Pre-war Flyer 4695 stupidity

[ScaleCraft]

I seem to be the place to send these things recently. Okay, I can replace drivers and lead/trail wheels. Surface commutators, clean brushholders, clean reversers, find missing parts, all that.

But:

I have never seen anything designed like these.
Reminds me of the 25 blind men and an elephant.

So, to start, a visual US prototype 4-4-2......with main rod connected to lead driver crankpin.......and valve gear / eccentric on rear driver crankpin. Okay.
Then expansion link.....I know how they work.....yet this is hung and pivoted from the top, with eccentric rod at bottom....NOT pivoted in the middle to allow reversing of steam via valve body.

Visually causes my eyeballs to rack and lock.

Now, reversing. Okay, levers in cab. One goes fore and aft, reverses, I can understand that. The other lever goes up and down....drops the front of reversing rod (in void around commutator and brushes), when dropped, ring catches hammerheads on idler gear shaft, SEEMS to function as a auto reverse....in three inches of travel. With a slip clutch.
And nobody seems to know the purpose.

Then there is the circus involved with pulling the motor block out.

Remove everything (including firebox side sheets) then slide aft, lift front, slide forward, lift again, pull up at an angle....certainly NOT designed for ease of maintenance!

[E7]

....certainly NOT designed for ease of maintenance!

They that designed it, were NOT figuring on maintaining it!

[healey36]

Coleman made stuff that looked nice, not stuff that was easy to take care of. Elegance of design was purely an external thing. That said, the 4695 is, to my mind, the loveliest standard/wide gauge locomotive every made. Lionel had nothing aesthetically comparable, nor Ives. It's just a beautiful thing.

Here's one I saw on Worthpoint recently:



Looks all the better for having had the rims on the drivers blackened (not something done by Flyer, I don't think). If something like this fell in your lap, you lucked out I'd say, even if it never moves off the mantel.

[ScaleCraft]

If I was into SG, yes. 700E or 5344K is more my style.

Look at that photo, closely, tell me your eyeballs don't rack over and lock in the stops when you see where the mainrods connect to the drivers, then where the eccentric crank connects.

[healey36]

You have to look past all of the technical stuff

[ScaleCraft]

You have to look past all of the technical stuff

Like where the expansion link pivots?

You get one of these, and try to take it apart...first time, cold....I am certain you'll figure it out....but it's like one a them Chinese Puzzle boxes.

[healey36]

I’m sure it’s a pain, likely one requiring five hands to reassemble (presuming you can get it apart). I’ve got my grandfather’s 1096 box-cab electric that I can’t figure out how to crack open. It almost looks like you have to bend tabs to get the shell off, but that can’t be right...right?

[ScaleCraft]

I’m sure it’s a pain, likely one requiring five hands to reassemble (presuming you can get it apart). I’ve got my grandfather’s 1096 box-cab electric that I can’t figure out how to crack open. It almost looks like you have to bend tabs to get the shell off, but that can’t be right...right?

right. Seen one early pre-war Lionel had to bend tabs. DON'T bend the tabs. Has to be a way.