Harvey Diversified Trades LLC

Harvey Diversified Trades LLC After nearly 30 years in the Tool & Die trade Matthew Harvey is taking his tool box home to blend his mechanical and historical interests into a new trade.

For those of you following along on the locomotive 21 restoration. With the rival of our newly cast cross head slippers....
06/06/2026

For those of you following along on the locomotive 21 restoration. With the rival of our newly cast cross head slippers. We decided to jump at it and see if we can get them machined and fitted up! We are also machining up a new set of bottom guide bars because the lower guide bars were particularly worn and one of them was steel and one was wrought iron…. obviously fitted from parts of other engines. Also, last week we finished tacking up our fire box patches and turned the boiler on its side and are waiting for the completed siphon weldments and door ring to come back from the x-ray lab. Steaming right along! HDT re-engineering.

Picture number one shows re-cutting the sealing surfaces on a 7 1/2 inch sellers injector. I’ve had a few inquiries late...
05/28/2026

Picture number one shows re-cutting the sealing surfaces on a 7 1/2 inch sellers injector. I’ve had a few inquiries lately on if we work on injectors and various other locomotive and traction engine of accoutrements. So I picked out a scattering of stuff. Included is hydrostatic lubricator chokes steam turret complete rebuilds with complete brand new bonnets and valve stems out of ASME code compliant material. We also can build and rebuild cylinder drains, steam governors, and of course, wash out plugs and fusible plugs. Just to keep things fresh in everybody’s minds! HDT re-engineering. 

Been working on a lot of forming here! Flat boiler sheets are a cakewalk compared to flanges arcs and curves with non-st...
05/22/2026

Been working on a lot of forming here! Flat boiler sheets are a cakewalk compared to flanges arcs and curves with non-straight joints. Here’s a pic of the door sheet patch going into the number 21 locomotive along with the fixture that we made for the hydraulic table for lifting it in and out. It was a lifesaver and a finger saver. Photos showing a very vague step-by-step process, but it is fitting up very nicely! HDT re-engineering! 

Just a little infomercial on these old-time buckeye throttles. And a shout out to the hungry Hollow club with their thro...
05/10/2026

Just a little infomercial on these old-time buckeye throttles. And a shout out to the hungry Hollow club with their throttle from a 25 horse Minneapolis. I’ve heard of a few of these throttles hitting the scrap can and being replaced with ball valves. These are actually very nice throttles and I think have a place on about every engine that has one. They are a bit of a bu**er to cut and lap all of the seats, but is still cheaper than re-piping a ball valve onto your engine. For the machinist minded, you can see the angles that need to be set up to re-cut the inside valve faces. Kind of fun actually ….. HDT re-engineering. 

04/29/2026

A little short notice, but, due to HDT shipping out a bunch of three-quarter fusible plugs I am getting a little low on stock. But we’ll have a few of them for sale at the Baraboo swap meet and WHSEA Membership meeting !!!! So if you’re in Baraboo and need a fusible plug see Asa Morey.. he will have them, still $125.
Thanks HDT. Re-engineering. 

04/15/2026

Well, it was one of “those” days.
Working with a great volunteer crew. We kicked off riveting the reinforcing rings into the rims for a set of new 35 HP Minneapolis Drive wheels. What you see in the video was just getting started. We paired down the process till we could go about 1/3 of the way around without turning the wheel. With the repositioning between each rivet, we could still do about 11 rivets in nine minutes. 96 rivets done and a bunch more to go! HDT. Re-engineering…

The fun of being self-employed, and I used that term loosely, is the neat jobs that come along that one would’ve never g...
04/11/2026

The fun of being self-employed, and I used that term loosely, is the neat jobs that come along that one would’ve never gotten to do otherwise. Here are the brand new eccentric blades for the Chicago Northwestern 1385 locomotive. They connect the eccentrics on the locomotive axle to the actual valve gear of the Stevenson reverse mechanism. It’s a very meticulous job with lots of details that have to be “just so”. So here’s a little photo history of the job and I would like to thank Mid-continent Railroad Museum for having HDT help with their restoration! HDT re-engineering!

Here is another detail. Steam locomotives have cast-iron brake shoes that rub against the outside of driving wheels. It ...
02/12/2026

Here is another detail. Steam locomotives have cast-iron brake shoes that rub against the outside of driving wheels. It is a great wearing surface, but the issue is cast-iron can break in operation causing a large chunk of cast-iron to fall onto the rail with less than ideal results.! The solution is to have what’s called a safety back Brakeshoe where the shoe has a steel back and steel reinforcing not unlike rebar in concrete. And also a steel loop that the key that holds the Brakeshoe on passes through. Needing a set of these for the 21 locomotive myself and crew set out to build all of the tooling to make safety back brake shoes. the devil’s in the details! The first picture is one of our new A24 safety back shoes. The second picture is an original. You can see where the cast-iron flows through the steel backing plate. Who would’ve thought a Brakeshoe would be that much work!!! HDT re-engineering. 

They say the devil’s in the details……. and that is a very true statement when it comes to steam engines. Haven’t been d...
02/11/2026

They say the devil’s in the details……. and that is a very true statement when it comes to steam engines. Haven’t been doing much razzle-dazzle work, but have been hunkered down machining a lot of bronze for several different locomotives. Here’s the one project for the midcontinent railroad museum 1385. The feed water shut off cox and check valves we’re in need of a tuneup, but upon close inspection, they had many problems and needed extensive restoration on these one of a kind valves. Many new parts made, and re-machining of all sealing surfaces on the assemblies. Details, details, details!! HDT Re-engineering.

12/25/2025

We’ve made a lot of front tube sheet patches. But I never had a hand free to record a single one….. here is a nifty reel that shows how our patches are hot flanged up with a little elbow grease. Once you got things set up it’s about a half hour job. Nothing to it..just gotta hit it where it needs it! And hit it like you mean it.
HDT re-engineering!

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Badger Drive
Campbellsport, WI
53010

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