Anton Richards is building a live diesel locomotive based on a 4 coupled Essel engineering chassis.

He is using a similar arrangement to my monster with a permanent coupled 850 series DC motor acting as a dynamo.

Here are his pictures so far and some glimpses of his unusual 32mm garden railway.































And just to prove it works.....

Wow, what a superb little model!

That track looks like it's got a bit of a story to tell, too... is that the old Bing or Marklin stuff from way back?

Hi
Thank you very much Carl for putting this up. I am in the process of writing a complete build blog which I will put up on here which explains everything (i hope).

cheers

My name is Anton Richards:
I am 18 years old and have just started to get into the whole railway lark:

I am going to apologize in advance for any terminology I use which I wrong as I do not know much about this yet; I am just a model boat, car and plane enthusiast who wanted to try something new.

I wanted to build a Live diesel locomotive for a while but thought it would be very complicated and gave up. I then realized from watching videos and searching the web that actually a far few people have done this. I had a dream of creating a few on a assembly line and selling them off. I started getting different ideas from online sources and things started to come together. I started by purchasing some track which I must say, I knew nothing about and therefore I bought the complete wrong thing. I purchased a large quantity of Lima O gauge track which was not suited to what I needed as it was just like hornby O gauge track but further apart, so the wheels flanges would not fit the track. I swiftly swapped this for some Hornby O gauge track which was cheap and worked OK, well so i thought. Me being young and having a credit card attached to an ebay account, I ended up with a vast quantity of hornby o gauge tin plate track which would be fine as I was not trying to build a perfect layout, i was focusing on the locomotives and i just wanted a test track really.

This is my live diesel locomotive that I have been working on for a few months. It is not finished yet but this is as far as i have got. It runs well and I have made some very poor videos of the loco running on a test track.

VIDEOS OF LIVE DIESEL LOCOMOTIVE RUNNING AT BOTTOM OF PAGE!

This is the Essel Engineering 0-4-0 electric chassis which I purchased for around £80 - http://www.mattharvey.com/esselengineering/




It started off as a plain chassis which I attached a brass sheet to as a fixing point. This is where my problems started as the sheet was too thin as flimsy.




As this was not the best foundation, I added a wooden top to this as I could also fix all necessary parts to the wood. Being a model aircraft flying, I know from experience that nitro engine fuel and by products (the oil) are very corrosive to wood and therefore the wood was sanded, varnished and then painted metallic black.




By now i had a idea of what i wanted it to look like as well as cross referancing with other models such a Carls so as to get ideas. I had previously tried to make a live diesel loco and failed as i had tried using Mamod flatbed 32mm wagon. I don’t know what was going though my mind then as this created a whole array of problems, the main one being that i had hardly any room on the top and i had to create my own gears on the bottom as it was just axles. I then wasted money and time experimenting with different ways to try and make this work and i managed to some degree but the dynamo never had enough power to turn the motors (twin 3v motors)(ONLY ONE shown in picture).





I tried many different ways but only one would remotely work, and still this was not very affective as i had no room to work with. I also found that having a pull start on the engine was a very bad idea as if the engine ever got flooded which being a nitro engine is very common, the whole loco would jolt heavily and i actually once ripped something off that loco by trying to start. below is a picture of what the unfinished project looked like. I have now scrapped that idea as i have moved on to my essel project.





As I said, this is now scrapped and I am continuing with the Essel chassis.
Now this is the part i am worst at, being young with little patience, creating the top half or the body of the loco would prove to be impossible for me. I did have a go though and here are some pictures which thow the process i went through in order to make the worlds most simple body. I made a body out of wood which i had planned to vaccum form.




The first vaccum form did not work very well



The second one was far better




I HAVE NOW ADDED THIS SHELL TO THE LOCO - USING LEGO STRUTS TO SUPPORT IT. THE EXHAUST CAN BE SEEN, POKING OUT THE SIDE.



It does not look scale or anything but it will do for now - I will make the HYMEK look more realistic.

After I had done this, i started production on the diesel loco. Until a few months ago although i had the dynamo which was just an electric motor with a gearing system to make electricity, stupidly i didnt realise that a Dc motor can produce electricity. with the help from you tube and this web site here: http://www.qsl.net/ns8o/Induction_Generator.html - i found out that all i needed was a nice Dc motor without all the fancy gearing as the nitro engine would spin the shaft fast enough anyway. Carl helped me to find the MFA Torpedo 850 series engine. This can be found at - http://www.westbourne-model.co.uk/electric-motors-drive-sets-for-model-boat-1727-0.html - I assumed that as Carl had the MFA 850, this was the one that i needed. well it works perfectly in fact its a bit to powerful as it creates to much current then i really need. I could have gone for a 600 but oh well. the downside is that it is a very juicy motor and as i am using an electric start from an external battery to start the motor/generator, it runs that down very quickly if the motor wont start. When I recived the motor, i straight away went ahead and attached it to a base as well as the nitro engien using a cheap platic universal joint. OHH DEAR, this went very wrong and nearly took my eye out and this would have bin the end of me as i am on the process of studying to be a commercial pilot. The plastic coupling flew off and Carl said i could just use a metal sleeve of some sort. I had one made for me by my girlfriends father who was very interested in the project as he is an engineer who works in the aviation industry.



Below is a photo of my engine on a test stand coupled to the Torpedo.




unfortunately I got to excited when making the rest of the loco and completely forgot to take pictures of each stage.

I have a few and i will list them up here:
This is the wooden parts that i used to fix the servo (futaba S3003) and the nitro fule tank to.


This is the loco with everything attached to it. the wood parts are unpainted and un sanded and in fact these ones split in half when i screwed them in, i made some more precise ones after and varnished them and painted them in the same metallic black as the base plate.




Now pictures and videos of my project so far...







Below are a few videos i have of my Diesel loco (SHUNT) running on the test circuit and then on the railway - I informative videos in due course.





Thank you for looking

Anton Richards

I looks like early Honby Tinplate and worth a bit too!

Mike

I merged the two threads (the orginal one I created and this one that Anton created). We now have a lot of photos....but then we can never have too many.

I think (but then I'm biased) that this is a great project.

Would like to know more about this vacuum formed body. That could have some interesting possibilities if it can resist the heat.

Ahh yes the vaccum formed body. I got this idea from a nitro car that i had. As the body is made from that plastic stuff which nearly touches the engine, i thought i would try and replicate this idea for my loco. it is made from plastic im sorry but i dont know what sort or anything as i do not have a vaccum former, i used the one at my place of study. my opinion is this is the easiest way to create a simple body. to my knowledge it will withstand heat as long as you add some simple ventilation. you may also need to change the glow plug to a hot glow plug as heat within the body will cut the engine. i plan to clip it to the loco using a very similar way the car shells are clipped, using butterfly clips.

I would also like to add, but i dont know how to do this on the post, so ill do it here....The really good feature of the essel chassis is that it comes standard with a fully adjustable wheel base. this means that the loco can run on either 32mm O gauge track or 45mm g gauge track with just a little turn of a grub screw.

Ok thanks ill give it a go

Yes i see where you coming from now...i still have not made a switch for it yet, so the minute i start the engine and connect the to motors together..the loco starts to run off... so i need to do that...but i dont fully know how at the moment...

and yes that would be a good little experiment to do as i would love to know this for future models

This is a really excellent project. Looking at your experience and Carls it looks
like you have to do everything twice in the world of live diesel.
A few questions, if you don't mind:
What engine have you used ?
Is it possible to get a better silencer ?
How long do you think the engine will run for without overheating?

Hi dtsteam
Thank you very much. yes trial and error plays a big part in building such propulsion as some really simple parts such a the link between motor and nitro engine are very easy to get wrong.
The engine i have used is a force 15 nitro car engine which i have taken the pull start off. this is because if the engine ever got flooded, it would jerk the loco into the air when trying to start.
yes that is what i am now trying to achieve as this is a bit to noisy. the problem is that i have hardly any room left. Si im stuck on the silencer part at the moment. i have run the engine for a full tank which as i have a very small one, it only lasts about 10 minutes. I will be adding a fan in as i know this well extend the life of the engine. my overall opinion on the force 15 is that they ok to use but i am a lover of OS engines and IRVINE engine which are both now made by OS.

hope that helps

I am now starting to gather pieces for my next model, not that my first on is finished yet but i wont another one as it was fun building it. Carl has very kindly given me a chassis to work with. I am stuck with engine choice. I am thinking of using a 4 stroke but I can honestly say i no nothing about them as all the planes and cars i have use two strokes. I guy who has seen my videos on youtube has been emailing me an he wants to start building one using a 4 stroke engine. he says "I will be using a 4-stroke engine so that it's slow to rev up, has a lower high and low idle, and makes a big cloud of smoke when it accelerates." I like the sound of those characteristics but do they have a lower RPM?

I am thinking of trying out some smaller generator motors such as this MFA 550 - http://cgi.ebay.co.uk/MFA-Torpedo-500-Motor-Suppressed-Motor-Mount-EM500-/350103057187?pt=UK_ToysGames_RadioControlled_JN&hash=item5183c4b323#ht_825wt_754

Im not sure if it would work or not. any suggestions?

I also need to talk about custom manifolds....any body know about creating these as i need it to off the engine and immediately turn to to the right or left and i cant find anything small enough...

I have found this but im not to sure....

http://cgi.ebay.co.uk/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?ViewItem&item=250606777932&fromMakeTrack=true&ssPageName=VIP:watchlink:top:en#ht_1971wt_826

Anton the 500 motor will be ok it'll chuck out about 9 volts max. but the current should be at least 3 or 4 amps.

I don't have the exact spec but I looked at a 540 motor which I presume is a bit more powerful.

The exhausts are great, I bought 2 of them, very small and compact, 10mm dia tube but watch out for the manifold spacing. It is the small size found on .12 and some .15 engines. The bolt centres are 28mm. The larger engines have longer exhaust ports.

I am making a simple brass adapter plate to fit the large engine (with 48mm hole centres).

The chassis I'm sending you is only tiny...10cm long and 4cm weelbase. I don't where you're going to fit a 4 stroke engine.

BTW I'm after an 8mm carburettor if you know where I can find one cheap. I looked on ebay and nothing less than about £20 which is more than I paid for the engine.