The Yankee Shop/Friends Models 3/4" scale, 3-1/2" gauge Boston and Albany Railroad 4-6-6 suburban tanker. Photo by Bob Hornsby. Taken in 1987 at the home of Charles A. "Carl" Purinton. If you would like this design back on the market, please scroll down for more information.
Here I am with my beloved Boston and Albany tanker. On some bad advice, I sold it in 1995, but had the opportunity to buy it back in 2009. It is now home.
This coal-fired 4-6-6 tanker was one of Yankee Shop/Friends Models' most popular designs. It is modeled after the Boston and Albany RR's 400-series class D1-A "tank engine" from American Locomotive Company (ALCO) in 1928. These engines saw commuter service in and out of South Station, Boston MA to Framingham, Milford, and Worcester from 1928 until the end of the steam era. The "tank" allowed them to run forward or backward without the need to turn around on a turntable. The model was originally developed by Harry Sait of Old Orchard Beach, ME and proved so popular among those who saw it and ran it, and such an operational success (it was "a good steamer" in every respect), that Lester Friend developed a version of this engine and made castinhgs available through his "Yankee Shop".
This design as a 3/4" scale live steamer is ideal. It is compact, yet powerful. It has a New York Central "Hudson" appearance when viewed from the front, and is nearly as large as one. The engine pictured, when owned by John Kurdzionak in the late 1980s, used to pull 3 adults with ease. Lester Friend used to claim that it could pull 8 adults around the New England Live Steamers (NELS) track at Danvers, MA. It weighs about 150 pounds and can be lifted by 2 adults for placement on, or removal from, the track.
It has slide valve cylinders "dummied" to look like piston valves, and Baker Valve Gear.
Friends will undertake the required pattern and foundry work, and will put this 4-6-6T back on the market, if there is enough interest in its return.
If YOU are interested in this design's return (rough castings), please make your desires known to me (see below).
Thank you for looking.
Richard Symmes runs John Kurdzionak's Boston and Albany tanker in 1987 at the home track of Charles A. "Carl" Purinton in Boxford, Massachusetts.
Cost for a complete set of brand new, top-quality, made in USA "sand castings" in iron and bronze (EXACTLY the same as formerly available from Yankee Shop):
$2,495.00
If you'd like this design back on the market, may I ask that you please make your desires known to me. Please participate in my "B & A Tanker Survey" by clicking HERE. The survey is so that I can determine how many people are seriously interested in these castings' return. You will incur no financial obligation by participating in the survey.
The survey went online October 29th, 2009 and will be online for the remainder of 2009 and into early 2010 (if required). The survey will be taken down in early 2010 if there is not enough interest by that time.
If by early 2010 the survey indicates to me that enough people are interested @ $2,495.00, then in early 2010 those interested will be asked to supply a 50% deposit ($1,250.00) for the castings.
If enough people supply deposits, the required pattern and foundry work for the B & A 4-6-6T will commence (in early 2010) and the castings will be produced for the first time since the 1970s. The other 50% balance (approximately $1,245.00) will be due when the castings are ready.
If not enough deposits are received, then your deposit will be returned and no pattern or foundry work will commence. For example, if 10 people are interested but only 5 send deposits, then your deposit will be returned in full and no pattern or casting work will commence. This design's return to market depends on serious interest by a substantial number of persons, and their wholehearted financial support.
I thank you very kindly for your interest. Please take the survey if interested in the return of the Boston and Albany 4-6-6T castings.
Harry Sait's ORIGINAL 3/4" scale Boston and Albany tank engine. Designed and built in the early 1930s by Mr. Sait, this locomotive was the inspiration for the "Yankee Shop" version developed by Lester Friend.
A superdetailed version of the Yankee Shop/Friends Models 3/4" scale, 3-1/2" gauge 4-6-6 Boston and Albany tanker. Photo courtesy Robert Hornsby.
The late J. Drennan "Doc" Lowell on his Yankee Shop/Friends Models Boston and Albany "tanker" at the former Norfolk Street site of the Waushakum Live Steamers in the 1970s. This is the locomotive seen elsewhere on this site that John Kurdzionak bought in 1987 after Doc Lowell's passing. Doc Lowell was a world-renowned bone surgeon by day, and an avid live steamer on the weekends!
