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Author Topic: Just a thought - what about an Old West loco fundholder project?  (Read 6206 times)

Offline Elbows

  • Galactic Brain
  • Posts: 9451
Re: Just a thought - what about an Old West loco fundholder project?
« Reply #15 on: January 28, 2013, 08:35:35 AM »
3D printing perhaps, and MDF laser cut for the cars?  The MDF cars could be very cheap.
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Offline Heisler

  • Scientist
  • Posts: 488
Re: Just a thought - what about an Old West loco fundholder project?
« Reply #16 on: March 02, 2013, 04:07:29 PM »
I would be interested in this. I have been slowly acquiring old American Flyer S Scale equipment including a 4-4-0 American. Box cars (or goods cars) would be excellent candidates for a laser cut kit as would cattle cars and flat cars. Refrigerated box cars would not come into general usage until 1878 so much to late for the ACW, but would be available for the Wild West period.  Passenger cars, combination cars and baggage cars would be a must, otherwise how are we going to rob the passengers?

Personally I'm a big proponent of S Scale being the best choice. The track has the right look to it when compared to most western miniatures. Here is a shot with a ruler underneath to give you a dimension. I know a miniature would have been a better choice for scale but this is what I have immediately available.
This track is from Tomalco another US supplier is GarGraves. This track is made for model railroaders so turnouts (switches) tend to be expensive and probably unnecessary for our purposes.

Here is the extent of my railway empire for Calamity

The building behind the train is Battle Flag's Undertakers kit. It all has the right feel to it although that 4-4-0 is pretty beefy.

During the ACW the standard freight car length was 30' but as we move forward to the 1870s the length increases first to 36' then to 40'. Passenger equipment goes from 40' to 50' and then to 60' during this time. You can certainly mix both the sizes but the 30' would be phased out of standard gauge service pretty quickly (30' would continue to be the standard length for narrow gauge railroads for a long time like to 1960).

For locomotives, during the ACW the 4-4-0 American is the standard locomotive and would remain in use into the next century. As car sizes got bigger more power was required and the 2-6-0 Mogul would be introduced and again would serve into the 20th Century. Demands for more powerful locomotives never really stop which would see the introduction 4-6-0 Ten Wheeler and the 2-8-0 Consolidation. There were other larger locomotives that would be introduced around the turn of the century but for gaming purposes these would be the four I would be most interested in.

Wheel sets (known as trucks) are available from American Models http://www.americanmodels.com/misc/wheels.html these are the wrong trucks for the period but they will do the job just fine. Really how many gamers know the difference between an Arch Bar truck and a Bettendorf truck?

Ye Olde Huff n Puff makes Andrews trucks as well as passenger trucks (and kits that are somewhat reasonably priced) http://www.yeoldehuffnpuff.com/SFreightBack.HTM

This is a lot of stuff and I don't know what is really practical to make. Bachman On30 equipment will do the trick but it is expensive. I can probably provide detailed plans of freight and passenger cars for the period from my collection of railroad books. Locomotives are a bit more difficult, although the wheel arrangements may be the same the engines can look radically different from each other as each railroad tended to have their own designs and different wheel sizes were used for different purposes depending on the job the locomotive was going to perform.

Anyway that's my contribution to this discussion.
It's NOT denial. I'm just very selective about the reality I accept. -- Calvin (Calvin and Hobbes)
<img src="https://i.imgur.com/jGGuwIV.jpg" title="source: imgur.com" />

 

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