Imp's Imponderable #1

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imp

Senior Member
Do you believe in Astrology, horoscopes? Follow yours or other's often? Do you take heed of advice gotten thusly? Just curious. My imponderables seem endless! imp
 

What is that thing in your hands in the forum picture?

I keep looking at that and think it must be a train car. What gauge would that be? Too big for HO.
 
Imp, I am pretty sure that this question is directed at you. I wondered if it was some sort of a model of an older oil car like used to be on some of the trains; but it looked too large for a toy model, and too small for anything else.
Enlighten us , please ?
 
"Imp, I am pretty sure that this question is directed at you. I wondered if it was some sort of a model of an older oil car like used to be on some of the trains; but it looked too large for a toy model, and too small for anything else.
Enlighten us , please ?"


"What is that thing in your hands in the forum picture?

I keep looking at that and think it must be a train car. What gauge would that be? Too big for HO. "
Happy to oblige! I am a dunce for not understanding the question to begin with!


It is this:
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And it was built so I could do this: (that's me riding on it. My wife took the pic from our front porch across the road.
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From the front view:
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The avatar pic. Locomotive not completed yet here. The large silvery object behind my ugly map is the tender, seen in the top two pics. I would be delighted to show some more info related to it, if desired. Don't hesitate a moment! imp
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I would love one, Imp. Red, I think. How talented you must be . My grandfather was a railroad engineer in Saskatchewan Canada . Ran the deal, with a shop of machinists in North Battleford. My grandmother travelled free on the train for The rest of her life. I wish I could ! We have a working steam locomotive here in our town.
 
Shalimar said:
I would love one, Imp. Red, I think. How talented you must be . My grandfather was a railroad engineer in Saskatchewan Canada . Ran the deal, with a shop of machinists in North Battleford. My grandmother travelled free on the train for The rest of her life. I wish I could ! We have a working steam locomotive here in our town.
Click to expand...

Exciting! What is usually done with it, excursion work? Talent, I think is too "big" a word, perseverance may be more appropriate. The skilled trades as they are called, Electrician, Machinist, Welder, Pipe-fitter, Draftsman, Millwright, all encompass specialties learned by experience more than "book learnin'", excluding maybe, Electrician, who I require to be Degreed, at least A.A.S. Technology. I learned all those abilities of necessity as a teen-ager building fast cars, having limited budget (meaning NO money), and very understanding and encouraging parents, who funded me as I went along. Good grades in schools were rewarded.

So, here's the story, as abbreviated as I can make it. Senior year, I took a steam excursion trip with my high school buddies, Chicago to Galesburg, Illinois and back, on a Sunday, around Labor Day, 1959. Two engines were assigned, at the request of the club, on the Chicago Burlington & Quincy which ran smack dab through my hometown of Berwyn, IL. The lead engine broke down, halfway to destination, causing several hours delay to an otherwise already long day's trip. The engine behind it, CBQ # 5632, a 4-8-4 Northern Class, struggled to push the disabled engine in front of it off onto a siding, where it was abandoned. 5632 then finished the trip, on into Galesburg, and on return to Chicago, it was learned later that special permission was granted by the "Q" to "pull out stops", we FLEW that couple hundred miles back! The telephone poles DID look like a picket fence! It was rumored 5632 hit over 100 mph returning. we were back only a few hours overtime.

This pic was taken by a railfan during a photo run-by, and I found it in a book I ordered in the '70s about CBQ Locomotives. If the writing below it is legible, it explains what happened during the trip. In the pic, the second locomotive back is 5632, behind it an old Railway Express Agency baggage car (remember them?), with the big double doors wide open, 2X6's nailed across the opening. I WAS IN THAT CAR! Note the date, if legible.

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Below, the ticket I found hidden in one of my railroad books by my Mother, she had saved it for "someday", I came across it in the '70s, many years after the trip. Bless her! Check the dates!
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I vowed back then, that one day, I would build a working scale model of 5632. A lifetime dream, I found the possibility to start in 2002, living in MO, awaiting my S/S benefit in 2004. By then, I had gathered together the machinery, and the ABILITY, to make metal parts of specialized form, as needed. We had only limited internet capability there, dial-up service, so research was impossible. I built by consulting two line-drawings from the CBQ locomotive book and other books I already had. Set up a drafting board made of my wife's old "breadboard", nice and flat, and scaled the size of parts off the drawings, then designed them as I needed to comply with my requirement that everything run on ball bearings!

Below, making one of the 8 driving wheels, 9" in diameter.
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This old Nitrous Oxide cylinder I got from a dentist for free. It became the boiler shell!
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Cylinder block end plate being machined.
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The cylinder block and it's liners.
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Main connecting rod, this part experienced forces of 1,000 lbs. alternating back and forth!
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The drive wheels mounted to the chassis.
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Gettin' there!
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The tender showing it's 13 gallon copper water tank, fabricated by hand, and hand-soldered. It did not leak!
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Front view detail.
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I spent 7 years on this, usually at least 5 or more hours daily, often 7 days a week, what else would I do living in the middle of 7 million acres of National Forest? I want very badly to build another, but fear it's too late. What will my poor wife do with a 1,000 lb.incomplete albatross? imp
 
Thanks for the info Imp. I grew up in Ohio near three rail road tracks. New York Central, Baltimore and Ohio, and one called Big Four came together to cross the river on a bridge. There was a switch house there that would allow us kids to come up and watch them work the switch levers and receive and send with the Morse code and the sender/receiver, telegraph.

I really loved the trains all day and night. My son has also found rail to be interesting and he has joined a rail club in England from the time he lived over there a few years back.
 
I believe in natal astrology which is very accurate. Chinese astrology is too. The dailies you read in newspapers are not accurate so I wouldn't bother with those.
 
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