After a number of stop-starts over many years and for a variety of reasons which resulted in the project being moved through a number of manufacturers, the NSWGR 59 class project is again underway.
This time, the 59 class is part of a much larger program which is already seeing progress on the 59 class project as well as a number of other both major and minor projects. Details of these projects will be released regularly on this blog, located as it is on the new, Shopify hosted website.
Meetings between Eureka and our Chinese manufacturer have already reviewed the 59 class project making up-dates where deemed necessary in order to accommodate manufacturing and material improvements that have taken place since the projects' inception.
One such change is the decision to switch from a boiler made of injection plastic to one made of white metal.
When Eureka Models first went to China in 2004, the use of white metal bodies was considered for our AD60 but the advice of our then manufacturer was that the technology for using white metal was not quite ready yet and that injection plastic produced better details and finish.
Since then the manufacturing process using white metal has improved to the point that it is considered that white metal boilers and their decoration are now a match for boilers of injection plastic with the added weight over the driving wheels that white metal boilers provide being a major factor in their favour. This additional weight over the driving wheels that white metal boilers provide is especially useful in steam engines where the space in the boiler is restricted or taken up by motor and gears etc.
A number of other areas of improvement such as in motors and gears are being incorporated into the 59 class design and this will be a topic for regular up-dates through this blog along with progress reports on the overall project.
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