Skeleton Edrig

I recently bought an Accucraft 'Edrig' power plant on eBay for about £320. List price was £370 but there are none available until at least June.

This is a fully working locomotive chassis and boiler but with no bodywork.
It is quite a good and cheap way to get into live steam if you feel like making your own bodywork.

I am thinking about building a simple square tram body.

Yes go for it Carl, a nice bicabine would look great! Presumably it would have to be in brass? I've never soldered brass before; how difficult is it?

mikey

I think it'll actually be a very simple open Tubize type cab that has featured in some of your postcards.

Soft soldering is not difficult to do and anyone with modext dexterity can do it.

There's no secret. Clean surfaces, flux, the right amount of heat.....oh and some solder.

Have a go with some scrap bits. Clean up the surfaces with some fine abrasive, brush a little flux onto the surfaces to be joined or into the assemble joint. You will need some means of holding the two surfaces or pices together. I often make jigs from wood and pins or screws to hold parts down. Apply heat with a powerful iron (min 50watts for thin bodywork) and when the metal is hot enough, offer some solder to the joint. The solder should melt instantly and flow easily into the joint. For heavy metal section I use a pencil flame torch sparingly!

I will post the progress here, when I get the time to start it.

Well done carl that looks a cracker - like the colour.

I expect you saw the article in February Garden Rail on the Edrig Tender conversion?



I think the long boilers look great with thinner boiler bands as on his conversion!

Can't wait to watch progress.

Cheers Brian

mikeyh wrote:

Yes go for it Carl, a nice bicabine would look great! Presumably it would have to be in brass? I've never soldered brass before; how difficult is it?

mikey

Hi Mikey

Completely agree with Carl don't be put off soldering it's easily mastered with preparation and patience. and immensely satisfying building your own loco's. I plan on building a cab roof / back for my Edrig so will post this on here too when I get started.

You're more than welcome to have a bash here with some scrap brass when you come over to play.

Cheers Brian

Carl

Why not go the whole hog and do the coal fired conversion Bracknell style?

I believe this one is based on an Edrig by DJB ...



Whoops, forgot you'r going for a TRAM !

Funny you post that tender version....
That's a nice job they made of it.

I have a Regner Hanna in kit that I may build as a tender variant. I have already built the tender!

So that's 2 live steam projects to do now this year.

The Edrig wasn't intented although I was considering one for the longer term. It was only because one came up new on eBay suddenly and with no more available in the near future it had to be bought.

I'm surprised that David Bailey uses the Edrig/Caradoc chassis for a coal fired machine.
To be fair the Accucraft and Roundhouse chassis are pretty lean and flimsy compared to Regner or Reppingen (or this new chap Hermann) engineering. The frames are twice as thick and heavy.

I think ultimately coal firing is the top for me. When my daughter is a bit older and I have some more money ( ) we'll see!

This is what I would have at the moment,

Casper 2.0

BTW Brian I have packed up you r/C and I will fight the OAPs and try and post it this week.

Can't believe how many Edrig based scratch builds and mods are out there ...

I think Carl's may well be the first Tram though?

carl hibbs wrote:

I think ultimately coal firing is the top for me. When my daughter is a bit older and I have some more money ( ) we'll see!

This is what I would have at the moment,

Casper 2.0

That's definitely the way to go. If someone on the forum could lend me the 3000 Euro's I'll happily pay my own travel costs to Appeldoorn to collect it!

Please PM me for bank transfer details

Brian

If anyone is interested in following Carl's lead and scratchbuilding their own body ..

I checked with Brandbright today and they have a couple of skeleton Edrigs left for £289 (plus £35.06 shipping to France)

Sorely tempted but coming a bit soon after my last purchase.

How about your first steamy Mikey?

B

£289......bloody hell.

Buy, buy, buy, and bye, bye, wife !

Seriously. anyone half thinking should buy.
I paid £320 on eBay plus £25 shipping. The new price will be at least £380 in the shops when and if they arrive on a slow boat from China in June.

Or you could always save up and buy a 20 year old Frank S that the wheels don't turn.

Mikey if you are thinking about that sweet smell of summer steam but not sure then talk to me.....!
I'm all ears.....

Be careful here - that looks like the price of the "bare" chassis to me.

Edrig Chassis

That is one without boiler and fittings, might upset Carl if you built your own boiler and burners

pjti wrote:

Be careful here - that looks like the price of the "bare" chassis to me.

Edrig Chassis

That is one without boiler and fittings, might upset Carl if you built your own boiler and burners

Well spotted - As there were no pics of it on the Brandbright site - one assumed.!

"Assumed makes an ASS out of U and ME"

Sorry to have raised your hopes guys.

Contrite in SW France!

carl hibbs wrote:

Or you could always save up and buy a 20 year old Frank S that the wheels don't turn.

I followed that thread on GSM can't believe someone would still want to buy it, given the chequered history of the model and the fact that this particular one appears to be bu****ed.

Well, I'd love to say how excited I had got at that price and how dissapointed i am now!! but i can't!! LOL I have a master plan (cunning) and at the moment am concentrating on getting as much track together as I can (but a steamer IS now part of the plan)

Mikey

Brian....a fool and his money come to mind.

I've tried to advise even today as I've been there myself and made those mistakes.

I said right at the beginning of that thread to leave well alone.

Mikey....I'm sending you a PM about steam trains.....shhh....

Clarification please, I undersood that distilled water was de rigour for small boilers and that de-ionised was very bad?
They are produced in different ways and in fact distilled water falls from the sky.

Distilled water and de-ionised water are sometimes marketed as the same thing but they are not as you say, a different process is used.
True distilled water comes from a number of often natural sources. De-ionising is a process removing certain mineral elements from the water.

From my experience filtered rainwater goes best in my locos.

On inspecting a loco that had used de-ionised water all it's life...an old imported Roundhouse Lady Anne I found that some of the silver soldered joints showed signs of a sort of corrosion. This was confirmed by an eminent steamologist as yes, de-ionising the water can cause a long term reaction with the solder.

Some people use different methods. Regner recommend a mixture of distilled water and about 5% of tap water for example.

I have followed this thread and the one on GSM with interest.

I like the look of the Frank S (In Steam or electric powered guises)
Have to say though - if the wheels can't be turned by hand - forget it.

Being a Stainz freak, I saw a Regner live steam model at the Llanfair Garden Rail show 18 months back
But it cost £1800 without R/C

I would have to sell my entire Stainz fleet of 21 locos to buy one live steam model !

Bruce has run his 0-6-0 live steam loco on the Linz Gstadt Bahn - and it managed the gradients and the R1 s with ease - it does have the benefit of R/C though.

If I was to dip my toe in the water of live steam, I would buy a Regner Konrad (geared type).
This too has run on my line - a charming little machine.

My (track powered) Frank S

I have edited and deleted a number of posts as I want to carry on this thread about working with an Edrig power unit which will have a tram body.

There is a new thread started about buying a steam locomotive in general.

Well done Admin, this is much nicer - and while you're at it you should ban that Carl Hibss chap from posting . His posts could be inflammatory and upsetting to some.

pjti wrote:

Well done Admin, this is much nicer - and while you're at it you should ban that Carl Hibss chap from posting . His posts could be inflammatory and upsetting to some.

I agree the more posts from Admin and the less from that opinionated Hibbs character the better.

Anyway I heard on the grapevine that he was taking his daughter to EuroDisney this afternoon, so we may have an un-interrupted afternoon

Eh....what....who.....me....?