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| alan2525 |
New Loco purchase - Mike Chaney 'Kitten'I purchased this loco from a fellow member of the 16mm Association, it's a Mike Chaney Kitten named 'Sherlock Holmes'Mike Chaney used to produce a number of upgrade parts for Mamod Loco's, this particular loco uses his upgrade cylinders, and in cab regulator. The loco is regaugeable 32 /45 has a much larger boiler than the standard Mamod loco, also features a waterpump and tank in the tender for topping up the water level. I really enjoy these early 16mm scale garden railway loco's they have a very unique charm and simplicity, with their freelance design they are not pretending to be something they are not. The seller is delivering the loco from Maidstone today and hopefully he'll be at the door any minute now! 
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| Cam |
looks great allan, what are the two pipes coming out of the tender for? 
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| alan2525 |
There's a hand pump in the tender, thats a piece of brass tube that fit's onto the pump to operate it, the boiler has a clack valve on the backhead for topping it up. I assume the knurled cap is the water filler on the tender too. I like all these little extra touches, being able to top up the tank in the tender and use the pump to fill the loco when it's still in steam is much nicer than using a garden spray bottle and a melted tube onto a top up valve. I keep meaning to build a little tender for one of my mamod loco's and fit a clack valve to a manifold on the boiler too. |
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| Cam |
Ahhh
thats great and a much better idea than melting plastic all over your engine! Quite a small guage though, is it adaptable? |
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| alan2525 |
It's 16mm:1ft scale, it's regaugeable for 32mm (0 gauge) or 45mm (gauge 1) I run 32mm as most industrial narrow gauge lines here were 2.0ft gauge. |
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| made-in-england |
VERY nice 
Shall we be seeing this tomorrow ? |
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| Rob |
oooooooh, i like that
is it someone from the 16mm association exchange newsletter thing? |
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| alan2525 |
Steamed the loco...
..one or two problems, easy enough to solve but: To begin with Cab roof height fouled the tunnel mouth so run was limited to shunting backwards and forwards as it wouldn't clear the tunnel. Loco was sold as requiring some work to get it to run, suspected poor o rings in cylinders and price was lowered to reflect this if new cylinders were required. I installed new wicks in the burner, lit the burners, adjusted the wicks and fitted to the loco, removed the handrail knobs and temporarily removed the cab, loco runs brilliantly. Pulls pretty much all the stock I have, can run at a sedate speed, but has plenty of oomph in reserve too. It's fairly heavy and has a lot of traction. Looking at the loco, there's a few neat construction elements which I'd like to replicate in my own loco projects. There are a few bits and pieces which need some tidying up but nothing major. I'm tempted to fit a new sight glass, the one fitted is a little small but until I've used the loco for some time I'll see how reliable it is. The tender could do with some detailing, toolboxes inside, maybe a dummy coal load, it also needs some dummy axleboxes on the sides as it looks rather crude with the bearings on display. First thing is to draw up a new cab and cut that out, loco looks way to big to be open cabbed. Slightly dissapointed as the seller has pulled off the nameplates and numbers, removed the spectacle rings and pulled off a toolbox on the side too. This has damaged the paint and the paint has been blown over with a rattlecan. I'll contact the seller and see what that is about. Is a little penny pinching as purchased the loco based on it's condition in the above photo. Still pleased with the loco though! |
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| alan2525 |
I purchased the loco from Simon Whenmouth (simonstrains) on the 16mm Association Yahoo group. He has some interesting loco's up for sale fairly frequently. |
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| Rob |
thanks alan, do you have a link? i have just joined the 16mm association, do i get a link from them? |
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| alan2525 |
http://groups.yahoo.com/group/16mmngm/ It's a yahoo group, a terrific bunch of guys who are always willing to help and advise, the group is rather chatty but if there's any particular help you need someone will be able to help you out! |
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| johnreid |
That Loco sure has a good sturdy look to it, real nice looking. | ||||
| John R |
Bought Loco`Well done Alan,She looks good, and I like the addons to her, More Piccies would please an old set of eyes, and I really hope your running times are enjoyable to you!. 
Stingy John. |
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| dampfmaschinenjoe 1967 |
Nice engine by the way !
Well done , Alan! cheers Joe |
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| Les |
A very nice addition to your collection.
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| Sandman |
Very nice Alan.
I really like that . |
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| alan2525 |
The kitten had some problems negotiating the tunnel mouth on the garden railway. I've performed some surgery and fabricated a cut down cab and replacement roof, unfortunately the original cab roof was bolted and silver soldered onto the cab sides, so a new roof too.
I've also made a new buffer beams and a new draw bar between loco and tender, this will enable the tender to be coupled up a little closer and looks in my mind a little more prototypical, buffer beams will also be painted black rather than red which looked a little odd on a tender loco. Although the loco now fits through the tunnel, the corners of the cab were fouling previously, the chimney is still the original height. Camera lens distorts a little, but I'm not sure if I'll shorten it to same height as the cab roof. Often narrow gauge loco's were hacked around to fit the limited loading gauges of the railways they operated on so these modifications are very prototypical!! There will be some other aesthetic mods, a safety valve bonnet, boiler bands, lamps and lamp brackets etc, plus some repainting to give the loco a nice spruce-up! 
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| John R |
ModificationsAlan,Well done that man. Stingy John. |
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| alan2525 |
Shortened the chimney today, I didn't have the right size dize to extend the thread on the bottom of the chimney, so cut the top off instead. To keep the decorative flared cap on top, I bored the top of the chimney out, parted off the cap and then parted off the chimney to length, faced it up and turned down the top to fit the newly bored out cap. Pressed the parts together and bingo - one chimney 12.5mm shorter! Stove paint completes the look, a new smokebox door dart and a number plate on the front and I'm good to go!
I contacted Mike Chaney to see if he ever fitted worksplates to his locos as I'll be adding some. He kindly sent a photo of some from an earlier loco, and although not an identical match, I'm happy that these will add a certain historic authenticity to the loco! 
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