Constructing "Old 99" #5: Rolling along

I sanded the cove on the front wheel assembly first thing this morning.

Front and rear wheel blocks.

The wheels for the engine drive need holes drilled 9/16” from the center of the axle hole. From past experience I know it’s important that these holes are as accurate as possible. So I took a small piece of axle dowel and found center and put a wheel on it. From center I marked 9/16”.

A tip: when you want to remove the dowel from the wheel, wrap the dowel with sand paper and you should be able to twist them apart. I have a foot square piece of plywood with 1/4” thick strips nailed at 90° to each other. I have a small rod with a point that goes into the drill press, used to find the center of where the quill is. With the wheel in the corner of the 1/4” strips the quill is brought down to the mark on the wheel; lock the quill down.
Then clamp the plywood to the DP table. Release the quill and put a 5/32” bit in the chuck, holding the wheel tight to the corner drill the hole. The other 3 wheels are just put in the corner and drilled.

Now that the wheels are ready, we can go back to the wheel assemblies.
On the plans for both front and rear wheel assemblies it says: “This height may need to be adjusted if wheels do not touch evenly”. They didn’t so, over to the belt sander and take a little off the top. I used feeler gauges to figure out how much, just over 1/32”.

The wheels are not glued but now all the wheels will ride the rails.

-- If we learn from our mistakes, I'm getting a fantastic education.