GSC locomotive beds

[Asteamhead]

Hello, I'm a newcomer in this forum of specialists and ask for your knowledge.
Building the locomotive beds (frames, Rahmen) for my project of a N&W class A engine in 5" scale, I found all the photos and drawings necessary to produce zhe beds by means of lasered parts. For casting seemed impossible to me, I tried to made the beds looking similar to castings.
You may know, GSC or General Steel Casting, Granite Cty Ill made all those castings for locomotives, worldwide. No other foundry / firm was able to cast such reliable and precise parts for this purpurse.
For I am fascinated about this outstanding production process, I tried to find more than the well known and excellent photos of finished beds, not in the Cyclopedia for Steam Locomotives, nor on Wikipedia.
Does anybody have knowledge or photos of the wooden? modells, the casting process at GSC or the castings coming out of the sand without being processed and is willing to share this information?
Thanks for your posts!
P.S. Photos will be added in a separate post cause I didn't manage to add those files sucessfully.
Asteamhead

[Asteamhead]

Two photos of lasered parts for the locomotive beds to show the method (instead of casting!).
Asteamhead

[Fender]

Hi,
Beautiful work. My understanding is that the molds for locomotive beds were laid out in a pit using an assembly of cores, rather than by using conventional patterns rammed up with green sand in a molding flask. But that's about all I know. I suspect you may get a better response to these questions on the Live Steam forum.

[RONALD]

I have been working on making models of GSC castings for a long time. Here are some posts I made;

http://www.chaski.org/homemachinist/vie ... =8&t=91998

http://www.chaski.org/homemachinist/vie ... =8&t=91297

http://www.chaski.org/homemachinist/vie ... =8&t=91267

I have had a GSC loco bed on the "back burner" for a looooong time, but, maybe this fall I will get to cast several parts of it.

It will be in several parts, because doing it in one piece is impossible for me.

[Asteamhead]

Thank you for all this information! Yours is the first one piece single casting of such a complex truck I saw, congratulations!
We other modelers are to be contempt by making such parts by means of one side simple castings or by laser cutting and tig welding.
And now I can understand a little better how GSC made those beds: outstanding craftmenship in combination with best understanding of the casting process. As far as I know, those locomotive beds never failed nor were prone to crack. This wasn't definitely not the case with welded or manufactured frames of a typical european locomotive!
Asteamhead

[RONALD]

As far as I know, those locomotive beds never failed nor were prone to crack. This wasn't definitely not the case with welded or manufactured frames of a typical european locomotive!
Asteamhead

Sorry to say, tho better than a totally a bolted frame, or one of bolted castings, the frames still broke occasionally. One example I'm aware of, is the C&NW 4-8-4 H series. As originally constructed by Baldwin, they used a "Banjo" style frame outside the mud ring of the fire box. They cracked so much near that point, that when the whole series was rebuilt into the H-1 series in the late 30's, they all received new modern frames from GSC.

Making large one piece castings by GSC, was a learning process, they made lots of mistakes along the way, but just about when it was time to close the book on steam locomotives, they had a great product.

Of course, with the knowledge gained from casting for steam, they also cast many diesel locomotive beds for EMD, and others.