A Recently Acquired Accucraft Plymouth Diesel Is Tested At The Beaver Creek Railroad

[beavercreek]

Whilst having a goodly time at the Llanfair show, I spied a used Accucraft Plymouth diesel on a trader's stand. It was in great condition and at a reasonable price and after a bit of haggling, it was at an even better price.
Besides giving it a quick test on the rollers I have not had her on the layout.
The the sun was dropping, casting long shadows and a pleasant evening was about to open up.
A good time for a testing session.
I hooked up the Plymouth to some of my tarted-up skip hoppers and off it went.
Now it is only a 0-4-0 with pick-up brushes on all wheels. It behaved well but was sort of 'bouncing' on its suspension springs at certain places.
On inspection, one of the brushes' springs had compressed so it was not touching the back of the wheel....the loco was only picking up power from two wheels....
A quick repair and all was well with no 'bounce'.
The only thing affecting its performance was the R5 points at very low speed (the stainless steel strip at the bottom of the frog gets mucky really quickly and causes most 0-4-0 locos problems at slow speed).

She needs 'dirtying up' and more detail in the cab such as dials, engineer's odds and ends etc....and of course the engineer himself.
I need to either DCC her with a sound chip or make her battery powered...either way it is going to be a challenge as nearly all of the space under the hood is taken up with a whacking great Pittman motor.

Here are a few shots of her progress around the layout...the 1:10 gradients gave her no trouble at all!

View attachment 202873

 

[Zerogee]

Lovely little loco, Mike! I'd think that DCC/sound is probably the way to go with this one, you're not going to be able to get much in there in the way of battery RC unless it's in a trail car.....

Jon.

 

[Beddhist]

That first pic is pure magic.

Perhaps you can fit a battery under the bonnet and a receiver under the loco?

 

[beavercreek]

The bonnet is almost filled with the motor (a rather large Pitmann .... the same size as in my K27 2-8-2!).
There is probably space under the cab for a DCC or Aristo revo board but where to put the speaker is going to be a challenge as I do not want to interfere with the cab interior.
As for batteries........hmmmmm......a battery trail car is a choice that I try never to use as my gradients mean that this would be a heavy load for any loco, never-mind a 0-4-0.

 

[Zerogee]

Fix the speaker (a small flat type) inside the cab roof, pointing down into the cab.... if you fix it with either a ring of blu-tack or hot-melt glue with a very small gap between the speaker and the roof, you'll get a decent seal sound-wise, and it is completely invisible unless someone looks upwards into the cab (which isn't going to happen when it's on the track!).
Rapid stock a handy Visaton 36mm one which is ideal for that sort of location.

Jon.

 

[stockers]

A nice little loco. A bit 'yellow' but I am sure you can muck that up!

 

[Rhinochugger]

S'nice - clean or dirty, it's still nice

 

[beavercreek]

Apologies lads, a blurry one got in to the shots ..... have edited it now.....

 

[Riograndad]

Smart little loco Mike,well spotted

 

[beavercreek]

I do admit that she is a little yellow at the moment and would have probably only looked like that when first emerging from the builders.
Also the nearest to Rio Grande, that the Plymouth was employed, was in Utah.
I will change the marker light lenses to clear and I think that I may go some way down this route:

 

[PhilP]

Lovely shade of 'acrylic rust'.. Though perhaps a little OTT?

 

[beavercreek]

Totally agree but it gives a general idea.

 

[stockers]

Wow! Is that red oxide or rust? Or maybe just a nice blend.

 

[trammayo]

Whilst having a goodly time at the Llanfair show, I spied a used Accucraft
Here are a few shots of her progress around the layout...the 1:10 gradients gave her no trouble at all!

View attachment 202866 View attachment 202882 View attachment 202881 View attachment 202868 View attachment 202870View attachment 202869 View attachment 202871 View attachment 202872 View attachment 202873 View attachment 202874 View attachment 202875

Nice shots (as per your norm!). I like - also - the weathered one. I was scrolling down and it looked full size until I got the whole picture on the screen

I have a "Mighty Mo" - that bounced around on the springs so I wedged the axle boxes!

 

[maxi-model]

Very nice looking little loco. Nice pictures too, any chance of a vid'. I would not underestimate what a powerfully motored 0-4-0 can do in the adhesion department. My little Darjeeling 0-4-0 live steamer is quite a performer on the West Well's (about to be minimized) gradients. Just keep the weight over the drivers and the wheels clean. Max

 

[vsmith]

Very nice paint, great detailed model, wish I could afford one but they want both arms and legs for one here