Doug Cockerham drives - newb question(s)

my guess is that the gearbox's on the trucks are original Overland. everything else is D. Cockerham including the drive shafts and universals, gear box, and what looks like a gearhead motor and flywheel.

Like a few of us, but Doug towards the end, he went to using gear head motors.  What you have is one of his later drives with a Pittman gear head motor.  As a matter of fact I'm using them on the 27 Baldwin Center Cab drives I'm building for Lou @CLW.  Everything beyond the gear head is 1:1.  Over the years I've worked on many of his drives and he did a great job and made things that were stout.  The gear tower is his own design but axle gearboxes varied because he was having difficulty getting the Ajin/Overland boxes he liked so much.  Mush more to the story but that's enough for now.

Jay

Doug's drives were bullet proof and he generally reworked or swapped out early OMI for later OMI gearboxes, he definitely installed new universals & shafts, but as noted above, everything else was new. His models would run very smoothly with great slow speed operation, with a little gear head whine at higher speeds, but they could pull the wallpaper off the wall.  I owned several OMI Turbines with his drives installed.

Doug's drives were built very stout, but dated by today's standards and a little unsophisticated when compared to the drives that Jay installs. Where Jay's are fine sports cars, Doug's were Pick-Up trucks....very functional and strong, but not real pretty.  But, in all fairness, it was a different world back in the 80's & 90's for custom drives.

You're models should run forever!

Butch

I recall Doug saying that some of the other well known drive builders built junk as he called it. Doug was a rather tall fellow from Texas I believe who used to attend Chicago in March years ago when it was held near the racetrack. Mundeline (sp?) I believe it was.

By the looks of the two flywheels I bet that was a very smooth runner.

Rod, actually, just one flywheel.  the other is the gear head.  19.5:1 reduction I believe.  But, having said that, it should be a great running model.

Jay

It runs as smooth as silk. Thanks everyone for the details.

Exact same motor is going in the CLW Baldwin Center Cab.  Everything beyond the gear head is, in fact, a little different and, I'm sure, Doug would not approve.

Jay

@rheil posted:

I recall Doug saying that some of the other well known drive builders built junk as he called it. Doug was a rather tall fellow from Texas I believe who used to attend Chicago in March years ago when it was held near the racetrack. Mundeline (sp?) I believe it was.

If you knew Doug, everything that anyone else built/did was junk.....his work was the best money could buy.   He had a very strong personality "Texas Style" and could rub people the wrong way, but I always enjoyed talking to him and he had a heart of gold when it came to kids. I spoke with him several time on the phone and he was fixing up some RC aircraft (another of his hobbies) for a local boys club and another time for some kids in the neighborhood...he gave the aircraft to them.  He was a hoot!

The "old" Chicago March Meet was held at a hotel in Arlington Heights, IL, very near to Arlington Park Race Track.  I think it was a Hilton hotel then.

I was pretty much a youngster back then who went to see what O scale looked like (and cost).  I remember seeing Doug (and others) promoting their drive work, but couldn't figure out what all the fuss was about.  After all, we had "momentum" switches on our HO transformers, so slow speed wasn't a big deal!

Chuck