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Gibson 5ft wheel rims/tyres - has the design changed?


Boston Lodge
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Hi.

I've been working towards scratch-building a Bury 0-4-0 Goods loco, from the 1830's. These engines had 5ft wheels with rather unique round cast iron spokes. Nothing exists commercially but 3D printing offers the opportunity to create my own.

I bought 3 pairs of Gibson Bulleid wheels perhaps 25 years ago for a resin bodied Q1, which still remains half-built. Pushing the inner BoxPox centres out was quite easy leaving me with a set of nice accurate rims. I've now designed and had made suitable inserts for my Bury (Shapeways - FUD). They fit like a dream.

 

Bury 5ft screenshot

DSCF3732

DSCF3727

 

 

But, I also have some other Gibson 5 footers, 16 spoke, ref 4860E.

When the inserts are pushed out of these my new inners don't fit, the tyre rims are a different design, the rims are thinner and the insert needs to be bigger.

DSCF3728

DSCF3729

 
Can anyone answer why?
Perhaps the Bulleids are an old design and the 16 spokers are the new.
Changing my 3D print to suit the thinner rims is simple but if I ever think about trying to sell them I'll need to know which one to put in the market place.
 
Thanks in advance for any feedback.

 

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  • RMweb Gold

Changing my 3D print to suit the thinner rims is simple but if I ever think about trying to sell them I'll need to know which one to put in the market place.

 
Thanks in advance for any feedback.

 

 

I can't answer your question about whether they've changed, but I would say that if you intend selling something that involves using parts from another manufacturer you should contact them directly to discuss.

You could obviously just sell the 3D print and ask the customer to purchase their own wheels, but they could prove useless if the design of the Gibson wheels changes again without your knowledge.

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  • 3 weeks later...

Hi

 

I've just read this thread and I believe that the original Alan Gibson used to produce a Universal wheel ( for 00) which was wider than the EM wheel that he then produced.  The new Gibson wheels are the same for 00 or EM.  This would explain the difference in tyre widths.

 

Norman 

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I'm going back about 25-30 years ago the 00 EM and P4 were all different

 

Norman

For your timescale I'm with polybear! Are you maybe thinking of Ultrascale?

 

I'll need to know which one to put in the market place.

As Chris P Bacon says, talk to Colin at AGW

Regards

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  • RMweb Gold

If we're definately talking Gibson wheels in both cases then there is no reason why they can't be different but it does seem unikely.

The wheel centres are moulded in a three piece tool. One part of the tool produces the outside diameter of the plastic centre, another produces the spoke detail and contains the pin that makes the crankpin hole, a third insert does the axle hole allowing the same centre to do different diameter axles. These three parts locate in a tool block that takes two wheels at a time.

 

Theoretically, I suppose you would mould all 5ft wheels to use the same tyre but there is no reason you couldn't have more than one. Perhaps there is a thin tyre and a fat tyre 5ft version. I do that with my FR England engine wheels

The tyres are actually turned by AHB Services and the usual method of working when doing a new wheel is to mould a load of centres and send a sample to Alan at AHB, he will then adjust the tyre bore as they're turned to be a tight fit. Actually, having written that i can see how there could be differences between batches if they're made to match a centre like that.

 

Tyres for an 0-4-0 isnt really a batch size to suit setting up auto or CNC machines but if they were doing some near size tyres in a larger batch they may tweak a last few to suit your centres if you sent them a sample. Give Alan at AHB Services - Google finds them

 

Alan used to mould wheels for me. Colin currently does and I am slowly getting set up to do my own.

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Hi Colin.

Thanks for the reply.

I was really just asking to understand why the 2 different style centres had different style rims.

The original Bulleid wheels I bought would have been nearly 30 years ago but none of this is a problem - i was just interested.

 

Because the 3D prints fitted so well (even without making any adjustments for shrinkage estimates) my plan is to buy some more of the 'thinner' wheels, push the centres out and order some more prints based on measuring the 'more delicate' design.

 

I can only apologise that I'll only be buying the odd wheel, here and there. I work far too slowly.

 

Richard

Edited by Boston Lodge
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