The Home Machinist!

James, good to know ! We center of the universe Seattleites tend to think of the PNW as extending from the Space Needle out as far as Everett and south all the way to Tacoma.

To bad no 3/4" or 1" tracks survive in the Washington. There might be one in Southrn Oregon...

Here are a couple of additional photos showing detail of continental and civil war cannon, that I was having difficultly posting under the old forum software. The new software photo feature seems to be just Wonderful! Hopefully it's working for Harold equally as well. image.jpeg image.jpeg image.jpe...

Visited the Strassberg RailRoad last week, just outside Lancaster Pa. Here's a couple of photos of their early 1900's Cagney 15" gauge miniature train. Coal fired, hauling 16 passengers per trip, they operate the little engine on weekends from noon to 4 P.M. They operate a point to point track ...

Hi Harold, Just tried out the new forum software. Looks good! There may be a configuration issue on the Private Message reply function. I tried to send a poster several pictures he asked for, regarding rail car design. But the forum only allowed me to post one phot. Not one at a time, but one photo....

Thanks Ken. Very helpful! Actually Mr. Griffens Ottaway and two switchers- well, one switcher and one electrified steeplecab are still Around. They are at my house. The Ottaway is pretty much ready to run, the Steeplecab is missing its electrical innards. Griffen built both the steeplecab and a loos...

On the subject of leveling a pad, instead of messing around with precision surveying equipment, you can easily use an old fashioned water level - 5 gal plastic water bucket hung on a step ladder, attached to 50' or 100' garden hose. Add a cheap 1" irrigation shut off valve on the end and with a...

Pete, yep, it gets pretty complicated once you dig into all the models and different foundries that produced the gun barrels. Iam pretty sure the Union 3" ordinance guns were in the neighborhood of 850# and the cast iron Napolean 12s were around 1200#. I am no expert - only going on what I saw ...

There's a lot of experienced people here to offer comments and suggestions, but I'll throw in one approach for you. Generally, I think it is safe to say the two scales you mention are not compatible. Couplers for 1.5" scale will be smaller than 2 1/2" scale, And potentially at a different ...

You can always freelance your design, based on 1880's style cars. Your basic dimensions for 71/2" ga equipment will likely come out to be around 5' x 16" x 16". Any wider with a small car and you run the risk of having them be unstable and tipping over easily. Also I had a four car co...

Re: welding up the broken foot. If it is cast, the amount of heat you need to put into the cast iron piece will undoubtedly melt the insulation fixed to the frame. You can't use standard mig/ Tig processes on cast iron. One alternative , perhaps drill and tap a stud to attach the broken foot back to...

Hi Pete, maybe my photos will show more about the plates. Just looked at one of my photos again - the number is actually 816 lbs. the number 8 is rather faint so I disregarded it initially. I think 816 in this case is the barrel weight. the rated weight of canister rounds for a 12 pounder is also 16...

The area your in sounds like it has the 16 lbdrs. This is a long shot (pun intended) but if anyone here has real easy access to a park close to them that has any Napolean 12 lbdrs I'm really looking for just a couple of dimensions and one picture of one single part located right at the rear top of ...