I am the new owner of a Darstaed Jinty. Unfortunately mine was damaged in shipping, I have reached out to Darstaed's USA contact for support but not sure how long the response will take.
Is there a online forum for Darstaed/European train enthusiasts comparable to the OGR forum?
I could use some guidance from folks familiar with these locomotives.
The one I recieved is scuffed up, but who cares! The main issue is that the right front driver came loose from the axle. I did some disassembly last evening to investigate. It appears the axle is fine. The wheel has a fiberglass looking bushing that , to use a technical term, is wallered out.
Since this loco is built to be 3 rail DC, maybe this is a common thing, but as a guy who grew up with lionel and mth, this is foreign to me. Does anyone know where to get such a fiberglass bushing?
Now for some general comments.
I dug out a dc transformer left over from the lionel dc powered mpc years, pushed the wheel roughly into position and gave the engine a few tries running back and forth. It is amazingly quiet. I assumed the open nature of the assembly and all those gears was going to be super loud and I was pleasantly surprised at how tame it was. I still intend to install a dallee or lionel reverse unit for ac operations.
The whole body is diecast, and super solid. Frankly I am not even really sure this is the right sub forum given the construction. In fact I tried to to it apart to figure out a way to get an e unit board into the cab , but it didn't come apart with the screws out and I didn't want to force anything.
The grab rail installation by the cab doors is really slick. The formed wire shape slips in from below and has a screw to hold it in place. No bending and hoping it looks straight here.
Overall I really like this machine, although for me, it needs some Yankee style touches. I intend to add a center headlight and back up light. What these details will look like is to be determined. Think a post war transplanted loco. I might even add a Pyle National style generator detail. I think this one will definitely blur the lines between tinplate and scale. One thing this non negotiable will be the installation of tinplate latch couplers. Fortunately on the Jinty the couplers mount with screws so change outside are easy.
Sorry for the long rant/intro. This will be an interesting project. Not sure what the final color scheme will be either.
