Detailing could make for another thread in itself I think.

I picked up some fine brass wire thinking I should do up some grab irons, loops & ladders on the crane.  That will be my first foray into adding detail like that, should be fun...so if you care to share what you are doing... I'll be interested in reading about it.

Tenders are another story.  My crane did not come with the tender, but I have a tender from another crane that with some work...might be worth using.  It's going to need a lot of help though as it is a Mantua model.  It will also give me a place to use the trucks that came with the crane.

Lots of stuff to keep me occupied.

...... they put the curved end of the roof back.

Detailing could make for another thread in itself I think.

I really would like to keep this thread all together from beginning to end. Perhaps on the next crane build I'll do separate threads.

That will be my first foray into adding detail like that, should be fun...so if you care to share what you are doing... I'll be interested in reading about it.

I will defiantly be posting until I've got it sitting on the track in primer paint.

Right now I've got the power wires laid out and through the end sill. I've cut off all the steps and am parring off the small ladders on the side of the frame. I'll be adding buck shot for weight in the bottom and using epoxy to hold it in place. Pictures to come later tonight I hope.

The crane tender car I think will be scratch built unless I can find a 3 axle passenger car to modify. We'll see.

Bernd

I've started to remove some of the cast on detail on the whole crane. Right now I'm working on the frame and redoing the grab irons and steps.

The areas marked are to be removed.
The other side with the steps removed.
I also glued down the power wires that are going to the tender car that will carry the batteriers.
To get the wires outside the frame I drilled 1/8" hole through the end sills and ACC'ed the pipe in. Then ran the wires through.
Then to add some weight below the center of gravity I'm going to add lead shot from a 12ga. shot gun shell. I'll use epoxy resin to hold them in. But first I need to add the setps and side ladders.
Here's three prototype views of two different ways to mount those steps.
 

Note: 12/12/13 Pictures need to be retaken on the next crane project.

That's it for now. Back to work on the crane

Bernd
 

To get a little change of pace I decided to spend some time on kit-bashing or perhaps scratch-bashing(?) the crane tender car. I had picked up two Athearn RPO cars at the Syracuse train show to modify into a crane tender car. Here's the start of it. I'll write up a build post later.

Two cars as is.

(pictures need to be retaken)

Here's what it looks like after the shop boys went after it with a torch.

(pictures need to be retaken)

 That's it for now. Back to the shop and more welding.

Bernd

You've got the start of a good looking wreck train there!  That baggage/RPO would make a good kitchen car.  I remember hearing stories form the old heads about being called for wreck train duty.  The hours were long, but they always talked about how good and plentiful the food was!

Perhaps I need to look for a kitchen car at the next swap meet. Good idea. Will have to look into that. The wreck train just got longer.

Bernd

I was thinking that the second baggage/RPO would make a good kitchen car, unless you have other plans for it.

Throw an old 8K Gallon tank car in there somewhere for water (usually non-potable), a flat car or two with spare trucks and/or track panels, and some old box cars for tools, materials, and even bunks.

I'm thinking along those lines. I guess then I'll need one long track in the yard on a railroad I haven't built yet. Trouble is I've got some of those cars that can be added. This my turn into a life long project. Mmmm...........

Bernd

I bought Tichy crane and boom car kits.  Those, in turn, became an entire wreck train in my mind.  Then, as I developed my track plans (once I finally had the space and budget for a layout) I made sure to include a derrick track to part the wreck train, and made sure that I would be able to get the train out as needed.

Mind you, the kits have never been out of the box, but those kits turned into a permanent part of the layout..

Fast forward to today.  I still haven't built the kits, and now I'm thinking about selling them.  The more I think about it, the less I need a wreck train.  The derrick track may be repurposed as a cab track or material track or who knows what else..  I'm thinking of selling the crane kit, too.

If I didn't have a layout, I'd probably build whatever I wanted and then sell it off to fund the next project.