Lifelong Dream: Live Steam

[jack.39]

I grew up around trains, as the main line of the Chicago, Burlington, & Quincy (now BNSF) divided our community west of Chicago in half north-to-south, all 3 tracks of it! It was unusual to drive somewhere, and needing to cross those tracks, to not be stopped by a train, freight or passenger, half the time. Diesels were already in general use- (I'm not THAT old!)-, but steamers were common enough to be seen around 1950 or so, especially doing switching service in the small yards near my Grandma's house in Chicago, to which yards my Dad often took me walking of a still-light summer evening. The RR men did not seem to mind our presence, though technically we were trespassing, a fact lost to me, of course, as a kid.

So, while a senior in high school, the Burlington offered a steam excursion trip early in September, 1959, and my friends convinced me it would be a neat thing to do; I was still "chicken" yet, even though new stuff like girls were amazingly interesting-looking! A couple of the guys were older, had taken earlier trips, and got us to "hole up" in the first car behind the second locomotive (there were 2, a "double-header"), a Railway Express Agency (later REA) baggage car, with big square doors open, with 2X6s nailed across the openings, we were still able to hang out over them!

The head loco was a big Texas 2-10-4, No. 6315, the second a Northern 4-8-4, No. 5632. The trip was great, until everything ground to a halt; 6315 had broken it's eccentric rod, on the right side. This is the rod which drives the valve mechanism. I distinctly recall standing right next to the broken dangling pieces, astounded that the rod was easily as fat as my forearm! With much wheel-spinning and effort, 5632 managed to get 6315, ahead of it, to move forward, as it pushed the disabled beast to the nearest siding, where it was uncoupled, and left behind. The remainder of the trip went fine, with 5632 doing the work most easily.

The pic below was taken by some fan and wound up found by me in a book about Burlington locomotives which I bought many years later. As I think about it now, it seems almost impossible that as that picture was taken in September, 1959, I was IN the baggage car which can be seen behind the 2nd. locomotive!

Also years later, I discovered the original ticket I had bought for the trip, tucked away in papers my Mother had saved and stored away; I wished I could thank her, but she was gone by then...if the dates are legible, note the book's author's accuracy, as they match! It was after that trip that I knew, someday, I would attempt to build a live steam locomotive, large enough to allow me to ride behind it on a car it pulled. I knew it would have to be a model of 5632! Thanks for reading; I will have more coming up. jack

 

[black85vette]

More than an interesting build. This is a really cool story.

 

[jack.39]

More than an interesting build. This is a really cool story.

Thank you! It will get a little hairier. BTW, I'll bet there is a story behind that black 'Vette, too!

jack

 

[jack.39]

1970s, living in Nevada on my wife's meager income, attending UNLV full-time, having lost ownership of a service station due to 1972 Arab Oil Embargo, I bought a few railroading books; one was "Steam Locomotives of the Burlington Route", by Corbin & Kerka. The pic in yesterday's post is from that book, which I read and re-read over the years.

Skip ahead to 2002, having survived my life's biggest set-back, lay-off from my job in Phoenix, living up in the woods of Northern Arizona, 1983, for a year, jobless, turned-down for foodstamps (wrong skin color, Mr. Sandoval said!); I held several new jobs until finally, the breaking point of disgust with the Clinton Administration gave us the courage to sell, in 1999, the custom home we had built in the Phoenix Area, and "drop out" of the rat-race system. My wife found the place we wound up at, in the hills of the Ozarks, big piece of very-rural land, we lived off the "nest-egg", carefully, not seeking to re-enter the madness. Summer, 2002, local high school Principal sought me out, had heard I possessed college education, implored me to consider teaching Math starting in 2 weeks; his Math teacher of 15 years had quit suddenly. We needed the dough, my wife encouraged me, so I accepted the offer. The school did not seem at all concerned that I had never taught, was not a teacher, and had no teaching certificate! They were, I thought, desperate!

The teaching income prompted me to decide, on Thanksgiving Day, 2002, to begin planning the steam loco "build"! The following 2 line drawings, from the book above, were all I had available to work with, relating to Engine 5632. I began making up needed drawings, using dimensions off the prints, scaling sizes of important parts not dimensioned on them. I started with the frames, after securing a copy of Joe Nelson's book, "So You Want to Build a Live Steam Locomotive", which provides a wealth of info, but in generalities. I knew this would take ingenuity and skill that I did not possess! So, I laid down in writing some rules I would follow:

I could not afford to buy a kit, or castings, to machine and assemble. Therefore, no castings would be used (actually, there IS 1, the front coupler).
Prototype appearance duplication would be as best I could do, given the lack of original detail drawings. Thousands of cosmetic details would no doubt be missing; those itty-bitty rivets, endless lines of piping, etc., would be awful hard to duplicate. I wanted a running locomotive above a cosmetic museum-piece!
All moving parts would be supported and run in, low-friction bearings. Turns out, even the crossheads and valve guides are mounted in ball bearings, as is the entire Baker Valve Gear.
It would be 1-1/2" scale, as the biggest parts to be made requiring machining were within reason for my 12-inch lathe and Bridgeport milling machine.
Though I knew saving weight was not a plus, as weight keeps wheels from slipping, as much of the machine, within reason, as possible, would be fabricated of aluminum alloy, mainly to conserve my meager supply of cutting tools! All wheels, axles, crankpins, and threaded fasteners (screws) would be steel, some being stainless steel.
No metal would be cut using state-of-the-art techniques, out of necessity; water-jet, laser, EDM-wire, etc. methods would remain outside my work domain. After all, I hadn't the dough, and those beautiful steam locomotives were built years ago by traditioned methods, right? (not a fan of CAD/CAM, either!).

So, the battle lines were drawn. I am hoping my effort here will "grease the skids" of some viewers, who would share the dream, and get them moving! Thanks for taking the time to look! jack

 

[Seanol]

Jack,
What a Kick Ass build!

Awesome story to go with it and a good display backer when it is built! I know you will run it but you need to take at least one perfect pic with the article and ticket framed behind it!

Regards,
Sean

 

[PhillyVa]

I will tip my hat to you, Jack. What a wonderful story...brings back some memories of my own.

Regards

Philly

 

[1hand]

You got my attention!!!!! I grew up in Minnesota right next to a BNSF railway. I fact my bedroom window was a mere 250 feet from the tracks. And the sand box that I played in 125 feet. Mainly was coal trains going back in forth from Canada. We did the typical kid stuff, like smashing penny's and such on the tracks. I still can remember if I would lay real still in bed, I could feel it shake when they came through.

Matt

 

[ozzie46]

Jack,

Since you didn't use castings, I'm very interested in how you machined the drive wheels and the open areas of the drive wheels. My guess is a rotary table and a lot of repetitive work on the mill.

Great story by the way. Close to mine. I started over a couple of times myself.

Ron

 

[kvom]

I saw the picture in the intro thread. Is the engine running now, or still "under construction". Looks like a heck of a project.

 

[zeeprogrammer]

Fantastic Fantastic.

No castings! Wow. That does give me hope.

Southern Missouri Ozarks?
I call Springfield my home town.
Spent a lot of time in Branson too.

 

[jack.39]

Jack,

Since you didn't use castings, I'm very interested in how you machined the drive wheels and the open areas of the drive wheels. My guess is a rotary table and a lot of repetitive work on the mill.

Great story by the way. Close to mine. I started over a couple of times myself.

Ron

You are right on! The conical face of "Box-Pok", or Box-Spoke, depending on which expert is relating it, would be a natural facing job in the lathe, except my compound feed is limited to only a couple of inches travel; overlapping cutting would take a looong time! I'll post a pic eventually of the wheel set-up in the vertical mill. jack

 

[jack.39]

I saw the picture in the intro thread. Is the engine running now, or still "under construction". Looks like a heck of a project.

My track layout has a grade steeper than I thought from "eyeball" elevation taking, and I felt the loco just was not pulling hard enough. Set up a pressure gauge in the smokebox, right at the cylinder feed, found with boiler pressure around 100, wheels running up on blocks, I was getting 60 psi up front. Big drop between the steam dome and the throttle valve, so tore into it last week. Winter job, anyhow. I removed the smokebox superheat coils, am close to re-testing.

So, it ran, I loved it (!), I'm a perfectionist (sometimes), not satisfied, so it's not running right now. Doggone it! jack

 

[jack.39]

Again, for those viewing who share the dream and are hesitant, my experiences doing this thing prove that others can, too! Please do not hesitate to ask about it, PM me anytime; if I can help in any way, I will be glad to do so! As evidence, I would cite my inability to effectively use the computer. Making parts out of metal will require experience for the intricate, difficult ones. Still, other parts needed, sheet metal for example, cuts with big scissors, bends to shape. To make parts mainly of a round nature, a metal-cutting lathe is a necessity. Most others, unusually shaped, or rectangular, etc., bring about the need for a milling machine. First-time build, smaller scales are probably indicated, especially for beginning machinists. I would personally lean toward 3/4-inch per foot scale, big enough to pull a car carrying an adult, but no huge parts to be machined. In the final analysis, my guess is very few complete "dorks" ever even think about building/operating live steam, so every one of the interested probably have some degree of mechanical and/or technical ability. Put that part of you to work!!

I'm lucky, in that in my youth, I somehow just had to know how things were put together, so I took 'em apart! Started with the Bendix "coaster brake" on my bike when I was 7. My Dad, a Tool & Die Maker, added incentive to learn about things mechanical, but he was quite unhappy after explaining to me that I need a lathe to make many of the parts I wanted, and I of course had to have one then! I ordered (with my Mother's help) the 12" Sears Craftsman lathe, made by Atlas Press Co., in Kalamazoo, when I was 15. It cost $275, and I skipped the quick-change gear kit, for lack of funds. That lathe is still the only one I have, over 50 years later! Having designed and built production machinery for various employers, I knew that a Bridgeport milling machine would eventually be needed to pursue the dream; I bought a used one while still living in Phoenix, about 1993, and wound up lugging the thing all the way to Missouri! Gosh, are those things heavy! I have in addition to those 2 needed machines, a 7X12 inch metal cutting horizontal band saw, ala ENCO Co., a pedestal tool bit grinder, and the usual hand power tools- drill motors, etc. That's it! Nothing fancy. But, I am fortunate to have become proficient over the years using my lathe, building all kinds of parts for the cars I raced. I never operated a milling machine before I bought the Bridgeport, but much of the "feel" of running a lathe spills over to the other machine. The two differ only in the fact that a lathe spins the workpiece and uses a fixed cutting tool, and the mill does just the opposite!

The Burlington Railroad Northerns! The road bought their first 8 of them from Baldwin Locomotive Works, all in 1930, classifying them as 0-5, and numbering them beginning with 5600. In 1936, the "Q", as the road was affectionately known, began building more of these beasts themselves, in their own shops in West Burlington, Iowa, buying only the boilers from Baldwin. Three were completed in 1936, and 10 more during 1937! Such ability on the part of a railroad numbs my mind! By October, 1940, they had built a total of 28 Northern 4-8-4s in addition to the first 8 purchased from Baldwin! The "home-built locos were classified as 0-5-A. Among them, number 5632 "my locomotive", was completed in August, 1940, two years before I was born!

The eventual demise of 5632 was submitted to me as an interesting story by one of the gentlemen who worked in the West Burlington shops. I will go into that later; someone shake my cage if I forget; remembering things is a process which slips away with old age!

The photo here of 5632 was taken, according to it's date, when the machine was only 3 months old; note the man, if it shows up, climbing up into the cab....I promise more pics tomorry, showing parts of my effort as I made them in my shop. Thanks again for all the kind words, you are spoilin' me! jack

 

[hammers-n-nails]

have you been to the museum of transportation in kirkwood(st. louis)? if not i would highly recomend it. http://transportmuseumassociation.org/ lots of locos to look at.

 

[jack.39]

have you been to the museum of transportation in kirkwood(st. louis)? if not i would highly recomend it. http://transportmuseumassociation.org/ lots of locos to look at.

Appreciate this tip! I heard a bit about it, briefly, but have not followed up. Thanks for the "push"!! jack

 

[black85vette]

Thanks again for all the kind words, you are spoilin' me! jack

Jack I don't think I'm alone in saying it is you who is spoiling us!

What park of the Ozarks are you in? We make frequent trips to Eureka Springs and Springfield. Just spent a week in Harrison Arkansas and have canoed down the 11 point River from Alton, MO. Love it in that area. I can understand landing there.

 

[jack.39]

First, here's a shot showing how I get this thing in & out of the shop/garage. 'Course, I had to try the first curved bit of track I ever made up & laid, by pushing the hulk in and out a few times! The radius of curvature is 50 feet. I got this by driving a big steel pin in the ground 50 feet out from where I wanted the track, used a thin wire looped around it and stretched to the track line, moved the wire while taut with one hand, and sprayed paint blobs on the ground with the other, thereby getting a series of spots to follow with the sections of rail fastened to ties, 10-foot lengths at a time. There is a foot-long removable section of track which allows the overhead door to close normally against the concrete floor. I considered channelling the concrete to place the track permanently below the floor surface, and decided, that would truly be insanity of modelling effort!

Correct me here if wrong thinking prevails, but if I describe in minute detail the machining work, it will bore most people here, and be of minimal value to the rest, no? So, unless advised otherwise, I will mostly give general ideas of what I'm doing. Below, one 9-inch-plus drive wheel is mounted on my rotary table, bolted down to my milling machine work surface. To the left is the vise which I hate to loosen & move; doing so requires closely re-positioning it accurately. The light-blue part visible beneath the wheel is a thin-walled curved parallel which holds the wheel up off the table, thereby allowing through-drilling, milling without hitting the table. Since the various holes in the Box-Pok, or whatever they're called, drivers, are equally-spaced around the circumference, they are easily located angularly by rotating the table the correct angle amount, and drilling at the correct distance from the center. The wheel is mounted on a center pin, indicated to be "true" with the machine spindle above, and held down by a bolt in the center. The wheel may then be removed, another "blank" plopped down, and work resumed. Some holes are round, some are rather oblong, keyhole shaped more or less, which required a bit more maneuvering using smaller end mills to cut out their shape.

Below shows how I tilted the mill's head sidewise a bit, and using a big endmill, cut away the face of the wheel to make it's surface conical, higher in the center, with an indented step along the wheel's outer edge. I did this after the holes were all done, as drilling against an angled surface "don't work" too well. 'Course, all those holes then had "flash" and super-sharp edges remaining; you know what that means, eh?

Looking at the line drawing somewhere above in this miasma of tripe, you will see that the engine's cylinder head, or front cover, between the cross-slide and cylinder block, is curved! Figgerin' this ought to be duplicated, the pic below shows how I made the entire front surface of each head curved, by fastening them to a strong angle-plate bolted to the rotary table at the appropriate radial distance from center, and using a long endmill to slowly cut away the meat to get the curved face. It could be done in a lathe, perhaps more easily, but the radius was too big to allow my lathe to do it. Boy, I need a BIGGER lathe!

 

[jack.39]

Jack I don't think I'm alone in saying it is you who is spoiling us!

What park of the Ozarks are you in? We make frequent trips to Eureka Springs and Springfield. Just spent a week in Harrison Arkansas and have canoed down the 11 point River from Alton, MO. Love it in that area. I can understand landing there.

This much I know: we are 200 miles from Harrison, AR! We drove down there in summer last year, bought an SUV, and drove it back here. Actually, we're about mid-way between Rolla and Poplar Bluff; the latter you may need a map for, unless familiar with this area. One cannot drive due east-west, or north-south, in the Ozarks!

Where do you roost, considering your travels here? jack

 

[black85vette]

Where do you roost, considering your travels here? jack

We are near Oklahoma City but try to escape the flatlands as often as possible. ;D Also been through Rolla a number of times driving up and down Rt 66. I have also spent some time in Northern Arizona. My dad owned a motel in Ashfork right on old Rt 66.

 

[cobra428]

jack.39,
Very Nice Jack. I'm a steam loco fan myself. But the urge only hits me around Christmas. I have my Ho's of 30 years of collecting. Had a layout till the fire in the house right above the layout. The firemen really thorn it up and I need to rebuild, someday. Got my Lionel's from my childhood and my dad's Lionel's from his (1925 vintage).

That's a beauty you have there, I wish I lived closer to visit.

Tony