Videos I've seen of the Cumbres & Toltec Scenic Railroad's steam-powered rotary snowplow OY in action tend to indicate that there are so many other noises involved you can't even hear the plow's steam engine.
THANKS for the input, After a few hours of checking web sites, I decided a two cylinder sound decoder will be installed. But like all things railroad, advancements in power and function improve. Lima built four "super Power" rotaries. These used a double bank of three cylinders taken directly from there shay. The Athearn rotary looks to be an exact model of the Lima super power. I have rotaries from Athearn and Walthers. The Walthers is what I will use as it "fits" my railroad better, rustic!
Very simple to do a You Tube search for rotary snow blower. You will find videos of the ones run by steam engine. Will probably sound like a Climax loco running unloaded which will be a two cylinder sound at fairly high rpm and all the mechanisms on the prototypes have a lot of other mechanical noise. Usually lot of whistle noises as that is how the operator would communicate with the loco engineer that is pushing the rotary.
Rich
If you ever fall over in public, pick yourself up and say “sorry it’s been a while since I inhabited a body.” And just walk away.
I think the main thing would be that the engine is going to be running fast for the plow, so you shouldn't hear the individual 'chugs' as in a normal steam loco running slow.
Elmer.
The above is my opinion, from an active and experienced Model Railroader in N scale and HO since 1961.
(Modeling Freelance, Eastern US, HO scale, in 1962, with NCE DCC for locomotive control and a stand alone LocoNet for block detection and signals.) http://waynes-trains.com/ at home, and N scale at the Club.
I would use a light steam sound. I have seen the insides of a couple steam type snow blowers and they used two cylinder setup. Have seen some diagrams of prototypes also and they were two cylinder versions. Never have seen any with three cylinders so far.
I am sure a Google search for this will show up a lot of links.
Going out on a limb, I'd say a Shay, since many steam roataries used a similar type of 2 or 3 cylinder steam engine to turn the plow.
--Randy
Modeling the Reading Railroad in the 1950's
Visit my web site at www.readingeastpenn.com for construction updates, DCC Info, and more.
I'm wondering if a shay sound decoder wound be a reasonable sound effect in a steam powered rotory snow plow? If not, what would come close?