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Good luck - that's going to need a lot of work. Comparing it to pictures of Hines Mikados, it might use some Hines parts, but a lot of it looks scratchbuilt. Looking carefully at the photos on eBay, it looks like it might have properly equalized drivers - if it does, that's really neat.

Try looking for an All-Nation Medium tender, I believe they use the same exact castings as the Hines tenders did. They're pretty accurate models of USRA 10,000 gallon tenders.

Thanks for the input! I could possibly come up with an explanation where a railroad added a larger tender… WMSR 734 for example, that’s a consolidation (admittedly a rather large one) with a 6 axle tender and it doesn’t look out of proportion to me…

The other side of the coin is that I might want to try to model a GTW mike and the medium tender would probably be more appropriate for that…

And then I have a decal sheet left over from my Railking NKP Berk renumber project that has enough left to do this up as the NKP 587… and that had a pretty big tender, at least in excursion service… (edit- the more I look at pics of the 587 the less I like the big tender, it overpowers the locomotive in my opinion… is that a Berk tender??)

So that’s 3 sides to the coin so far…

Last edited by Steaming Jon

Nice project.  Yes, NKP 587 had a Berk tender behind it during its past excursion years of use.  Helped with fuel range.  It first had the NKP tender that had a 3 axle under the coal bunker and 2 axle truck under the water tank, then that was swapped out for a Berkshire tender.   When first built, being a USRA light Mikado, she had the typical small tender those came with, then NKP kind of swapped tenders around depending on need.   Looking forward to see what you do with that old Mikado.   AD

Good luck! It's a mess, but someone spent a lot of time on that. I'd start by taking photos of everything, then I'd carefully dismantle it, clean everything, then slowly put it back together making sure everything gets a drop of oil. As long as the wheels turn freely and the rods don't bind, I'm sure it runs - those old motors are hard to kill. I personally prefer to have gone through everything, making sure everything is free, before trying to run anything.

For most parts, you can just wash them in hot soapy water and lightly scrub with a toothbrush. It's important to dry everything off quickly, I typically just set parts in front of a fan to dry. I would only wash parts like that if it's completely dismantled, that way everything can dry properly and you can reach everything. For the motor, I might wash removable parts in water, but not the field or armature. I normally clean the commutator and brushes with cotton swabs soaked in isopropyl alcohol, and use toothpicks to clean out the grooves.

I think this motor should be series. You would reverse the polarity of the brushes or the field to reverse, both would work. I think reversing the field is more common. Unless this locomotive has a reverse switch or reverse unit, it's forward (or reverse, if wired that way) only. I don't know why it would have a rectifier, that motor should run on AC or DC, it's only when trying to run a DC motor on AC is it necessary.

Thanks! I think the rectifier is a relatively recent addition… it certainly doesn’t match the “patina” of the engine. I’m guessing someone was attempting to make it run and didn’t know what they were doing…

I’ve seen videos of vintage O scale outside 3rd rail engines with a “reverse” switch somewhere on the engine. Apparently those would reverse the polarity of the field, thereby reversing the motor rotation… From my (limited) research/knowledge I don’t see a way to change the direction of the motor “remotely”…

It runs! I took the axles out and cleaned and oiled the bearings and all of the rods and valve gear. I noticed a screw missing in one of the binders on the rear axle in the auction photos… turns out it’s not entirely missing, most of it is still in the frame… uh oh… that’s gonna be fun to deal with…

There’s a bit of a bind in the valve gear, and I think it might have something to do with the lift arms being loose on the shaft that runs across the locomotive… the radius rods fall into the full forward position and I think the geometry is off enough that the radius rods are trying to move farther than the valves will allow… I might just tack it all together in the neutral position and call it good…

The rectifier works great, thanks Bob!!

The valve gear can be properly adjusted? That's really cool, quite a rare feature. Most models have it permanently fixed in a slightly forward position. You wouldn't want it in neutral, the valve gear won't be as animated. It sounds like the bell cranks are loose on their shaft? I would solder them in place to the shaft, being very careful to make sure that both sides are in the same position. I had to do that on my Pacific or they'd just flop around. You've probably done it already, but remember to oil the valve spindle too - those need to slide freely.

When extracting the stuck screw, remember that if you damage the brass frame you can fix it by drilling and tapping a hole, and then soldering a brass screw into the hole to fix it. Then cut it off and file it flat - you can then properly redrill it.

So the more I dig into this engine the more interesting it gets…

As I looked closer at the axles I realized that the bearings are not drilled on-center. I then paid closer attention to the bearings and noticed wear patterns matching the suspension on the top of the bearings and scratch marks on the bottom. I re-assembled the chassis paying careful attention to the orientation of the bearings and it runs much smoother (although not perfect). The frame measures out spot-on, so I’m thinking correctly machined bearings would be the proper solution, but I don’t have any machine tools to make new bearings…

I also don’t believe the boiler came on this chassis originally. With the smoke box tight to the saddle there are a few spots where the spring rigging touches the boiler, the top of the gearbox is also a slight interference fit, the air tanks interfere with the expansion links, and the rear cab support is about 1/8” behind the rear of the frame. None of these issues are game-stoppers for me, some careful trimming of the boiler and shortening of the air tanks will allow the interfering parts to clear and will be mostly hidden or not noticeable, and the cab mounts can be easily modified to fit…

It’s just interesting to me, makes me wonder about the history of the locomotive…

So… I decided to strip the boiler down to clean it up. I took all the detail parts off, removed the running boards, and pulled the cab off… that’s when it got interesting…

I noticed that the engineer’s side of the firebox was separated from the backhead, then I realized that the bottom of the boiler was coming apart just in front of the firebox. So now the boiler is in two pieces…

2D034238-EC3E-4EE7-87AE-784C0A86C6063C3F39DE-5424-4916-9015-FFEFDBD89ED9

I’m getting the real steam locomotive restoration experience! A “quick overhaul” is never quick, and you always uncover lots of hidden issues…

I’ve got some ideas on how to put it back together better than how it was done before…

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