Westlake Publishing Forums

Hello modeling friends
I am always on the Internet to look for new modeling projects. Some time ago I came across the Hulett ore loader.

These machines were used at the Great Lakes in the early to middle of the last century to unload iron ore from vessels.
Here you can see the machines in action:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1RJfnk2S330
Very impressive, I think.

Of course, this is far away from what I normally build. But I would be interested in the modeling challenge of rebuilding such a beast in a functional way. In 1:35th scale, it would be 4.8 ft or 1.5 m long at least.
(Illustration: Historic American Engineering Records (HAER), Dept of Interior)

Now my questions about this:
Mike Rabbitt offered a set of drawings in 1:87th scale. Unfortunately, he passed away last year and it is unclear at the moment what will happen with his work.
Do anybody of you know where to get these drawings today?
Or do anybody of you have the drawings and could make them available to me?
Do anybody of you live at the Great Lakes and could take pictures of the few remaining machines (e.g. in Cleveland) for me?
I have relatives in the USA who could take care of shipping the documents to Switzerland if necessary.

Many thanks for your feed-back.

Bernhard

The "remaining" ones are all in pieces on Whiskey island in Cleveland, probably never to be put together again. One of my uncles operated them at Ashtabula. I always wanted to build one. I have the Rabbitt drawings but don't know how I could copy them. A montage of digital pictures maybe. There are a lot of pictures of them online. Here is one good source:

https://clevelandmemory.contentdm.oclc.org/digital/search/searchterm/hulett

A quite good model exists at the maritime museum in Ashtabula

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=C3bkh7ZxzcI

I follow this person on Flickr, he has many good Hulett pictures:
https://www.flickr.com/photos/115892967@N03/albums/72157640696962653

I hope you do this project...I probably never will.

Lastly...the sad state of what is left of the Huletts can be seen in the approx. center of the loop of track:
https://www.google.com/maps/place/Whiskey+Island/@41.4942899,-81.7235147,183m/data=!3m1!1e3!4m5!3m4!1s0x8830f05c381015fd:0x7a46229d490b9f19!8m2!3d41.4958841!4d-81.7165209

Walthers made a Huelett kit in HO scale.
This is a link to an O scale modeler who used the Walthers kit to fabricate O scale parts to build a Huelett in 2015.
Maybe you can find a way to contact him to see if he has any other plans or photos that he worked from. https://ogrforum.ogaugerr.com/topic/new-project-hulet-loader

Here is a link to a post of a modeler who built a Huelett in 1:32. It is a functional model, but built from pieces similar to an Erector Set rather than a scale model. I don't know the date the model was built
https://www.nzmeccano.com/Documents.php?show=32

Here is a link to the Bowling Green State University Library  Jeff Clark Hulett Collection that has plans:https://lib.bgsu.edu/finding_aids/items/show/2728

Maybe some of these can help.

Thanks Bill.
I also found the Walthers kit, as well as this H0 -> 0 conversion. However, this is not necessarily the approach I want to build my models.
The link to the Bowling Green State University Library seems interesting, I'll have to take a closer look.

Bernhard

You might be interested in this thread on the railroad-line forums:

http://www.railroad-line.com/forum/topic.asp?TOPIC_ID=17649

Beware, it is 30 pages long...

Paul
Thanks for your information. If you can find any way to copy the plans, I would be very interested. Of course I would pay for all costs.

Hauk
I saw this thread as well. It is very interesting because it gives a good insight into the structure of the unloaders.

Bernhard

As for reproducing the plans, do you have a shop similar to Staples near to you?  I have had them successfully duplicate drawings as large as an A plate for reasonable prices.  I have had to copy old East Broad Top drawings over the years to allow work on repair and restoration to continue.  Also, the Library of Congress' Industrial Heritage Program may have plans for sale or because it is an agency of the US Government for download without worry of copyright issues.

Thats just "jaw opening stuff " looks a lot of fun building that one
Barney

First I have to find the drawings! Then let me see what I can do...honestly I don't make ANY unnecessary trips anywhere these days. So if I can manage something at home I will. I once copied about 100 drawing of a locomotive by putting them on the floor and shooting them! With color correction they read fine.

Paul, the project is certainly not worth any health risk. But of course I am grateful for any other support.

Bernhard

Much of the Library of Congress is available on the Web.  It takes a bit of digging to find some of it, but since there is no copyright you won't have a problem copying it.  Or, most of their plans can be purchased.

I will try and dig the drawings out this weekend and take a sample photo(s)

Paul