Glowplug Engine Powered Mack by Graham Drake

My sons and I have been experimenting with fitting "internal combustion" engines into models and the attached photos and video show the results so far.  We intended the glowplug engines to be self starting and to power a generator, which then supplied power to the traction motor(s). The motor attached to the glowplug engine acts as a starter generator. Speed control is by the engine throttle alone, operated by a (radio controlled) servo, which unfortunately came loose during the filming leading to erratic running!  Forward and reverse is by a a servo powered reversing switch, using a second channel on the radio system. As you can see, the loco chassis is a "Mack", and they don't come much smaller than that!  Therefore the engine/generator set should easily fit into much larger models of locos, using the original model's traction motors. The whole assembly costs less than a smoke-sound system and when I have sorted out a few problems with throttle control, radio interference and tuning of the exhaust to make it sound more realistic, I may market the engine-generator set and controls.

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Scratch Built Locos built by Peter Smith and John Smith
 

The bogies are US Trains 45mm gauge. The body is scratch built using Plasticard. The radio control is by Remote Control Systems. The sound card is by Dallee. On-board batteries provide the power.
 

At G Rail 2005 I had a partly built 2-8-0 on show on the fiddle yard of my layout. The loco is finished now, it uses an etched C16 chassis from Old Originals models, with the remainder scratch-built from plastic card.
 

The photos on the left and right are of an East German 0-4-0-0-4-0 articulated mining loco before the paint job.  The centre picture shows the completed loco which has sound, lights, firebox flicker and smoke.

The loco is finished in 'as built' condition, as delivered from the Baldwin factory in 1880.