Against all good advice - bought a junker Jamco

[randgust]

I got my 1.5mm electrical connectors in Friday night, so the goal this weekend was to get the tender wired and working rather than jumper cables, and then really test the thing before I move on to cosmetic work.

The 1.5 barely fit through the access hole under the tender deck, but it did.  Wires really too stiff so I rewired everything with the thin and flexible wire I've got with black insulation, looks vaguely like the tender-locomotive water lines.

And then the gremins came out in force.   For some reason, one particular Atlas turnout, in one direction only, naturally in hidden track, kept derailing the lead truck lead axle.   Regauge, check clearances, nothing else has derailed there in years, and nothing else anywhere was derailing although the geometry there is a push, to be polite.   Long story short, the points were just a hair low and the wheel was climbing the outside rail; shimmed up the points and that fixed it.   I'll leave out the 50 laps of testing, four hours of cursing, etc, and running several other trains (including the Hallmark 4-8-4 and my "Super C" of 15 89' piggybacks) to prove that my 'fix' hadn't created a new problem.  On my layout, getting into that particular turnout meant disassembly of scenery, fascia, etc - I have a way in there, but it's not pretty.

Got that beat, train testing time.   Started all tracks testing in all directions with a mixed train of Rivarossi and MT heavyweights.   First 2 cars, then 3, added on the consist, car #3 was a stock MT heavyweight coach.    Round we go.....and then the unmistakable sound of a derailment in the hidden section at the back....then the equally unmistakable sound of a car crashing off my hidden track and hitting the floor in pieces.   It's raining MT parts 48" onto the floor!    Wheels, roof, glass, two partitions, car weight, seats, you name it, all flying off in different directions.   

Took a while to find all the parts, and astoundingly, nothing was actually broken or damaged.   And the rest of the train didn't derail.  (wondering if this goes in the 'MT heavyweight derail thread!').    No explanation, didn't pick a switch, hit something else...   Put everything back on, another 15 laps or so over the exact same spot  - flawless.     So added two more MT heavyweight pullmans pushing my luck, equally flawless.  I can only assume I never properly railed the coach to begin with, that's my story and I'm sticking to it.

Oh, and did I mention that the motor is apparently wired in reverse?  It runs backward to everything else, which means the motor is on upside down.  Top frame plate isn't drilled for a motor mount, and bottom brush holder grounds to the frame, so guess what, it's stayin' that way.

So despite a frustrating series of tests punctuated by an epic fail derailment, it's running pretty good.   It's certainly the equal of the Hallmark 4-8-4 and pretty much what I wanted, one that pulled and ran as well but doesn't look quite so awkward on my 13" curves.  I've got a seven car heavyweight train and it's going to be able to easily handle it on my 2.5% grades and 13" curves.

Dirk's 12K tender tested out quite well, despite the smaller wheel treads and flanges, never derailed once.     I was going to do a video here but it's always wise to know when to declare victory and leave the field of battle.

[CRL]

Looks like you’ve found your new turnout testing locomotive.

[randgust]

Inexplicably, yes.   It was always the Hallmark 4-8-4 before.   I'm not sayin' though that anybody else looking at that turnout would admire my trackwork and I'd probably redo the entire thing if it weren't buried in semi-hidden track.

And for better or worse, all the cast-on piping was ground off last night and I began replacing it with wire.  That's really difficult work to get it smooth and polish it back out, but the drilling was much easier than I thought.   Punched right through it all the way down to #80 for the .010 wires, lubricated bit, slow speed, constant flute cleaning.   Probably did about 20 holes and didn't even break a bit.  This thing has a ton of piping, not sure how much is practical.

I'm putting on GMM stanchions here as well.

[randgust]

Still making some progress.

One of the odd features of some of the bigger ATSF steam was the ladder on the crosshead guides.  Even the Bachmann 4-8-4 has that one.

While it's not real obvious after painting, it's one of those things I debated if it was possible.  Decided to give it a shot with brass shapes and ladder stock.  Tried drilling the crosshead guide #80 (nickel-plated brass) and it actually worked. The GMM industrial ladders have a nifty hole in them to mount the cages in, the idea was to 'staple' the ladder to the guide using .010 wire in from the back and bending it over to make a secure joint with a bit of ACC on the wire.

For the bottom support I experimented with bending up .010 x .030 flat brass stock and drilling a .030 hole in the bottom of the cylinder, then soldering the final joint between the stock and the ladder bottom for strength.   And it can be adjusted.

I 'think' this worked.  And it's durable.  Test ran it, nothing hits anything.  And you can also see I've replace the sand lines successfully.



I'm puttering away putting on new piping.   Lots of piping.  I know steam locomotives and there's still stuff going on with this one I still can't follow; partially because it has both a steam dome, turret on the boiler top, and outside throttle, all kinds of evolved features.  The more I study it I get a respect for just how much of a heavy-duty locomotive this class was, definitely the 3776-class Northern's little brother in every way.   A good example is realizing that the one mystery major-league line from the turret on the left side under the cab and BACK through the tender is simply the steam-heat line for the train, and it's a pretty big line.

[randgust]

Got some more progress in.... I'm working on piping, piping, piping.... man, there's a lot of piping to add.

Decided to take a break and finish up the tender with the etched brass details.   This is an ATSFnscalemodels (Dirk) 12,000 gallon tender; resin body with etched brass parts.

What can I say, it's a great upgrade.   This is really well done, all I can do is assemble it to do it justice.   The only significant modifications I made was to hack out the front end so that can disconnect it from the locomotive; a 1.5mm two-pin plug that slides under the tender deck into the tender body when connected to the locomotive.

[mmagliaro]

You have definitely crossed over into "super-detailing land".  Don't stop now!  Ha ha.

Looks really good, Randy.  I'm not sure about the spacing of the ladder rungs on that ladder over the valve slider.
They look a little close together.  But I still think it looks good and is much better than leaving it out.
To be honest, until you put it on there and I went to look at photos of these engines, I never realized they
had a ladder there at all!  That was pretty gusty drilling #80 holes through and putting pins in there.  Great idea.
It will be very sturdy that way.

[Cajonpassfan]

Really nice job on the tender, Randy. I have several of Dirk's kits, but have yet to tackle one, too busy working on the rairoad. Glad to see it comes together so well, and the all-wheel pickup is a big plus as well.
Looking forward to see what you do to the loco, with all its piping...
Otto

[randgust]

Bad news, good news departments:

Bad news - in my efforts to add details on the boiler casting, I had two semi-catastrophic incidents.    In trying to drill through the running board on the RH side to add a linkage for the power reverse control rod to the power reverse, the entire running board broke loose and bent up vertically, as well as breaking off another drill bit.  Whoops.  That took some repairs.    Second 'oh crap' was when I discovered that I somehow bent up the new LH crosshead guide and as soon as I tested it under power the entire mechanism locked up.   That was good for some tense moments, I think I got that all straightened back out... I think...    Naturally my ladder detailing made repairing it much more difficult.   Once again, there are some really poor solder joints under that brass paint.   That is a heavy brass casting for the boiler and every joint made to it looks semi-cold to me.

I'm still frutzing with the headlight, it's mounted, looks great, but I can't come up with a good tiny, removable one-pin connector and I don't really want to solder it to the hot lead just yet.   May have to invent something here.   

Good news is that for anybody looking to do something like this (trash a semi-collector brass locomotive, admittedly a non-runner) I successfully sold the original tender and even the original etched brass cab on Ebay.   So the 'cost' of this project came down a lot more.

I've got the reverse linkage to add on the RH side to cosmetically link the power reverse to the valve gear, other than that, I'm pretty close to done.   I've drilled a LOT of holes in this thing, and I think I've broken only two bits, both .022, both on stupid drilling mistakes.   At low speed with a dremel, and a lubricated bit, I've successfully punched through the boiler casting and other parts maybe 30 times here.  It wasn't anywhere near as hard to drill as I imagined, but it also had more variation in casting hardness than I thought at different locations, you never knew what you'd hit on every hole.  Some would take forever for the first .020 and then go through it like cheese, others would hit something hard in the middle and you'd just wait it out.

[CRL]

...you never knew what you'd hit on every hole.

Batter up! 

[Cajonpassfan]

I came across this image of the 3434 a few days ago on FB of all places. I realize it's the modernized version with 79" drivers and big tank, but the view from the top is rare. Perhaps you'll find it useful.
Otto [ Guests cannot view attachments ]

[randgust]

Actually, yes.   Almost every shot I've seen is low angle or roster shot.

See the little platform on the pilot deck in front of the tank?   That's the best angle I've seen on that detail.    Another one of the hundreds of things just ignored on the Jamco model.  The number of odd steps, grabs, platforms, etc. to maintain these efficiently is impressive.   I'm guessing that was to reach up and clean the headlight.

One big difference between the 'historic' photos and the current 3415 restoration is the removal of the train steam heat lines, and all the plumbing that took, and those were big lines.   You can see that there's what looks like two brake lines to the left of the coupler and one more hose to the right.  I'm guessing that the independent brakes were somehow rigged together along with the normal trainline, and the hose to the right (thicker one) is the steam heat connection.

I've drilled the holes for the pilot braces but haven't installed them.   They can't be secured on both ends and get the boiler off.

[mmagliaro]

Oh boy do I hear ya on the cold solder joints.  I've seen that on a lot of brass locos.  I have some Precision Scale N Scale K4's to fix up for a guy and some of the main supports between the two frame halves had those lousy solder joints that had broken free and had to be repaired.  I had no way to solder such a large piece without damaging other parts so I drilled small holes through both parts and pinned/epoxied everything back together.

You are one persistent bugger.  This is a difficult project, but it's really turning into something nice.

[Cajonpassfan]

Well, here's another one, same place on Edelstein Hill during WWII on the Chief. Better resolution. The step shows clearly. [ Guests cannot view attachments ]
Otto

[randgust]

I finally figured out the headlight problem, and this might be a useful tip.

I used the brass boiler casting for the one side, that's the 'neutral' side of the LED (soldered), and the 'hot'side was taken over to a contact.   I glued a paper layer to the top of the brass boiler above the motor with Goo as an insulator layer, and then soldered the LED wire / resistor to a .005 phosphor brass strip, glued to the paper layer, that hits the motor brush contact on top of the motor.   No direct wire connection to have to frutz with, boiler still just lifts off.  Anyway, it worked.

That 'hot contact' that picks off the top of the motor would work about anywhere, I think that's sort of what Rivarossi used to do on their headlights too. 

And I had it running a train around again, so there's no damage to the mechanism from my 'improvements'.   I did conclude that this would work a whole lot better if I made that tender shell easily removable off the tender frame.  Maybe a latch and pin, or magnet, or something, so that I can couple it up and then just drop the tender shell down after the tender, wires, plug, etc are all in place.   Nothing wrong with Dirk's screws, but I think I want to take this up a notch somehow.   

Way back when - I used to light cabooses with an AAA battery and a PFM 1.5v. micro-light.  I made caboose smoke jacks out of .030 brass rod (soldered like a "T") and drilled all the way through the frame so that when you twisted the smokejack it turned the caboose lights on as a switch.  Yeah, something like that, only just as a latch to hold the body on.....     I think John Sing got the last one of those when I sold them.

This class evolved into some real individuals.  That tender on the 3420 was one of maybe two that had that scheme with the big blue and silver heralds.  Some had original spoked drivers, some got modern ones, some had the extendable stack, some didn't, different tenders, different trailing trucks, some got a bigger sand dome at the end.   Piping details are all over the place.   3415 has the 12K tender, original trailing truck, modernized drivers, original sand dome, no stack extension.   And, paint has changed, you see the stack is graphited and the smokebox is painted dark gray.  I wasn't sure what that color deal was until color shots showed up in the last "Warbonnet" magazine.

[randgust]

Put it all back together for more testing and found a couple glitches.    I got a 'snap on' tender body idea with vertical spring wire through the screw holes, it worked.     And then it ran, and ran, and ran, and ran....

Found an occasional short off the lead pilot truck wheel front left into the cylinder casting and had to grind a bit off, lubricated the devil out of everything, and in general, can't find anything else not working... so finally, a shot of it assembled, pulling a train, after a successful run-in period.   About 80% of the new brass piping is on, headlight works, handrails are fabricated, some more still to do.