One of the reasons I jumped into On30 is the ability to scratchbuild "critters" using HO mechanisms. Combining scratchbuilding with whimsy appealed to me.
The first of several such efforts was based on the ancient and not very believable Roundhouse Climax, ironically the first logging loco I bought way back in the day. An example is shown here http://www.gearedsteam.com/climax/class_a_mdc.gif
It was not very difficult to convert to DCC, and now has a TCS T1 hidden in the water tank, on top of the motor. Of the original body, I kept the boiler and stack, and not much else.
The rest was built from styrene, with a few detail parts scavenged off broken HO locos. I can't say I used a single source of inspiration for the design but liberally cribbed from examples found all over the internet.
It runs okay and is fun to watch. I briefly considered adding sound, but it's so noisy to begin with, any sound module would be drowned out. As for the headlight, the challenge of wiring made me keep the original non-working light.
I think it looks at lot more believable in its new incarnation than it did as a pretend-Climax in HO. If nothing else, it looks a lot more interesting. And yes, that is real wood stacked around the boiler.
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| Backing away from the log dump |
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| Heading off towards the junction |
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| The mechanism with the decoder. The motor is inside the water tank and the flywheel inside the boiler |
Here is a short video of #8 pushing a cut of log cars onto the log dump - running at top speed. Note how loud the mechanism sounds. No point in paying big bucks for a sound decoder in this one.
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