Improving?? Athearn's Mack Model B Wrecker

[Bangorboy]

This is my first post concerning my own work.  It's also my first attempt to post pictures.  We'll see how it works out or if I totally missed what the procedure is.

Well, I bought an Athearn Mack Model B Heavy Duty Wrecker.  I thought it was a great model as far as it goes, but it looked a little "naked" in the working parts area.  There was no visible means of support to hold those massive booms up where they were, and no cables to tow anything.

 

So,  I looked all over for something to represent the rigging cables.  I tried beading cord, , beading wire, unbraided picture hanging cable to a single strand, cross-stitch floss that had been unbraided (but that fell apart when taken down to one strand), and they all were too bulky.  They all seemed to scale to about 2" to 3" cable.  Way too heavy to make the bends around the pulleys in a truck this size.  Finally, I ran across Berkshire Junction EZ-Line in .003 size.  I had seen their heavier version at train shows.  They have a display that they have shown at Dothan and other places, with telephone wires strung between poles.  It has a motor with an arm that keeps pressing the wires down to the ground and releasing them to demonstrate the stretch characteristics.

I had never seen the fine .003" diameter version of this, so I bought a spool.  This scales out to .48" or just under a half-inch in N scale.  I drilled some holes in the "pulleys" molded to the wrecker's superstructure and booms.  I did some research on the internet, looking for pictures of some of the larger Holmes wreckers for the 50s and 60s.  There aren't many out there that I could find.  And it's hard to find pictures that show clearly where all the cables go.  I also found that apparently molding limitations caused the structure to be a bit more bulky than true scale.  That made it impossible to string the cables exactly where they appear to go in the pictures, but I was able to get what seems to be a reasonable approximation.

One thing I compromised on was the double cable loop supporting the booms.  The real cable is anchored at the end of the pulley assembly on the stationary mast.  I was able to match that.  From there it goes to a pulley (1) on the boom, back around a pulley (2) between the anchor and the mast, back to a pulley (3) beside (1) on the boom, and back to a pulley (4) next to pulley (2), then down to the drum.  I wasn't able to fabricate pulleys small enough to replace the cast-on pulley housings, so I drilled holes through the casting to represent where the cables would pass through the blocks.  I couldn't make the holes big enough to pass through twice, so there is only one loop on my model versus the double loop described above on the real Holmes.  However, once the tow cables were added, the "flavor of the prototype" that we often talk about in N scale seemed to be there.

Here's the finished model:


What do you think?

Bill Blinn

[Bangorboy]

Well, that didn't work.  The example I found under "Help" seemed to show that you type in the path to the image between the marks.  How come my pictures didn't show in my post?

Bill

[Chris333]

Bill,

This is what you have pasted:
http://f/dcim/100ncd50/dsc_1644.jpg
The link doesn't work so I'd guess that is why you get the red X. Maybe their server is down or it is typed wrong?

Edit: Actually that isn't even an address. It sound like it came right from your cameras card? 

[Bangorboy]

Yes, I'm trying to post two pictures from the card in my camera, which is now in my computer slot.

How do I get these to appear inline in the message like the other guys do?

Bill

[Chris333]

Most upload them to a photo hosting site.

I have pics here:
http://picasaweb.google.com/ErieChris333

And here:
http://www.trainboard.com/railimages/showgallery.php/ppuser/3174/cat/500

And here:
http://s114.photobucket.com/albums/n255/Chris333_33/

Some very large ones here:
http://chris333.fileave.com/

Even some very old ones here:
http://community.webshots.com/user/chris333333

I'd pick one you like and upload your photos to it.

[Bangorboy]

Thanks, Chris.  I appreciate the help. 

Didn't realize they had to be coming from a web site.

Bill

[jmlaboda - RIP]

Not just a website but a photo archive that allows "hot links" (allows the photo to be posted to another website.  Rail Images is a good one for this as are the others mentioned.  I will be sending you additional instructions in an email.

[wcfn100]

If you're given any space from your internet provider, you can link from there as well.

Jason

[David Leonard]

You can also build web pages on AOL withgout being a  paying AOL member, e.g: http://hometown.aol.com/nscalepennsyguy/images/nysw%20bridge.jpg

[DKS]

Lots more suggestions in this thread:

http://therailwire.net/smf/index.php/topic,15986.0.html

[Bangorboy]

trying my personal space on my ISP to see if I can post from there.



Bill

[Bangorboy]

That would be a "NO".  Guess I'll try to do this next week.  Packing and driving tomorrow.

Will be set up at the National Peanut Festival grounds south of Dothan for the Wiregrass Train Show Sat and Sun.  See you there if you can make it.  I expect to see Gregg Mahlkov there -- usually do.

Bill

[wcfn100]

You're sooooooo close.  You can't do it with the FTP address, you need the http address.

Right click and look at the properties to see what the right address looks like.






Jason

[3rdrail]

That would be a "NO".  Guess I'll try to do this next week.  Packing and driving tomorrow.

Will be set up at the National Peanut Festival grounds south of Dothan for the Wiregrass Train Show Sat and Sun.  See you there if you can make it.  I expect to see Gregg Mahlkov there -- usually do.

Bill

You might see me there for a little while on Saturday morning, shopping. I did not receive notice about the show until last night, too late to make arrangements to bring my railroad. It usually takes a couple of days to check out my portable layout and fix problems before packing it for travel. I was surprised to find that Walthers' 0-8-0 will negotiate the 7" radius curves on it!

[Bangorboy]

Well, the show at Dothan went well.  Tom and I did the whole show on our 12 X 18 NTrak layout, running a train each on the red and blue lines, and usually two trains on the yellow line.  We never once had an unwanted uncoupling or a derailment for the whole show.  Didn't even induce any by running a turnout that was set against us!

Gregg was there.  Sorry he didn't get the message about the show until too late.  There was some confusion this year.  The main "driver person" of the host historical society had a medical problem a few weeks ago, and there were rumors that the show might not happen.  It did, he was there and appears to be doing quite well.  I hope he recovers completely.  Anyway, I was glad to see Gregg even though he couldn't come as an exhibitor this year.

Back on subject.  I saw the HO scale Athearn Mack B Holmes wrecker at the show.  It comes with cables installed, modeled with black thread.   They seemed a bit dark in color, and a bit heavy in size to me.  The interesting thing about it is, they elected to run the boom support cables in a single loop rather than the prototypical double loop.  I did the same thing because I just couldn't fit two cables through the holes I was able to drill in the N Scale model.  I think they did that on the HO model to simplify the manufacturing process and reduce cost.

OK,  here's the wrecker before and after the cables were added.




Thanks, Jason for pointing out how close I was.  I was about to decide my contribution was not worth the trouble it took.  At least in this case.

Bill