Live Steam

Shay Wheels Completed

Shay Progress as of January 2009

Along the way I learned how to silver solder, use a lathe, mill, and various other metal working skills as well as acquired various tools.  It wasn’t really what I wanted though as it was just too small for my tastes.  I really wanted a 7.5″ gauge live steam shay.  While the track is only slightly more than twice as wide the mass and volume were 8 times.  So using castings from Ken Schroeder at www.shaylocomotive.com, I got started on what i really wanted.  This was about April of 2009.

Nelson Riedel created a website that chronicled his journey through the construction process and has been an endless source of inspiration.  He probably wonders why that one IP has been visiting his site so often.  Here is a picture of him on his Shay so you can see the scale:

I have also found there is a club, Colorado Live Steamers, about 30 miles away from the house that I can join and run my locomotive when done.  I hope to visit soon on a run day to meet some of the members and see the facilities.  Actually running the locomotive seems a long way off though.

One thing that had to be done though was get a much bigger lathe capable of turning the bigger pieces.  I got a Grizzly 10″ metal lathe and wow is it nice.  The old Harbor Freight 7″ lathe seems like a toy but it was a great learning tool.  The only bad thing about the Grizzly was wrestling the 450 pounds into the basement.  Thank god for walkouts.

It does seem to attract a mess.

With the lathe and the mini-mill I got to work on my Shay Trucks.  Lots of milling, drilling, and tapping.

Oh yeah, and heating, bending, welding, and grinding.  I am a terrible welder.  Must be my Dad’s fault.

The axles are just sitting in place without the wheels which haven’t been finished.  Each end of the axle rides in a ball bearing.  Very smooth rolling at this point.

Lots of parts waiting their turn on the lathe, welder, mill or simply to be assembled.

There, now that we are caught up I can provide updates on the details as they come together.  As you saw from last night’s post I am working on finishing up the trucks by building the spring planks.  Other things left to be done include turning the wheels to the final profile, turning the gears down to the final dimensions, cutting keyways, and pressing the wheels onto the axles.  Since I am building a 3 truck shay and I only have 2 trucks worth of castings I will also need to repeat a lot of the steps that got me here.  Good thing I am relatively young.

My goal has to been to build a nice green forested look with multiple layers of foliage.  I have used mostly Woodland Scenics turf and polyfiber as well as experimenting with some Sweetwater Scenery products.  Many of the trees were transported from Michigan and my previous layout.  They are bottle brush type that I made from wire, sisal twine, ground foam, and spray paint.

Another closer view.

The final view is from the other side.  I have much more work to do but wanted to share how things are going.

Almost had a disaster this morning as I tried to order some more Sculptamold from Amazon. The product was handled through one of their marketplace merchants. Good thing I did a double take right before I pushed the final confirmation button!

Things have been a little quiet on the railroading front as I have just returned from vacation in the Florida Keys. I will have some progress updates soon.

UPDATE: Joann.com has it for $3.91 a bag and their shipping is only $7.95. I went to their site as I noticed they actually filled my initial order. My six bags of Sculptamold are now happily on their way but not via private limo apparently.

I was in San Francisco this weekend and I was absolutely thrilled to see all the street cars along the Embarcadero. They were painted in many different but bright colors. One has to wonder why as a country we fell so in love with our cars that we were blind to the benefits of public transportation, particularly rail based. It is nice to see it making a comeback with modern light rail equipment in cities like Sacramento and Denver as well as putting these old street cars to use in San Francisco.

I have recently uncovered several blogs similar to mine with lots of good content. Blogs are exploding and perhaps Model Railroad Crossing can provide a vehicle to gain viewers and engagement to provide incentive to keep on blogging.

I still have much to learn about managing the site, so let me know if you see something amiss or have questions.

http://www.modelrailroadcrossing.com

Looking at the site analytics over the last few weeks has demonstrated that many people come here to find examples of how to do various things like wiring, bench work, and scenery.

If you already have an web site or blog then I can provide a snippet of your content and link off to your site. Alternatively, if you don’t have an existing site, I can provide you an account here. Send me an email at mgminton AT gmail.com if you are interested.

• 1980’s – Various for a total of 19
• 1988 – Complete
• 1989 – High School/College – Model Railroading not cool.
• 1990 – Boot Camp, etc, etc, etc
• 1991 – Complete
• 1992 – Complete
• 1993 – (5) Total – Okinawa
• 1994 – (5) Total
• 1995 – Minus September and November
• 1996 – Complete
• 1997 – Complete
• 1998 – Complete
• 1999 – Minus April and June
• 2000 – Complete
• 2001 – Complete
• 2002 – Complete
• 2003 – (7) Total. Busy year with a little side trip to Iraq.
• 2004 – (1) Total. Not a great year for Model Railroading! Left Marine Corps and moved back to Michigan to start new job.
• 2005 – Missing February, March, and June
• 2006 – Complete
• 2007 – (6) Total.  Another life changing year with a new job and a move to Denver.

I have 21 special Model Railroader Annuals including Great Model Railroads, and Layout Design.

The second most popular magazine, especially in the last four years as my tastes have become more refined, is the Narrow Gauge and Short Line Gazette. This magazine focuses on the logging and mining railroads of the early 1900’s. This magazine is only published six times a year but I still have 26 issues.

Why do I keep them? They are a great source of inspiration, a frequent reference tool, and the source of many memories. The material is timeless. The Model Train Magazine Index is a great tool that allows me to find a barely recalled article from years ago.

There is one that I no longer have that I remember dearly. The very first one that I ever purchased was the January 1986 Model Railroader. Malcolm Furlow had an article about a model railroad he built for someone that was called the Silverton and Telluride Railway Company. He built mountains from plaster that ran from floor to ceiling. I had never imagined anything like it. It was the source of inspiration for many years and I literally wore the cover off the magazine. I don’t know what ever happened to the magazine, I think my little brother Steve stole it.

Update: Ebay is my friend. January 1986 is on its way!

A few short hours later, I was jerked back to reality as I realized this was not a democracy and the weight of one spousal unit vote far exceed the support of all my friends and family.

Out of the almost 1000 square feet of basement space, I am thrilled to report that I have been allocated 23.7% in the form of the 13 X 19 square foot space highlighted in red.

We are lucky to have a walk out basement with lots of light in on the left side of the drawing above and plan to incorporate a bar and bathroom in the coming years. Combined with new backyard landscaping and a patio, I am sure finishing the space will add value to the house and be used frequently when entertaining.

All of our useless storage items have been awarded 24% of the basement in the form of a 10 X 24 foot storage room.

I will include a follow up post on the thought process for how to fill that space in the coming days. It is a good amount of space but I have had to leave behind two years of research on representing the West Side Lumber company fairly accurately. My new plans center around including as many interesting scenes as I can in my 237 square feet regardless of prototype fidelity.

Just outside of a small town 50 miles west of Denver there exists a feat of early 19th century engineering. In order to cross the 2 miles from Georgetown to Silver Plume the railroad laid 4 miles of track including looping over itself to gain 75 of the 600 foot elevation gain.

Erin yet again indulged my affliction with trains and we were able to take a trip on this short little railroad. It was a good thing that we checked on tickets first thing in the morning because they were nearly sold out. Quite the popular attraction.

To me, the steam engine is a marvelous beast that lives and breathes with each chuff and seething gasp. I am quite fortunate that Colorado has so many of these little lines remaining for me to find and ride.