I've added the rivited air tank, cow catcher and brakes. Still more to do but it's coming right along.
Looking good, Jim. You are more ambitious than I am... I have yet to add air brakes to my old Americans. I'm enjoying your progress!
Tonight I tackled the unusual tender. The prototype tender had it's height extended by adding a section around the bottom (which is very obvious in the original photo) I guess to increase coal capacity or water or both. Anyway, I had a spare AHM tender and carefully cut off a section from the bottom and grafted it to the bottom of #151's tender. A little putty and some sanding did the trick. I then drilled grab iron holes and fabricated the grabs from wire. Now there should be room for a the mini Tsunami small steam decoder with sound and a small speaker. Bonus tender modification!
Looks great Jim. Now you just need to get new trucks. Also do the tender steps need to be changed out?
Thanks, Manny. Yes, the prototype has archbar type trucks and different steps and will receive due attention. Yesterday while at the hobby shop I picked up a pair of rerailers to hang from the frame but I'll have to order steps or scratchbuild. The trucks are on the back burner for now but I'm going to have to modify them because I need electrical pick up from all eight tender wheels instead of the poorly designed system it currently uses (pun intended).
Jim, I'm sure I have a set of Roundhouse tender arch bar trucks somewhere with wipers I can send you if it will help. I'm still going through all my detail parts for the "U" pipe fittings, lol. Let me know. Manny
They will go out in Monday's mail. Please PM me your address. Heck, I might be able to get them out today!
She now wears her coonskin and received front boiler braces and sports her newly raised tender. About all that's left is tender detail modifications, DCC and sound installation and decals. It's more of a challenge to model my time era but its been fun and thanks for following along.
Hey Jim, Looking good. I really like the head shot. Isn't the coonskin on the smoke box front the best railroad symbol ever? I think so. I'd like to see more shots of the engine from different views. Are you going to add a rope for the bell and whistle?
Well, I was going to ask you guys about that. Let me run through what I think I need to do. Drill a hole in the brass headlight casting up from the bottom and again from the front and poke an LED light up in there. Run the two wires down into the boiler shell and back towards the tender. I guess I will need to use a two wire micro connected so that I can separate the tender from the engine. I don't know much about using a resistor or where it would fit. I want to use the Tsunami micro DCC small steam decoder and a small speaker which I'm sure I can cram into the now expanded height tender (which of course also contains the motor) and surely it has wires for the headlight. My fears are about properly using and placement of a resistor, screwing up the headlight casting, getting a proper sized LED light and routing the wires. I want to do this but I truely dread it. I am determined to do it though. Any advice?
Jim, Right off the top you're going to run into a problem between the magnet that the engine has and the magnet that the speaker has. You are going to have to either have a strong anchor for both and a shield or the speaker may need to be relocated. I don't know if the extra height you gained in the tender body will be enough for all the components you want to install. Have you gotten the dimensions of the decoder and the speaker and measured at all?
Not exactly but there's quite a bit of room behind the motor for a small speaker and the decoder wil fit above the motor and a coal load can conceal it as well. The Tsunami micro decoder should fit nicely. I'll post pics of the situation this afternoon. It will be tedious work but I'm up for it. My Roundhouse 4-4-0 with sound has opened new vistas for me. I'm bitten by the DCC/sound bug in a big way. I will make this work somehow. I should say I hope this will work somehow.
Jim, I would recommend using a Miniatronics 1.5v 1.2mm diam 15ma bulb for the headlight with a 820 ohm resistor for current limiting and voltage drop. I think the bulb will look and work better. I will get you the exact dimensions for the Micro Tsunami; I will just have to pop open the tender on my 0-6-0. For a speaker, don't worry about the magnetics. The key thing is to enclose the speaker. As long as the front side of the speaker is sealed from the rear side, you will create the necessary baffle. On my 0-6-0, I mounted the speaker face down through the bottom of the tender frame, using the entire body as the enclosure. It is also possible to mount the speaker on a baffle that faces the speaker upwards through holes in a coal load so long as the baffle seals to the car body or the speaker can be in its own box firing up through a coal load. You can glue coal to a fine screen wire to conceal the speaker.
Thanks, Keith. You're definatly my go to guy for DCC info. My Walthers catalog listed the decoder and it seemed as if it will fit. Thanks for the shared wisdom.
Tsunami micro small steam decoder is only 1" x 1/2" and .22" thick. That will fit for sure. It uses a standard 8 ohm speaker sold separately. Walthers sells this for $139. Yikes. Anyone know of a cheaper supplier?
