# 3/4" Scale Peter Cooper Locomotive - Another Attempt



## Grimm (Oct 5, 2009)

In the year or so since I tried to make this locomotive in F-scale I have not been idle. Mostly I have been trying to get to be a better machinist. Now, with the success of my little wobbler engine, I'm feeling much more capable in that department. I have fixed up my milling machine so it's much more stable and I put some DRO's on it as well.









I have also done more research into the locomotive and have been able to answer some of the questions I still had. To the point that I have been buying original newspapers from that time period. One of my questions was, on the loco did Winans' friction bearings look like they did in his 1828 patent or did they look like the ones in the B&O's 1831 report? By pure luck I purchased a newspaper from 1829 (Niles' Weekly Register, Sept 26, 1829) that had an article which detailed Winans' visit to England in that year. His reason for going was to both promote the friction wheel and also to learn more about the railroad practices in England.

In this article it was stated that Winans had already been testing the friction wheel months before the Rainhill trials which wouldn't happen until October of that year. And by then he had already known that they tend to wear quickly and suggested that a case could be placed around the wheel to both protect it from dust/dirt, and so the wheel could be immersed in oil to keep it lubricated. This gave me the point in time in which Winans had changed the design of the friction wheel. As this was about a year before the famous run of the locomotive I'm much more confident that they looked as they were described in the 1831 report. 

I'm also a lot more confident in how the actual frame looked. I'm going to be following the frame style that is depicted in the 1831 advertisement even though it is a later version of the engine. It still has the friction wheel bearings and as the frame was specially made by Imlay I don't think that it would have been laid aside that quickly. This changes my original plan quite significantly, also I know now that the car the engine propelled in front of it did not look like the model I built.







The car that was used was one of the first cars on the road and these were open topped with inside bearings for the wheels. I suspect that this car was used because the newer cars were heavier and the locomotive might not have been powerful enough to push them. Also the B&O was in critical need of passenger cars at this time so it might have been the only one available for the trip.

The awesome thing, I was able to score a very important newspaper for my collection. It's the Sept 4, 1830 edition of Niles' Weekly Register that announced the first public running of Peter Cooper's locomotive. Here is a scan of the first page, the locomotive news starts at the bottom of the first column:

Cooper Article

Whew! Lots of text, to be continued....

Jason


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## Grimm (Oct 5, 2009)

OK, now I'm having way too much fun with all the ideas from Bob and Kozo on the DIY wheels for the locomotive, and also the cars as well. Here is a preliminary plan for the wheels, I'm thinking of moving the jig to a separate page so I can expand on it. Also there are a lot of omission's and errors on this on, so back to the drawing board. 

Does this look like a good plan? Any critiques and errors are most welcome.

Wheel Plans

Here is a peek at the other items I have been working on as well. All of these need to be redone as I'm still learning how to do this CAD stuff and I just got the new version of the software I'm using that is much nicer (QCad version 3.0). 

This is the new frame:

Frame Plans

The friction wheel (I'm trying to get my brother to cast these in brass or bronze for me):

Friction Wheel Plans

This is the current plan for the engine. I don't know how many times I ended up engineering myself into a corner on this one.









Steam Engine Plans

The plan is to have a 3/8" diameter piston with a 1" long stroke, and a 1/4" diameter long slide valve. No reversing, the original only had one direction and then had to be turned around at the end of the line.


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## xo18thfa (Jan 2, 2008)

I like that wheel jig a lot. Is it possible to fit two of the spoke supports? One might allow the spoke to tip out of place, just about the time the solder ready to run. This jig would work for curved spokes too. Cut section of thin wall tube for spokes.

The bore/stroke is good. Ruby's are 10mm I believe, so .375 is comparable.

Are you going to try a real friction wheel? Soft rubber might be a good choice for that in the small scale.


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## Grimm (Oct 5, 2009)

Thanks Bob! 

I don't see any reason you couldn't have two spoke supporters. I was thinking of just using a short section of 1" type-L copper pipe for the support. You could even just bore out a support to any thickness you would need. I'm hoping that the tipping will not be a problem unless the spokes are way too short. I am worried about the spokes rotating out of place so a thicker support might be better? 

Could you elaborate some more on the curved spokes, many early locos and cars had them.

That's good to know on the bore/stroke, I had the ruby in mind as I was thinking about the engine. If the ruby, as small as it is, can work then maybe mine can too.









No real friction wheel I think, that would be too much. *shiver*







I am thinking of following your suggestion and use a salter type safety valve on the boiler. I'm pretty sure that the original just had a simple weighted safety, but I don't think that will work very well. It's one of the reasons I think that Peter Cooper held the safety down on the that run. Every bump would have let precious steam escape and they might have not even made the trip. That would have looked good to the public I bet.







L.B.S.C. has a design for a really cool salter valve in his Canterbury Lamb plans I'm thinking of using. 

Jason


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## xo18thfa (Jan 2, 2008)

When silver solder flux boils it often pushes parts out of position. Only one spoke support could allow the spoke materiel to pivot out of position at the worst time. I can guarantee that would happen to me. Two supports gives two point of contact, adds stability.

The curved stokes. I saw a guy on another website do them. For straight spokes you just cut off lengths of strip material. For curved spokes, part off a short length of thin wall brass tube. The length parted off equals the width of the spoke. From that ring of tube, cut off sections to make spokes.


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## Grimm (Oct 5, 2009)

Looking at the numbers, if I push the ID in 1/16", the spoke support would be 1/8" thick and perfectly centered between the tire and the hub. Do you think this would work? I'm also thinking that it might be easier to just make the whole support assembly in one piece, including the hub pedestal? It would be fairly straight forward to do on a rotary table. And you have to mount it on one to cut the slots anyway, so just do it all in one mill setup.

Jason


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## xo18thfa (Jan 2, 2008)

Posted By Grimm on 06 Jul 2012 02:28 PM 
Looking at the numbers, if I push the ID in 1/16", the spoke support would be 1/8" thick and perfectly centered between the tire and the hub. Do you think this would work? I'm also thinking that it might be easier to just make the whole support assembly in one piece, including the hub pedestal? It would be fairly straight forward to do on a rotary table. And you have to mount it on one to cut the slots anyway, so just do it all in one mill setup.

Jason

Yes, that should do. And the one piece jig is a good idea. It will be re-usable a zillion times. Make the same wheels for rolling stock perhaps.


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## Grimm (Oct 5, 2009)

Cool, I'm also thinking of making a couple of support assemblies for wheels with differing number of spokes. For instance the car that was pushed by the loco was an earlier type, and as far as I can tell the wheels they used only had 6 spokes. So one for the later 9 spoked wheel and one for the earlier 6 spoked ones. To the drafting board...









Jason


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## xo18thfa (Jan 2, 2008)

Here's a guy who makes curved spoke wheels. Check pages 2 and 3 of the thread.

Mike Mott's project


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## Grimm (Oct 5, 2009)

Thanks Bob,

I wasn't able to view the thread. I tried to register as well but the forum software just said I was spam so I gave up.









Jason


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## Grimm (Oct 5, 2009)

Here is the latest plan for the wheels, next up the jig. This one should print better than the last one.

Loco and Car Wheels

Jason


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## xo18thfa (Jan 2, 2008)

These guys are the suppliers for K&S hobby brass. They have brass strips in several sizes. Might have some good spoke material.

Plan looks good. How about 7 spokes? Nothing like a really odd number.


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## Grimm (Oct 5, 2009)

Thanks Bob, no link? I have had some trouble sourcing 1/2" X 1/16" ground flat bar. The prices vary widely from as low as $5 per strip all the way up to $23 per strip which is ridiculous. I'm a bit leary of the K&S flats because they seem to cut them with a shear and that distorts the flatness of the part.

I have been basing the number of spokes for the loco's wheels off of the flour car diagram drawn by Benjamin Latrobe for the 1831 B&O report. The 6-spoked car wheels off of Winan's 1828 friction wheel patent. I hoping that they drew them from what they saw?

Here is the plans for the wheel jig, again, please let me know if this look good or point out any problems. I'm also interested in suggestions on how to make the plans better.

Wheel Jig Plan

Thanks,

Jason


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## xo18thfa (Jan 2, 2008)

Ooops. Here's the link:

Special Shapes.


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