Large Scale Central

SML&M Co. #1 "Sheyenne"

Modeling Motive Power
#1

OK so I have decided on the next loco project. As the “my first build” CR&N #3 comes to a close (within a few weeks it will run, I promise) it is time to embark on a new journey. It will be a small logger based on Eric Shade’s 1:1 projects over at the WW&F Ry. I really like the looks of the #10 and am using it for the basis of this build. I hope Eric doesn’t mind me putting this on my post (Eric if you do mind I will gladely remove it)

This will be the rough idea of where this project is heading.

The back story for the locomotive is as such. Sinsley Mountain Logging and Mining Company is a family run business that exploits the natural resources of the families vast land holdings in mountains of North Idaho. The time is set in the 1920’s. They run both an active silver and lead mine and stamp mill as well as a logging operation and mill on Sinsley Mountain. The products of these ventures are hauled by rail to a dock facility on the lake which is the main thoroughfare for the regions commerce. They sack their ore at the mill and transfer it to barges, in addition they export cut lumber and raw logs. They have two locomotives that they operate. The #1 “Sheyenne” is a 0-4-4 (the subject of this build) that is mainly used for the logging operation and switching at the mill. The #2 “Logan” is a 2-4-2 saddle tank loco (future build) that is the prime mover that moves goods to the dock and freight up the mountain. Both locos are old 1890’s era engines that have been lovingly maintained and are in top notch working condition. They have been modified as time and need dictated. As business is expanding there is discussion of a 3rd brand new locomotive, #3 “Darcy” a purpose built articulated 0-4-4-4 but those plans are only on the drawing board.

The #1, the subject of this build is named after the owners daughter. It is a small hard working locomotive just like her namesake. She is a tenderless wood burner that is out fitted for logging duty. It has a small tank and fuel bin behind the cab. Her key feature is the steam powered gypsy winch on the pilot deck. She is a simple machine but works hard. She is outfitted with a Westinghouse brake system and electric lights. The company still uses link and pin couplers.

So that’s the story and direction for this build. It will likely be a long ride just like the last one. But it will be a fun one (at least for me).

#2

The “givens” for this build are that it has to run on the future indoor layout. Since I have been “VICtimized” as Korm refers to it, it has to be able to run on the 30" minimum diameter curves. After some discussion with VIC on what has to be to make this happen the choice of motor blocks was limited. The Lil Big Hauler is a favorite of Vic’s because it is small, handles the curves, and is readily available. So in a horse trade I procured one from David Maynard. Another requirement to meet the tight curves will be the use of truck mounted link and pin coupler at least on the rear. It has to have a steam powered gypsy winch that’s a must, and total length has to be under 12 inches in order to fit on the short side of the engine house I built for the MIK Challenge. Other than sticking close to 1/24 there really are no other “givens”.

My “Druthers” are to have this very highly detailed. The ten foot rule does not apply. I would like to use the many available detail parts out there. It should have a real wood cab. I’d like to get working lights forward and aft working directional. I will need to find a creative way to get the brake compressor and tank on it. All proper piping and wiring needs should be there and in a realistic fashion. This will be R/C battery so room is a consideration.

I intend for this log to be more than just a way to show progress. A few others have shown interest in doing similar builds so I will do this as tutorial showing the steps and techniques and products used to do it. Since I am still a novice builder I will solicit help and show my failures and their fixes along with my success. The idea is that someone can follow it along and build one similar if they choose. This won’t happen over night though.

Here is the starting block on the yellow version

The beauty of these locomotives is there sheer lack of detail. It makes it a blank slate. For my purpose it scales almost perfectly to the WW&F Ry. #10 so using the proportions of that loco will work nicely. Very little detail will need to be removed.

#3

Oh!!!, Devon, I adore, wait a little and you will be served.
To zoom on my miniature of post

#4

That should be a great little loco, Devon. I will be following this very closely.

#5

OK the next step in the process was to plan the destruction. I need to get the locomotive down to its starting blocks. So I took the thing apart to see what would need to be done. It comes apart very easy and there really are very few parts on this thing.

This is the actual starting block. By itself it actually is a handsome little loco. It could be taken as is and have some detail parts added to it to make it quite nice. But that’s not How I do things so lets tear it apart starting with the tender.

Remove the four screws on the bottom to separate the shell and the base. All of the base goes in the parts bin. The coal load is just a snug fit and comes right out and into the parts bin. This is a wood burner.

The herald that Stan Cedarleaf made for me for these locos looks like the one I had made for the sign for the MIK build. For the locos it measures 2.25" wide and 1,25 inches tall. So enough tender tank has to be left to fit it. Above are the cut lines. I will cut the front off just at the front edge of the opening in the top. Which is 1.5 inches. The rest will be taken from the back wall of the tank forward 1.5 inches, making the whole tank 3 inches. The X’ed portion of the tank will be removed. The small back deck portion will be removed and a wooden beam put in its place under the tank. The height and width will remain the same. I am keeping the water filler as is even though its a bit big.

A frame and deck will be fashioned to leave a 1" gap between the cab and the round front portion of the tank and then extend all the way back to where the rear beam will be. The cab gets removed altogether and will be replaced with a real wood one. It takes two screws on the bottom to remove it. I am retaining the cab because the new one will be the same dimensions.

The boiler is removed with one more screw under the boiler support in the front. Now working with the chassis. The rear step and coupler are removed. The raised rectangular area Where the coupler goes will need to be removed flat with the deck. The drop down part where the step mounts will also have to be removed up to the deck. This will clear the way for the new deck and frame. The side rods are removed and put in the parts bin we will be making new ones. I removed the front step and coupler. Everything forward of the boiler support will get removed and a new frame and deck made for the gypsy winch, pilot beam, and link and pin coupler.

I am going to R/C Battery. If you stay track power then forget this next little bit and leave the wiring alone. I removed the bottom cover and took out the screws holding the power pickups. I then cut the power pick ups off but left all the wire. I then pulled the wire up to the top of the chassis and replaced the cover. I don’t believe I will be removing any more electrical except the light. I am leaving the spring detail it isn’t to bad. But I am going to remove all of the brake detail.

Here comes the major surgery. If you don’t have length requirements I would leave this part alone. But to get under the 12" mark I need to shrink this. I want a smaller smoke box anyway so here is how I think I am going to do it. First a note: the critical thing here is that the boiler mount is in the Boiler support and must be reused and that means moving it means cutting the boiler also to match the mounting position. I will cut the chassis right where the motor housing ends in front of the front axle. I will cut the boiler support square. Then I will need to make a notch in the motor housing to accept the boiler support to a place where it just misses the spring. This should still clear the front driver just fine. If not a little notch can be made to clear it. That gives me almost a 1/2 inch more room. That will do it for the chassis.

Now for the boiler. All backhead detail will be removed. Whistle and pop offs are molded in and will be cut off. The horrible bell will be cut off and so will the head light. The stack is removed but I am keeping the mounting collar. The front sign board will need to be moved back all the way to the smoke box door. Now in order to match the chassis I will have to wait until the chassis is done before I shorten the smoke box/boiler. But a chunk will need to be removed between the stack base and the boiler band in front of the steam dome. I will take out as much of the hole where the bell is when I do this. Less to repair. This will also help dictate what happens to the running boards as they will be cut also. I have not decided yet on fully removing them but I wont be lowering them I don’t think.

The front of the smoke box will have a section taken out between the front and where it mounts up to the boiler support. This should leave sufficient room for the winch.

Well that’s the plan of attack. Once the chopping is done I will develop a plan of attack to rebuild the chassis/boiler/and rear tank.

#6

Watching …

#7

While laying in bed not sleeping but dreaming I came up with another possibility for shortening this locomotive chassis to meet my 12" max length requirement. There is a significant distance between drivers.

The front drivers could be moved all the way back to the point of touching. The axle could be right in front of the gearbox frame. To do it you would have to remove the spring detail and cut a section of the motor housing out between the drivers just in front of the rectangular box the motor can sticks up through. Then the spring detail (or after market ones) could be re-positioned. If I really wanted to get radical in shortening it I could also do what I planed to do and that is mover the cylinders/steam chest/ boiler support back as well.

One thing I can say is by moving the front axle back I will be reducing the wheel base and it will be even that much better on the curves.

This is a thought at this point I will have to look close when it comes time to hacking.

Looking at the boiler with this in mind I could remove the entire section between the sanding dome and the stack base. And cut the chassis to match. I was going to put the dynamo where the bell is and the bell on the sanding dome. But I could put the dynamo where the light is and put the light on a bracket above the winch. Where else could the dynamo go? Would it be unreasonable to put the dynamo on the tank in back instead of on the front? I don’t see why not. Or could the air tank go back there on top of the water tank by the filler and then put the dynamo on the side where the running boards are on the opposite side of the brake compressor?

#8

Devon … There is so much you could do…

#9

Another consideration in putting either the dynamo or the air tank on the water tank is I was going to put a light back there as well. And since length is an issue nothing can protrude too far off the back, at least not any farther than where the coupler has to be. So the water filler I was going to keep as is. It huge and takes up a lot of room. I can remove it instead and put an after market filler on it that is a small round one that will be in the middle between the light and the wood. The air tank I am thinking can then go on one side of that.

#10

Oh I agree Sean. The possibilities are endless. This whole project, the indoor railroad itself, will be somewhere between a “toy” or “whimsical” layout and a protolance realistic road. I am not concerned with such things as “well the boiler is so short to have ever produced enough steam to pull itself down the road”. But at the same time when you look at it it has to have the feel of a realistic plausible application. I like the drawings and it does show what can be done that would fit my somewhere in between criteria.

#11

OK so I went to hacking today. I couldn’t resist the temptation. After much consideration I decided to move the wheels closer together and get my reduced length by shortening the motor block. More on that later; but, that decision did dictate what I needed to do to the chassis and boiler. I did not do what I am about to describe in the order I am describing it. After doing it, I decided this presentation is a more logical order of work. Lets get cutting.

The determining factor was what I was going to remove out of the boiler. One thing I have learned to do is try and remove parts that if left would need to be fixed. This is such a case, the bell is cast in and hollow. If removed it would leave a hole that would need to be plugged. So I decided to remove the section between the stack and the boiler band in front of the sand dome. This would result in a 7/8ths inch reduction in length. So that was my number

Before actually cutting the boiler though I wanted to cut the chassis. I started with excess details and unwanted plastic described in the previous post.

Since I decided to move the wheel that meant moving the spring. I cut them off flush so that I could reuse them.

Removed the brake detail

I removed the rear coupler housing plastic. On the top surface leave a uniform lip of plastic that matches the existing lip. The cab mounts to this and by leaving it, it will give an attachment point when I scab in the new deck.

The underside.

I removed the front pilot deck and beam flush with the steam chest this will all be rebuilt for the winch and wood pilot beam

I said I would admit to my mistakes. Here is the first one. I needed to move the wheels back 7/8ths of and inch. I measured wrong and ended moving them back a full inch. It worked out just fine. Just means my whels are a little farther away from the steam chest/cylinder than the original.

In order to put the wheels in the new spot the little tab that power pick up rested on needs to be removed.

In this picture you can see the new notch that was cut plus the recess for the bearing block to slide onto. I also cut out the 7/8ths inch from the block and in doing so removed the old notch so I wouldn’t have to repair it.

Here is the wheels back in place and the chassis glued back together. Dang the wheels are close, this should get around Vic’s pizza just fine.

This shows just how great it worked out. Right where I hoped it would be. Still goes together with ease.

New

Stock

I next cut the section out of the boiler after removing the running boards. I will add back in real wood ones once I determine where other stuff is going. I had to give myself a pat on the back once I glued the boiler back together I was pleasantly surprised that it all fit back together perfectly, using all the original mounts. A tip on gluing the boiler together. I used MEK after testing it to see if it would work ( not sure what kid of plastic this is). I mounted the rear half of the boiler in place with the cab to hold it tight to the chassis. I then liberally applied the MEK to both halves (front and back) and then put the front half into place where it belongs and screwed it in. This assured me of the proper alignment and also acted as a clamp to hold it.

The final piece of the chassis chop was to cut the bottom access cover. Now this is screw up #2 and #3. I basically chose a 1" section at random. Mistake #2 was making it 1". It should have been 7/8" inch because that’s what I shortened the motor block by. But remember I moved the wheels back and inch, I was thinking for some reason I needed and inch to match the wheel move. So that meant I cut it too short and now have a gap to fix. The third mistake was the random decision to just cut out a chunk. Those little notches line up with the axles and receive the bearing block. I did not take this into account and missed, but not all that bad. Since the bearing is held by the main block all I did was widen the notch enough until it fit flush on the motor block. I am not going to fix it, it won’t be noticeable and doesn’t effect operation.

The gap. I will fix it by gluing in a piece of styrene bar stock and then notching that to fit the gear box. It should actually help reinforce this joint.

Speaking of reinforcing joints, the two cuts (chassis and boiler) are not perfect and will need to be reinforced and filled. I like bondo for this because it bonds to reinforce and fills gaps and shapes easy as a putty for a patch. I will do all that later after the all the new additions are made to the chassis. Next will be to remove the headlight, whistle, and pop offs. Then I will chop the tender tank and glue it back together. Finally for the chassis I will add all the frame, decking, and pilot beam and rear beam.

#12

I think I am still going to shorten the smoke box. It now looks to big for the boiler. So I will move the front all the way back to just in front of the boiler support. This will give me lots of room to work with the winch.

#13

What if you moved the cab forward and lengthened both the front porch for your gypsy and the rear for your fireman?

I’m enjoying your build.

John

#14

John,

That is an intriguing idea. I have seen several small locos like this before and it didn’t even cross my mind for this one. I still am very much in a place in the build where I could make it happen. I think I will play with this idea. Moving the cab forward and covering the steam dome would give me at least another inch or so. I don’t know about a larger porch for the fireman but I could use some for the winch and also then I could do some little extra with the back of the tender that I wanted to do but wasn’t going to have the length.

Building to a fixed length is proving to be an interesting challenge. Its actually kind of fun. It really is making me (and obviously you) think creatively.

#15

Y’know, because of the heat in the firebox, you’ll need more weight back there to keep your short wheel base balance.(http://www.largescalecentral.com/externals/tinymce/plugins/emoticons/img/smiley-laughing.gif)

John

edit: failed fool’s day bait…(http://www.largescalecentral.com/externals/tinymce/plugins/emoticons/img/smiley-embarassed.gif)

#16

I should be doing my homework but this kept bugging me so I unscrewed the cab and set it just in front of the steam dome. Oh boy, I like this a lot. For starters it gives an 1 3/8 more in length. Next it puts the smoke box into better proportion to the point where I don’t think I would cut the smoke box down. By not cutting the smoke box down, when I remove the head lamp and move it forward onto a bracket in front of the smoke box over the winch like I want, I can use the head light space for the dynamo. By putting the dynamo there I can then put the air tank on the side where the running boards would have been on the opposite side of the brake compressor which is what I wanted in the first place. Also I had at one time considered a cab like Eric Schade’s WW&F #9

With the cab this way it puts the Backhead at the back of the original cab. If I extend the cab back to the tank like above it makes the boiler in a great location for the fireman. Then I have an additional 1 3/8 to mess with on the front of the loco for the winch or on the back for the light of tools or what ever.

Stay tuned I think we have another major modification coming. This will be a bit of an undertaking because just simply extending the deck forward will get in the way of the drivers. But since there will be no front doors on the cab and there needs to be a seat I will just build the new “floor” as a bench to sit on that ends where the original deck is. Then drop the cab over the drivers, Hard to explain the vision but I think it will work great.

I am not sure whether to thank you or curse you John but at the end of the day this will be a great idea.

#17

Either way works for me! (http://www.largescalecentral.com/externals/tinymce/plugins/emoticons/img/smiley-innocent.gif)

You’ll like the bigger cab.

Oh be sure to leave room enough to ‘oil all around’.

John

#18

Ok so I got my paper written. On more book report to do by Sunday. So I took a break and went to hacking again. I am loving this thanks John for the idea on the cab. That was the ticket. More and more this is achieving the goal of being under 12" and having that small diminutive little logger look.

I have to say it is turning into a cute little bugger.

So I cut the tender tank. Pretty self explanatory. I cut it even with the back of the opening. The made up the difference on the front for a total length of the tank being 3" not counting the platform. This leaves 2 1/2" inches of flat space for my herald which is 2 1/4. Looking at the water tank and the boiler I will have ample room for R/C equipment. I am thinking the batteries will go in the boiler to add weight over the drivers. I can then put the R/C equipment in the tank.

As a side note the LED ESC that was discussed here and I think/hope I advanced on to the point of having directional lighting will be used in this. I think it is a fun idea and 11v LI Ion would run it very well.

Back to the task at hand. I cut the cab to fit down over the steam dome. Again I am not using this cab for anything more than a template so this was for fitting and visualization

I am liking the proportions more and more. It does have a somewhat “toy” feel to it in my opinion but then again so does the one John posted. There just are some very small locos out there.

Now mocked up this way here is what I got. As it sits from the back to the number board is only 9 3/4 inches. That leaves 2 1/4 for the pilot deck/beam/ and coupler on the front and the coupler on the rear truck. I am thinking 1/2 an inch is all I will need in the rear. So that is 1 3/4 up front and if you count the space under the smoke box in front of the boiler support I have 2" or 4 scale feet. I think I can work with this very easy.

I have a little more chopping to do. Need to remove the headlight, I need to remove the filler on the tank (its just to big), I need to remove the old cab mounts, and I still want the front number board closer to the smoke box door. Oh and the back head details need to be removed. Then by golly I think it will be time to rise a phoenix from the ashes.

#19

No problem, I’m happy to inspire.

John

#20

My God, my God!!!
I am going eventually believe that it is easier to make of the total scratch.
Go Devon, I can resist a photo in scoop

Good luck