# Avast Ye Lubbers, a new wind powered inspection car for the pizza



## vsmith (Jan 2, 2008)

Arrgg! Ye Monkey Crew! 

New for the pizza, a inspection car that doesn't need coal or gasoline to get around, instead using a sail instead.










































































Its a Stomper drive, on a basswood frame with an HLW gondola body, the rest is basswood dowels and whatever stuff I could find lying around, the nameplate is an old part from a long dismantled AMT General kit, the belaying pins are small pop rivets, the pulley blocks are scratched from basswood and the sails are tissue paper stiffened with white glue.


Believe it or not this has been done many times around the world,

Examples from the real world:

http://www.copsewood.org/ng_rly/sailbogie/sailbogie.htm

http://www.douglas-self.com/MUSEUM/...l/sail.htm

Perhaps the most widely known version was from "Around The World In 80 Days" 

http://www.widescreenmuseum.com/wid...days_4.htm


Condensed building log to follow:


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## vsmith (Jan 2, 2008)

Quick building log:

Basic chassis, HLW gondola, bass and some balsa wood, some leftover wood trim, and the stomper drive:





































Mast added:



















Seats added:










Painted, wood stained, belaying pins and stanchions added, beginning rigging:



















The main yard is actually a cheap wooden paint brush handle, I pried off the brush, sanded it clean and stained it, lug sail added, rigging well underway:



















The name is a leftover from a model kit of the General, if anyone asks, it called the General because of a disagreement in the Borracho Locomotive Works crews, one faction of Johnny Rebs wanted to call it the General Lee, but the Yankee's in the Works wanted to call it the General Grant, in an attempt to quell the dispute the foreman suggested calling it the General Patton, finally the President tired of the intrigue, declared, "its gonna be called The General, and you can add whatever the **** name you want to afterwords yourself"


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## BigRedOne (Dec 13, 2012)

If you need to tack, do you send out a crew to change track?


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## toddalin (Jan 4, 2008)

Very cre8tive.


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## lownote (Jan 3, 2008)

Needs a johnny Depp captain jack sparrow action figure! 

Very cool. Leve no spare part unused! 

I'm wondering how those sail cars could have worked. I'm no sailor, but I have to think they'd only work with a prevailing wind in one direction only


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## toddalin (Jan 4, 2008)

Posted By lownote on 10 Feb 2013 11:24 AM 
Needs a johnny Depp captain jack sparrow action figure! 

Very cool. Leve no spare part unused! 

I'm wondering how those sail cars could have worked. I'm no sailor, but I have to think they'd only work with a prevailing wind in one direction only 

You can "run" with the wind, as you indicate, but you can actually go much faster with the wind to your side. This is the same principle as squeezing a pea between your fingers and having it shoot out the front under pressure at high velocity. The keel/daggerboard provides this side resistance (or in this case the flange against the railhead). If fact, up to a point, you can sail into the wind before you have to tack. 

Jibe Ho!


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## Totalwrecker (Feb 26, 2009)

Aye mate, makes me think indoors the breeze must be; ye blow me down.... the track, Jack


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## Paulus (May 31, 2008)

That's genius! I like the way you are thinking and wished I had some of your creativism  
My only addition would be a little lantern in the top of the mast. 

This idea actually lingered in my head also after reading Jack Higgens novel 'Storm Warning' some years ago as he describes a sailing lorry on a small track somewere on the Outer Hebrides islands. 

Though I think the one in the novel looked more humble, like this one in Kent:


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## peter bunce (Dec 29, 2007)

Hi Vic,



Nice work, the Festiniog Railway have built a replica of one that the local land and slate quarry owner had. He and his family used it to get to Portmadog, on the continuous downwards gradient; the sale was used for the resturn as luckily the prevailing wind is in the general direction of the railway.

If you put 'Festiniog Railway boat' into Google and go to images there are quite a few there.

Yours Peter


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## Dave Meashey (Jan 2, 2008)

Victor; 

I love it! Great work. It will look right at home "sailing" the pizza layout. 

Best, 
David Meashey


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## tj-lee (Jan 2, 2008)

Wonderful, Vic. 

Best, 
TJ


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## Torby (Jan 2, 2008)

Vic, you're mad










Would a sail car work? Annoyingly, you'd often find the wind blowing right down the track and you sails luff.


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## vsmith (Jan 2, 2008)

Posted By Torby on 12 Feb 2013 01:15 PM 


Vic, you're mad











Would a sail car work? Annoyingly, you'd often find the wind blowing right down the track and you sails luff.

Tom, sure it would. Follow the links in my first posting above for historic examples, and theres this:


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## Ironton (Jan 2, 2008)

As a sailor I have to agree with Torby. A lot of the time the wind seems to be coming from directly where we want to go. A sailboat "gets there" by tacking back and forth. Usually in the neighborhood of 45 degrees to the wind. The angle changes with different hulls and rigs. 

So you build one of these in Kansas. You head east, the prevailing winds being westerlies. Now you want to go back. Must wait for the wind to shift to a more favorable direction, and no guarantee it will hold. 

The slate referenced above, the prevailing winds were across the track. Most of the time you can go either way. For a circle, you will always stop in one part or another depending on the wind. 

Still think it is a neat idea, and love the modeling.


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## vsmith (Jan 2, 2008)

The application of such a vehicle as this would be rather limited in the real world, but this was just to neat not to model









From what I have read, that sailing into a headwind issue was why most of these rail/sail cars used a lug sail arraignment, its the most versatile as it can be sailed pretty close to a headwind, you just might not be going very fast. Mine isn't exact in its sail plan, I tried to model a lug arraignment but did use some (alot) of license, a lug sail arraignment is basically the same as a Chinese junk's sail set up, and they can sail very close to a headwind. This is missing the lower yard, it would have been just too crowded if I added it, but I wanted to capture the appeal of such a vehicle.


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## stevedenver (Jan 6, 2008)

vic i really like what you've done 

pray tell, 
l what is a stomper drive? and where can i get one? 
cos im gonna try to build my own 

i particularly like the cap'n


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## vsmith (Jan 2, 2008)

Posted By stevedenver on 19 Feb 2013 02:57 PM 
vic i really like what you've done 

pray tell, 
l what is a stomper drive? and where can i get one? 
cos im gonna try to build my own 

i particularly like the cap'n 
The same inquiry about Stompers was asked on the GSC forum so it bears repeating here for your answer

Stompers were a series of battery powered toy off road 4x4 cars that first appeared back in the late 80's early 90's, cash strapped early large scaler's discovered if you could pull the big tires off their thick metal axles, and with very little work(boring out the axle hole a tad) replace them with plastic large scale wheels, and have a cheap drivetrain for small bashes. I came upon this concept late after official Stompers disappeared but found out they are still being made by Chinese companies and sold as various 4x4, construction or army vehicles by New Bright and/or New Ray toys. Though of late the ones I have found have thin metal axles and mounting the new wheels now requires a styrene tube shim, big pain to install but for a $3 dollar drivetrain I won't complain 
Stomper commercial from back in the day: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9pko_iTP4sQ Here is the first stomper bash I did, with full sized wheels:







Here is another full size wheel Stomper based bash:







The sail car shares a drive with another model railcar, it has smaller wheels so it rolls better on sharp curves, but I had to cut the gear housing so it will clear turnouts. One thing, if you look at the motor mount, there is only one screw holding the drive in place, that because if you build it so, the drives are interchangable, so you can build 3 or 4 models that use the same drive-brick, all you need is to keep a screwdriver handy. 

If your looking for them, I found mine at Big Lots, just make sure they are the 4x4 or construction vehicles that have wide wheels, they are the slower versions as I have picked up one that was a car version and it was way too fast. I haven't looked for any of late, hope they are still around.


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## vsmith (Jan 2, 2008)

http://www.newbright.com/product/view/id/230 

Hey whaddya know, I'm pretty sure these are the latest incarnation of the Stomper. The battery mounting in the instructions looks dead on the same.


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## BigRedOne (Dec 13, 2012)

What happens when you get to a tunnel? Get out and push?


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