Building (and improving) the Showcase N Shay

[randgust]

Last night was one of those nights....

Successful on getting all the wiring connections into the cab, and testing it.   Haven't secured the cab yet.   Before I do that, the bell has to go, looks terrible, and I found some beautiful bell castings in my collection, maybe the Atlas Shay?   Not sure where the parts came from.

Grinding off the original bell with an abrasive disk, delicate work.     Finished up, sorta.....oh, CRAP.   The vibration had loosened the tiny air compressor from the boiler, dropped out on the floor somewhere, and worse than that the 00-80 nut and small brass washer were vibrated off the mounting screw as well.   No good deed goes unpunished.   Somewhere on the floor, three tiny pieces........ two critical to hold the drive to the shell.  Fatal error.

Spend the rest of the evening on my knees with flashlight, tweezers, and floor 'scraper rod' searching for parts.  I have a vynl tile floor so it's not like a shag rug, but still.......  I don't have replacements for those.  So you find them.   Period.

So about an hour later, found the compressor, and the nut.  The washer took another half an hour.   

Secured the nut and washer with canopy glue this time.   Another evening.....

[amato1969]

Oof, nice save @randgust !

[mark.hinds]

Last night was one of those nights....
(text removed)  "... Somewhere on the floor, three tiny pieces........ two critical to hold the drive to the shell."  (text removed)

FWIW, my technique for finding stuff like that is to use a vacuum cleaner, on minimum suction, with a piece of old T-shirt material rubber-banded over the end of the pipe. 

MH

[Dwight in Toronto]

It’s astonishing to me just how many dozens of hours, in a typical year of modeling, I spend doing the very same thing … scouring the floor on hands & knees with flashlight, magnifiers etc.

It’s equally astonishing  a) how far away some tiny, weightless parts can bounce, and b) the percentage of dropped parts that NEVER get found.

[randgust]

OK, well, I photographed this before I painted everything, it's all grimy black now, but this is how I jammed the dropping resistor for the LED in there.  You can see the 'heavy work' I did in bringing in the headlight wires, the 'fingers' centering the MT 901 Z coupler, the .020 wires pinning the retainer plate, coupler fingers, too.   And the two wires to the left are in a hole that is diagonally drilled through the boiler and comes out in the backhead.  The wiring connections to the cab, the rear headlight, and the drive unit are all tucked in the cab.

I did the back headlight on the cab roof exactly the same way I did the Nn3 one, the resistor is glued to the cab roof inside all the way to the front.  Cab is still very much open.

If you look closely at the photo you'll see why it was so important to cover everything metal in .005 styrene.  I also make a habit of not using shrink tubing unless I have to, I'd rather solder connections and paint them and insulate the area.  Shrink gun heat here would have damaged who-knows-what.

Oh, and Peteski, all this was done before your resistor posting.   Will definitely try that for the next one.  Finding space for those stock resistors has been an issue with my headlights.



Link:  http://www.randgust.com/ShowShay4005.jpg

Oh, and when I built the layout room in the basement, I levelled and sealed the concrete floor, and put down vinyl tiles - relatively light colored.  The lesson learned came from a friends layout that had green shag rug carpeting, oh what a disaster that was.  I can almost always find stuff if I'm willing to search long enough.  I also use a magnet stick, very effective, but not on pewter or brass nuts and washers.  The Iphone with the low lens and flash has turned out to be a great search tool, I can see under the workbench desk and bookshelves with it.

[Assaboutengineer]

     Great work randgust !!!  Uve  taken that Build to another level inspiring stuff.👍loving the log pile,builders plate and not to mention the engineering wrk😉 makes me miss my old Pickering lumber no3 atlas shay,
and want to tackle something along similar lines..
       Appreciate you posting and the ensuing collaborative comments from others,I had been curious about low flange options for the kato mechanism so many thanks peteski.also been on the search for smaller power bogies for a tram project so the azl spares may offer a way forward for some superlow mechanism options. Cheers Glenn

 

[peteski]

       Appreciate you posting and the ensuing collaborative comments from others,I had been curious about low flange options for the kato mechanism so many thanks peteski.

Sure thing.  But there are other options too.  Back in the day when many locos (especially all German made models) had very large flanges, many of us used some brute-force methods for trimming the flange depth. Some even connected test clips the the model so the wheels could spin freely and the using a file just turned down the flanges.  If course one had to be careful not to get the metal filings inside the mechanism (or make sure to take the model apart to clean it out.

[randgust]

I did that 'brute force' method to blind the center drivers on a Hallmark 4-8-4 as it couldn't even negotiate 15" curves and was very successful.  But I've lost track of how many Tomytec chassis I've turned the wheels on, split axles and a Dremel and a micrometer, easier than you think.  As long as you have split axles, it's pretty easy even with a power drill.  What you do need is good measurement tools.

A lot of it depends on the turnouts you have.  As I'm populated with Peco C55, Atlas C80, and some legacy stuff, with relatively deep frogs, you're going to bounce through a frog and lift an opposite wheel typically, leading to very erratic pickup on little critters.  Given the choice between a photo-perfect model and one that is  stalled on the track, I've always picked the latter.   On these, the entire focus is trying to get better electrical pickup at very low speed for geared steam performance.  Same thing with tread width, a narrow tread drops in the frog.  But I like to mention wheel turning for the population that has Atlas C55 or Fast Tracks, would certainly work.

I'll put this in the thread so it doesn't get lost (I've posted this elsewhere), this shows the front pickups as installed, and was before I did the headlight wiring.  This was testing the front truck pickup with all the weight on it, tweaking the contacts for weight distribution.  When those were painted black they pretty much disappear.


Link: http://www.randgust.com/ShowShay4009.jpg

As far as the project, last night was putting on the .010 wire boiler handrails.   Well, that was painful.  Stanchions had to be hand-fabricated from wire, and drilled in the pewter boiler.   I did real well until the last one, finally snapped off a lubricated drill bit, lucky it was only one, but pewter is so miserable to drill tiny holes in.  And I probably lost three stanchions on the floor or workbench.  But it's done.

Well, one more 'acid test' before paint, ran it all over my logging module looking for glitches, hangups, and curve issues.  See how it handles all my Trix curved turnouts and 7 1/2" interior curves.  Those Trix R1+R2 curved switches have a LONG insulated frog, and the primary reason to either make the front truck electrically hot on these or don't bother at all.   The only thing that showed up was that this locomotive has ZERO ground clearance under the drive unit, it will hang up on anything even .010 over the surface of the rails.  But other than that, wow, what a champ.  No issues.  On to paint!

[randgust]

OK, so I have to admit, as difficult as this kit has been, it's been worth it.   The 'last feature' I added that I messed with on the Nn3 one and am doing here is the fake driveshafts.   
I managed to make linked and connected (non-functional) wire and tube ones on my scratchbuilt 25-tonner many years ago.  That's proven to be a real headache over time. I even made universals that worked.  Had visions of a spinning crank that ultimately failed.

I tried the same stunt on the Nn3, and the angles were so tight and the distances so short it failed.  So I faked it out, drilled holes in the truck ends .020 and simply glued in black thin wire (with black insulation) on one end, and clipped it just short of the cylinder end.  It rotates with the truck, doesn't touch the cylinder end.  The only time it's in alignment is on straight track.  But in photos, it's perfect.  Looks great.  You can't see it's not doing anything.  And it's so short you don't really notice it on curves when running.

Repeated the same thing on the N one, just as effective.  Talk about cheating.  But that's another thing that annoyed me with that Showcase kit, I don't mind that the shaft isn't spinning (the Atlas one is cool but what an operational PITA that is) but the big 'air gap' missing shafts is actually pretty bad.   This is a pretty effective fake-out visually.

[randgust]

It's getting close anyway.

So you can see a couple mods in this shots, other than painting.   I got the bell replaced.   The oil bunker was ground down, and made into a coal load.  Something removable has to hide that mounting nut, that's my story and I'm sticking to it.

The highly fragile steps are on, handrails, and grabs.  Fake driveshafts.  Crew in the cab.   I'm please with the degree of invisibility on all the additional wiring and pickups in there.

Still have to add the window glass, builders plate, number plate, maybe "W&D 6" decals,  one more round of touchup painting.  And probably the wood ramp on the RH side going over the toolbox as it was 'left to die' in Endeavor.   

But overall, pretty happy, and the performance is just exceptional.  I have  a couple Atlas Shays, and while they are great, I always have my heart in my throat watching everything spin and hopefully not throw off universals or a driveshaft.  And they are stiff; they don't like any track warp of any kind, will stall.   This has better low speed, surprisingly good adhesion and tractive effort, and with the 'hot' front truck, it doesn't stall at all, it's a flexible little monster now.  That front truck pickup and the couplers are the two design flaws that if you beat them, it's a winner.



Link:  http://www.randgust.com/ShowShay4011.jpg



Link:  http://www.randgust.com/ShowShay4010.jpg

[up1950s]

Looks great Randy , thanks for sharing your tricks and pitfalls .

 I am wondering if brass tubes were glued the the trucks and cylinders , and soft rubber rods which float but are long and short enough to allow for left and starboard turns as well as vertical changes but just won't fall out is possible . No spin , but no gap . 

Heislers and Climaxes being center drive shafted are so much easier for 8 wheel pick up and drive , why manufacturers are not pumping these out is confusing , and pissing me off for decades .

[peteski]

Heislers and Climaxes being center drive shafted are so much easier for 8 wheel pick up and drive , why manufacturers are not pumping these out is confusing , and pissing me off for decades .

I suspect  that the reason is always the same (and same as with any other business): Major model RR manufacturers likely do not think the such a model would sell well enough to make any  money after dumping a lot of money into design,m, tooling and assembling them.  We both know that this type of a locomotive is a niche product (not a like a Big Boy or GG1 or any modern Diesel), and with with a complex mechanism (it is not a simple diesel model) and all the fine details on that model, it would be a very expensive project.

[peteski]

Heislers and Climaxes being center drive shafted are so much easier for 8 wheel pick up and drive , why manufacturers are not pumping these out is confusing , and pissing me off for decades .

I suspect  that the reason is always the same (and same as with any other business): Major model RR manufacturers likely do not think the such a model would sell well enough to make any  money after dumping a lot of money into design,m, tooling and assembling them.  We both know that this type of a locomotive is a niche product (not a like a Big Boy or GG1 or any modern Diesel), and with with a complex mechanism (it is not a simple diesel model) and all the fine details on that model, it would be a very expensive project.  Model RR manufacturers are in the business of making money (to at least break even on a model), not in the business of pleasing a small number of modelers.  If they happen to produce a model which can do both,  they hit the jackpot.

[randgust]

The Atlas Shay is really cool, but the most mechanically fragile thing I've ever owned.   After you've tried to reassemble the driveshafts for about the fifth time, you can only imagine the kind of warranty returns, etc. that they would have run into.  Frankly I like the Showcase approach, rock solid power truck, the only flaws are the 'dead' lead truck and the visible gaps in the shaft, both of which this approach fixed.  This is a far more 'typical' Shay, unlike the big Atlas 65-tonner that was late production.   And it's all metal, which you need as well.  RP printing is fun, but you need weight and a lot of it.

I tried myself to make a spinning crank on my 25-tonner I scratchbuilt decades ago, failed, it's static.  But connected with slide joints that work.  I put a 25:1 gearhead in it, it's a winner, a little smaller than the Showcase one.  I ran both Atlas and my Shay at Altoona, the Atlas shed a driveshaft (again) about an hour in and went home shop for repairs, my Shay ran two solid days without a repair or failure.

I was successful in getting a moving jackshaft on my Climax B, that's REALLY obvious if that works, more so than a Shay, and it doesn't drive off the centerline shaft at all, it works off of a second worm.   YouTube video on that below.  Everybody asks me if I'd do a kit, but I scabbed together parts from about five models plus a Faulhaber 816, so it's financially a nonstarter commercially.  But it's a repeatable and solid design that has held up.  Front truck only powered, but it does well with a metal boiler.

I've been trying to make the 'perfect Heisler' for about 20 years.  My original 1976 Heisler (working siderods, diesel truck frames) that I've christened "Bigfoot" because of the wheelbase, is an excellent performing model but what I still want is one with a working V drive (not in overspeed like Rivarossi) and working rods, with 48" wheelbase on the trucks and 42" wheels.   A very elusive project.  I've developed a design, sort of, but the truck-to-worm-to-wheelbase is a significant design problem.

/>