Tom, If you look at a mess of old S Gauge Herald's you will find little
ads for several folks who over the years to would custom build those
SSI&S kits. Some did a lousy job, others kept the money and ran, but a
few did come through but I think most of those got tired of getting 25
cents per hour for doing the work. A few like Jess Bennett (who really
didn't build the kits but made his own engines using the parts) and
perhaps, John Bortz just kept working until they couldn't build them
anymore.
Claude's early boilers were heavy sand castings generally requiring a
heavy duty resistance or torch for soldering. This later boilers were
lacking in many ways. The various styles of outside running gear
required lots of patience to get right--some were cast nickel silver and
very soft/easily bent. The frames, as he sold them, were solid and the
gear was the open worm and gear just like AF. Some of those engines
were indeed a work of art but I think there are a lot of coffee grinders
out there also--probably not unlike the early imported brass we've been
discussing.
I 've mentioned this in the past but I had a guy (George Sills, I think
was his name) built a Southern heavy mike for me. Very well done
overall (he rolled his own boiler) using the bulk of SSL&S parts. Jack
Troxell our local loco hero, worked on the drive rods, installed a
modern gear box, replaced some crooked drivers, the motor and a few
other things to finally make a smooth running engine. A few of our
members were really impressed enough to order engines from George and I
wanted a 0-8-0 switcher. We sent our money off and he disappeared.
He charged in the $350 range, so one can easily see after buying the kit
what his lack of profit would be. I couple of years later the Overland
engines started to arrive in the $500 range. Overall the Korean stuff
was overall superior to Claude's kits. I remember him sitting at the
dealer tables with his samples and not selling much.
This engine is the one awaiting a better sprung frame from our
new/renewed suppliers. It will then receive a new paint job and be
rolled out of the shops as a Milwaukee L type engine. They had one
engine with an Elasco feedwater heater, which this Southern engine has.
Bob Werre
BobWphoto.com
Thomas Baker wrote:
>
>
> Some questions:
>
> Although many of those scale SSL&S kits are out there presumably,
> hardly any ever show up on E-Bay or on our list. I wonder if those
> kits are like the Sunshine kits in HO: They accurately portray the
> prototype freight car they are supposed to, and they sell. But I
> really doubt that all the purchasers have assembled them. Perhaps it's
> that way with those kits for brass steam locomotives. I once inquired
> of Claude Wade about assembling such a kit. He graciously responded
> with a letter instructing me that,yes, it did take time to assemble a
> kit. He also included the directions for the Berkshire. I kept them
> for many years and recall that they were highly detailed and many
> pages long.
>
> All that leads me to suspect that many who have purchased the kits may
> still have them on a shelf somewhere. Claude Wade also had a 2-8-0 and
> some switchers if I remember correctly.
>
> Tom
>
> [Non-text portions of this message have been removed]
>
>
[Non-text portions of this message have been removed]
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