Modeling the Colorado and Southern C-3E class part 2
At the end of part 1, we had picked out our candidates for the C-3E class modeling, the bachmann ten wheeler coming out on top of the list for a starting point. Since that article was published, I've built 2 C-3E's and have a 3rd on the shelf of unlikely origin.
#312, the first victim, er uh, candidate
The first C-3E started out life as one of the new bachmann 4-6-0's in the blue box. This particular one was a NYC ten wheeler I purchased from Amazon. Nothing too fancy here, just the basic model.
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| #312 started out as NYC 1238 |
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| #312 now without decals next to K-2 ten wheeler #637 |
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| Mason bogie bracket, not quite what I'm looking for |
While thinking on the headlight situation, I proceeded with the sound install. This locomotive received a soundtraxx megabass speaker in the tender along with a Loksound V5 Nano decoder. The speaker is so large I had to do quite a bit of milling on the tender frame and the nano barely fit back there with the speaker. My plan was (and still is) to place the keep alive under the coal load. I also added some coal board extensions at this time. These were done off memory of how I "thought" the boards should look, they never looked right to me and we'll come back to that shortly. At this time I also hit the model with a can of Walschaerts-be-gone (pat pending) and removed the valve gear. This would receive some tidying up before long, I ended up having to order new hardware for the main rods from bachmann, as the normal eccentric crank acts as a washer so a smaller screw can be used to hold everything together. Without the crank the main rod would just fall off, I ordered the larger hex head hardware for the 4-4-0's that don't have valve gear and it was a perfect fit!
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| 312 on the bench with the coal boards and the lack of valve gear. |
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| the 3d printed headlight test fitting on the smokebox. Note I've also filed some of the extra valve gear detail off at this time. |
With the headlight out of the way, now it was time to work on some other details. When I designed the headlight, I also attempted to design the unique cab that 312 received in the 20's but decided to hold off on that for now. I may revisit this at some point, but I decided having all the C-3E's in their late 1910's appearances would be easier to do. As they later started having odd drivers and tender swap galore occurring. I also designed a tender bunker that would be a little more accurate than my attempts at building the coal boards.
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| #312 posing next to #429 with the other style of headlight. #429 will be subject of it's own post at some point! |
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| #312 crossing Mike Maline's bridge module. |
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| #312 passing a small 4-4-0 on Mike Malines stock yard module. |
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| #312's bare side at the show. |
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| Parked on the spur at Granger on my module. |
One thing that bugged me was the decals didn't look quite right. Nobody really makes a C&S decal for standard gauge locomotives pre-burlington lettering that I knew of. But It looked better with the lettering that without it, so a short time later I decaled the other side of the locomotive.
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| Now decaled on both sides and with a painted headlight to boot! |
I didn't have long to wait until another pikemasters setup bought #312 out to play again in October. This time 312's performance was hampered by a rather stiff grade on the modules, account of the ramp the layout was setup on. 312 spent a fair amount of time in front of 638 showing off my work until, it stopped working about halfway through day one of the show. I sidelined the locomotive on a spur to keep showing it off, at least I could still show the work. On a random chance later that day, I selected it again and it ran. Maybe it overheated or had a fluke? who knows, so I ran it. The next day, same problem, this time straight out the gate. What I was able to determine was there was either a bad connection or a bad spot on the commutator in the motor, as tapping around the motor on the outside of the shell would get it going again. I have heard mixed opinions on the new bachmann ten wheelers because of poor motor quality, so this could be the culprit. Either way, 312 was relegated to double heading for that show because of the grades.
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| #312 double heading with #638 at the October TECO/PMRA show. |
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| #312 on display after it stopped running, it ended up cycling in and out of this pocket until the end of the show. |
Two more? #310 and #309
One thing I haven't mentioned at this point in the article is I acquired 2 more ten wheelers towards the end of Summer. In August, one of our former members at Pikemasters passed away and his family donated a bunch of items to the club. Included in this I found a brass Gem/Olympia Maryland and Pennsylvania ten wheeler. What I didn't know up until that point is the Bachmann ten wheeler is loosely based on the Ma&Pa ten wheeler. It was a basket case, with some valve gear missing, no drive train, and lots of loose parts and bodywork that needed to be soldered back on. I decided that this would become my #309. Since these photos I have removed the remaining valve gear on this one as well
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| #309 next to #312 for comparison. |
Not long after the October show, I ordered a Bachmann Spectrum 4-6-0 from the original run of models. This one a UP model. This would become my #310 and would allow me to put to use some of the methods I had figured out with #312 to practice. First thing that occurred was to equip this one with a sugar cube speaker and Loksound V5 micro.
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| #309, 310 and 312 all together. |
One of the things I wanted to do at this point was change out the pilots on the locomotives, the Gem model had a a different small style of cow catcher with steps that was very close to what the real 309 had, so I decided this one could stay as is. The other 2 locomotives had bachmann's wide running board across the front, not exactly prototypical for the C&S (or for many roads for that matter....). So I searched for a solution. What I found was PSC #2962 brass pilots were pretty close to what the C-3E's had in some photos. I ordered 2 of these pilots and set about swapping out the pilots.
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| 310 mocking up one of the pilots. Looks like I'm going to have to remove that cast coupler pocket part...... |
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| #310 now equipped with the pilot and a kadee scale head coupler installed. I don't use trip pins, so this will couple to just about everything. |
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| #312 with the new pilot. I think this actually made a decent addition of weight to this thing.. |
The pilots went on nicely, I had to remove the bachmann metal coupler box to make them fit and look right. I'll make a 3d printed draft gear part to sit here to look the part. I also painted the pilots at this time, and while I was at it, I painted the smokeboxes silver to match the prototype.
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| Both locomotives now sporting new pilots and painted smokeboxes. A huge improvement! |
One thing I mentioned earlier in the blog is that I wasn't happy with how the decals from microscale looked. I ordered sets from several manufacturers and found the ones from thinfilm were just about perfect! To top it off, they were actually silver, which is correct for the post 1908 era versus white. I destroyed the first set, turns out thinfilm decals don't like solvaset....... But I managed to salvage enough to finish #310. This was a HUGE improvement. I went back and removed the lettering off 312 and replaced it with thinfilm decals as well.
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| 310 with Thinfilm decals. This set I ruined with solvaset. |
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| 312 and 310 showing off both styles of decals, 310 with thinfilm, 312 with microscale. |
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| Both engines with the thinfilm decals |
What's next?
Ok, so both engines look pretty good at this point. What's next? Well there are a few items on the list I'd like to knock out.
-Redo the coal bunker on 312 and make one for 310.
-3d print a headlight for 310. 310 had a rather unique headlight I still need to design.
-Install keep alives in both 310 and 312 (insert your brand of capacitor if that's not your cup of tea)
-backup lights for both engines, 310 had a rather large box headlight, 312 I don't have any clear shots of, but it seems to be a more modern round design.
-Install linkage for the unmodeled Stephenson valve gear on all 3 engines.
-Repower and repair #309, it needs some real TLC!
-design and print a draft gear box to cosmetically complete the front of the locomotives.
-add crews and piping detail.
-add class lights
Whew, that's been a lot of work done in the article at this point! I have an offer from a friend to purchase one more of the spectrum 4-6-0's, which will become #317 in my fleet, this one will be equipped with the large pilot snow plow. 4 of the C-3E's allows me to pretty much accurately model the Falcon branch comfortably.
Until next time, keep on modeling!
J. Patterson
