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 Posted - December 18 2014 : 10:01:53 AM
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It seems I forgot the video when posting this. 
Tycomaniacs:
I was blundering around the internets, looking for cookies, when i found this wonderful video:
Guilford Mack is one of those one-man manufacturers that built this hobby. I believe he is still in business, though in an "older and slower" way, as he himself put it a few years back. If so, this makes him the last manufacturer of HO locomotives in America.
The. Last. In. Am er ica.
His company is Tiger Valley Models. If you've never encountered them, they are metal kits of Alco diesels, because Mack likes Alco. They are well detailed, heavy and powerful, and have an unusual Delrin-chain drive that works very well.
This video shows Mack, his model railroad, his small shop, and his wife "Tiger" for whom the company is partially named. :)
http://centralny.twcnews.com/content/news/135599/model-train-maker--a-closer-look-at-a-legacy/
Things I really liked:
-The maverick DIY independent spirit shown by Mr. Mack himself. Love that! So much!
-The terrific model railroad of course, and look at all that cast metal! Darth Santa Fe will be envious...
-The informative display of simple, small-scale, yet effective production methods that many of us could easily emulate.
Tiger Valley diesels were and are made from a zinc-cadmium alloy. (I am pretty sure this is the jewelry alloy known as Nye-600 or some similar composition.) They are centrifugally cast in vulcanized rubber molds. Standard jewelers' techniques. Drive components were sourced from the NWSL catalog. Nothing fancy or inaccessible. Just a cottage shop like many others in our hobby history.
An interesting similarity: Arbour steam kits were made from the same material by the same casting process, yet Arbour went away, while TVM produced well-liked products for the last 30 years. Why? I think the answer is design. Mr. Mack is combining proven drive components with his own parts in a design which minimizes complexity and problems. With better design work, Arbour could very well have been a lasting success. Take advantage of the strengths of your process and minimize its weaknesses. That's how you end up being the last HO train builder in America...
But does he have to be the last ever?
I wonder!
Looking at this video, I think - this is something many of us could do. This hobby doesn't have to be tied to a half-dozen boring pipelines of imports from one or two Chinese companies. It could be anything we want it to be. And Mack is even having fun with trains while making his hobby what he wants it to be. That's inspiring!
No, Mack doesn't have to be the last HO trainbuilder in America.
Transcript of the video in case the site goes away at some point:
quote:
"I started Tiger Valley Models in 1979," said model train enthusiast Guilford Mack Jr. "I bought some expensive brass locomotives imported from Japan. They were not very good, and I paid quite a bit of money for them, and I thought to myself that I could build something a lot better than this a lot cheaper, and that's why I got started."
"So I cashed in my retirement fund and built a room upstairs in the barn," Mack said, "and put all this stuff in there, and casting the models that I sell and also for myself. We put some talcum powder in the mold, the talcum powder acts as a lubricant for the metal flow. We place the teflon insert in put the piece in the mold, make sure it's seated, put it in the spin-caster, and when I close the lid it'll start to rotate."
"Get Fresh clean metal, pour. Lift it out, spread the rubber apart and pull the casting out."
"I like building kits or scratch building from basic materials. The panels are my own design and built by myself. I use a strange system that probably no one else in the country uses, I use a dimmer switch to control the train speed," said Mack.
"The basic premise of this model railroad is the KISS principal, which means keep it simple stupid. There's a lot of wires because there's a lot of switch machines and a lot of blocks. All the panels have volt meter, amp meter, circuit breakers, reversing switches."
"Some of the scenic greets in here are the passenger station; that's 12 feet long with curved canopies over the train platforms. And then there's a 21 foot long tressel that crosses the basement going out to the outer walls."
"Well Tiger Valley was taken from my girlfriend's nickname, who I've been married to for almost 44 years, and the Valley came from the Lehigh Valley, so the two favorite things in my life," Mack said.
"It's been a work-in-progress for 36 years now and it will probably never be completely completed...I won't live long enough."
Mack says he draws his inspiration from real trains that were once a common scene in the Auburn and Syracuse areas.
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This video has been so inspiring to me in the last few days. I hope others can share that feeling of inspiration.
Edited by - Autobus Prime on December 18 2014 1:16:20 PM
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 Posted - December 18 2014 : 10:21:58 AM
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Tried looking up Tiger Valley Models and had no luck. I'm at work, so I do not have alot of time to spend browsing the internet. Can you add a few links?
Sean
Sean
"If everything seems under control, you're not going fast enough!" - Mario Andretti!
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Posted - December 18 2014 : 11:49:42 AM
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Sean:
Well, he hasn't got much of a web presence nowadays ^_^ But here is a facebook page:
https://www.facebook.com/pages/Tiger-Valley-Models/161107140576869
There is contact info on the fb page, I can PM it to people if they don't do facebook. It was sent to Modelmaker of the trains.com page, for public distribution.
(Modelmaker actually forwarded his email to me at that point, I kind of misremembered, there was a messy situation where RMC thought I was the keeper of Tiger Valley info and I kept trying to point them to Modelmaker. This was back in 2009 when they had a RS3m article using some TVM parts. )
Edited by - Autobus Prime on December 18 2014 11:53:36 AM
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Posted - December 18 2014 : 12:02:50 PM
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AB: I'm inspired just reading his quotes! Going to look at his FB page 
Note - well his FB page does have his contact info, but was hoping to see some photos. 
http://tycodepot.com/
Edited by - JNXT 7707 on December 18 2014 12:06:37 PM
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Posted - December 18 2014 : 12:47:57 PM
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I'm an idiot!! 
It seems I forgot the most important part of my post: the link to the ACTUAL VIDEO lol.
Fixed now. It's in the first post, and here too:
http://centralny.twcnews.com/content/news/135599/model-train-maker--a-closer-look-at-a-legacy/
  
quote:AB: I'm inspired just reading his quotes! Going to look at his FB page
Note - well his FB page does have his contact info, but was hoping to see some photos.
Originally posted by JNXT 7707Â -Â December 18 2014Â :Â 12:02:50 PM
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A certain Santa Fe Sith Lord whom we may know reviewed a Tiger Valley RSD-12 for the MR forum at one point...
http://cs.trains.com/mrr/f/88/t/164639.aspx
Edited by - Autobus Prime on December 18 2014 1:12:36 PM
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Posted - December 18 2014 : 3:35:19 PM
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Pretty neat guy! WOuld love to learn how to do that. The hard part is, getting a mold made of what you want. I could melt metal. But learning the molding process is the toughest part. Neat video article.
Jerry
" When life throws you bananas...it's easy to slip up"
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Posted - December 18 2014 : 3:58:52 PM
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quote:Pretty neat guy! WOuld love to learn how to do that. The hard part is, getting a mold made of what you want. I could melt metal. But learning the molding process is the toughest part. Neat video article.
Jerry
Originally posted by AMC_Gremlin_GTÂ -Â December 18 2014Â :Â 3:35:19 PM
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He makes his own vulcanized-rubber molds. While I have never done this personally, I have some basic familiarity with the process. Soft raw rubber is packed around a master in a metal frame, then squeezed and baked in a heated press until it becomes harder and elastic. Raw rubber actually flows under pressure to fill the fine detail, and the heat causes it to polymerize and cross-link.
Wax masters for lost-wax casting can be molded in vulcanized molds, but they can also be used directly for white metal casting (as Mr. Mack is doing.)
C.C. Crow actually has a nice illustrated guide:
http://www.cccrow.com/how-2/metal.html
You can see how simple the press actually is in these photos.
I don't know how Mr. Mack makes his masters. One nice thing about this process is that sunken detail is sunken and relief is relief. No need to cut away everything but the door gap on your diesel hood. ^_^
Edited by - Autobus Prime on December 18 2014 3:59:56 PM
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Posted - December 19 2014 : 09:48:18 AM
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I find it somewhat refreshing that there's still some H0 stuff being made in the USA.I searched them and found that their models actually kinda have an old fashioned appeal to them. Like the fact that they're kits, they come in old school style packaging, etc. It's actually kinda cool.
-Steve
"A lot of modellers out there who go to these train shows see broken HO stuff and go, 'This is useless' when, in reality, they can still be used for modeling whether it's as a prop on your layout or a cool project to make something old new again."
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Posted - December 19 2014 : 7:01:45 PM
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I'd forgotten about Tiger Valley, and Darth's review. Such a cool success story, and amazing to think he's surviving in today's RTR climate.
Autobus, I was thinking about your dissertation on zinc rot and the parts per thousand contaminants and had to wonder if any of his castings have disintegrated over the years. That sort of contamination could happen very easily in a cottage industry like this.
It's also interesting to note that his quiet, reliable drive train is a tank drive from the days of open frame motors, and with a robotic chain drive no less. Next thing you know rubber bands will be making a comeback.
The Tyco Depot
Edited by - NickelPlate759 on December 19 2014 7:05:31 PM
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Posted - December 19 2014 : 7:43:53 PM
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quote:I'd forgotten about Tiger Valley, and Darth's review. Such a cool success story, and amazing to think he's surviving in today's RTR climate.
Autobus, I was thinking about your dissertation on zinc rot and the parts per thousand contaminants and had to wonder if any of his castings have disintegrated over the years. That sort of contamination could happen very easily in a cottage industry like this.
It's also interesting to note that his quiet, reliable drive train is a tank drive from the days of open frame motors, and with a robotic chain drive no less. Next thing you know rubber bands will be making a comeback.
Originally posted by NickelPlate759Â -Â December 19 2014Â :Â 7:01:45 PM
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His alloy is not zamak (zinc, aluminum, magnesium, and copper). It's a zinc-cadmium alloy. I think it's actually almost pure zinc with a small percent cadmium added. I don't know if these can get zinc pest, but Arbour used a similar alloy and I never heard any confirmed reports of zinc pest on those.
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Posted - January 05 2015 : 12:31:53 AM
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Now there's a guy who's got an American spirit that so many have lost! The Tiger Valley RSD-12 I have is still a great runner.
The white metal he uses is similar to what other small manufacturers in the USA use, since it's easy to work with and conforms well to detail (though not as well as brass). It's softer than the usual zinc alloy and has a lower melting temperature, so it's solderable if you're careful. The metal's easy to work on, and it's very heavy!
Darth Santa Fe, doing weird and challenging projects for the fun of it!
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Posted - February 17 2015 : 03:30:18 AM
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How would go about buying a engine from him?
" Heck with counting 'em rivets, TRAINS ARE FOR FUN! Not called the Mad Scientist for nothing either!"
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Posted - February 17 2015 : 09:28:09 AM
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quote:  The one and only; Darth Santa Fe. (Darth Vader theme from Star Wars plays) But yeah, I love the fact that there's still someone making H0 scale equipment in the United States, though. I'll definitely try looking for them at shows and stuff, maybe.
-Steve
"A lot of modellers out there who go to these train shows see broken HO stuff and go, 'This is useless' when, in reality, they can still be used for modeling whether it's as a prop on your layout or a cool project to make something old new again."
Edited by - kovacste000 on February 17 2015 09:29:13 AM
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