The boys in the shop have been wanting to try their hand at building a locomotive. With no experience in this area, management has been quite reluctant to grant their wishes but understands that if they don’t let them try, they will never get any experience. SO, the shops have been given the task of building a small backwoods engine. See the art quality sketch below.
The little engine will be built on a USA Trains power truck (in hand prior to 1/1/25). As stated above, we have absolutely NO experience in this field, but we will give it our best shot. The engine cowling will be 3D printed along with the power truck’s side frames, the fuel tank that will be mounted on the rear of the engine and other small details yet to be determined. Most everything else will be made of wood and brass.
This will be a true challenge, but fun also.
I can certainly cut it in half, but then it will be like Humpty Dumpty, all the King’s men and all the King’s horses won’t be able to put it back together 
I normally do all the 3D modeling at one time but this year I’ve had to do it in bits and pieces and I’ve missed quite a few details only to learn about them after I’ve printed that particular piece. For example, I’ve printed no less than 5 sets of side frames before getting all the little details added. I didn’t realize until the fourth set that I had completely overlooked the attachment detail for attaching the frames to the engine body. Same issue with the cowling, but I can fix the cowling issue without reprinting, thank goodness.
