BACHMANN ANNOUNCE O4

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Atlantic 3279
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Re: BACHMANN ANNOUNCE O4

Post by Atlantic 3279 »

Incidentally, although the O4 cab+boiler come off in one piece when carefully handled, they are separate mouldings, but with a slight anomaly. In many (most) other Bachmann locos I suspect the cab is clipped and glued to a blank or open rear of the firebox, and the cab includes the backhead or a separate backhead (sometimes metal to add weight) is fitted. The O4 boiler moulding includes the backhead. The cab clips over the rear of the firebox in a shallow groove. I believe this should make it a fairly simple job to create an alternative 04/6 cab if desired and clip/glue that on instead, retaining the nice backhead on the boiler rather than having to make a new one or transplant the original.
Side elevation drawings also suggest interesting possibilities for redeployment of boiler moulding and cylinders, even the cab if you are not too pedantic about sidesheet length. In perspective unfortunately the idea comes unravelled as unlike the 8Ks the similarly boilered 4-6-0s and Atlantics had straight rather than waisted-in lower sides to the firebox. Anybody going to build an 0-8-4T?
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Bill Bedford
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Re: BACHMANN ANNOUNCE O4

Post by Bill Bedford »

Atlantic 3279 wrote:Incidentally, although the O4 cab+boiler come off in one piece when carefully handled, they are separate mouldings, but with a slight anomaly. In many (most) other Bachmann locos I suspect the cab is clipped and glued to a blank or open rear of the firebox, and the cab includes the backhead or a separate backhead (sometimes metal to add weight) is fitted. The O4 boiler moulding includes the backhead. The cab clips over the rear of the firebox in a shallow groove. I believe this should make it a fairly simple job to create an alternative 04/6 cab if desired and clip/glue that on instead, retaining the nice backhead on the boiler rather than having to make a new one or transplant the original.
One end of the boiler must have been moulded separately, else they wouldn't have been able to get off the tools.
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Atlantic 3279
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Re: BACHMANN ANNOUNCE O4

Post by Atlantic 3279 »

That makes sense, so I shall have to look again. Maybe the backhead is glued on first, and later the cab clipped on, but no joint in the boiler is apparent so far. The cab certainly isn't bonded, you can move it, but the backead is firm on the firebox.
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Atlantic 3279
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Re: BACHMANN ANNOUNCE O4

Post by Atlantic 3279 »

Bill: Only discernible in very good light I found, owing to the quality of the fit, but the smokebox front is separate.
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Re: BACHMANN ANNOUNCE O4

Post by Atlantic 3279 »

I'll add more explanation tomorrow (probably) but here are a few things that may be of interest. I've reversibly made the loco electrically independant of the chip in the tender, which I won't be using but which I wish to retain as a contingency. The tender now unhooks very simply from the original drawbar and does not have to be "mauled around" with consequent risk of damage to details every time the loco body is removed or refitted.
STA75525 de-wired un-coupling drawbar.jpg
I've moved the pony truck backwards somewhat towards its correct position and there's still loads of sideswing before wheels touch cylinders.
STA75522 re-drilled Bach O4 pony pivot.jpg
STA75529 sideswing of short-arm pony.jpg
Look at the "elbows" in those O4 con-rods in the picture above!

{Added 5/7/10. In respect of the pony truck I've not had to go to nearly as much trouble as I did when I scratchbuilt my own O4 a few years ago. In that case the pony axle was in "dead scale" position closer to the leading ends of the cylinders. In order to keep it clear of those just on 3 foot radius curves, and to get satisfactory track-following by the pony wheels (which may have finer flanges than Bachmann offer) I had to equip it with a much longer-than-scale pivot arm, swinging on a pivot point way back between the leading two coupled axles}

I've fitted dummy front frames to the O1 body to suit the new pony position.
STA75523 O1 with moved pony & dummy front frames.jpg
I've had a good look at that "errant" O4 slidebar bracket and decided that it can fairly easily be modified to reduce the slope of the slidebars, but it still won't be "dead right" as its lower part does not loop under the coupling rods too as does/did the real thing. You certainly cannot do without it as a support for the slidebar ends, as they flop about all over the place and the crosshead disengages without the bracket to secure things.
STA75501 O4 slidebar bracket & steps.jpg
I've got the O4/8 body chunks screwed together and onto the O4 running plate, and fitted this to the chassis. The "entrails" on top of the motor will have to be relocated or binned, as they interfere with flush seating of the B1 based bodies onto the chassis. I was only just able to shuffle them about enough to get the O1 body to sit down, pushing them to the "shoulders" of the motor, which worked owing to the wide slot at the base of the firebox. The slot in the O4 running plate prevented this approach with the O4/8 and the body was under strain as I screwed it down for a couple of quick photos!
Last edited by Atlantic 3279 on Mon Jul 05, 2010 11:31 pm, edited 3 times in total.
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Atlantic 3279
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Re: BACHMANN ANNOUNCE O4

Post by Atlantic 3279 »

O1 versus O4/8
STA75524 O1 complete bar rear sandboxes.jpg
STA75555 LHS with details.jpg
STA75556 LHS with details, bright.jpg
STA75551 RHS with added detail.jpg
STA75552 RHS with details, bright.jpg
Both options still need rear sandboxes, when I make some, and seats back in the cabs. Miraculously, the drawbar slot in the B1 body moulding(s) as modified to make the O1 finished up at exactly the right height to let the Bachmann drawbar pass through it, but as a further aid to body removal I removed the lower edge to fully open out the slot, as seen in this rear of cab picture:
STA75526 O1 cab rear & drawbar.jpg
Last edited by Atlantic 3279 on Thu Jul 08, 2010 10:36 pm, edited 1 time in total.
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davidwest
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Re: BACHMANN ANNOUNCE O4

Post by davidwest »

Great affect! :mrgreen:
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will5210
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Re: BACHMANN ANNOUNCE O4

Post by will5210 »

I've just been swotting up on these on the Encyclopedia bit of this site, and I do fancy having a bash at one of the Gresley boilered types (O4/4, O4/5 or O4/7).

Anyone know of any pitfalls to this? It looks a straight boiler swap for the O4/7, boiler & cab for the O4/5 & boiler, cab & frame lengthening for the O4/4?
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Bill Bedford
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Re: BACHMANN ANNOUNCE O4

Post by Bill Bedford »

will5210 wrote:I've just been swotting up on these on the Encyclopedia bit of this site, and I do fancy having a bash at one of the Gresley boilered types (O4/4, O4/5 or O4/7).

Anyone know of any pitfalls to this? It looks a straight boiler swap for the O4/7, boiler & cab for the O4/5 & boiler, cab & frame lengthening for the O4/4?
The O4/4 had a gap between the splashers and the cab front. with the splashers curving down so that they were symmetrical.
earlswood nob
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Re: BACHMANN ANNOUNCE O4

Post by earlswood nob »

Hi to all Gresley fans
Following this great series of converting bodies to build new locos have given me an idea.
I have dis-assembled an old Kays O4 ROD kit and was going to convert it into a S1 humpshunter by adding footplate & chassis extensions, side tanks and bunker.
If I keep the O4 footplate & chassis and add a Hornby B17 boiler, I might get something resembling an O4/7. This would leave the O4 ROD boiler needing a new (straight) footplate for conversion to a S1.
Now to order the Isinglass drawings.
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Bill Bedford
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Re: BACHMANN ANNOUNCE O4

Post by Bill Bedford »

earlswood nob wrote:If I keep the O4 footplate & chassis and add a Hornby B17 boiler, I might get something resembling an O4/7. This would leave the O4 ROD boiler needing a new (straight) footplate for conversion to a S1.
Now to order the Isinglass drawings.
You might be able to make a O4/8 that way but an O4/7 had a smokebox without a saddle
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coachmann
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Re: BACHMANN ANNOUNCE O4

Post by coachmann »

Atlantic 3279, both locos look very neat, the 04/8 being my favourite. I wonder how long it will be before Bachamnn announces this variant and we can all have one without the bother! :wink:
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Re: BACHMANN ANNOUNCE O4

Post by Bill Bedford »

coachmann wrote:Atlantic 3279, both locos look very neat, the 04/8 being my favourite. I wonder how long it will be before Bachamnn announces this variant and we can all have one without the bother! :wink:
I suspect they will do a GWR one first.
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Re: BACHMANN ANNOUNCE O4

Post by Atlantic 3279 »

If you are sufficiently determined, the beatifully detailed Bachmann boiler, cylinders / slidebars / con-rods, maybe the cab and certainly the tender, could be combined with a Hornby B12 chassis plus newly fabricated running plate and splashers to make one of these:
STA75518 B4 McG, use for O4 boiler, cab, cyls.jpg
Extreme as that might seem, it might not be as arduous as my recollection of sorting out the McGowan kit from which this B4 was actually made, especially the boiler, cab and tender! If you happen to have a McG kit for one of these to build, it might even be easiest to just use the running plate and splashers plus the aforementioned O4 and B12 parts, and deploy the other whitemetal parts as fishing weights!
Here's a closer look at the tender top to show a "proper" GC version (albeit a slightly earlier coal-rail type with added plating) and then some other GC tender tops compared with Bachmann's ROD-only version:
STA75517 GC tender top more detail.jpg
STA75516 GC vs ROD tender tops.jpg
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Re: BACHMANN ANNOUNCE O4

Post by Atlantic 3279 »

Here are closer views of the means of making the O4 reversibly independant of its "life support unit" in the tender.
I pulled the tender plug out of the four-pin socket under the loco cab, and then bridged the terminals in the socket as a left pair and a right pair, simply pushing a U-shaped piece of 0.45mm brass wire into each pair of terminals to achieve this:
STA75510 bridging terminals.jpg
With the brake actuator lever temporarily removed, I then unclipped the wiring from the drawbar and with the leading tender axle out to give good access just folded the wiring+plug back out of harm's way. It seems quite happy to stay there, "supported" to some degree by the axles, the brake gear, and the inherent stiffness of the wiring. Contrary to the impression given by this picture, the four-pin plug isn't rubbing on the spokes of that wheel!
STA75512 tender plug & wiring tucked away.jpg
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