Throwing my hat into the ring. Minitrix 2-10-0 / I1SA improvements

[delamaize]

Hey everybody,
I managed to acquire two of these minitrix 2-10-0 / I1sa relics for very cheap a few years ago. For the most part they've sat in my project drawer waiting for me to have some motivation to do some serious kit bashing. Then here a few months ago I saw that Keystone details was offering his 3D prints again after shapeways had closed down. I thought to myself hell this is my opportunity, then ordered myself two of his kits. My plan is to have one with a Long Haul tender, and one with the Factory Short tender. So far the Long Haul version is running very well, and I'm pretty happy with it. Unfortunately the short haul version has a cracked wheel center, I was able to shake the parts box and find a close enough wheel from some other random steam locomotive, but the mechanism has a pretty bad lope in it now that I can't seem to work out no matter how many times I requarter it. getting out the micrometer, I discovered this wheel is just a miniscule amount taller than the others. That led me to our trading post, and a request to shake the parts box, to obtain a new complete wheel set and axle. Dave v, and Lee replied to me, with the doc asking me to post about my progress. So here I am. Unfortunately I did not take any pictures during the building of either one, but here are some pictures of both at their current state.

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The Long Haul version still needs detail work, such as a dog house and train phone antennas for the tender, and boiler details such as the feed water heater handrails and a bell for the locomotive. The Tender is from a Bachmann EM1, I think once I add the details mentioned above , and letter it for Pennsylvania it'll be a convincing foob. I decided to tackle turning down the wheel flanges so it would run on my home layout which is all a combination of Micro Engineering code 55 and atlas. I actually have it running really well right now, trudging around my small layout at a scale 20 mph pulling 25 random Atlas ore cars and an N5 caboose.

The decoder I am running in this locomotive currently is a lokpilot, which I installed into the tenders existing circuit board and speaker with a Next18 harness.. The plan eventually is to change to a loksound.

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This is the other one, I took the existing tender shell, and modified a Bachmann full pickup tender frame to fit the shell. Although now that I have done it, I'm thinking I might see if I can get a Bachmann K4 tender for this locomotive, as it is a lot nicer looking than what I've done, and will have DCC and sound Provisions built in, like the Long Haul version my target is to have a loksound decoder. As for the locomotive itself on this one, unfortunately the Piston rods were damaged, as this one was bought as a box of Parts completely disassembled. I could not get the Piston rods to straighten out enough to run in the cylinders smoothly. So I clipped them, I'm hoping to maybe find a replacement set one of these days. Without any rods on the locomotive, it actually runs pretty well.

As for Keystone details kit, I'm very impressed, and very happy with it. His instructions online are detailed, and well executed. I also bought one of his steam locomotive detail kits for Pennsylvania railroad, so I will be changing out sand domes on both locomotives to have ones that have the proper shape. If anybody is looking at buying one of these kits, and putting forth the effort to improve one of these old relics, I highly recommend the kit. It's been a joy to work with. I will try to remember to update this thread as I make progress.

[Dave V]

Yeah, looking good so far!

[Dave V]

@delamaize ,

So... You added DCC to these? The "long haul tender" version is running spectacularly sweet. Is that the original motor? And if so, how on earth did you manage to isolate it for DCC?

[Dave V]

You know what? I just realized I have my own long haul tender available... I built this 20 years ago, and I still have it.

[robert3985]

Oh Yeah... @delamaize - Your loco in the video is running especially smoothly...runs great! Roughness is almost always accompanied by slinky-effect and I didn't notice any in your ore hoppers even though I realize some of them are drawbar connected.  Take photos of further progress please!

Cheerio!
Bob Gilmore

[Lemosteam]

Mike, thank you for the compliment.

I will also soon be selling a tender detail kit with one and three man doghouses, backup lights, water scoop, marker lights and front & rear steps.

Later two full on long distance tenders riveted and welded, with shell, trucks and chassis will be available with a built in 8x11 speaker enclosure.

[delamaize]

@delamaize ,

So... You added DCC to these? The "long haul tender" version is running spectacularly sweet. Is that the original motor? And if so, how on earth did you manage to isolate it for DCC?

Yup, added DCC to the Long Haul one, going to add to the other eventually, but I want to get it running smooth first. Adding to Next18 adaptor harness was pretty easy, just had to desolder the decoder plug on the board in the Bachmann EM1 tender, I Sat down with a multimeter to figure out which pad was what. Pretty strait forward, and with it being Next18, I can swap out the LokPilot with a Loksound whenever I want.

It is using the stock motor, mine was pretty easy to isolate. IIRC One connection was just a soldered wire. And I feel like the other was a physcial connection that was easily broken. Then I added orange/gray wires running back to the tender, also a pair of red and black for pickup also. Headlight, I cut down a OLD Atlas incandescent light board from a split frame diesel, removed the Diode, I trimmed it so it's a friction fit in the smoke box. Ill try to get some pictures the next time I have the shell off.

[randgust]

John and I tinkered quite a bit with my concept modifications.   I was really lucky in that I got that box of leftover GHQ stuff for mine, but that still didn't solve the front end issues.

You really have to hack up a lot of stuff to get the left and right side running boards right, and put in that huge feedwater heater that was so common.  Just remind yourself it's just plastic.   I got lucky finding one of the GHQ Southern 2-8-2 conversion kits for a song to get my feedwater heater.   And I replaced the entire cab with the GHQ L1 cast one.

This is really a case where a well-done RP boiler and cab would do this justice.  If you can get a good mechanism (and it sure looks like you do) it's worth it.   That is one durable design and is all-geared, not dependent on rods, and both sides pick up power.  I put a five-pole on mine and I also have a second one on the workbench with Lee W's resin boiler that may or may get finished someday.

I'm curious on your method for taking down the flanges.   I filed mine under power, worked, but sure wasn't easy.

[Ed Kapuscinski]

I mean, we could guarantee BLI will announce one if John makes a full kit...

[dem34]

I feel like I'm taking one for the team trying to dress up an old Minitrix B6 some days.

[delamaize]

...I'm curious on your method for taking down the flanges.   I filed mine under power, worked, but sure wasn't easy.

What I did was on the same vein, but different execution.
Upside down in a foam cradle, Power jumper wired to the tender wheels, Masking tape over the exposed gears on the bottom, then ran it forward direction, With a dremel tool, on a low to medium speed, (Mine has 10 steps, I was running on step 4) with a small drum sander, and a "Medium" grit drum, With the dremel spinning in the opposite direction, a light hand, and frequent stops to check size.  Once I got them down to about the right size, I used a file, while it was running, to clean up and profile the flanges.

Worked well, and didn't take nearly as long as this job had with just a file, like I have done before.

[randgust]

I feel like I'm taking one for the team trying to dress up an old Minitrix B6 some days.

Biggest thing you could do to improve performance is add a 'hot' tender to get 8x8 pickup.   It's pretty much the same internally as the Decapod.
You can easily isolate the motor and go DCC as well, just 6-pin it into the tender.
Take the flanges down like Delamaize and I did although it sounds impossible.  I did mine with the motor out and spun it down with an abrasive disk on the dremel, holding it back lightly with my fingers.   Real mess of metal dust that had to be cleaned out though.
https://www.spookshow.net/loco/trix060.html

I added a kato shortened caboose frame with pickup trucks under a Rapido 0-6-0 to make it 'hot', and it now has a Trix motor in it.   It's a real performance champ now and has been for years, my 'go to' little steam engine for public shows that just runs and runs and runs without argument.  Aldo did a 'shorty' tender that way for my D16, and that one doesn't even have any electrical pickup in the locomotive with the motor in the tender.

[Dave V]

Ok, I just joined the club. Picked up a Trix 2-10-0 on eBay last night!

Because I didn’t have enough projects in the backlog…   

[delamaize]

Ok, I just joined the club. Picked up a Trix 2-10-0 on eBay last night!

Because I didn’t have enough projects in the backlog…   

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[Dave V]

Mike, thank you for the compliment.

I will also soon be selling a tender detail kit with one and three man doghouses, backup lights, water scoop, marker lights and front & rear steps.

Later two full on long distance tenders riveted and welded, with shell, trucks and chassis will be available with a built in 8x11 speaker enclosure.

@Lemosteam John,

Any thought on a proper tender shell to fit the Minitrix shell? The shell looks like a 90P75 and the I1sa engines with the short tender had the 90F82 with the straight sides on the coal bunker.