Hello To All:

Well since the 2018 Announcement excitement is dying down a little I thought I would post the completion photos for my green and cream open air coaches which I think turned out OK. I am glad to have them to go behind my Mighty Mac loco having previously completed my blue and cream coaches to go with my Duke loco which can be seen on page 9 of this thread. I am very happy to hear that the red coaches were announced and I am planning on getting 3 or 4 of those when ever they are released.







I have also decided that since it would be very difficult to add some narrow gauge track to my existing HO layout I am planning on building a separate 2 foot by 4 foot narrow gauge layout using John Allen's Gorre & Daphetid track plan as shown below using N Scale track and Bachmann's Resin buildings which I just found out are very expensive. I think that this track plan will work out very well when built as a narrow gauge railroad in this 2 foot by 4 foot size.



Chaz, I am looking forward to seeing progress on your Duncan project. This is a very smart move on your part especially after seeing the 2018 announcements. We do still have Rusty to look forward to this year, but with no loco announced this year that means no loco next year. Also if Peter Sam and Sir Handel do get made some day it will probably be 5 years before we ever see Duncan.

Chaz, can you give us a little more info on that Baldwin loco, looks pretty cool to me.

I also called TW to ask when Rusty would be available for pre-order and I was told that as soon as they get firm pricing info and a tentative release date that Rusty will be available for pre-order so I was told to check back in a few weeks.

Enjoy,
Grandpuff

Hello to All:

Here are a few photos of my completed Mighty Mac locomotive. The locomotive kit is from Langley Models in the UK. The power chassis is from a Bachmann N scale GP-50. The lining tape is by Line-O-Tape from Mega Hobby. The brass nameplates are from Narrow Planet also in the UK. I know that the series loco did not have nameplates but I have decided to add them anyway. This has been one of the most difficult projects I have ever attempted and definitely not for the inexperienced modeler.









Now I am working on 3 Elsbridge open air coaches to go with my Mighty Mac. The Peco coaches in the last photo are just place holders until I finish these. I may also consider building a set of the red coaches as well. Thank you all for your suggestions on what to do next, but after the coaches are done that will probably be it for this Winters projects. During the Spring, Summer, and Fall I spend most of my time at Train Mountain in Oregon running my 1/8th scale trains. If anyone is interested you can see my videos at my YouTube channel just search for RXRBILL.



Enjoy,
Grandpuff

Griffin:

Thank you very much for your kind words. I am also inspired by the work shown here by others.

I am not so sure about talented but more so just experienced. I have been building HO scale models for over 60 years now. Anyone would be expected to learn a few things over that many years, but thank you again for your comments. This project although HO scale is really working on an N scale mechanism and that has been very difficult indeed. The Mighty Mac project has been much harder than my Duke project.

I have just finished the final assembly of my Mighty Mac project and I am now trying to eliminate a small bind in one of the steamy boogies. I will post a few photos here soon and post a video as soon as I get the mechinism running freely. I have also started work on my Elsbridge open air coaches to go with Mighty Mac.

Thanks again,
Grandpuff

Douglas:

You might want to take a look at how the cars are coupled together. I think that a solution may be to make sure that the loop from the first car is under the loop from the engine and then the same through the rest of the cars. That way as the train reaches the crest of the grade the loop on the loco may hold the loop from the next car onto the pin of loco or car ahead. It seems worth a try.

Grandpuff.

Hello Again:

Now that the Mighty Mac boiler assembly is painted and stripped and now complete I have started to work on the running gear. The Langley Models Fairlie locomotive kit uses an N scale Bachmann GP-50 as the power chassis so I thought that maybe I should explain a little more about how that works. The Bachmann loco uses a split frame assembly to hold the motor, drive train, and the power truck assemblies. The parts that are used from the GP-50 are the motor, drive shafts, and power trucks. The split frame and of course the loco shell are not used. The photo below shows all of the parts left to assemble.



You can see the completed boiler assembly at the left of the photo and to the right of this is the replacement split frame assembly that is included in the loco kit. With a split frame each side is insulated from the other with plastic bushings and picks up power from the rails from the trucks and makes the connection to the motor. When finished the drive train assembly fits inside the completed boiler assembly. The red bottom plate is what holds everything together. The right half of the photo shows the power truck assemblies, the cylinders, side and connecting rods, and the wheel discs that are glued on to the power truck wheel faces. The next step is to attach the driver wheel discs and then drill the holes in each wheel for the side and connecting rod crank pins.



The photo above shows the assembled Bachmann GP-50 power trucks after conversion to the steamy boogies. Next comes assembly of the split frame power train, testing and adjustments. Once the power train is assembled it then fits inside the completed boiler assembly. Then comes the final assembly and completion.



This photo shows my next  project which is 3 new open air coaches to be painted green and cream to go with Mighty Mac. Even though the series only showed Mighty Mac with one coach I have decided that 3 would look better.

I will continue to post here my progress and when all is completed I will post a video to my Youtube channel RXRBILL and post that link here for you all.

Thank you all for your interest and support.
Enjoy,
Grandpuff

Hello to All:

I am glad to hear your favorable comments regarding my Mighty Mac project and have a few questions to answer for those that have asked them:

Chaz:
The Mighty Mac chassis is a Bachmann GP-50 so yes it runs very well, nice and slow and smooth. In fact I have coupled up all 16 of my narrow gauge cars and Mighty Mac pulled them all with no trouble, and I think he could easily pull twice that number. I do plan on posting a video of Mighty Mac to my YouTube channel RXRBILL but not until I finish the running gear.

DrNick:
The folks here have said that hopefully once Rheneas was released that Bachmann would re-stock Skarloey. Others have also said that Rusty might arrive late Spring after the February announcements. We can only hope that more information may come from the Bachmann.

Griffin:
Yes, I have done some research on a Freddie model but 2-6-2 N Scale chassis are hard to find and the loco model would likely have to be kit-bashed. This might be a project for next year.

CC55:
Yes, I did get the cab windows painted correctly right after my last photos were taken. The cab window are yellow on the Mighty end, and red on the Mac end, and they match the water tank hatch covers as can be seen in my photos.

AnthonyP2:
I paint my models using a Paasche double action air brush that I have had for many years. The lining you asked about is made by Line-O-Tape and is available at Mega Hobby. I use the 1/64" X 120" which comes in several colors. In fact it was Chaz that shared this info with me as this is the lining tape we used on our Duke models.

Terrence:
I am also impressed with your layout photos and will look forward to seeing your videos.

Elsbridge Shops:
Just ordered three of the open coaches to go with my Mighty Mac so looks like that will be my next project. So thank you for letting us all know about these new narrow gauge coaches.

Thank you all for your comments and questions. And yes, this is the best thread going for sharing of projects and information regarding HOn30 or OO9.

Grandpuff

Hello to All:

First Photobucket stops working because they now charge for photo sharing and now Flikr no longer supports Internet Explorer so now I am going to try using Tinypic so we will see what happens.

As I said earlier I have been able to prime and paint my Mighty Mac model and I think it has turned out very well and hope you all agree.







Sorry, I have not figured out how to rotate photos on Tinypic yet.

I have installed the vacuum hoses, headlights, and the Mighty and Mac faces on each end of my loco.

I have also completed the gold, red, and yellow stripping and now have the Mighty Mac boiler and chassis completed except for adding the brass nameplates. I have not received the brass plates from Narrow Planet yet but they are on the way.

You may also notice that I have installed the couplers, buffers, cylinders and crosshead guides on the loco drive train. The most tedious job remains which is to drill the holes in each power truck wheel for the crank pins to hold the connecting rods and drive rods which will complete my model. I think this will probably take a few weeks as this needs to be done very carefully to maintain the driver quartering.

I will post some additional photos when I finish the running gear. Once everything is running I plan on posting a video on YouTube as I did for my Duke loco. You can see all of my videos by searching for my YouTube channel at RXRBILL and my videos will pop up.

Enjoy,
Grandpuff

Yes THL I have been able to get my Mighty Mac primed and painted this week thanks to the local SF Bay Area weather co-operating. I plan on painting the smoke boxes black tomorrow, then I can add the handrails and stantcions, then there will be a considerable amount of gold, red, and yellow stripping to do. I should be ready to post some photos this coming weekend. There is still a lot of work to do on the power chassis converting the Bachmann GP-50 diesel drive to the 0-4-4-0T steamy drive but at least the painting is done and I am very happy how well everything turned out and hope you all will think so too.

I was very interested in hearing from Elsbridge Shops about there being some more narrow gauge coaches in the future especially since I will need some open air green and cream coaches for Mighty Mac.

Grandpuff

Hello to All:
Chaz Your mine scene is an inspiration to all of us showing what can be done in HOn30 or OO9 for those in the UK. I was especially happy to see your Duke loco again.

For those of you that have posted about issues with Rheneas mine looks perfectly fine to me with no warping or paint issues, just lucky I guess.

I just had an opportunity to prime all of the castings for my Mighty Mac project and with some more warmer weather I hope to get the painting finished this week. My brass plates are also due soon from Narrow Planet.

As soon as I can figure out why my photos are not posting correctly I will post more when the painting is done. Does anyone know what I am doing wrong with Flikr?

On another note I wanted to take the time to thank Chaz for starting this thread. I think this is one of the most helpful and informative threads going here. Another modeler on the HO threads was talking about the lack of project related posts over there so we are lucky to have so many modelers sharing information over here.

So Happy New Year to You All,
Grandpuff

Hi Griffin:

I finally have an answer for you regarding the faces that I plan to use for my Mighty Mac loco you asked about back on page 11.

The set of faces that I got from a Take and Play Mighty Mac turned out to be too big.

After doing a little searching I found a couple of derelict Ertl metal Rheneas locos which have the correct size faces to fit my Mighty Mac.

I added a lick of hair on one and some freckels on the other and I think they will work well as stand-ins on my model.



I do not know why my photos are not appearing only the link, does anyone know what I am doing incorrectly?

Still waiting for some good outdoor painting weather.

Sorry it took a while to get back to you.

Grandpuff

Hello to All:

Progress on my Mighty Mac project is going well as far as the clean up and preparation on the Langley Models Fairlie locomotive. The clean up of the castings took over a week to do. The locomotive is a very nice model and very well detailed. It uses an N Scale Bachmann GP-50 for the running  gear and this part of the project has moved slower because the GP-50 loco that I purchased from Langley was not at all compatible with the loco kit because Bachmann has re-designed this locomotive. I had to find an earlier version of this loco on Ebay that would work. Anyone else wanting to duplicate my efforts will need a Bachmann N scale GP-50 with a model number of 612XX and not 635XX. This has considerably slowed my progress. Converting the GP-50 chassis to an 0-4-4-0T is looking like one of the more difficult projects I have attempted so I think this will take awhile to complete.

Photo #1 will be posted here this evening showing overall assembly. The loco frame and body are now ready for priming and painting.



Photo #2 showing the temporarily assembled loco body with the running gear prior to priming and painting this coming week weather permitting.



The conversion from diesel to steamy will not be easy. The drivers will need to be filled with some sort of putty or epoxy, wheel covers glued on, and then holes drilled for the crank pins and side and drive rods. I am not looking forward to this part of the project.

Hopefully in another week or so I will have the loco primed and painted and I will post more photos at that time. The red, yellow, and gold stripping on this loco is extensive and looks a lot more difficult to do than my Duke.

I did order Mighty Mac brass name plates from Narrow Planet for this loco even though the Thomas loco did not have them the Festiniog loco did. I have not decided yet if I will use them however.

Thank you all for your interest.

Enjoy,
Grandpuff

Hello Angelo:

Thank you for asking.

The photos were taken on my new 3 track Narrow Gauge staging yard I just added to my existing HO layout in my two car garage that I have been building for over 25 years now in anticipation of adding some narrow gauge and dual gauge trackage to my existing layout.

My Rheneas runs very well and the detail is very well done as Chaz has stated in his great review, thank you Chaz.

My Mighty Mac project is progressing well and I will be posting more photos soon now that I have solved my Flikr problem.

Grandpuff

Rheneas is here. Thank you Bachmann for another fantastic narrow gauge model.

IMG_0673 by Bill Dwyer, on Flickr

[/url]IMG_0674 by Bill Dwyer, on Flickr[/img]

[/url]IMG_0676 by Bill Dwyer, on Flickr][/img]

I will post some more Mighty Mac photos soon.
Grandpuff

Yes I would definitely want to add some more of this type car to my collection.
If you look back at some of my photos of Duke around page 7 you will see some of these cars that I have had for many years made by Eggerbahn in the 60's for the HOn30 Minitrains line.


Grandpuff

Just to let everyone know that I was just notified by "TW" that my Rheneas was shipped to me today.

Horray !!!
Grandpuff