John Sethian posted:Mario,
Thant looks cool!
John,
thanks for the idea on the plastic behind the mesh screens!
I was able to pull them out without removing the screens, with a hook-shaped pick.
PS: heres the frame mounted ladders...
Thanks!
-Mario
Clever, Mario. Not only is your "hook" method faster, it saves having to touch up the paint!
As for the steps, I wanted the same style front and back, which is why I ordered four replacement rear steps from Lionel. They arrived in less than a week, and the total cost (including shipping) was $23.60.
You are very generous, John. A great asset to the forum.
John it was a pleasure meeting you at the Strasburg show on Sat. I enjoyed the conversation and I hope the interior kit works well for you on this project Scale City Design(Keil Line). Also thanks for the info on the PRR Catenary .
Inspired by your hard work and great results, for those who want to partake in the joy that are the Legacy Sharks, there's a revised version of the coupler mount.
they are marked as "experimental" until I can get some to do a fit test.
Thanks,
Mario
With little interest in diesels, I still found all that effort, and methodical and persistent attention to detail impressive.
By now everyone has discovered that I don't work all that fast. But here is the latest update
(First of all, a well done to Mario..those will make life easier)
Now on to progress. As promised I moved the lead motor in the A unit to the lead truck in the dummy B. This is a trivial swap. The motor wires are fed through a Minatronics Micro-mini two pin plug
I brought the wires through the door. This matches the motor feed wires coming through the back door on the powered A
Yes they will show, but they are small and black, and with the close spacing I have in the units they are tough to see
I came up with a better way to clamp the chassis for cutting out the recess for the pilot. This photo shows the method:
I also used only Bondo to smooth the pilot/shell transition. It is easier to sand. I used bondo to hold the pilot in place to the shell. When it cured, I still reinforced the joint on the back side with JB Weld as before. Here I am, having a little diversionary fun with the pilot:
As you can see, this technique made for a smoother pilot
The air hose is made from PSC parts: The glad hand and hose are from the MU kit, the angle inside the pilot is from a PSC angle cock/brake hose assembly, filed to fit. The last loop of the chain slips over the glad hand before it is pushed into the hose. That gives the prototypical method of holding the hose.
You can also see that I changed to golden yellow LED for the headlights. Not perfect, but closer to an incandescent than the original. I disconnected all the other LED headlights, to prevent that "glowing spot" on the unit ahead
Here are two "Builders Photos" beauty shots
As you can see I still have a ways to go: weathering, adding cut levers, adding MU connections. I also have a squeak in one of my electrical contacts (easy to fix), and a newly discovered TMCC/Legacy "dead spot" on my layout. Probably can be fixed with a suitable ground plane.
My first attempt at a video:
Excellent, John. 
Most excellent work John!
NICE !
John,
Love the video! Especially the super elevated curves. Great effect!
Steve
great work John.
Wow John...your entire project is so inspiring, and that video will be replaying in my head all day no matter what I'm up to...classy project indeed.
Bob
Beautiful job as usual John!
thank you for sharing.
Andre.
John:
You are a master!! Stunningly beautiful!! Plus your video was excellent!!
Pete Trunk
John Great video, and fantastic work on the Sharks. I think I might pull mine out and copy some of your mods, hope you don't mind. cTr...( Choose the Right )
SHARKS.. Part III
In this installment I added MU cables, front and rear cut levers, and speed sensors
MU cables: I originally thought this would be easy. I would get some Precision Scale MU Connectors with bracket, drill a hole in the end wall, and glue them in. Ah…..Were it just that easy. The MU brackets are not attached to the end walls, but rather to a structure hanging down below the end wall. This is a blow up of one of the photos in Hahn’s book:
Despite the many photos in Hahn’s book, it’s not really obvious how these should look. So I winged it a bit. I made my structures from brass stock. Space limitations prevented me from easily fitting in the four hoses used in the Sharks, so I went with three. (PSC 56197). I’ll take the 75% grade and be content with being a solid C minus student. The following sequence shows how I made these things:
Even with a resistance soldering unit, you have to take precautions to prevent previously soldered pieces from coming undone. The components are just too close together. The key, as most of you know, is to keep everything clean (use stainless steel brush, then clean in acetone), use a good flux (I used TIX flux, even though I used soft solder), pre tin one component, and above all, be quick about it. Since I had to make twelve of these assemblies……..
......this was easily one of the most tedious and mind numbing things I have done in O scale. Part of the problem is you have to continually pay attention! I would rather ballast track.
Installing them was more straight forward. Drill .025” holes into the shell (note the ladder turned to clear the drill holder):
Insert the MU structure,
and glue in place (I used Gorilla Super Glue Gel)
The hoses are supplied with the PSC kit. Cut them to length (I made mine about 5/16” long), glue the glad hand on one end, then glue the hose to the manifold.
As delivered the PSC hose will hang in all sorts of random directions. I found I could coax them in the general direction of a quasi parabolic quarter arc facing down and back (I.E. a coupled position) by judicious use of a soldering iron. Judicious is the key word in that last sentence. Settle for good enough here.
Notice in the photo above on the outboard vertical leg there is a brass PSC Lift Ring (eyebolt) soldered to a short lenght of channel which is then soldered to the vertical leg. This is for the cut lever. After installing the eyebolt, I used a pair of needle nose pliers to make sure the eyebolt was reasonably round, and then drilled it out to .028.” The cut levers were made from .025” steel wire.
The right angle bends are not prototypical, but they prevent the cut lever from interfering with the coupler swing. I was reluctant to tie the cut lever to the top of the couplers, as I was not sure my assembly would take the repeated stress of the cut lever sliding back and forth through the eye bolt. At the bare minimum it would quickly take the paint off! At any rate, from a normal viewing angle, and with the units coupled together, it really looks like the cut levers are headed in the right direction.
The cut levers need to be removable to get the shell off for servicing. (The couplers are attached to the chassis, the eyebolts to the shell). I solved that problem by gluing 1/16” neodymium magnet cubes (K&J Magnetics, part N42) on top of the coupler box. You can see one of them in the photo above. Its that little silver covered cube. These are more than adequate to keep the cut levers in place during operation.
So here is what the final assembly looks like from trackside
I realize that the there are no apparent connections from the chassis to the backside of the MU hose manifold. This is on my “to do list” for future modeling projects.
The pilot cut levers are a little different. Here is the prototype, again a blow up of one of the photos in Hahn’s book:
The Lionel pilot has a cast in rendition of the above. There is a rectangular depression, and it looks sort of like a giant hammer was used to mash the cut lever and its bearing tube flat into that depression. Recall that I opened up the rectangular Lionel pilot. For the bearing tubes I cut some brass channel, and soldered a tube in at an angle. This was quite easy..file the end of a long tube at an angle, and pre tin the channel. I cut the tubes to length, and drilled out the channel so the cut lever would go through the bearing. I made the cut levers from steel wire. Here are the pieces:
And here is the final assembly
Again I used magnets to hold the lever in place near the coupler
For the speed recorder, I used PSC 5672. This is for an EMD unit, and I am sure some expert will point out it’s the wrong one. The PSC unit is in two pieces, one piece goes in the truck journal, the other piece is supposed to go on the chassis. A small diameter hose (not supplied) is supposed to connect the two. I could not find a suitably small enough diameter hose. I even tried stripping Teflon insulation from #24 AWG wire. There is also the problem of getting the hose to maintain its shape. So I cut off the nipple on the PSC recorder, and drilled out a .0225” . I then soldered .020” diameter phosphor bronze wire into the hole, after bending it to a suitably prototypical and visually pleasing arc:
Note I glued a piece of the aforementionned insulation on the end. This is to prevent the paint from rubbing off the phosphor bronze wire. You can’t see that insulation from any normal viewing angle. The insulation is stuck into a slot between the chassis and shell.
This allows lots of swivel movement of the truck, whilst maintaing the shape of the recorder cable
Here is a close up of the recorder and pilot cut lever:
That finishes this installment. There will be two more. One is a bit of a surprise cooked up by Mario. The other will be the final weathering.
small details that make a huge difference!
Well done and thank you for sharing!!
Andre.
they'd only have three hoses on my RR!
Nice work.
the story continues... nice work!
Marvelous John!
loved seeing a video of your layout. 
You haven't missed a stitch John. This sort of workmanship sets a high bar for those looking to do prototype based super detailing. Most of us run out of steam long before reaching such a level of craftsmanship. Excellent stuff.
Bob
Masterful.
I agree. Those are simply masterpieces - works of art. But so is the layout they are operating on!
I would like to second that statement Bob!
Thanks again everyone for your encouragement! Considering you guys are world class modelers, its doubly appreciated! Bob2 indirectly raises an interesting point. Model railroading is all about time management, and you have to strike a balance between detailing locos and cars, vs building the layout. This project is in its third month, and while I have enjoyed it immensly, particularly figuring how to do all this stuff, that is 3 months off from the layout. Not a complaint at all, just an observation
Surprise!
Stay tuned, thanks to Mario my Sharks wll soon have proper cab interiors. Although my Sharks will be hardtops, not convertibles
John Sethian posted:Stay tuned, thanks to Mario my Sharks wll soon have proper cab interiors. Although my Sharks will be hardtops, not convertibles
And you thought GE made the only "convertibles"!
High-Definition Black Acrylic was just added.
SHARKS- Part IV
While waiting for Mario’s cabs to arrive, I decided to detail and Pennsy-ize the ends of the units. In particular, I am going to add the back up light with electrical conduit, add class lights, and improve the buffer plate. This is the look I am going for (from Hahn’s book).
I will pass on the flag holders and the safety chains between the units.
Lionel, unfortunately, positioned the back up light to the left of the door (as viewed from the B unit) and at mid height. So lacking a hole mover, I had to remove the existing light assembly, make a new one and install it above the door.
I made the new back up lights from three pieces of nested brass tubing soldered together (the outside one is shorter than the other two), styrene tube (which fits inside the tubing, and a 1/16” diameter rod which fits inside the styrene tube, and serves as a mounting post into the shell. Note the .025” diameter wire used to simulate the conduit. A .026” diameter hole drilled through the brass and styrene makes it easy to fix the conduit. I used the Lionel lenses (which are easily liberated with a small diameter punch from inside the shell).
The class lights are pretty standard on just about any Pennsy Cab unit. I know for sure they are used on Sharks, F units and E units. The class lights are made from .120” OD styrene tubing, which has been bored out to .044”. They are sectioned off in .100” thick slices. The light itself is a MV product lens.
To make parallel cuts in the styrene tubing (its harder than you think) I drill a .128” hole in a piece of aluminum angle that is 3/32” thick. Hold the tube against the aluminum and slice off a section with a razor blade. Clamp something very stiff (like a steel rule) to the backside of the aluminum, and slice the tube flush with the aluminum:
Here are all the pieces after being primed. The wire is .025” diameter and will become the conduit
To install the back up light and class lights I built a couple of jigs from styrene sheet; For the back up light
And for the class lights
The conduit is bent by eye to a drawing, and has a right angle leg at the end to go into the shell. The .025” diameter hole for the conduit is drilled by using a piece of wire that is bent the same way, but lacks the leg going into the shell. That way it is easy to see where the hole goes.
I used Goriila Glue Super Glue Gel to fix the back up light and class lights to the shell. After the inevitable paint touch up, I fixed both the back up light lens and the M/V class light lenses with small drops of Formula 560 Canopy Glue. To install the MV lenses, place a minute drop of glue to the bottom of the class light tube, then moisten your finger, pick up the lens with the red lens up, and press it into place
Remove the existing light housing by drilling it out with a .166” diameter drill. I snuck up on it by drilling smaller holes first. And drilling slowly. Otherwise you run the risk of spinning the housing in the shell, which makes an irregular oversized hole/.
I did not want to mess with patching the hole. That would be a pain, due in equal parts to the proximity of the grab iron and my inherent laziness. So I covered the hole a totally unprototypical, but very realistic looking, hatch cover.
For the fantasy rear hatch, I used Journal covers from DesPlaines hobbies
Close up:
This was surprisingly easy to do on a lathe. (A cast in mounting post is on the back side) I cut back the plate so the cover stuck out about 1/16,” and then used a razor saw to cut it out while still spinning in the lathe. I sanded the backside and was done.
Here is a completed end (left), next to an original (right)
From the side, it looks reasonably close to the photo in Hahn’s book:
Observant readers will note I cut out a trapezoidal notch for the coupler. This is only slightly more realistic than the rectangular plate. The problem is the Lionel end porch is very wrong. The real Sharks have a horizontal plate welded to the frame at one end and the vertical buffer plate (the one with the trapezoidal opening) at the other.
(The photo above, from Hahn’s book, is of a BF15. Note the difference in backup light and the absence of class lights. But the buffer is the same as in a BF16)
You can’t rebuild the buffer without exposing the unprototypically ¼” thick chassis. You can see it poking out behind the trapezoidal cut in my comparison photo above. The proper way to do this would be to cut off the end of the chassis and build up a new buffer from brass or plastic. But that is too much work for something that can’t really be seen when the units are coupled..as witnessed by the prototype photo of the BF16s coupled together. As Allan McClelland said… “don’t model what you can’t see.” Or in this case what can’t be easily seen. So I’ll be happy with the way I notched it.
By the way, just to remind everyone, the dummy B is really not a dummy, as it had a motor in it per my last installment. It is now even a little smarter, as I added electrical pickups and coupled them to the powered unit via a Micro connector. This ensures the headlight never blinks due to momentary loss of contact. I also added a tungsten weight as my tests showed the wheels on this unit were easily slipping. (The tungsten alloy I used is about 50% heavier than lead for a given volume. Its also non-toxic. The alloy I used is used for crankshaft weights)
My last step before reassembly was to paint the interior walls of the cab Milwaukee Road light gray:
Even with my stand in cabs, these enhance the interior
-----------------------------------SIDE BAR-----------------------------
Legend has it the distinctive nose of the Baldwin Sharks were inspired by the T1 Duplex, which in turn was designed by Raymond Lowey.
I am not so sure about that. The T1 was produced in 1942. It was designed to overcome the shortcomings revealed by S-1 Duplex which came out in 1939. So the earliest the T-1 could have been designed was 1940. Lowey had his own design for the early T1 which looked like this:
This was extracted from a web page (http://www.jitterbuzz.com/stream.html). Note the date on the patent is Aug 31, 1943.
In contrast, the 1939 Graham “Spirit In Motion” Sedan seems to have the same type of nose as a Baldwin Shark:
(Photo from Hemmings Motor News, Dec 2016, page 26).
These have since been dubbed Graham Sharknose Sedans. These were actually introduced in 1938. A total of 8000 were built. So it is entirely possible the Graham was the inspiration for Baldwin’s T1 and Sharknose.
Incidentally, there are two 1/43 models of the Graham Sharknose. Neither are particularly great models. The one by IXO is comparatively easy to find, but it lacks most of the thinner grille bars and is an open convertible, so its kind of wrecks the look. The one by Brooklin is a sedan, but thats about all it has going for it. Like a lot of early Brooklin models it is devoid chrome trim except for the bumpers and headlight surrounds, and it is rather expensive.
nice work again John.
BTW, it looks like the BF-15 B unit 9704 in the photo does have the PRR bullseye marker lights on either side of the end door.
Chris
You are correct! I meant to say "flag holders" and had a total brain short circuit.
True mastering of your subject John. The best of the best!
Thanks Erik, and I am enjoying your posts as well!
It is interesting the way a project such as this one continues to gains traction and ultimately becomes an extensive redo in the end. It's a form of modeling fever which when it take hold becomes all consuming. This is an excellent pursuit John, your obviously up to the task, and I suspect it will become the standard for Pennsy Shark modeling going forward. Excellent Thread indeed!
Bob
I've never seen that exact picture of the T1. It is beautiful.
When I was young and saw the pictures of it, I thought it was a Nazi (Hitler) train engine. I'm going to get blasted for that comment.
THE LIONEL SHARKS. PART V. THE FINALE
In this latest, and final chapter I installed the cabs and weathered the units
Mario’s interior arrived. They are very nice and extremely well engineered. I chose “Black Hi-Def Acrylate” as the material. And although more expensive, it is definitely worth it. The parts are smooth, the detail is crisp, and the resolution high:
A word of caution, as delivered these have a thin semi gooey film on them. I found that a quick soak in alcohol gets rid of that film (Dawn does not)
I decided I should make sure these fit before going any further. Mario designed it so it snaps into the cab. You do not screw it down to the mounting posts. (You can’t !) The posts simply help trap it in place
Mario designed these precisely, they are designed for a tight, snap in fit. Spreading the shell with your fingers helps, but I don’t need this type of precision. As I would be going through several install/re-install cycles, I did not want to risk breaking anything (in particular the antennas) I wanted something I could drop in an out. So I sanded a few things to give more clearance. On back wall, I sanded the outer edges back a little (from 1.595 wide to 1.580 wide). I made the notch cut out for the springs taller. I also cut a notch for the interior light, because mine runs lengthwise rather than the Lionel issue sideways. If you kept the original Lionel configuration this would not be needed. (I wanted the look of a single dome light). On the floor, I sanded the cut out of the door section from 1.825” wide to 1.805” wide. Compare with the second photo above and you can see where I sanded
By the way, it is trivial to sand these. I used one of those foam backed sanding boards from the cosmetics counter
I also counter bored the hole for the electrical cabinet, as the screw interferes with the mounting posts:
Although the screw holds the electrical cabinet in place, I also glued it to make sure it is in intimate contact with the main control stand. (I used gorilla Super Glue Gel). Sand off the nubs on the mating surface of the electrical cabinet first.
I drilled out the chair mounting holes to .096” diameter (#42). This is to accommodate the PSC #56177 ALCO/EMD Cab seat (chair). I drilled a .140” diameter hole (#28) for the train brake stand, PSC #4211. I winged the position of this one. And I drilled out the door handle hole in the cab doors to .046” diameter (#55 drill) for the PSC #5639 cabinet door handles. For the speedometer, I decided not to use the 3D printed one as I thought it dominated the view into the interior from the windshield. So I used PSC #5667 Speed Indicator. I soldered a .025” diameter to phosphor bronze wire to the shell. And drilled a .055” diameter (#54 bit) into the top of the throttle housing. I glued a short length of .055” diameter brass tubing into that hole. The .025” wire from the speedo will slip into that tube. The tube gives the right thickness for the mounting tube without having to solder it directly to the indicator box:
I also drilled a .025” diameter hole (#72 bit) for the throttle control and independent brake control. The control levers will be made by phosphor bronze wire with a length of Teflon insulation from a #22 gauge wire to simulate the hand grip
I primed everything with Tamiya primer. I painted the floors with Polly Scale PRR Maroon Floors, and everything else with Polly Scale Milwaukee Road Light Gray:
I have no idea what the correct colors would be. Pennsy painted the floors of their EMD units Indian Red, which is close to the Maroon. I thin either gray or green would be correct, but gray is a better match for the DGLE exterior.
I also added a pull cord for the horn (only because I could):
Its made from .025” Phosphor Bronze wire, with a handle from Teflon Insulation. (Incidentally, the reason I used Teflon insulation is that it is smaller diameter than conventional insulation, even that used in much smaller wire sizes, and it pretty much retains its shape when stripped.)
I found a couple of interferences when I went to install the interior: The LED boss for the gauge cluster prevents the cab from going all the way into the shell. This in turn prevents the chassis from fully fitting into the shell. Since I was not going install illumination (nifty as it may be), I simply cut off the boss.
I also found the Lionel engineer figures when sitting on the chairs prevented the interior from seating properly. Their heads hit the roof. This is probably an artifact of me using PSC seats. So I had to shave down the Engineer’s butts to clear the cab. No big deal. The engineer looks like he is reaching for the whistle cord. (I don’t have a photo—you will have to take my word for it!)
After testing everything to make sure they were fine operationally (they were!) I turned to weathering the units. I did not excessively weather these. In 1956 they would be rather new, so the underlying paint would be semi glossy at worst and they would just be dirty at most. See the following:
These aren’t even all that dirty! Note the base coat is shiny, not dull.
To get this effect, I used the Lionel factory sheen as a base. For the weathering itself, I used a modified Lee Turner method. I masked off the vertical rivet seams and sprayed my weathering mix (20 Polly Scale Grimy Black/20 Polly Scale Roof brown/10 Polly Scale Earth/30 Polly Scale clear flat/20 water and a drop of Dawn) in light vertical strokes into the unmasked area:
I continued the airbrush strokes downward onto the trucks and fuel tank. That way the trucks are not uniformly weathered. Note I placed cardboard behind the truck side frames, as I already weathered the wheels. I then removed the masking, and with a light broad vertical spray, gently blended in all the weathering. Finally, I lightly, and I do mean lightly, moistened a Mr. Clean Magic Eraser with Mean Green, and lightly dragged it down the sides. This gave a slightly streaked effect. The overall effect is subtle, and more noticeable in person. But that’s what I was after.
As an added touch, I did not mask off the door windows on the B unit. After applying the weathering coat, I went back with a Q tip and wiped away the weathering coat to simulate a recently cleaned window.
I painted the fuel filler caps red, because Lionel forgot to do that.
And with that, I am done.
As a reminder, this is what I started with:
These turned out to be much more of a project than I had hoped for. Mainly because a lot of things kind of snowballed. Flanger got it right in his post when he said:
flanger posted:It is interesting the way a project such as this one continues to gains traction and ultimately becomes an extensive redo in the end. It's a form of modeling fever which when it take hold becomes all consuming............
Bob
I think my fever has finally broken!
Also as I said at the outset this was my first time at an “interactive post”, in which I post progress as I go. The upside of that, I discovered, is you get helpful input and the project becomes a better model. The best example of that is Mario and his 3D printed cab. I owe him a debt of gratitude for that. In my opinion what he is doing with all his 3D printed parts is not only benefiting the hobby right now, but also pointing the path to the future. The downside of the interactive post approach is all that helpful input stretches out the project and it takes a lot longer.
At any rate, the Sharks are now in service, and are now dragging a string of hoppers around my layout.
Here is a new version of the video. Its not perfect, mainly because I don’t have three hands.
Cheers!
Lovely work, John.
ta da! well worth the effort. great work John!
Access to this requires an OGR Forum Supporting Membership
