Any Train Simulator/model railroading geeks here?

[Johnny Wishbone]

5 hours ago, Cydonian Monk said:

 

 

Nice little GP40 there. I always liked the old Chessie paint jobs (and not because of the stupid cat). The black, orange, yellow scheme always looked good to me for some reason. Made the locos pop and stand out when mixed into a consist of other roads locos.

[Green Baron]

I am at it. Just had to pause a few days. If the weather permits i will cut out the helix parts tomorrow and make the helix.

Meanwhile i planned the second storey, the ground floor, sotosay. In principle it'll consist of a 2-track round course with the shunt yard in the center. The shunt yrad will have two tracks leading in, the roll off hill and a harp of 5 departure tracks. Furthermore i'll build a through station in the round course. That'll be around 2k funds for tracks, switches, magnetic switch drives and decoders.

The electric backbone for driving and switching is a simple T under the table, with punctures in the floor and ceilings to reach the second storey. Electricity for lights, in the first step only for lighting the shadow station, will have an own ring cable and transformer. And that will be it.

But: the place is not enough for the second storey. I need an annex of 1,6 by 1,6m, which makes an L out it. No problem ...

 

Technical remarks :-): cut out a template from plywood, a curve with the lowest radius you accept for your layout, in my case 480mm. Use it to bend your flextracks around it if it comes to narrow curves. Just like a super fast glue hardens in one second but which second, who knows (usually when you test with the finger tip), a tightly bent flextrack will assume any curve but not necessarily (almost excluding) the one you want, causing corners, causing derailings.

 

More soon(tm).

:-)

Edited March 4, 2018 by Green Baron

[Kerbinchaser]

On 2/28/2018 at 12:56 PM, Cydonian Monk said:

(snip)

 

What a cute 'lil Geep! I love the Chessie System. Sad they merged with CSX

[Johnny Wishbone]

53 minutes ago, Lo Var Lachland said:

What a cute 'lil Geep! I love the Chessie System. Sad they merged with CSX

Technically, they are CSX. They merged with Seaboard to form CSX.

[Kerbinchaser]

5 minutes ago, Johnny Wishbone said:

Technically, they are CSX. They merged with Seaboard to form CSX.

True. Very true. 

[kapteenipirk]

Kinda forgot about doing the update, but better late than never right. Anyways, here is what i was able to get done.

 

Spoiler

 

The first day consisted of organizing the bits of track that i had into neat little stacks, i wanted to start building the track as-well, but it was like -10 to -15C on the balcony that evening.

The next day i went out and built the track, it was again very cold and i had to go back inside to warm up my frozen hands 3 times.

I decided to go with the "single large track with few sidings" idea, as the trains that i now have a very long, and there a few of them, so having a smaller double track didn't seem like the best idea, tough i may end up going for it in the future once i get more track.

Spoiler

in-case you are wondering what that tripod is doing there, they started to build an apartment building right next door to us and there's a real good view of  it from the balcony, s i decided it would be fun idea take a picture of the site every day (well...roughly everyday) and make a little time-lapse video of it once the building is complete.

 

I do also keep some model out there as not all of them fit in my room. The models you see in this picture are:

A Tamiya 1:350 Yamato in the window sill.

A Revell Monogram 1:48 PBY Catalina that my dad and big brother built when i was like 4 years old (that makes the model about 16 years old) and witch i have kept good care of ever since got it in my own collection like 3-4 years later.

A Revell 1:144 AN-124 Ruslan that i built during the 10 week work training period at Patria Aviation (i had to haul it and some other models i built at that time about 200km to get them back home from Jämsä where i lived for those 10 weeks).

I didn't want to have just a boring oval as the main-track, so i put some straight-bits on the curves and made the right side straight go around the little TV-stand (or whatever it was supposed to be) instead of trough it like usual.

The sidings now include the main 3 fork siding that has the big garage on the end of it, a siding next to it that is used as a cargo-loading track wit bunch of buildings around it, a bunch of small short sidings for parking locomotives (or maintenance cars, haven't decided yet), in to, and one under the little TV-stand (ran out of straight track, so i had to turn it into a snake).

 

Spoiler

I wanted to place the the more "city-buildings" on the bigger more open area at the front, but since i have to step there almost everyday, i didn't want to risk accidentally kicking them.

 

I regret placing the lumber-mill there as every-time i disconnect the cable for the Multimaus controller (Don't want the screen to be on day and night), it slaps my neatly stacked lumber piles.

 

A little bonus shot showing the interior of the lumber-mill witch i left accessible by not gluing the building around it to the base-plate.

 

I still have some work as there's two small boxes full of lumber, street-signs, pallets...etc, that need to be placed.

Spoiler

 

And there's also all the vehicles.

Spoiler

Some are HO scale toy-cars, some are pre-assembled/painted and some are model-kit ones that had to be built.

And yes, that's all the HO-scale vehicles i have (minus the ones that are loaded in the back of the military-train).

 

Fun facts:

The truck with the SCHENKER livery was originally a British police truck that came with a playset that had a bunch of stuff in it, i later on tough it might make it more fitting if i took a bunch of stickers and pasted them over all the Police markings. There where also 4 other cars that would have fit perfectly and would have been of the right scale.

 

The little green and red little trailer looking thing on the bottom left corner, was actually something i created from a bunch of extra-parts that where supposed to be use on a different version of the green and red logging truck (witch was the first HO scale vehicle i built btw).

I built it to go in between the truck and the trailer. It was supposed to give space for extra logs, but it's so short that even the shortest logs are too long to be loaded in it.

 If i get myself a summer/job im definitely gonna buy myself some more track so that i can do a double track with some sidings to park trains into.

Im probably also gonna invest on some switch motors so that i don't have to walk around back and forth multiple times just to park a single train, tough at that point it would be nice to have a table so that i could effectively hide all the cables.

At this point investing on a layout table isn't really necessary since the layout is in a place where nobody really goes, plus i want to maximize the available space, and having no need for around table access means i have more room for the track.

 

And in-case you where wondering, no, im not trying to model anything specific with this layout, it's just a random collection of stuff from different era's that i've happened to find and stuff that i've found interesting.

 

My parent's where both on holiday last week, so we went for a shopping trip to Tampere, while there, i got the chance to see that what the progress is on the locomotive repair. Apparently the spare part that's needed hasn't arrived yet.

[Green Baron]

Just got another stack of lumber for an annex of 1.6*1.6m so that i can fit my plans.

And i am doing version 3 of the struts that hold the helix. This time with threaded rods like everybody else does. 5mm plywood is a little flabby, as @Shpaget has warned me, but i can save it with a lot of struts (8 on either side around the circle) plus eventually a skirt around the outside to avoid bending.

Will then begin with a lot of jigsaw for the first series of ribs.

 

Edited March 14, 2018 by Green Baron

[Shpaget]

Sorry to hear that
Make sure you fix it now, since it will be more difficult later after laying track, not to mention significantly more frustrating.

On our layout, if any one is interested, last few days I've been toying with new motors for the train elevator. That's another case of overestimating material (there are more cases of it than I care to think about). Anyway, this is the third pair of motors I'm installing. First two were steppers, NEMA 17 size. I've spent days trying to calculate and test if the previous motors would be strong enough and after figuring out that the first one would be only marginally strong enough, I bought twice as powerful ones, thinking I've solved the problem of lost steps and stalls. I was wrong. The elevator would work for a few hours and then one motor would lose a step, stop rotating and whole thing stopped. Not only that but it made nasty noises even when working properly (that's just one of the facts of life - steppers are noisy). 

This last purchase I went all out, broke the bank, but man are these motors awesome. They are NEMA 23 sized Clearpaths from Teknic and wow. They are brushless servos/stepper thingies. I still haven't installed them, I need to make new mounting brackets, but what I've seen on the bench... amazing.

[Green Baron]

Do the steppers drive threaded rods ? I have seen such a contraption that had problems like you describe, when one of 4 motor looses a step the thing canted and squealed for help.

How about strong motors that drive axles, like one at each end and one in the middle with cogs and endless chains around each cog and fixed axles under the ceiling ? Thus a missed step doesn't stall the thing .... know what i mean ? The board can still run in rods that fix horizontal position.

[Shpaget]

Yes. There is a 2:1 timing belt reduction and then threaded rods. Two motors, one on each side (the elevator is about 3.4 m long), each driving it's threaded rod. The problem with steppers is that if the lose a step, they will not catch up (without some fancy feedback and control) and if they are under considerable load they may even stall and not start again, since they require acceleration and can't just jump to speed.

There are two linear bearings to hold horizontal position.

Yes, I understand and chain design was one of many that we considered, but decided against. The reason was primarily aesthetics,  since most of the elevator will be seen by visitors. Polished steel of the threaded rods and aluminum platform look a lot nicer than some greasy chain :).

The new motors are, mechanically speaking, servos but are controlled just like steppers (with step and direction commands). They have integrated positional feedback and will catch up with commands and (do their best to) return to commanded position if forced out of it.

 

On the right, there is a hole in the wall that will feed the trains from the existing layout in room on the right. There will be a couple of levels in the room you are looking at, and another level all the way down that leads to the basement, where another 200-ish m^2 of layout will be built. That's why the elevator is dug into the floor.

[Green Baron]

Do you mean friction belts ? If you don't get it running due to the long overhang, friction loss, and asymmetric load then try something like a paternoster drive. Cogs in ball rests at the ends and the rail fixed to bycicle chains. Or endless and more than one rail. That may be overengineered but probably not as failure prone.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Paternoster#/media/File:Paternoster_animated.gif

 

[Shpaget]

I mean this sort of belt.

Linear bearings seem to handle the overhang fairly well.

[Green Baron]

Update.

The helix is done. I have the current welded to the rails each spiral. The cables will then be welded to the T-tail below the table. All the rails that you see here will later be underground.

Coming out of the spiral, the double track meets the oval via a simple crossing and a double electric crossing, thus splitting the track into three. The two innermost 2 tracks stay level and continue down the table on the ribs, into a u-turn, then run up into a through station and into another u-turn that meets see above. The outermost track will rise a few centimeters and turn behind/over the double track onto a yet to build short leg of the table, an annexe of 1.6*1.6m, towards the stand of the photographer, where the roll-off hill will be and the slightly curved shunting station will begin.

For the future, i will move to a German model train forum and post a link here.

Edited March 24, 2018 by Green Baron

[Guest]

On 3/24/2018 at 3:33 PM, Green Baron said:

Update.

The helix is done. I have the current welded to the rails each spiral. The cables will then be welded to the T-tail below the table. All the rails that you see here will later be underground.

Coming out of the spiral, the double track meets the oval via a simple crossing and a double electric crossing, thus splitting the track into three. The two innermost 2 tracks stay level and continue down the table on the ribs, into a u-turn, then run up into a through station and into another u-turn that meets see above. The outermost track will rise a few centimeters and turn behind/over the double track onto a yet to build short leg of the table, an annexe of 1.6*1.6m, towards the stand of the photographer, where the roll-off hill will be and the slightly curved shunting station will begin.

For the future, i will move to a German model train forum and post a link here.

Good!

On 3/12/2018 at 10:35 AM, kapteenipirk said:

Kinda forgot about doing the update, but better late than never right. Anyways, here is what i was able to get done.

 

  Hide contents

 

The first day consisted of organizing the bits of track that i had into neat little stacks, i wanted to start building the track as-well, but it was like -10 to -15C on the balcony that evening.

The next day i went out and built the track, it was again very cold and i had to go back inside to warm up my frozen hands 3 times.

I decided to go with the "single large track with few sidings" idea, as the trains that i now have a very long, and there a few of them, so having a smaller double track didn't seem like the best idea, tough i may end up going for it in the future once i get more track.

  Reveal hidden contents

in-case you are wondering what that tripod is doing there, they started to build an apartment building right next door to us and there's a real good view of  it from the balcony, s i decided it would be fun idea take a picture of the site every day (well...roughly everyday) and make a little time-lapse video of it once the building is complete.

 

I do also keep some model out there as not all of them fit in my room. The models you see in this picture are:

A Tamiya 1:350 Yamato in the window sill.

A Revell Monogram 1:48 PBY Catalina that my dad and big brother built when i was like 4 years old (that makes the model about 16 years old) and witch i have kept good care of ever since got it in my own collection like 3-4 years later.

A Revell 1:144 AN-124 Ruslan that i built during the 10 week work training period at Patria Aviation (i had to haul it and some other models i built at that time about 200km to get them back home from Jämsä where i lived for those 10 weeks).

I didn't want to have just a boring oval as the main-track, so i put some straight-bits on the curves and made the right side straight go around the little TV-stand (or whatever it was supposed to be) instead of trough it like usual.

The sidings now include the main 3 fork siding that has the big garage on the end of it, a siding next to it that is used as a cargo-loading track wit bunch of buildings around it, a bunch of small short sidings for parking locomotives (or maintenance cars, haven't decided yet), in to, and one under the little TV-stand (ran out of straight track, so i had to turn it into a snake).

 

  Hide contents

I wanted to place the the more "city-buildings" on the bigger more open area at the front, but since i have to step there almost everyday, i didn't want to risk accidentally kicking them.

 

I regret placing the lumber-mill there as every-time i disconnect the cable for the Multimaus controller (Don't want the screen to be on day and night), it slaps my neatly stacked lumber piles.

 

A little bonus shot showing the interior of the lumber-mill witch i left accessible by not gluing the building around it to the base-plate.

 

I still have some work as there's two small boxes full of lumber, street-signs, pallets...etc, that need to be placed.

  Reveal hidden contents

 

And there's also all the vehicles.

  Reveal hidden contents

Some are HO scale toy-cars, some are pre-assembled/painted and some are model-kit ones that had to be built.

And yes, that's all the HO-scale vehicles i have (minus the ones that are loaded in the back of the military-train).

 

Fun facts:

The truck with the SCHENKER livery was originally a British police truck that came with a playset that had a bunch of stuff in it, i later on tough it might make it more fitting if i took a bunch of stickers and pasted them over all the Police markings. There where also 4 other cars that would have fit perfectly and would have been of the right scale.

 

The little green and red little trailer looking thing on the bottom left corner, was actually something i created from a bunch of extra-parts that where supposed to be use on a different version of the green and red logging truck (witch was the first HO scale vehicle i built btw).

I built it to go in between the truck and the trailer. It was supposed to give space for extra logs, but it's so short that even the shortest logs are too long to be loaded in it.

 If i get myself a summer/job im definitely gonna buy myself some more track so that i can do a double track with some sidings to park trains into.

Im probably also gonna invest on some switch motors so that i don't have to walk around back and forth multiple times just to park a single train, tough at that point it would be nice to have a table so that i could effectively hide all the cables.

At this point investing on a layout table isn't really necessary since the layout is in a place where nobody really goes, plus i want to maximize the available space, and having no need for around table access means i have more room for the track.

 

And in-case you where wondering, no, im not trying to model anything specific with this layout, it's just a random collection of stuff from different era's that i've happened to find and stuff that i've found interesting.

 

My parent's where both on holiday last week, so we went for a shopping trip to Tampere, while there, i got the chance to see that what the progress is on the locomotive repair. Apparently the spare part that's needed hasn't arrived yet.

That is REALLY nice!

[Kerbinchaser]

On 3/24/2018 at 4:33 PM, Green Baron said:

Update.

 

Spoiler

 

The helix is done. I have the current welded to the rails each spiral. The cables will then be welded to the T-tail below the table. All the rails that you see here will later be underground.

Coming out of the spiral, the double track meets the oval via a simple crossing and a double electric crossing, thus splitting the track into three. The two innermost 2 tracks stay level and continue down the table on the ribs, into a u-turn, then run up into a through station and into another u-turn that meets see above. The outermost track will rise a few centimeters and turn behind/over the double track onto a yet to build short leg of the table, an annexe of 1.6*1.6m, towards the stand of the photographer, where the roll-off hill will be and the slightly curved shunting station will begin.

For the future, i will move to a German model train forum and post a link here.

Looks epic man. Can't wait to see it finished. It looks like it's going to be awesome to operate.
Cheers! 

Edited March 26, 2018 by Lo Var Lachland

[Kerbinchaser]

Just got two new locos, a PRR SD45 and a BN GP9.

(HO scale)
 

FREEEEE!!!!  

[Kerbinchaser]

Today's antique store find:

3 N scale train cars for $11.50 USD. Both of the boxcars have metal wheelsets, but 40s era trucks. The hopper has plastic wheelsets but modern trucks. 

Besides that, the couplers are the old Rapido ones. I'm going to upgrade to micro-trains couplers in the near future. I think I will use the CSX one as a test weathering subject. 

[Kevin Kyle]

I would love to have a great train sim. I just have 2 problems, time and money. Maybe someday I will get there but I just cant do it right now. Been wanting to do this for several years now. Grew up in the country right next to a crossing. Its funny what you can sleep through. Even train whistles and a shaking house was no reason to wake up. lol :)

[Kerbinchaser]

I will...

 

BRING THIS THREAD BACK TO LIIIIFE!!

[kapteenipirk]

On 5/5/2018 at 6:30 PM, Lo Var Lachland said:

BRING THIS THREAD BACK TO LIIIIFE!!

Im glad you did. Pretty perfect timing too.

 

Ive got an update on the secondary tracks, and something special.

 

I went on my parents summer cottage with my mom (my dad's in America at the moment) and decided to try and see if it would be a better place for the Bachmann (Murica track) and manual train track ("Toy train" track).

I don't really like to go there as it's not really my kind of thing, and i tend to go little crazy if if there's nothing to do. Bringing the tracks there is my attempt at making the place feel more like home and a place where i actually feel like going to (it is a good place for me to get away from videogames and correct my totally broken sleeping rhythms).

They both fit in the lower section of the bunk-bed in the little mini cottage next to the main one. The mini one is there just for sleeping at and nothing else.

 

While was there, i also worked on another train project. Or should i say i continued it there as the design work for it was done at home.

And this project has to do with something from my early childhood.

When i was like 3-5 years old, we got a huge bunch old old Lego from one of our cousins. It included a few complete sets, but most of the stuff was what happened to left of some sets, I have later been doing some searching to try and find what sets those parts belonged to. That stuff was all the way from the early 80's to early 90's. In that lot was two sets that i loved, the Skull eye schooner (witch, like many of my lego sets, i had to give away before the move, as they simply would not have fit anywhere in our new, MUCH smaller apartment...well, at-least not with all the other more important hobbies i have), and set 7745, high speed express train, from the 12V train era. It was never complete (one of the train-bases, a bunch of the train-wheels and couplers, the transformer and speed-controller, and all the cables where missing), but i still loved the look of it and made many many trains with the parts from that set. Now that i know a little more about that and other 12V train sets, i really, REALLY want a complete set of it, but unfortunately they cost hundreds on ebay (the good ones with all the stuff still there at-least).

So, i want the thing complete, but don't want to spend hundreds...why not make it out of paper.

And that's what i did. I started by checking if my AutoCad Student license had expired or not, turns out it hadn't (i was pretty sure our teacher said it would last 3 years, and im pretty sure it has been a lot more than 3 years since i got the license).

I used AutoCad on my Finnish armored train paper-model before, so i knew i could design the model with it in no time. There was the matter of coloring tough, the Armored train i made was black and white cause i didn't really know how to get it colored nicely (was pretty sure there wasn't a way to color stuff with AutoCad). If i was gonna do a Lego train model, it needs to be colored. Thankfully there was a form of hatch that could be used to put solid color, so coloring of the model was possible.

and here is the result.

On the left is the real-deal, it's all i have left of the set. On the right is the paper thing, witch is the locomotive, while the Lego one is the rear driving carriage.

I have designed and printed the rest of the train, i just need to build it.

The "stickers" i was able to recreate with line drawing and text tools, so no playing around with images of the stickers was needed.

I tried to make the model a little more simple while still being very authentic looking.

I already have plans for recreating the Intercity train and some kind of a freight train from the 12V era. As for the 9V era...maby, RC/infra-red...nah, and Power functions...just feels wrong. I want to concentrate on classic sets that are a little hard to get, not on doing the same as Lepin but with paper.

I don't have a clear plan on weather im going to keep this as a personal project, or weather i should release it and put it up on somewhere like the Papermodelers forum.

[NSEP]

I just downloaded Train Sim World, and im in love with trains again, after 8 years.

[Kerbinchaser]

On 5/16/2018 at 2:42 PM, NSEP said:

I just downloaded Train Sim World, and im in love with trains again, after 8 years.

Oooooh!
 

Which one? 

[NSEP]

26 minutes ago, Lo Var Lachland said:

Oooooh!
 

Which one? 

Train Sim World. I don't have any DLC for it so im stuck with the GE evolution series of trains but that isn't a bad thing. I love the 4400HP version.

Im quite new to the whole train thing, so excuse me if i say something weird.

Also, Im working on making a basic design of a train designed for the Moon, yes, the Moon. I'd love to combine my Spaceflight nerdiness, with my out-of-the-water Train nerdiness into one.

[YNM]

9 minutes ago, NSEP said:

Train Sim World.

Unfortunately they're far more resource-hungry than ye olde Train Simulator. But what you pay for beautiful realism... sadly a potato is indeed not pretty.

GE ES44 had been the Dash 9 and AC4400CW.

Edited May 18, 2018 by YNM

[Kerbinchaser]

1 hour ago, NSEP said:

Train Sim World. I don't have any DLC for it so im stuck with the GE evolution series of trains but that isn't a bad thing. I love the 4400HP version.

Im quite new to the whole train thing, so excuse me if i say something weird.

Also, Im working on making a basic design of a train designed for the Moon, yes, the Moon. I'd love to combine my Spaceflight nerdiness, with my out-of-the-water Train nerdiness into one.

Ahhh, CSX. You like American railroads? 

 

Personally I live in the US (Totally not biased)

 

But I like American railroads for their diversity. I mean, all the railroad companies, all the different types of locomotives and train cars... Etc.