richard carr
Western Thunderer
As some of you will have seen I have been bitten by the US bug, it has been lurking in the background for a awful long time, I even started making some box cars back around 2002, but now I have finally given into it. The shed still has a bit of space for long thin layout so one day I may get round to building one.
In the meantime, I'm building my GP9 (details on the GP9 thread) but I am also looking at converting a number of other locos and freight cars to P48. I love tinkering with thing like this and the good thing is that they aren't too expensive if it all goes horribly wrong !
Jason on here sold me a Weaver GP 38 a few weeks back, so this is the next project. It is in UP livery so it will need a repaint into Southern Pacific red and grey, but before then there are quite a few mods to do. Converting it to P48 is relatively straight forward, you can simply buy some new wheel sets from Right O Way and put these in to replace the 2 rail ones this had. It turns out that the Weaver drive mechanism seems to be a favourite for converting other locos and a complete setup is available from PD Hobbies in the US.
There is quite a bit of work to do on the body but fortunately Southern Pacific leased a bunch of GP38s that were ex CSXT and these have the smaller fuel tank and no big cut out in the nose for lights ! That should make life a bit easier but the fan spacing is still wrong at the back. They didn't have the L cab window either.
These are the replacement wheel sets, the original model drives the front bogie from the rear with a big cardan shaft running the length of the loco that is very visible.
Not any more on this one, the front bogie won't be powered, the rear one will be more than enough for what I have in mind for this.
The other other thing I have done is to replace the gearbox drive tower with one from Finescale 360, this runs in ball bearings and is height adjustable so you can get the right tension on the chain. It also comes with a large bottom gear to reduce the gear ratio for better slow speed running. There is a new top gear too as the old one had a bit of wear on it.
In the meantime, I'm building my GP9 (details on the GP9 thread) but I am also looking at converting a number of other locos and freight cars to P48. I love tinkering with thing like this and the good thing is that they aren't too expensive if it all goes horribly wrong !
Jason on here sold me a Weaver GP 38 a few weeks back, so this is the next project. It is in UP livery so it will need a repaint into Southern Pacific red and grey, but before then there are quite a few mods to do. Converting it to P48 is relatively straight forward, you can simply buy some new wheel sets from Right O Way and put these in to replace the 2 rail ones this had. It turns out that the Weaver drive mechanism seems to be a favourite for converting other locos and a complete setup is available from PD Hobbies in the US.
There is quite a bit of work to do on the body but fortunately Southern Pacific leased a bunch of GP38s that were ex CSXT and these have the smaller fuel tank and no big cut out in the nose for lights ! That should make life a bit easier but the fan spacing is still wrong at the back. They didn't have the L cab window either.
These are the replacement wheel sets, the original model drives the front bogie from the rear with a big cardan shaft running the length of the loco that is very visible.
Not any more on this one, the front bogie won't be powered, the rear one will be more than enough for what I have in mind for this.
The other other thing I have done is to replace the gearbox drive tower with one from Finescale 360, this runs in ball bearings and is height adjustable so you can get the right tension on the chain. It also comes with a large bottom gear to reduce the gear ratio for better slow speed running. There is a new top gear too as the old one had a bit of wear on it.
I should have it done by this weekend though.
