Albert S. Campbell's 12" gauge 1902 4-4-0

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Harold_V
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Re: Albert S. Campbell's 12" gauge 1902 4-4-0

Post by Harold_V »

Glenn Brooks wrote: (my previous 1949 4-4-4 Jubilee was 7 5/8"
Hmmm. Brings back fond memories of our dear friend Ernie Allen, of New Westminster, B.C., now deceased. Did you ever see his pretty Jubilee?

Harold
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Mike Walsh
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Re: Albert S. Campbell's 12" gauge 1902 4-4-0

Post by Mike Walsh »

steamin10 wrote:I can see it will change the motivation to standardize to 12 inch. Maybe you should consider track that is 12 5/8. I wonder if the 12 incher can stay on the rails with the wide gauge.
It will.

WF&P trackage is gauged at 12-5/8" but our equipment is gauged at 12". Allows for the bigger (4-8-2, 4-6-4, etc) equipment to play on our track.

Mike
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Re: Albert S. Campbell's 12" gauge 1902 4-4-0

Post by Glenn Brooks »

Mike, that is good to know. I plan to lay done a few sticks of rail at wide gauge and test it with one of the bogies...

Harold: unfortunately no, never saw the loco in person, although I think I found photos of his engine when I was researching 4-4-4's when I came into mine. This wheel configuration was more popular in Canada than the U.S., as I recall.
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Motive power : 1902 A.S.Campbell 4-4-0 American - 12 5/8" gauge, 1955 Ottaway 4-4-0 American 12" gauge

Ahaha, Retirement: the good life - drifting endlessly on a Sea of projects....
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Re: Albert S. Campbell's 12" gauge 1902 4-4-0

Post by FriscoJim »

Mike Walsh wrote:
WF&P trackage is gauged at 12-5/8" but our equipment is gauged at 12". Allows for the bigger (4-8-2, 4-6-4, etc) equipment to play on our track.

Mike
Mike, are you sure about the 12-5/8"? I thought it was gauged at 12-1/4"...
Jim P.

N&F RR - 12" Gauge Live Steam
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Re: Albert S. Campbell's 12" gauge 1902 4-4-0

Post by Glenn Brooks »

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Couple of photos of the 'switchers' that came with the Ottaway. They have been in storage for 30 years, so in need of a bit of new livery... The steeple cab is all electric and needs a motor. The 1500 switcher is powered by an old one lung Onan gas engine and what looks like a model A Ford transmission. Both engines could use a little detailing to bring them closer to the prototype design. Not bad though, for having been built in 1968. A spring time project for sure.
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Motive power : 1902 A.S.Campbell 4-4-0 American - 12 5/8" gauge, 1955 Ottaway 4-4-0 American 12" gauge

Ahaha, Retirement: the good life - drifting endlessly on a Sea of projects....
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Re: Albert S. Campbell's 12" gauge 1902 4-4-0

Post by Harlock »

Looks like your cup runneth over with fun projects now. IF the WF&P is indeed 12 5/8 and will accommodation that loco - well, that's probably the main track away from home that'd you'd want to take it to. And if the wheels on the Ottaway are wide enough to also run on that - then you can build your railroad to those specs as well and enjoy both without a lot of extra work.

For a while I was in communication with Herb Ottaway's nephew and he sent me a number of interesting photos of "Uncle Herb's" personal track and some of the engines he built. He was a neat guy who was also into early motorcycle racing.

Looks like the Ottaway can be your 'right now' engine while the Campbell engine gets up to speed.

12" gauge is a good size - big but still transportable - our 9" gauge narrow gauge locomotives are about as big.

The gas engines look like fun projects as well.

-M
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Re: Albert S. Campbell's 12" gauge 1902 4-4-0

Post by Mike Walsh »

C&H is about 4 hours closer to him than St. Louis and I think they specialize in Ottoways and probably some other smaller locomotive manufacturers.

There is also Frisco & Northview railroad near Springfield, MO. You could probably do a big loop if you arranged with the operators of all the railroads to visit each railroad and get as much rare mileage in on one trip if you wanted. I have contacts at all these railroads.

-Mike
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Re: Albert S. Campbell's 12" gauge 1902 4-4-0

Post by Glenn Brooks »

Harlock - indeed, projects galore! I figure there is enuf work on tap to keep busy until 125 years of age. Would actually like to reconfigure the cab on each of the switchers to more closely represent the actual prototypes. Plus build some rolling stock. Both cabs could pretty easily be cut down and built back up with real windows and lower profile fairing to be more proportional. Right now the cabs have 6 or 8" of headroom, plus seats that give full knee room. But they are already 12" ga, right on the money, as is the Ottaway and an original Ottaway Pullman car, plus a more recent, 12' drop bed flat car. So I think it possible to profile the body more accurately, and still have a comfortable engineers position in the cab. Maybe can do some measuring and layout options this winter. The roofs are supported with 11/4" angle iron, so easy to cut and weld new supports.

The WF&P is in fact gauged at 12 1/4", I think mostly to accommodate a couple of their long wheel base locomotives on tight curves. James Pekarek at Northview RR ran his 12" ga loco there a few years ago and advised anything over that ga would very likely derail, unless one had 1 1/2" to 2" wide tires. James thinks the 12 5/8" is an accidental typo. The ottaways hae, I think, 1" tires, so don't accommodate wide gauges all that well. They definitely will fall off the track at 12 3/4", which is the ruling gage for the rear wheels of the Campbell. I'm planning on building my ROW this winter and spring to 12" ga standard, maybe 12 1/4" to 12 3/8" in the turns, and aiming to regage the Campbell to 12" when I can afford a new boiler.

Mike, yes, it would be very interesting to make a road trip to run on both RR's. I haven't actually thought of that - but it sounds like a great idea. actually James' private RR is also along the route from Seattle to St. Louis, as is the Flosom RR in Northern Cal- another 12" ga pike open to the public north of Sacremento. I think there are another half dozen or so private RR's here and there along the west coast, but I have only read about them and have never communicated with the owners. To bad 12" isn't more well represented in the hobby machinist community, as the gauge and scale in my mind are much easier to work with because of the larger size of parts- although costs certainly do go up the larger the scale. If there were a few 12" tracks around, the guys who build 2.5" -3 3/4" scale could have an option to gage their equipment at a more realistic 12" and actually enjoy a very stable and proportionally scaled equipment. Besides its great fun to be part of something that has been going on since the late 1880's. What we call the larger gauges. HOHOHO!
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Motive power : 1902 A.S.Campbell 4-4-0 American - 12 5/8" gauge, 1955 Ottaway 4-4-0 American 12" gauge

Ahaha, Retirement: the good life - drifting endlessly on a Sea of projects....
Glenn Brooks
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Re: Albert S. Campbell's 12" gauge 1902 4-4-0

Post by Glenn Brooks »

And here we are 4 years latter...

Finally started working on the Campbell locomotive again- after a long hiatus, nay- sidetrack...

I decided to regauge the Campbell to 15” gauge and look for a new boiler. First, though I’ve been lifting dims and drawing an as-built for the existing boiler.

I made up 2 shop rules for this rebuild.

number 1 shop rule on this one is: “Nothing comes OFF, until Iam ready to renew and put back on.”


Rule Number 2: “Don’t get sidetracked with other stuff”

Ahaha, we’ll see how long that lasts.

First step was to shoot the boiler and firebox with ultrasound to determine what shape the plate is in. Got a pretty consistent .240” - .255” reading throughout. So 1/4” boiler plate - fairly typical for a 105 PSI boiler of the era, I think. (The boiler has only been fired a few times in its life - the loco never run on the ground. So all new mechanically; just 115 years old).

Here’s the backhead with the various dims. Also a shot of the riveted fire box flue sheet. Pretty cool to see historic work from the old Masters.

Glenn
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Moderator - Grand Scale Forum

Motive power : 1902 A.S.Campbell 4-4-0 American - 12 5/8" gauge, 1955 Ottaway 4-4-0 American 12" gauge

Ahaha, Retirement: the good life - drifting endlessly on a Sea of projects....
Glenn Brooks
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Re: Albert S. Campbell's 12" gauge 1902 4-4-0

Post by Glenn Brooks »

Stripped the cab, plumbing, and lagging off the loco over the last couple of days. Real honest-to-god steam punk look under everything. Work of art really.

For reference, the cone shaped rivets are around 1” diameter.

The orange color isn’t rust- thick coat of red lead paint.

Tomorrow, the top of steam dome comes off and I start on what ever part of the throttle and pick up tube is accessible inside the dome. Also do a visual on the stay bolts and shoot some more plate thickness. Generally looks in good shape around the threaded holes on the side of the boiler.
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Moderator - Grand Scale Forum

Motive power : 1902 A.S.Campbell 4-4-0 American - 12 5/8" gauge, 1955 Ottaway 4-4-0 American 12" gauge

Ahaha, Retirement: the good life - drifting endlessly on a Sea of projects....
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Re: Albert S. Campbell's 12" gauge 1902 4-4-0

Post by NP317 »

Wow!
Real Old World construction.
Wear breathing mask and gloves...
And have fun.
RussN
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Re: Albert S. Campbell's 12" gauge 1902 4-4-0

Post by Glenn Brooks »

Cleaned up the smoke box and steam dome yesterday and today. The smoke box had an angle iron frame bolted to the inside of the rolled plate. This frame had 1/4” wire mesh affixed, assuming it was an internal spark arrestor. So took this out to make room to pull and replace the exhaust plumbing.

Also, still bolted in place, are two vertical sheet metal plates, extending downwards from the height of the spark arrestor frame. no idea why that is mounted in the smoke box. It appears to be some kind of arch, to swirl the exhaust gasses maybe??

If anybody knows what these devices are supposed to do, much appreciate a heads up.

Here’s a pic of what they look like.
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Interestingly, the loco has no petticoat extending downwards from the stack. Iam a bit surprised at this. Al Campbell was a Master Railroad mechanic and shop foreman on the New York Elevated Railway when he designed and built this engine in 1903-1904. He must have felt the loco didn’t need a petticoat or any kind of Venturi to vent the smokebox. Still, a bit surprising, as other aspects of the loco are iconic steam locomotive design.

Then moved on to freeing up the throttle assembly and inspecting the steam port and valve in the steam dome. Broke off one of the two bolts holding the steam port casting to the side of the steam dome. Dumb and dumber. Should have put a bit of heat onto the bolt to loosen it up, but didn’t. So now two steps to the rear, and prolly three days lost time worrying the broken stud out of the hole and replacing with a new bolt.

But anyway, take a look at this construction! This is a top view of the steam dome- with massive, heavy round headed rivets holding the dome plate inside the vertical hot worked round dome assembly. NO tubing here! It’s all rolled steel, two pieces riveted together! Same as the boiler AND the smoke box.

The studs are set into the rolled 1” square bar. Each stud between two adjacent rivets.

Amazing construction. I have new respect for old school craftsmanship.
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Glenn
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Motive power : 1902 A.S.Campbell 4-4-0 American - 12 5/8" gauge, 1955 Ottaway 4-4-0 American 12" gauge

Ahaha, Retirement: the good life - drifting endlessly on a Sea of projects....
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