Gordon Corwin

Shay Progress 1956
Brotherhood of Live Steamers

News from the Pacific Region

Harry Dixon, Hayward, California

The North American Live Steamer, Volume 1 Number 4

Gordon Corwin of the Southern California Live Steamers club sent good news that he now has his 1-1/2 inch narrow gauge Shay operating on air.

The entire chassis with drive wheels and engine are considered 95% complete.

After a 10-hour break in test with light oil and graphite, the throttle was cracked open another notch, which brought the speed indicator up to 1725 RPM.

With a gearing ration of 2 to 1 it would take 317 RPM to make 1 mile per hour or 1268 RPM to make 4 miles per hour, which is considerable over track speed of a prototype. However, it is felt that a miniature engine of this type would have to do 4 to 5 miles per hour to be impressive.

Next on his agenda is the boiler, and then we hope to give you a later report on the progress of this very fine engineering accomplishment.

Carl Herrera Restoration
From Chaski.org

Postwarbob posted:


 * Carl Herrera now owns this engine . He has totally restored it to its original beauty. He spent many hours repiping and repairing worn out parts . The purple paint is still the original paint but most of the black paint is new.

David Rohrer posted:


 * The Shay really looks great, I remember it from when Francis Moseley owned it, was pleased to see you even have the cable wrapped around the sand dome.

Gordon Corwin Meets
From The Miniature Locomotive, July/August 1953

By C. S. Chovil, Secretary, Southern California Live Steamers

The Gordon Corwin annual picnic and engine meet proved very popular with S.C.L.S.. the attendance was more than in the past years, the day was perfect and the tracks of the SUNKIST LINES in good condition. Many members brought their lunches as invited, came early and stayed until the last boiler was blown down. The roster of locomotives was as follows: Jim Keith's 1 inch scale Hudson; Barny Shrive's 3/4 inch scale N.Y.C. Niagara; Irene Lewis's 1 inch scale six-wheel switcher operated by Bob Harpur;  Milton Uhler's 3/4 inch Tom Thumb;  John Matthew's 3/4 inch English Shunting engine "Pug";  Burt Petersen's 3/4 inch Northern;  Bill wightman's 3/4 inch 2-4-4 tank engine; Andy Wightman's 3/4 inch Mogul and J.D. Hillyard's 3/4 inch Atlantic.