann could not solve such as the Annie Front Truck Derailing.
When I had complained to Lee Riley that the Bachmann worm & gears should be made of brass, Lee’s response was that " plastic " was better. After all of those drive failures, Bachmann finally went to a brass worm & brass gears for the C-19 .
My suspicion is Bachmann back then did not own the equipment required for a brass worm & brass gears and did not want to make the financial investment in the required machinery.
I do not understand why Bachmann had produced highly detailed, correctly scaled with wonderful paint graphic locomotives built over a defective drive design?
Both the Streetcar and the Gandy Dancer still have defective drives. Why?
Norman
Norman, you confuse me with the original TOC (The Ole Curmudgeon), the venerable David Goodson. My conversation was several years ago while business was still fairly good. Yes, higher pricing would definitely affect Barry’s business, I believe the availability of the gen 5 chassis at affordable price points has equally hurt his business.
All of that said, his health is the root cause of the closure.
Norman,
You do understand that Bachmann does not make the products they sell. They are made in China on Chinese machinery. Mr. Riley must have meant that “plastic” gears were “better” because it met their price point at the time! (https://largescalecentral.com/externals/tinymce/plugins/emoticons/img/smiley-wink.gif)
