Running some vintage live steam while staying safe at home. Both engines are from Bassett-Lowke in the UK. Both are alcohol fired pot boilers and are pulling newer LMS tinplate coaches from Darstaed. First up is my old Enterprise, available from the mid 1920’s up thru the 50’s mine dates from the end of the production run and has seen little use as shown by no wear in the motion or axle bearing holes. Second video is the Mogul, engine has been restored at some time, the tender is the original finish. I have not managed to date this one yet as it also had a very long production run, along with being reissued by Corgi in 1999/2000(those are different and require more fine scale track). You want a vintage one if you wish to run on tinplate track. The Mogul has a throttle/direction lever thru the cab roof, the Enterprise depends on the load its pulling to temper/control its speed. Both have a schrill steam whistle. Enjoy!
Great stuff! Love that blue glow under the boilers from the burners! And that exhaust steam from the stack is as real as it gets!
Along with the smells of hot oil, steam and fuel burning, the chuffing is genuine and not some fangled digital sound card. Just have to deal with oily mess they become after running with a gentle wipe down while still warm. Just part of the fun, and to think they gave these things to young boys to run on the living room floor back in those years. And being expensive as they were, they were being run in really really nice homes on hardwood floors and rugs! Mike the Aspie
Yeah Mike, I know, it’s hard to imagine in this hyper-cautious-with-kids and lawsuit happy age we live in kids decades ago actually playing with toys like yours. Different time indeed.
Or maybe the idea of a “trip to the woodshed” if they fouled up royally and set the living room on fire made them especially cautious?
Or possibly it was really like those old magazine illustrations where Dad grabs on to the Lionel trains and Junior never gets to run 'em? I can see it!
I suspect the dad’s that could afford these back then were seldom home and nannies raised the children. A very different time back then if you could afford these trains.
The toys being sold at toy stores even in the '60’s would be considered far too dangerous now a days. I remember Model rockets, airplane motors, and all sorts of things being sold to any kid with the money. I purchased a mini jet engine powered with solid fuel. This was my brief model rocket days.
A friend at school and I would make rockets out of tightly rolled paper, and packed solid with match heads, which can be surprisingly explosive. We would have contests. This all stopped when a classmate lost two fingers.
sorry about the downer. I’m lovin’ those engines !!!
Paul
Me too! Estes model rocket engines!
When I was in college I used to take empty Garcia y Vega plastic cigar tubes (I loved cigars back then!) fill 'em with black powder, and an Estes model rocket motor was a perfect fit in the tube. Glued on some fins an voila! Home-made surface to air missile! Made a nice BOOM when the parachute popper charge went off!
I left a foot wide powder stain on a water tower with one! Lasted for years! [:-^]
You are like me. Sometimes I consider myself very lucky to have survived my childhood unscathed…
Paul
We swam were we probably shouldn’t, roamed the streets till the street lights came on with not adults with us. We all did stuff that parents do not let their kids do today. But we are all still here and probably a bit wiser and smarter from it.
Well Paul, you, Mike and I probably have one thing in common, there’s a big difference between crazy and stupid! Know enough not to cross the line and you’ll be OK! [;)]
I’ve still got all my original parts. Most of 'em still work too!
I once put a D engine in a tiny rocket with the nosecone taped down tight. I found it sticking straight up in the middle of a gravel road. [swg] Who says paper tubing can’t stand extreme G’s! [:-^]
You know, I was just reading an article by Jeff Young in the Garden Railways mag from December 2009 today. In the “Raising Steam” column under the heading “The collective wisdom of live-steam hobbyists” he mentions using “Harley Davidson’s Harley Spray Cleaner and Polish” sprayed on a soft shop towel. Says it “picks up the grime and leaves a nice shine on the engine that would make any old-time engine wiper proud.”
By the way, I recently ordered this back issue because it has an article on a Disney themed layout: “Adventures in Anaheim-The Castle Peak & Thunder Railroad.”
I missed that issue. But, it would be easy to duplicate a Disneyland train using a Hartland 4-4-0. It seems easy to make something that looks right.
But, be careful!!!
When I started with Lionel, I told myself"Just one train"…
“Just one train…”
Then it’s “One more train…”
Kind of like this guy… https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lEDKUTV-mCA
At one time, Hartland did a limited edition WDRR engine in coperation with the Carrolwood group. Just as Lionel did a WDRR “General” yeas ago. One could also take an Accucraft live steam 4-4-0 to do a custom live steam version. Accucraft did a 2-4-2 Fort Wilderness live steamer after the ones that ran at that now long closed Disney attraction. Those are hard to come by, I would love to have one myself. Mike the Aspie.
Here are the G locos running on David Sheegog’s layout: https://www.cptrr.com/locomotives.html
You can read the full text of the Garden Railways article on his website: https://www.cptrr.com/garden-railways-magazine.html. He built them from scratch.
Fort Wilderness Railroad: The train doesn’t show up untill about 7 1/2 minutes in, but before that you can see and hear water traffic on Bay lake including at least one of the two side wheel steamers.
I hate to do this…
+
But if I didn’t show you that…https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fort_Wilderness_Railroad
"Rolling stock
The FWRR utilized four
It was a sin to let those beautiful locomotives and cars go to waste like that! At least some of them found good homes.
You should see the Accucraft G scale live steam one, along with the matching correct coaches they did. Quite hard to find for sale these days, but beautifully done! Mike
I found a video! [:D]
Thanks for the video Becky, oh-so-cool!
I was at a train show in Virginia Beach about 20 years ago where some live steamers were putting on demonstration. One of the club members told me that for their small size those live steam models are quite powerful, amazingly so.