# Building a Steam Locomotive on "**** on Wheels"



## Tom Parkins (Jan 2, 2008)

Here is a link to an upcoming show on "**** on Wheels". They challenged them to build an 1800s steam locomotive. Pretty cool stuff. 

http://www.amctv.com/****-on-wheels/videos/inside-****-on-wheels-building-the-train

Enjoy. 

Tom


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## Dwight Ennis (Jan 2, 2008)

I'm really looking forward to this show. Too bad the train is fake though... especially the locomotive. It definitely shows.


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## wchasr (Jan 2, 2008)

I agree with Dwight....I know that professional set makers take short cuts and I know most people will NEVER know the difference...it makes suspending disbelief for the folks that know better even more difficult. Even a fake loco could ahve been much better. It really doesn't capture a "period" locomotive to my eye...but my eye has a decidedly east coast slant to it. 

Chas


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## Scottychaos (Jan 2, 2008)

This was being discussed over on RYPN: 
http://www.rypn.org/forums/viewtopic.php?f=1&t=32231 
I will just copy and paste what I wrote about the color!  

I wonder why they didn't hire Leviathan.

Art department: "mind if we paint it black?" 


For the time period they are representing, (just after the Civil War, late 1860's) its not supposed to be black..very colorful locomotives were the norm up into the late 1800's.. 
for the 1860's and 1870's, they were very colorful.. 

actually its quite unfortunate (to me) that they chose to paint it (mostly) black.. 
that is quite historically inaccurate! 
In their research, they must have seen the replica locomotives at the Golden Spike National Historic Site, those locomotives are painted in accurate period colors: 

http://www.nps.gov/gosp/photosmultimedia/photogallery.htm 

http://www.railpictures.net/viewphoto.php?id=132537&nseq=17 

http://www.railpictures.net/viewphoto.php?id=107218&nseq=20 

They gave it *some* color..but overall its still far too dull and drab for the time period.. 
Perhaps the producers of the "**** on Wheels" show felt an accurately colorful locomotive for their show might not be "gritty" enough or something..thats too bad, 
another unnecessary re-write of history..getting it wrong on purpose. 

Scot


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## vsmith (Jan 2, 2008)

No valve gear was the biggest gaff I saw. It also doesn't chuff like a real engine would. Both could be fixed easily by adding fixed rods to the pistons and by adding a timeable blower to the stack. Oh well theres always next season LOL


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## Scottychaos (Jan 2, 2008)

Leviathan! 


brand-new..built 1999 to 2009.


Leviathan's webpage 

yeah, it seems like the "**** on Wheels" people could have found a "real" loco to use..
I cant believe there were *no* options..

Scot


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## vsmith (Jan 2, 2008)

In terms of coloring ...didnt any of the producers bother to visit Golden Spike Nat. Park??? Those are not drab little engine in the pics at Promontory.


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## Scottychaos (Jan 2, 2008)

Posted By vsmith on 17 Oct 2011 04:08 PM 
In terms of coloring ...didnt any of the producers bother to visit Golden Spike Nat. Park??? Those are not drab little engine in the pics at Promontory. 



Is there an echo in here? 
(go up four posts! 

Scot


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## Andre Anderson (Jan 3, 2008)

Then the producers lied through their teeth in this video and said that they could not find any period locomotives. I don't think they looked very hard myself. Now in their defense real locomotives might have blown the budget. With a real locomotive you need a real crew that knows how to keep a locomotive in steam safely, you need a water supply, fuel supply, time for maintenance where this thing can just sit there till you need it and no one needs to babysit it. These are all costs that they may just not allowed for when setting the budgets out.



The gentleman that built the Leviathan (http://www.leviathan63.com/) which according to his web page is from the same order as the Jupiter, he is just like dan Markoff in that he loads the thing on trucks and moves it around to were ever some one want's to see it run. The Reader Railroad has several small loco's that would have fit the bill. Old Tuscon had the V&T #11 that could have been moved to the movie site. Heck for a movie you could have moved the Eureka and borrowed a coach or two from either the D&S or the C&TS along with what ever freight cars you might have needed. Granted if you did that the rail fans would have h a field day with the fact that the trains were 3' foot gauge rather than standard gauge but the general public would have never know the difference.

I really think that a little well placed grime on one of the period locomotives would have look better than this thing.


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## David Leech (Dec 9, 2008)

I think that the problem is that the very clever movie magicians can make all kinds of things look real, but all too often they are not experts, or even worse, no nothing about what they are creating! 
I find it interesting after all the explanation of building the 'American' loco, the last shot is of a mogul running. 
Now, is that a 'real' one, or another fake one? 
All the best, 
David Leech, Delta, Canada


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## vsmith (Jan 2, 2008)

I think the numbers to build new from foam and plywood was less than the numbers to procure, schedule, ship, and operate a real steam engine whose operation would need to be contracted to an appropriate live steam operating co. This is just a prop built as cheaply as allowable.


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## snowshoe (Jan 2, 2008)

Its Hollywood. 99% of the people watchig the show will never know the difference. Im sure if the producers were making it for us train people they would have been more accurate. Its the movies. With a title, **** on Wheels, a colorful engine would not fit that title.


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## Spule 4 (Jan 2, 2008)

At least it is not a diesel, a 1900s 0-4-0T, or a European well tank loco as used in several other choo choo movies.


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## DKRickman (Mar 25, 2008)

Posted By snowshoe on 17 Oct 2011 07:29 PM 
Its Hollywood. 99% of the people watchig the show will never know the difference.
And what's wrong with making it accurate enough that 99.9% of the people wouldn't know the difference? Look at one of my new favorite Christmas movies - Polar Express. That has to be the most accurate animated steam locomotive I have ever seen, bar none. Could they have made it simpler? Sure. Would 99% of the people have known the difference? No. But they made the extra effort, and it's one of the reasons I can really enjoy the movie.

By contrast, glaring ignorance of reality is the reason that I have not seen and have no desire to see Unstoppable. And now, the producers of **** On Wheels want me to believe that this styrofoam child's toy is "completely accurate" - sorry, but I'll pass on the show. Tell me it's an artistic rendering for the sake of the show, I'm fine, but don't try to lie to me and tell me that you've re-created reality. I am a modeler, I recreate reality for fun, and I know what the limits are. And I know when someone is trying to pass crappy modeling as great work.


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## armorsmith (Jun 1, 2008)

Not to mention that both the General and the Texas are still available in Georgia, and are correct period locomotives for shortly after the Civil War. 

Bob C.


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## norman (Jan 6, 2008)

Hi Guys: 

Note that the diamond smoke stack wobbles as the train is pushed along the track ! I hope they fix that for the television series. 

Still a worth while television endeavor. 

Hollywood Western theme movies are never historically accurate. The wagon train always passes by that famous Hill in the middle of the desert ( Monument Hill ? ) no matter from where and to where the wagon train is travelling because that Hill makes a great movie backdrop. The gunmen are always tall and handsome. Do an internet search for historical photographs of "Billy the Kid" and " Bonnie Barlow and Clyde Barlow" . None of these individuals were attractive persons. Quite the opposite as they were short and very plain looking. They definitely were not the Clint Eastwood or George Clooney types. The gunman with the 30/30 Winchester rifle always misses while the responding gunman with his short barreled handgun always hits his target no matter how far away! 

Up here in Canada, the CBC did a documentary of the building of the Canadian Pacific Railway "The National Dream" . The cross nation railway was built to halt any American territorial northern expansion into Canada which at the time was not a completed formal federation as in British Columbia and the Western Territories could just as easily have been absorbed by the then young nation of the United States of America. 

Operating steam locomotive 1057 was used over and over. As soon as the audience was enveloped into the 1800's era watching the Chinese labourors toil in the otherwise silent wilderness, in would walk author Pierre Burton in his 1990's garb looking like the man from the Glad garbage bags commercial ! Talk about a historically jarring image ! Great locomotive footage ruined by the massive ego of the author who insisted on explaining each historical moment in person on screen. 

So at least this American television Western has folks in their proper period custumes. 


Norman


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## DKRickman (Mar 25, 2008)

Posted By norman on 17 Oct 2011 10:22 PM 
[A]t least this American television Western has folks in their proper period custumes.
Are they proper period costumes? Or are they some Hollywood producer's idea of "proper period costumes"? If they're willing to take liberties with the train (and call it accurate) what other liberties are they willing to take? I believe that the laissez-faire attitute toward accuracy has done more damage than we can measure to people's idea of what history really was. It's like seeing the starship Enterprise bank in a turn around a planet - it's completely ludicrous, but we're so used to seeing it that reality looks wrong to us.


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## vsmith (Jan 2, 2008)

Interesting you mention Star Trek. I always silently chuckle watching because they take it all so seriously except whenever they fire phasers accompanied by sound effects ...in the vacuum of space LOL.


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## Tom Parkins (Jan 2, 2008)

How much would it cost to have Hollywood build a J3 Hudson? Of course it would be supervised for accuracy. Is there any place for something like that? I would personally like to see it, but it must include a simulated cab complete with sound effects so kids could climb on board and play engineer.


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## Dwight Ennis (Jan 2, 2008)

except whenever they fire phasers accompanied by sound effects ...in the vacuum of space LOL.Ever read the book, "The Making of Star Trek"? Stuff like that was considered. Roddenberry realized it was inaccurate, but felt such scenes were dead with no sound, so they added it in. In the end, he realized he may be making a show about the 22nd Century, but he was making it to be watched by a 20th Century audience. Compromises had to be made if the show were to sell. 

Interesting book about everything it took to bring TOS to network TV.


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## vsmith (Jan 2, 2008)

Yeah Dwight, almost every sci fi flick has gotten that one wrong since the Buster Crabbe "Flash Gordon" serials. Kubrick's "2001" is the only one I think that got it right, where Bowman blows the hatch on the pod to back into the ship and theres no sound until the hatch closes and enough air repressurizes the chamber. But even that seen got the physics wrong, the pod wasnt grappled to the Discovery, blowing the hatch should have pushed the pod flying off in the opposite direction of Bowman. That whole action=reaction Isaac Newton thingy. 

Real trains can get very expensive. I remember that the producers on "Pettycoat Junction" had a 1:1 fiberglass replica of Sierra RR#3 and a large scale operating model built to cut costs and limit production outside of the studio. With the replicas everything from station scenes with the actors to the outdoor scenes with the train running thru a miniature landscape could be filmed on the studio grounds, so I understand why building a mock up from scratch would appeal to the producers.


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## Dwight Ennis (Jan 2, 2008)

Actually there was a scene in TOS where there was no sound... at the end of "The Alternative Factor" where the Enterprise was firing on Lazarus' time ship from space - no sound in the space shots. Back to **** on Wheels, I have no real problem with using a prop - just with the historical and physical inaccuracies of said prop. I'm still going to watch the series. A western with a train theme... what could be better (if it's well done)?


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## wchasr (Jan 2, 2008)

As someone who does historical re-enactment as a hobby I can say that this thread is a typical conversation around the campfire...different time and place but the similartities are bovious. Spend a little to do it close or a little more to do it right. Are you telling a story or re-creating history? Can you afford true accuracy or is your budget (time & mooney & talent) constraining a cheaper less accurate model? Acheiving the "feel" and only ruining that for a few "scholars" who truly cannot suspend disbelief to enjoy the "feeling" that the producers (re-enactors) are trying to achieve.... 

Chas


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## Spule 4 (Jan 2, 2008)

Posted By armorsmith on 17 Oct 2011 09:22 PM 
Not to mention that both the General and the Texas are still available in Georgia, and are correct period locomotives for shortly after the Civil War. 

Bob C. But unfortunately neither look the way they did at the time.

As for the period look and costumes...again a lot of liberties...and there were a lot of what we would now call "minorities" as "Cowboys" back in the day too that is not often shown now either according to a couple historians I have spoken with.


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## lotsasteam (Jan 3, 2008)

And to top it of....the actors will never see a penny ..cause in the last scene they hand out live ammo....... 

manfred


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## norman (Jan 6, 2008)

Hi Guys: 

Years ago I viisted Disney World MGM shortly after the Dick Tracy film was released. There was a model loco which was used to film the scene where Dick Tracy, or some other character, was almost ran over by the locomotive ( I don't remember which character that was ) . This schene looked extremely realistic. The locomotive model was sitting on a track of I guess 15 inch gauge. I was on an escorted tour of a warehouse containing movie props and I was not able to spend much time to admire the locomotive model. It was explained that Disney used an automated process to later synchronise the movements of the actor filmed on green screen with that of the model locomotive ( don't ask me to explain it now ! ) as the locomotive image was later inserted into the film. Anyway, it amazed me as to how a 15 inch gauge model locomotive appeared to be absoultely real as later viewed in the movie. 

As to the hollywood inaccuracy of the western cowboys, in reality these gun slinger cowboy folks had little if any formal education and basically were thugs. The shoot out where each gunslinger walked towards each other down the main street of the western town is an absolute hollywood fabrication. Never happened. TV Ontario interviewed an American expert historian on this. He explained that it was immigrant film makers from Russia working in Hollywood that invented the walking towards each other down main street shoot out while the townsfolk watched from the side lines. I know that I am going to receive a lot of flack over this, but thems is them facts. Bounty hunters shot their human bounty with a shotgun from behind in the back. There was no code of honour in these manners. These bounty hunter folk were simply hired guns to kill their bounty in as a safe a manner as possible for themselves. The crude reality of historical western life needed to be cleaned up and romantised for the film industry. Furthermore, the distance at which these gunslingers shoot at each other in the films is a joke. They would be lucky to hit the side of a barn with those crude early handguns. Shooting a handgun out of the opponents hand is pure fantasy. Today's Police Officers using modern accurate handguns have great difficulty in hitting their target with fear and adrenaline pumping through their body. 

Anyway, the old westerns are great fun to watch. The John Ford westerns with the diamond stack locomotives really got me interested in steam trains at a young age. 

The funniest schene to me of Blazing Saddles is that of both the horse and the gunman being hung simulataneously. The multiple hangings unfortunately did accure in the old west with often innocents being hung instead of the guilty party. 


Norman


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