I’ve always loved steam trains. I’ve drawn scores of trains through the years as fine art. I’ve painted many trains larger than life as murals on walls across Canada and the USA. And in our theme park work, trains continue to be very popular. Most of the trains were logging trains. One was a pirate train, which went to Trinidad and was a lot of fun to build! The colourful Sci-fi version was built for Galaxyland in West Edmonton Mall. I’ve got more on the drawing board, and I look forward to building the next.
Roughing in the scorpion
Henry was a little disappointed to hear I would be in Nebraska all of this week. We made up for it by devoting much of Friday to the float. We changed two tires and roughed in the armature of the scorpion's body. Henry measured and cut steel while I did the welding. We managed to do the bulk of the lower body and started on one of the claws, which will be articulated by pulling the rod from the driver’s seat. He was happy to delegate that operation to me as he figures he will be plenty busy throwing candy and squirting the stinger from his lofty perch on the tail. Stay tuned for more progress next week when I get back to the studio…
Tail structure complete
The first question I am asked each time Henry visits the shop is ‘Can we work on the parade float today?’ The parade float isn’t a high priority As I am currently very busy designing next year’s paying projects for customers but we often try to make at least a little progress. We’ve already stripped down the old dragon parade float from a few years ago and set up the golf cart chassis on some jack stands. The driver’s seat was mounted late last week but today it was finally time to get serious and do some actual work that Henry could appreciate. We decided to fabricate the curved structure that would curl up over my seat to form the scorpion tail. Henry measured and carefully cut the steel tubing. He is good with a tape measure! As fast as he could operate the metal bandsaw I welded the pieces together. Henry got more excited with every piece and by the time he headed home this afternoon it was at long last time to climb up to his lofty chair for the first test fit. He enthusiastically approved! Stay tuned for more progress…
