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  • November 15, 2022 at 1:15 pm #1351
    Avatar photoJohn3855
    Participant

    Hi Folks

    I am a member of a few model railway groups and I like to give my trains a good run. My two monthly groups have coarse scale track with no points and on this Big Big stock runs well, but my local weekly club has fine scale track with many points. Big Big stock will not run well on this, with the wheel flanges touching the sleepers and the wheel back to back too small to run through the points.

    I decided to convert some Big Big stock to run on fine scale track. To my mind the Big Big bogies are okay so I just wanted to change the wheels. Buying 3′ 7” coach wheels is easy I got mine from Roxey moulding and I have also tried Slaters (7125) but the bearings supplied do not fit Big Big bogies. I have seen others have got round this by drilling through the bogies to fit the bearings but I think this ruins the look and cannot work very well with the supplied bearings due to the large hole in the Big Big bogie. My answer is to turn my own top hat bearings to suit. I am lucky enough to own a unimat SL lathe so I am able to turn some 1/8” brass bar down to 0.111” Dia  to fit the coach bogie, about 4mm long with a small flange and drilled to suit the wheel set. I then shorten the axle to 46mm.  I have converted six coaches, one Hymek and a few wagons and they all now run very well on fine scale track with no problems with points.

    The Hymek needed a bit more work, I fitted a second motor bogie and used Roxey mouldings 7W0 15 diesel fine scale wheel sets modified to take the driving gear on each.  This will now pull six coaches or many wagons around the club track with no problems.

    John

    November 19, 2022 at 10:14 pm #1352
    Avatar photoDave
    Keymaster

    Thanks for sharing this John. I would love to see some pictures of your successfully modified stock running on this fine scale track. Great to read that you put in the efford to keep Big Big Trains rolling!

    Regards,

    Dave

    November 20, 2022 at 11:40 am #1353
    Avatar photoJohn3855
    Participant

    Hi Folks

    Dave asked to see some pictures of my modified Big Big stock running. I have some video shot on my phone but I do not know how to share this on this site.

    If it is possible and somebody could tell me how. I would be happy to post it.

    Regards

    John

    December 3, 2022 at 7:38 am #1355
    Avatar photoDave
    Keymaster

    Hi John,

    I will try to explain.

    Use your phone with the video on it to browse to this site and create a message.

    In the menu you see a picture icon.

    Tap on that and you will see a screen for adding media.

    Tap on the browse icon to the right of the location field.

    Now you can browse your phone gallery and add the video.

    Hope this helps.

    December 3, 2022 at 12:25 pm #1356
    Avatar photoJohn3855
    Participant

    Hi Dave

    I did try that but it will not load. I get a message “file wrong type or too large” I did put the video onto my laptop but when I try from there I get a “skip to main content” message.

    The file is a MOV File 46,182 kb

    Regards

    John

    December 29, 2022 at 2:39 am #1365
    Avatar photoTomBTR
    Participant

    What I did was to first upload to Youtube and then put a link in my reply.

    YouTube gives a URL to copy which you then paste here. You can tell Youtube that access to the video is to be restricted to those who have the URL.

    Look under Ruston Shunter for an example.

    For what it is worth, as an 18-year old student, I converted my Red Rocket Hymek by adding a second motor bogie and replacing all four rubber wheels with brass. I turned the wheels to have a similar coarse profile to the originals. I also did a rough job of painting it in the then current NSWGR diesel colour scheme. The model has outlasted our government railways but one can still see the old colours on heritage train outings. Something else for me dig out for the grandchildren’s Big Big revival.

    December 29, 2022 at 2:55 am #1366
    Avatar photoTomBTR
    Participant

    Here is another example.

    I don’t know how to make the video appear in a reply without clicking a link.

    • This reply was modified 2 years, 8 months ago by Avatar photoTomBTR.
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