Prototype Details
W. Day & Sons Pty. Ltd. were a small family owned engineering company located in South Melbourne. The company closed in the '60s and the location is buried under a casino. They were well known for their water pumps, but from the mid '20s to the early '40s they also sold some fifty odd small rail tractors in two main versions, based on either an 0-4-0, or an 0-6-0, cast steel chassis, fitted with a tractor power unit.
Early ones were powered by a modified Fordson model F tractor. When Ford stopped making Model F tractors in the US, Days changed to using more powerful McCormick-Deering tractors made by International Harvester. Tractors at the time generally ran on power kerosene (TVO in the UK), although they were started with petrol and only switched over once the motor had warmed up. Power kero was cheaper than petrol and a rail tractor was claimed to do twice the work of a horse team, at a third the cost.
The 0-4-0 rail tractors seem to have mostly gone to industrial or civil engineering users. The 0-6-0 versions seem to have mostly ended up in the timber industry, replacing horse haulage on timber trams.
Days rail tractors were fairly standardised, unlike their main competitor Malcolm Moore, who built a similar number of rail tractors in a bewildering range of designs, all powered by Fordson Model F, or the later Model N, tractors.
Model Story
The long delay in building these two rail tractors was that suitable rtr miniature Fordson Model F tractors are unobtainable in 1:20.3 scale. The somewhat crude Ertl model and the expensive International Hobbies model are both made in 1:16 scale, which is far too large for a scale model Days rail tractor. That left scratch building and I was in no hurry to get into scratch building tractors.
Then at the last GSSU in 2025 opportunity knocked on the door. One of the commercial tables had a 3D printed 7/8" kit for a Days 0-4-0 rail tractor displayed. I was more interested in the 0-6-0 version, so I politely asked if it would be possible to get the tractor part of the kit printed off in 1:20.3 scale. The answer was yes and I ordered two.
The consequence was that work started on the model rail tractors, beginning with turning the wheels. No research needed, as that was done years ago and the search results were already in the files. The models are based on one of the Days rail tractors that ran on Russell's timber tram that interchanged with the VR at Gembrook and ran to timber mills out along the Black Snake Creek.
The first pic in the composite photo shows the turned wheels and 3D prints for one tractor. The kit I saw had a tractor printed in one piece but the supplier decided to convert to a multi-piece to make printing easier. Fine with me, it made detailing a lot easier as the build proceeded. The 3D prints are hollow, so don't add anything much in the way of weight to the model.
The second pic shows a chassis ready to be fitted with the motor/gearbox, The design being built with my usual preferred methods and is basically a simple small diesel chassis. Designed to be nice and heavy for hauling a scale load.
The third pic shows the assembled drive minus the covers, ready to be installed and wired.
- Days-a-d-e.jpg (290.32 KiB) Viewed 1934 times
The chassis of the models is built as heavily as was practical, to get a drawbar pull high enough to pull a scale load. The motor drive is more visible than I'd like and there was no space to also fit rechargeable battery cells, or hide the on/charge switch, the charging socket and the rx-esc. These were built into the timber load on a pair of log bogies.
The first pic in the next composite photo shows the electrickery arrangements hidden away inside the load of timber. Shown from above, before the top layer of the load was added.
The second pic shows the timber pair coupled to a rail tractor. Visible is the gearbox fitted to the chassis and the wiring running in a groove under the drawbar, as well as the miniature plugs fitted so the electrical can be separated for maintenance.
The third pic shows a completed shelter assembly ready to be fitted. The framing is K&S brass tubing and the corrugated sheet is copper shim fed through the corrugator rolls I built using the rolls from a paper crimper. Fully annealed 0.25mm copper shim is much easier to form than 0.25mm brass shim. Standing on the bench on its own it looks like a small hay shed.......
- Days-h-i-l.jpg (245.37 KiB) Viewed 1934 times
The first pic in the next composite photo shows a running chassis fitted with an assembled and detailed Fordson Model F print. The pressed steel seat typical of tractors was beaten to shape on a wooden former. Again copper shim was found to be much easier to form than brass shim.
Some of these rail tractors ran in this condition, not that the usual shelter did much except keep the sun off. There's an old photo showing one without a shelter, running on the timber tram at Tanjil Bren in winter. Some poor soul is huddled in a greatcoat driving the thing in snow up to the footplate.
The second and third pics show a completed model rail tractor with a driver figure temporarily fitted. Ready for the paint shop.
- Days-k-o-p.jpg (309.46 KiB) Viewed 1934 times
There seems to be no record of paint colours used on Days Fordson rail tractors when they were new. Preserved ones are in all the colours of the rainbow, so when the weather improves enough for painting I'll need to make an executive decision on the paint scheme.
The final weight of the completed model has come out at a 640g and the max. drawbar pull was measured at 150g during a bench test. So a single rail tractor should easily handle a scale load on the track.
Graeme
