Bob S
New Member
I bought an "N" MDC mogul awhile ago because I heard good reports about the performance. The reports were not exagerated. Of course, as luck would have it, it matched neither my prototype (A&W, GB&W) or era (1920-1945). Details like the wooden cab, oil headlamp, and tender with small bunker and flared coaming just scream "19th century". So I "modernized it":
The cab and smokebox front with centered electric headlamp are "spares" from the Model Power mogul, the flared tender coaming has been removed and an extended coal bunker made from styrene. One of the neat things is that the new headlamp works perfectly with the model's existing constant brightness bulb: it glows brightly even at a dead crawl.
As it sits in the pictures, it has just been temporarily reassembled for test with enough paint slapped on it to cover the body shop scars. Some basic details (generator, two single stage compressors, injectors, check valves and piping) are (hopefully) in the mail from Walthers.
It is still the star performer that it was. It hauls 15 cars around my work-bench test track with 10" radius curves, and it creeps ponderously through the dead frogs on the Atlas code 55 turnoputs that are set up temporarily in what will be the Sturgeon Bay yard on the shelf (The frogs will be powered when track is permanently installed.)
It still doesn't match any prototype ... it has a very superficial resemblance to GBW No. 92, which was the red-haired stepchild of the fleet, bought used from Chicago and Alton; started life as a 2-6-0, was converted to 0-6-0, and then back to 2-6-0. I may just slap "92" on it and call it "good enough". It runs too darn good to be a hangar queen!
Carry on!
Resp'y,
Bob S.
The cab and smokebox front with centered electric headlamp are "spares" from the Model Power mogul, the flared tender coaming has been removed and an extended coal bunker made from styrene. One of the neat things is that the new headlamp works perfectly with the model's existing constant brightness bulb: it glows brightly even at a dead crawl.
As it sits in the pictures, it has just been temporarily reassembled for test with enough paint slapped on it to cover the body shop scars. Some basic details (generator, two single stage compressors, injectors, check valves and piping) are (hopefully) in the mail from Walthers.
It is still the star performer that it was. It hauls 15 cars around my work-bench test track with 10" radius curves, and it creeps ponderously through the dead frogs on the Atlas code 55 turnoputs that are set up temporarily in what will be the Sturgeon Bay yard on the shelf (The frogs will be powered when track is permanently installed.)
It still doesn't match any prototype ... it has a very superficial resemblance to GBW No. 92, which was the red-haired stepchild of the fleet, bought used from Chicago and Alton; started life as a 2-6-0, was converted to 0-6-0, and then back to 2-6-0. I may just slap "92" on it and call it "good enough". It runs too darn good to be a hangar queen!
Carry on!
Resp'y,
Bob S.
Excellent job, and lets see more photos of it rolling through pastoral scenery! 