An intrepid DIY man, Liu Jiming's childhood obsession with trains has led him to come up with a miniature steam engine-driven train.

Liu Jiming dreams of a park where he can steer his handcrafted miniature steam engine-driven trains while children flock to his side, begging for a ride.

"The kids will be so happy but I would be the happiest," the 55-year-old says while laying the tracks on an open space in his compound in south Xuhui district in Shanghai.

"When I play with children, I am like a child," he says, beads of sweat on his forehead. "They can also learn about steam engines which propelled the Industrial Revolution.

"I won't charge anything for a ride. I remember clearly how I was jealous of the neighbors' kids having new toys when I was a little boy."

When he was small, Lu loved trains. Very often he sneaked into train stations and spent hours looking at trains, dreaming of making his own trains and seeing them run on tracks.

And he liked all kinds of gadgets. "I ripped apart toys to see what's inside," he says, "I made model ships and planes.

"It is a pity the Shunfeng model store on Nanjing Road is closed. Kids nowadays are busy with study and have no time to make models."

However, back in the 1960s in times of scarcity, many people started making their own furniture, toys and clothes. Lu became crazy about assembling transistor radios.

"I skipped classes to buy components and welded them myself," he says.

After graduating from high school, Lu tried different vocations.

He took a job to mold component cast, moved on to be a miller, a carpenter, a home decorator and plenty of other jobs, far too many to remember now.

"I decorated my own home and did everything by myself from electricity to water pipes," he says.

This year, Lu made it to the Shanghai Guinness World Record for making the world's smallest "rice popper", the size of half one's fist. "My grandson demands popped rice every time he visits," Lu says.

In the 1980s, his interest in the mini train revived. "First I bought internal combustion engine models but lost interest soon as I can't make internal combustion engines myself."

One day he saw a picture taken in a park in Britain where tourists rode miniature steam trains. "I thought I could probably make that," he says, remembering the beginning of a sustained preoccupation.

Lu began collecting every piece of available information on steam trains, even in languages he could hardly understand. Texts in Japanese and German, figured on his bookshelf. He also purchased components from overseas to study them.

After countless failures and tests, Lu finally saw his first steam train running in a summer evening in 2000. "Neighbors came to watch and took rides," he says.

Since then, he has made several more miniature steam trains and sold some of them. In a recent visit to Guangzhou and Shijiazhuang, he displayed his trains in exhibitions to promote the Shanghai World Exposition.

In the 10-sqm studio in his backyard, components are stacked on the shelves, covering three walls. In the middle, there are five lathes. "I melt and mold components in a stove," he says while connecting the tracks, 5 inches wide and more than 80 m long, in an oblong. He began to move the locomotive, one-twelfth of a real one, and four tenders on them with several helpers. The whole set weighs 60 kg and runs at a speed of up to 30 km per hour.

The small train, painted black, is an exact miniature replica of a real one. The 88-cm-long locomotive has a capped stack similar to a one-fen coin, a boiler the size of a rice bowl and a chimney of needlepoint proportions. Inside the cabin, there are a flight of steps, railings and stairs, seemingly existing only in a Lilliputian state.

The hand-grips are wrapped in steel, carved with patterns, to prevent burning and sliding from hands.

The tenders, 110-cm-long each, were made of wood and painted blue.

"It's all done," said Lu, pouring water into the boiler through a hole 1-cm in diameter and shoveling mini coals into the stove.

Steam billowed out and the pointer on the monometer began to rise. In 10 minutes, when clouds of steam flew from the chimney, Lu said the train was ready to move and took the driver's seat.

The crowd, watching for the last two hours, piled on, old and young. Fifteen passengers filled the tenders.

"It is starting," said Lu, pulling the whistle and turning the engine on. "I never call for passengers. Whenever the whistle sounds, crowds begin to gather."

The train moved forward slowly but smoothly, whistling and hissing on its way. Soon it came to a stop with passengers yelling excitedly, "We have arrived." New passengers hopped on.

Two hours later, Lu had used up the fuel but people were still unwilling to leave. "How wonderful it could be if there is a park where I can drive my train regularly and more people could enjoy the fun," he says.

By Cao Li (China Daily)

Last update: 06-05-2009 22:45