Kriegsloks building shops

[KriegslokBR52]

Today train show-Renningers in Kutztown, Pa. If no one in the area hasn't been yet, its worth coming by, lots of variety and one can find quite some deals. I've had to quickly walk away from few stands, otherwise i'd be bringing home two more steam locomotives. Found bell and narrow shank coupler for the Mikado. At home finished details on boiler and cab structure; steps from smoke box to pilot, wind deflector on top of cab and made a mounting for the bell. After that painting;

Missed few spots and had to respray some more. Here after final coat the boiler with cab, pilot and front air tank assembly are drying for the night:

Tomorrow hopefully modified bell on top of the boiler, decals on cab and sand dome and maybe jewels in marker lights. After that it'll have to get the running gear in order.

 

[pnova56]

I

Today train show-Renningers in Kutztown, Pa. If no one in the area hasn't been yet, its worth coming by, lots of variety and one can find quite some deals. I've had to quickly walk away from few stands, otherwise i'd be bringing home two more steam locomotives. Found bell and narrow shank coupler for the Mikado. At home finished details on boiler and cab structure; steps from smoke box to pilot, wind deflector on top of cab and made a mounting for the bell. After that painting;View attachment 175079View attachment 175080
Missed few spots and had to respray some more. Here after final coat the boiler with cab, pilot and front air tank assembly are drying for the night:View attachment 175081View attachment 175082View attachment 175083View attachment 175084
Tomorrow hopefully modified bell on top of the boiler, decals on cab and sand dome and maybe jewels in marker lights. After that it'll have to get the running gear in order.

The Mikado looks awesome. I have a mantua mikado that I plan on restoring. I have a few projects a head of it though. Your work will be a great reference. So thank you.

I also went to the Renningers train show. It’s a good show. I picked up a bunch of old varney, penn line, bowser, and mantua die cast and tin rolling stock.

Thanks
Patrick

 

[GuilfordRailman]

Just getting caught up on this thread. Your locomotives look incredible! Keep up the great work!

 

[KriegslokBR52]

Just getting caught up on this thread. Your locomotives look incredible! Keep up the great work!

Thank you.

 

[KriegslokBR52]

I

The Mikado looks awesome. I have a mantua mikado that I plan on restoring. I have a few projects a head of it though. Your work will be a great reference. So thank you.

I also went to the Renningers train show. It’s a good show. I picked up a bunch of old varney, penn line, bowser, and mantua die cast and tin rolling stock.

Thanks
Patrick

There was a guy who had a Bowser I1 with proper boiler installed and 8 axle tender, so tempting as the Pennsy "Hippo" is my favorite American steam engine. But i already have one on the table that needs work.

 

[KriegslokBR52]

A few morning shots of the L&NE Mikado so far:

I will be on the running gear next, as that needs some attention. It'll also have to do something with that guiding truck, low lighting shows how unrealistic that looks. Real guiding Pennsy truck had visible huge leaf spring going across.

 

[KriegslokBR52]

Little extra time after work and dinner, so i sat down and tackled the running gear on Mikado today. Soldered in the plates under firebox:

After that cleaning and quick painting of the wheels and rods.

This is what it looks like as of now:

Still to do decals with numbers on cab sides and sand dome. I have also narrowed the front of trailing truck so it wouldn't touch rear driving wheels when on curves.

Need to weather this thing, way too shiny

 

[migalyto]

Beautiful job!

 

[KriegslokBR52]

Beautiful job!

Thank you.

 

[BigGRacing]

Great job for sure! You have me debating painting my wheels and drive rods some day.

 

[KriegslokBR52]

Great job for sure! You have me debating painting my wheels and drive rods some day.

I never liked that toyish look when the rods and wheel rims stand out with all that shine. This will get a coat of grime and flat clear at the end yet. I'd like to make imitation of brake gear still. Neither Penn Line or Bowser had that option. Carry, Kemtron and few other firms had separate brake shoes, and these items are getting difficult to find. I'll probably just scratch build them for this steamer.

 

[KriegslokBR52]

Beautiful and sunny, managed to get number decals on before church service. Of course do to silly perfectionism i also destroyed a "4" on one side trying to allign it. So after cutting off another "4" and putting it on the cab i was still able to spray clear laquer over to protect the film. Real mikados on L&NE had a hand rail on side of sand dome, so no number like the rest of the fleet.

This picture is from the book "Eastern Steam Pictorial" by Bert Pennypacker:

Deffinitely some of the most minimalistic lettering of steam locomotives anywhere. An aquaintenance is working on the number board to go on front of smokebox and that would be it for markings. Next step is preparing to mix some grime paint in airbrush and weathering the beast.

 

[KriegslokBR52]

Today a little exercise in math and drafting. Lehigh and New England besides the huge "decapods" and second hand "mikados", also had some of the largest "consolidations" which they bought new from ALCo. As far as i was able to find no one made a model in H0 gauge, not even in brass. Having very little to go by measurements wise, i'm drawing a rough side elevation of such machine; E-14 class:

The caption on the bottom picture has a mistake, those E-14 were built by ALCo, not Baldwin. Easiest way to tell from a picture is by the shape of builders plate; Baldwin had oval builder plates, while ALCo had rectangular, (Lima had diamond shaped ones for the curious). Lots of improvising since the only measurements i was able to find were size of drivers, driver wheelbase, locomotive wheelbase and locomotive w/tender wheelbase. Everything else is guesswork and trying to extrapolate some hight measurements from physical pictures. I figure after drawing a rough sketch on this paper, i'll draw everything on a sheet without the stripes. Tender would be standard looking one:

I would eventually have to build a booster truck to go with it, but that's in the future.

 

[KriegslokBR52]

That's as far as i'm getting today. Always looks different on the drawing than on pictures. Considering that given total wheel base with tender is 65,16' it should be ok

Total driver wheelbase given seems a little off. The number 4 driver set was offset, but seems closer to the rest on pictures. https://www.steamlocomotive.com/locobase.php?country=USA&wheel=2-8-0&railroad=lne#412
According to this site my drawing is correct concerning distances between axles, but the site is known to have mistakes. Revised drawing after i realised my mistake in overall engine wheelbase

 

[KriegslokBR52]

Last week besides getting motivated for the upcoming train show, decided it was time to fit the DC71 motor back in the rebuilt mikado. After delicate lube as not to spill any oil on electrical parts of the motor i screwed it on the frame and did some braking in. Of course being me comes with brain farts and when installing drive wheels and valve gear i put on driver set backwards which lead to short on live rails. After some necessary "garage latin" coming out of my mouth i switched the offending driver set (thankfully it was number 4)in proper direction.

Still few more tweaks like shaving a little off the rear frame, so the KW truck has more swing without creating a short. It ran like a clock on the mainline;

On the unfinished figure "8" secondary track it was stalling running backwards as the KW trailing truck was being pushed to the sides and touching its wheel to the main frame. Besides that the bell and rear cab wall needs to be installed. When i'll have warmer day, i'll weather the beast.
Went to a large train show in Allentown called "First Frost Train Meet". I highly recommend this one for anyone who is able, as the variety is great and there were numerous rare out of production pieces available. I found a fat proper sized Belpaire boiler for Bowser I1 decapod:

So the project with two decapods can begin.

 

[Marlin338MX]

Great work! Very creative and interesting.

 

[KriegslokBR52]

Work started on the Pennsy I1 decapod. All holes for hand rail on the side of the boiler were drilled in wrong space. I had to use some baking soda to fill them and drop CA in to fill them up. After which had to smooth the boiler surface. At the same time i drilled new holes corresponding to actual I1 drawings.

Cab roof had no rain gutters, so i made a pair out of thin .020 brass wire. New gutters visible on first picture. Cab also had no windows in the front wall. Those were much tougher to make. I used a thin diamond rod on a dremel and mini drill bit to make the initial openings, after which mini files went to work in shaping of the windows.

Front of the smoke box got the half round handrail installed. All of these are PITA to do. Most of what's coming next is much simpler to fit in. During that time the original super detailed boiler was soaking in DOT4 brake fluid in the garage. Every day in the evening i went and scraped loose paint off that with a tooth brush. Today i finally made final brushing and washed the brake fluid off with warm soapy water. Someone did very nice job on all that super detail:

Too bad it has to come off. The brown roof paint held a lot better as can be seen, but that area is not as important. Now i have to carefully remove all that detail and apply it onto the larger boiler.

Few pieces fell of with brushing; like the turbo generator and some piping. After that detail will come off, i'll have a spare K4/L1 boiler. This super detail job has four cylinder compressor on both sides. Few "Hippos" had that set up, including the only saved example number 4483 in Hamburg, NY. I'll be doing single compressor setup. That huge accessory in front of compressor on the last picture is the Worthington water heater-standard on pennsy "Hippos". That's all for now.

 

[Bruette]

I admire your work. You are a true artisan.

 

[KriegslokBR52]

Got off a little earlier from work. Ate dinner and started on the decapod. Most of the details are off the small boiler. At the same time i started to apply the largest and easiest details to the large boiler. Safety valves on top of firebox are on, compressor and Worthington water heater are on left side as well as a few more holes drilled for more details. First fitting onto the main frame to check for proper height:

The bottom of the cab is just at the right height, but will have to drop the front maybe just a little less than half of 1mm;
This is definitely a mixed setup with walkway above the compressor and water heater splitting it at the same time. Thankfully i found more than one picture of such a setup in "Pennsy Power" and "Locomotive Cyclopedia"-Volume 1. Saved me from modifying catwalks on the side of the boiler.

Above is number 4628 with a long distance tender but still with turbo generator on top of the smokebox behind the light, exactly the setup i'm going for.

 

[KriegslokBR52]

Quite a bit of filing, drilling, smoothing. Installed ash pans under firebox. That took a lot of shaving since i had to maintain proper clearances above drive wheels.

One ot the most work intensive was the rear plate which goes under the cab and has clearances for tender coupling bar. Had to do several metal shaving sessions. Plate was soldered from two pieces of brass; a channel and flat piece where the channel rests between bottom of cab and top of main frame to keep cab (and boiler) at proper height:

Not sure if i'll add more details to that plate. In this scale it will be barely visible when the tender gets coupled to locomotive.

Dinner time