The Highview Light Railway

No 1

The first of many ???

Not so much "Old No1", currently "The Only One".

I started from a position of no knowledge so decided that having no workshop facilities I should let someone else do the hard work and I'd buy a chassis. I happened to be in Compass House at Rotherfield and spotted a second hand Maxitrak power bogie sitting amoungst the goodies. A bit of bargaining soon had it heading towards it's new home in Kent.

My new toy appeared to be unused so I went straight into building a chassis for the body out of 1"x1" angle bought at great cost from B&Q. A base plate of 18mm MDF was screwed to the chassis frame and then a body made from 6mm MDF started to take shape.

The Power Bogie and chassis frame are bolted together separated by 6 rubber door stops. This was my answer to providing suspension but I suspect it has no real effect.

Performance is sedate. It's probably the slowest thing at my local club but i'm told it's typical of Maxitrak loco's. However, it's perfectly adequate and safe for the younger ones to drive. And i've never yet managed to exhaust the 62Ah battery that I use. The speed controller was purchased from Maxitrak and works well.

Most disappointing thing is that I don't get much time to run it at my local track...Such is life...!