ScaleCraft early and later drives

Didn't Scalecraft do a Challenger also?    A friend had one some years back, and I thought he told me it was from a Scalecraft Kit.

Carey, Great timing, I've been in a Scale Craft sort of mood the last week or so!!  Pulled all my junk boxes out to go through the piles again lol.

Later SC K4 center axle drive https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=42iGFNvshK8&t=14s

Early SC K4 Rear axle drive https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dzkFM-Pjv2Q

Later SC Mikado chassis, same as later K4 with horizontal worm https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xX00w9e81FI

Yes, Carey - the definitive Scale Craft post.  I don't know when they split the frames, but it sure makes driver swaps easier.

I thought the rear axle drive was the original, but was not sure.  Thanks for that.

I shall add my Scale Craft to this thread.  I ay have to re-decal and stripe my Hudson after seeing your stunning photos.

Thanks!

The Hudson, early it was actually a half cast and half fabricated boiler as was the tender. Here is the later raw bronze boiler and tender in project form. I still need most of the valve gear for this mess. Also later had a Zinc alloy cast tender with rivets like Carey shows above.

Close up of both drives on the K4 Pacifics and on the SP Mountain.  

Note, the SP Mountain also could have been purchased with the early or late drive..

 Dang it!!! My order is all messed up!!

Did not know that about Mountain drives and early Hudsons not being all-cast.  I am going to bring all four early Scale Craft together here - The Mountain came to me via a friend who rescued it from the estate of Allan Wehrle, one of the good guys who had a foundry in his back yard.  Ditto the SP Pacific, which remains an outside third model probably for the foreseeable future.

Not the J1d Hudson- the sand domes on these is, as far as I can tell, completely wrong, so I replaced it.  Also, since I have a penchant for Lobaugh drivers, it got those too.  The tender is a "slump-casting" of various size rivets, so I toned down the big ones, hoping to make the pattern a little more uniform.

Herewith:

A couple of notes come to mind.  First, the K4 has Loco Works drivers.  A friend in Florida talked me out of the originals, and I have to machine another set - some day.  The K4 is otherwise stock, just like Donnelly would have produced it.  The paint is getting a crocodile patina, and I intend to preserve it that way.  I have three others, some highly modified and detailed.

Next the Pacific - it came with the same tender as the Mountain - a 1/4" scale tender behind a 17/64 locomotive.  Ungainly.  The tender shown is brass, 17/64, and has gold decals, so it might have been the one they hooked to Baldwin 60000 when it went up the hill.  That's my story, and I am sticking to it.

Yes, that is the original headlight on the Hudson.  I may change it some day.

And the Santa Fe?  No way will I allow the original Scale Craft tender to come anywhere near my collection.  I have two tenders for this beauty, and may in fact make a third.  The second tender is a giant thing, most often found behind the ATSF Northerns.  It has those six axle - oh, what the heck - here it is:

It's ScaleCraft day!!!!   Smith and Donnelly are smiling down ....thank you for showing the videos and photos .

I'll take some more photos tonight ....

the "mystery '  sheet brass Hudson ...listed yes in the flyer ...none of the boys I know have seen one ...  yet .....

there is the early Hudson casting with two hatches on the sand dome ...and much sharper features throughout ...   then they messed with the mold and created the huge single sand hatch which drips down the sides of the dome ...  and finally same as the last but now the steam dome is a separate piece as used as the reverse lever ( 1937)  ....

YES the SC headlight is really that large ...

Cheers Carey 

...the hits just keep coming; another terrific thread.  

Thanks!

Mark in Oregon

https://youtu.be/FCZLToxtEtA     Here's my Scale Craft Hudson       CTR..... ( Choose the Right )

https://youtu.be/K9FWpvP4F2c   The Mikado two      cTr.... ( Choose the Right )

Hello all ..Fun to see all the SC come out of the woodwork ...  when collecting prewar   O scale ....I'd guess about 60-70% of the time if you find an engine it's a SC ......so they must have had a fairly good following offering a product that operators could afford , build and ran .    

Here are a few more photos ...   Donnelly was able to make a small fortune in his ScaleCraft enterprise ..oh course he started with a large fortune ...pushing full force on the O  and OO scale fronts , 1937 he offered die cast passenger cars 17/64's in O scale  and same cars in OO ...

Donnely being in the printing business was able to publish some wonderful catalogs . One of the illustrations is of a "silver"  Hudson upon a desk ... sample ? show piece? ... the engine today is in a collection ..(not mine) ...however  two weeks ago a Mountain surfaced in the same finish ..( sans tender) ..and this one is in my collection. 

SC found some economy reusing some of the bits from the SP Mountain on the SP Pacific .

The Mikado ...sand cast ...there are some wonderful examples of great detail found in sand casting ... not this one ..the tender is  just short of a brick on wheels .  

Cheers Carey

Look at that!  A trek through history, 3/4 of a century ago.

Nickel plating used to be easy.  You walked down to the local plater with the entire model (preferably de-greased, they dunked it, you gave them five bucks . . .

Didn't affect insulation, motors, apparently gears, or bearing surfaces.

Wish you could still do that - I have some PAs that need a nickel flash.

Awesome...just awesome.

Mark in Oregon

Here are a few pics of the SP Mountain flyer when it came out in 1936. With all the locos I’ e found, so far I haven’t located any of the assembly plan sheets!! Dearly would love to come across them for each of the locos!!  Notice these details support the early separate piece drive block like my Lower SP chassis.  Makes me wonder how many went out like this versus the later all one piece frames.  Surely, the one piece frames were a much simpler component and cheaper to manufacture than the resulting three pieces of the earlier frames.  The fact that we as collector's/runners seem to think the later frames work and run better 80 years later is just a bonus!  lol

You have seen this before, but here is my Scale Craft/CLW/Scratch Northern:

This one taught me a lot about scratch building - I think I did this around 1981 or so, just before I started real scratch building.  This one got a new cab and firebox, new domes, and other mods of less significance.

Oh I like that Bob!  I was curious how the frame was done on that loco.  Def a new direction compared to the prewar SC brass hunks!!  Reminds me of my CLW H10 Consolidation frame.

Thanks all for the posts, most interesting.

I will contribute the following (showing a different drive - the frame is somewhat daylighted, and the drivers are sprung).

bob2 - can I ask what you do not like about the tender ?

I have all the  Scale-Craft engines now 2 rail equipped with DC motors, DCC and sound.  They run quite well even after all these years.  The split frames are the early version, then the "new style" solid frames replaced them as mentioned in the catalogs starting around 1938 except for the mountain which remained split frame to the end.  I hope to post some pictures next week.  Believe it or not, I also think the mikado tender is fixable and will show my efforts.  BTW, Carey - post-war Scale-Craft only produced one unpowered version of the Northern, none were sold to customers.  Bob Smith at CLW produced the working models.  I mistakenly passed on purchasing the SC estate with the catalog model of the Northern and all the freight cars about 20 years ago.  I can't post pictures of videos currently but but should be able to next week.    The Hudson master was damaged over the years and this resulted in some of the changes you note in early to later produced shells.  Henry Pearce had the SC prewar masters in the 1980's and told me about it.

Scale Craft was even sold by Sears in 1941.....  they also have the 00 line and Varney ho.

Bill Pope in 1979 also claimed to have Scale Craft patterns up in the barn attic.  He had a really nice gentlemen's farm.

You guys are a wealth of knowledge.

The ATSF tender above is not Scale Craft.  It is very well done scratchbuilt with Lobaugh trucks.  I approve.

The Scale Craft tender is more like a bathtub - the old style with those big overhangs.  It could be fixed, but probably not worth it.

Wasn't the original Scale Craft Mikado tender a big 1 piece Aluminum casting? 

  The split frames are the early version, then the "new style" solid frames replaced them as mentioned in the catalogs starting around 1938 except for the mountain which remained split frame to the end. 

 

  I mistakenly passed on purchasing the SC estate with the catalog model of the Northern and all the freight cars about 20 years ago.    The Hudson master was damaged over the years and this resulted in some of the changes you note in early to later produced shells.  Henry Pearce had the SC prewar masters in the 1980's and told me about it.

You got me thinking, One of my 4-8-2 chassis is solid one piece. The other is split and three pieces. Hard to see the solid one up top but here are a couple of better shots of it. It came with cast iron drivers where as the split frame loco came with zinc pest drivers. 

Now I am curious, I bet the P13 SP 4-6-2 only had the later chassis as well as the Mikado but it seems the Mountain came both ways over time like the K4. There even seems to be a split and non split version of the Hudson.

would be interesting if someone could track down the patterns for these today lol. Not that there would be a big market but it would be cool.

Hi,

Yes the Mikado tender was cast Aluminum even though one catalog said bronze.  It is 2 pieces, the body and the deck. 

The P-13 Pacific and the Santa Fe Mikado were only available with the "new style" solid frame.  The others transitioned.  I had never seen a solid frame for the Mountain before, not sure that the catalogs reflect that.  Both mine are split frame.  BTW, the mikado pictures above show a gearbox, not original.  Everything pre-war was open gears.  Also, I am pretty sure there were never any die cast drivers, so the "zinc pest" ones are not original SC - which were cast iron.  

After Bill Pope, the patterns (such as they were) went to Henry Pearce and then likely to Stevenson Preservation.  Bill Pope initially said he would offer the SC line but after inspection of the patterns found them too fragmentary and in some cases too damaged to be of any use.  A few of the best SC detail locomotive parts stayed at CLW (Bob Smith got them first in 1950) and were reused with the SC/CLW post-war 4-8-4 Northern.  The only nearly complete set of pre-war patterns is for the Mikado for which there is really no market.

J2M

The S/C ATSF tenders I have seen were red art bronze.  Understand that the prep for pouring aluminum or bronze is the same - just depends on what you throw into the crucible.

I think - but am not sure - that 1929 production used a lot of lead alloy parts, and bronze only on the main frame.

I was stumped by the zinc pest drivers as well but I actually found some paper documentation that seems to support it at least for a short time. Note the diecast wheels marketed as sharp detail!! Note that they offered them for both the 1-5/8” and 1-1/2” that were on the Mountain.  This was the only one of ten SC locos I’ve owned that ever showed up with zinc drivers too so it’s likey they did not offer them very long. This is from the 1936 sales booklet.

How about a car?  Long ago I was visiting Si Simonton in LA, and in parting he handed me two beat-up freight cars.  Both, it turns out, were well-built Scale Craft.  I put some Future Floor Wax on them for preservation, and they now rank with my best freight cars.  For comparison the car on the right is PSC Brass, now in the hands of Brad A.  Easy to see my preferences:

Dennis, it appears as though you've got quite collection going on there. Please feel free to post more pictures; perhaps even a couple of over-all shots of your examples. I can only speak for myself, but I would love to see more! This (mostly, I guess) pre-war stuff is just fascinating.

Mark in (wet today) Oregon

I have thirty or so SC tank cars, but they are so common they are not worth a photo.  And one stock car, which does not hold a candle to Lobaugh.  And maybe aluminum hoppers and gons, but they are not marked.

No caboose.  Lionel and Walthers did much better cabooses.

Dennis - did you get my note?  Side rods await.

Bob, Yes yes, will email you shortly, thank you!.

I lost a bunch of my pictures, but here are a couple of my SC refrigerator cars, please forgive the 3 foot tall rails

I have a couple of hand lettered SC cars, one that Bob and I thought might have been factory lettered as an early PRR boxcar.  Will dig them out and take a couple of shots.  Bob, never to tired to see your tank cars!! lol  Mark, You at least have an SC hopper if I remember right lurking about...

I suppose we can discuss the change in refrigerator car frame style to go with the loco frame design changes.

I don't have any SC cabooses, but being a PRR nut, I tend to favor that type and I do have a few Walthers PRR cabooses,  Also have this one which I think is an Alexander based on the frame and major differences from the Walthers variety.  I don't want to stray too far off target, but it goes with the PRR K4's and the CLW/Saginaw H10's.

This thread is really great and very informative. Hard to find some of those models in France unfortunately, except with your help Dennis...

Do you know the maker of the spare bogies in front of your nice caboose, I have the exact same one and would be curious to know. 

I just got a new in box kit of a Scale Craft hopper here and two other brass cars, will take some pictures tomorrow.

All my best wishes, Daniel

Daniel,  I'm willing to bet you have the best American 2 rail O scale collection in your neighborhood!! 

I'll take a look, those trucks might be Auel but I am not sure.  There were several other possibilities...

Dennis, maybe I am the only one Frenchy having an interest in those historical models but I am far to you and other talented collectors here...

The beginning of all was my favorite piece, a Scalecraft Hudson without tender. As finding an original one seems not easy at all, it has been paired with a Hudson Products one which is a replica of Lionel's 700 one. it is modified in two rails and also adding a pick up to run on three rails.

Daniel

Dennis: thank you and please keep 'em coming!

Bob2: I never tire of seeing parts of your (what must be an extensive) collection.

Daniel: that's a beautiful piece. You're lucky to have it.

One of the best threads ever...

Mark in Oregon

I see nothing wrong with thread drift, as long as we don't tell management.

Tank cars?

Oops!  Bottom one is a Lobaugh.  Bob Anson made me enough decals to do several Lobaugh, a MiLoco, and at least one Scale Craft.  But you get the idea - top two have original Scale Craft markings.  Ignore the feeble attempt at weathering.

I love tank cars - keep 'em coming (I continue to wonder why we can't get a decent model of the UTLX  X-3 or a GATX type 30)

Thanks to those who commented on my SF Mike. I always wondered about the mechanism and tender being "original", but it is the only Scalecraft I have, so no basis of comparison.

A couple of pics of the NYC Hudson from my U-tube video above. I dont knew who detailed this one, but they did a great job. I did have to make a new headlight and fit an LED, and there are few more jobs to do cTr...( Choose the Right )

This is my K4, in its travels it lost a few bits and pieces. I had resolved that there was no way!  Id ever find anything Scale Craft in Australia, when this turned up on the bay locally. Im not sure how Im going two finish this one, I have some Labough drivers that might work em???   cTr...( Choose the Right )