OcTRAINber 2021 - WIP story

[Sven J]

(OT - sorry)
When I hear the name of Giorgio Moroder, honestly I don't think of his music first - instead this one comes to my mind immediately...
Would be a fine beast of a Lego model, too.

[Feuer Zug]

After slight reworking of the chassis, my Pennsylvania RR test weight car is complete. It is a precision car that was used for scale calibration. To mimic this feature, my car includes a pair of boat weights internally.

The real deal at the Pennsylvania RR Museum in Strasburg.

Additionally, at this time, due to the high number of powered "critter" locomotives being built, I have decided not to build a Trackmobile. With no intention of powering it, it would have little to no chance of being considered.

[Paperinik77pk]

8 hours ago, Feuer Zug said:

After slight reworking of the chassis, my Pennsylvania RR test weight car is complete. It is a precision car that was used for scale calibration. To mimic this feature, my car includes a pair of boat weights internally.

The real deal at the Pennsylvania RR Museum in Strasburg.

Additionally, at this time, due to the high number of powered "critter" locomotives being built, I have decided not to build a Trackmobile. With no intention of powering it, it would have little to no chance of being considered.

Very nice and interesting subject!!! It's not a common thing! 

[Paperinik77pk]

@Ts__

@Tenderlok

After your kind suggestion, maybe I found something to represent the mudguards. Sausages gave a really nice shape, so Sven was absolutely right (again thanks )...but they are a bit too orange. The phone receiver is a ready to buy part (also in yellow) , and seems fitting enough. Mudguards could be done also with flexible tubes, which came to my mind immediately after trying the sausages, but I sincerely am not able to draw them in Stud.io  - I'll try both solutions 

 

[Sven J]

3 minutes ago, Paperinik77pk said:

but they are a bit too orange

Have you tried it in reality? The difference between bright light orange and yellow is much less in reality than in Stud.io. Especially when you consider that yellow is one of the colours that suffers quite a lot from inconsistency.
I used BLO for this one as several parts weren't available in yellow - nobody noticed until I mentioned it...

Nevertheless, the phone receivers are a clever solution, too!

[Paperinik77pk]

1 minute ago, Tenderlok said:

Have you tried it in reality? The difference between bright light orange and yellow is much less in reality than in Stud.io. Especially when you consider that yellow is one of the colours that suffers quite a lot from inconsistency.
I used BLO for this one as several parts weren't available in yellow - nobody noticed until I mentioned it...

Nevertheless, the phone receivers are a clever solution, too!

Unfortunately no, currently I have no sausages parts handy -  maybe there's something in my daughter's old "Friends" set.

I saw them in photo and seemed to me a bit "dark" (I'm color blind so not so good with color gradations) - but I've got a lot of yellow tube and probably it can be shaped even more (with some heat). 

Phone receiver part has the good point to be more "attached" to the body, leaving the clip part only at the center, while both sausages and tubes are leaving some space.

Parts for the 500 arrived just as I am writing, so I can now try without too much CADding!!!   

Thanks also for the color hint!

 

[zephyr1934]

18 hours ago, Tenderlok said:

As for the mudguards: Would sausages work? They are available in bright light orange, which comes very close to yellow.

Great idea, extending it further, 3mm rigid hose and bananas also come to mind (whoops, I see that already came up after the cited comment, so make this +1)

[XG BC]

here is my latest progress this time focussing on the undercarrige and i also tried out the dark green DR livery. i am now kinda undecided whether to send in the red or the dark green one as they both look equally cute

as you can see i added the earthing pole for the overhead line to the side aswell as an air tank used for braking.

here is the view from the other sides where some kind of radiator resides

[Ts__]

10 hours ago, Paperinik77pk said:

The phone receiver is a ready to buy part (also in yellow) , and seems fitting enough.

Yes, fits better as the "block" solution.

But Sven's sausage idea is not bad either.

I'm curious to see what else is coming...

 

Thomas

 

 

[Paperinik77pk]

Time for some updates!

Blue body is finally ready, and the two older relatives are giving to the new "Critter" a warm welcome!

But project is not finished yet - I had an idea to enrich this toy locomotive, but it needs to be investigated, and eventually developed.

In the meantime, works is progressing on the little Fiat rail vehicle :

Thanks to @XG BC suggestions, I investigated a bit some Li-Po batteries and charging solutions. I found a very small 200Mah 3,7v battery (fitting in 4 studs) and a very small power manager, which acts also as charger/discharger. Some soldering and it is now working properly (I also added a small on/off switch - look at the open door. 

The battery charger is an USB to serial RX/TX adapter I had around. It's only used for 5V and GND, and it can be attached to an old PC-Speaker cable .

Traction wheels have been wrapped with some thermo-restricting rubber envelope, used in electronics, so now there's a sufficient traction to move it around! I finally chose the "phone mudguards" solution, and I ordered some other parts , which should arrive next week.

That's all for the moment!

Ciao,

Davide

 

Edited October 23, 2021 by Paperinik77pk

[XG BC]

15 minutes ago, Paperinik77pk said:

Time for some updates!

Blue body is finally ready, and the two older relatives are giving to the new "Critter" a warm welcome!

But project is not finished yet - I had an idea to enrich this toy locomotive, but it needs to be investigated, and eventually developed.

In the meantime, works is progressing on the little Fiat rail vehicle :

Thanks to @XG BC suggestions, I investigated a bit some Li-Po batteries and charging solutions. I found a very small 200Mah 3,7v battery (fitting in 4 studs) and a very small power manager, which acts also as charger/discharger. Some soldering and it is now working properly (I also added a small on/off switch - look at the open door. 

The battery charger is an USB to serial RX/TX adapter I had around. It's only used for 5V and GND, and it can be attached to an old PC-Speaker cable .

Traction wheels have been wrapped with some thermo-restricting rubber envelope, used in electronics, so now there's a sufficient traction to move it around! I finally chose the "phone mudguards" solution, and I ordered some other parts , which should arrive next week.

That's all for the moment!

Ciao,

Davide

 

nice solution for powering the cute mow vehicle! as for enhancing the toy loco dont go too far otherwise you are going to end up with something that looks like mine!

[Paperinik77pk]

2 minutes ago, XG BC said:

nice solution for powering the cute mow vehicle! as for enhancing the toy loco dont go too far otherwise you are going to end up with something that looks like mine!

Don't worry - aesthetically the locomotive is finished - the modification is something on Circuit Cubes side. 

There's no risk of overlapping - yours is electric! (HINT)

[zephyr1934]

1 hour ago, Paperinik77pk said:

Blue body is finally ready, and the two older relatives are giving to the new "Critter" a warm welcome!

 

The family looks good together. And the Fiat looks fascinating

[XG BC]

4 hours ago, Paperinik77pk said:

Don't worry - aesthetically the locomotive is finished - the modification is something on Circuit Cubes side. 

There's no risk of overlapping - yours is electric! (HINT)

was ment more as a joke rather than beeing serious btw. and also competition is never a bad thing i am in it for fun and not for proving that i am better than someone/wanting fame or the first place! side note i could also just remove the pantograph of mine so it could go the other way round  aswell! anyways i ofcourse wish you the best of luck with both of your designs!

edit: once the competition and build is finished i will also upload the studio model of both color variants to my dropbox for all of you to build and have fun with

Edited October 23, 2021 by XG BC

[Paperinik77pk]

44 minutes ago, XG BC said:

was ment more as a joke rather than beeing serious btw. and also competition is never a bad thing i am in it for fun and not for proving that i am better than someone/wanting fame or the first place! side note i could also just remove the pantograph of mine so it could go the other way round  aswell! anyways i ofcourse wish you the best of luck with both of your designs!

edit: once the competition and build is finished i will also upload the studio model of both color variants to my dropbox for all of you to build and have fun with

Noooo problem at all - I was joking too!  

Don't worry of these things - there's no risk your sentence could be intended in the "wrong" way.

Without your help the Fiat 500 would have been a static model (or a model running for only 2 meters before running out of batteries - button batteries were absolutely a wrong choice)! 

I love the way your E69 is progressing - It could be nice to do one thing at the end of the Octrainber , a good picture of both locomotives in diesel and electric version! We shared this thread from the beginning, let's close it with some style  (damn, I've to build a pantograph!)

Ciao!

Davide

Edited October 23, 2021 by Paperinik77pk

[XG BC]

42 minutes ago, Paperinik77pk said:

Noooo problem at all - I was joking too!  

Don't worry of these things - there's no risk your sentence could be intended in the "wrong" way.

Without your help the Fiat 500 would have been a static model (or a model running for only 2 meters before running out of batteries - button batteries were absolutely a wrong choice)! 

I love the way your E69 is progressing - It could be nice to do one thing at the end of the Octrainber , a good picture of both locomotives in diesel and electric version! We shared this thread from the beginning, let's close it with some style  (damn, I've to build a pantograph!)

Ciao!

Davide

we defenitely have to do that! mine will only be a render though. what we could do is render both models side by side. tomorrow i am going to work on adding the tan stripe to the red one and attaching the front and back windows properly. another thing to work on is the roof electrical systems mainly the isolators and electric switching gear ontop of the roof

Edited October 23, 2021 by XG BC

[XG BC]

here is my latest progress on my loco:

as you can see io added the tan stripe to the red one and had to redesign the headlight mounting for that. i also removed all parts that where held in by just friction namely the front and back windows and the side vents of the rear hoods. i also had the time to create a pantograph design for @Paperinik77pk. you just have to figure out a way to mount it to the roof of your "spielzeug"!

 

as you can see the construction is essentially the same as my pantograph just instead of grey droid arms i used light bluish gray thin liftarms which should give it a better look relative to the style that you built the spielzeug in. the bars are 4l bars in light bluish gray with the top one beeing dark bluish gray to indicate the collector bar that touches the overhead line.

[Paperinik77pk]

Ciao! Nice thought!

 I was drawing yesterday something similar, but I was falling literally asleep and I kept it for today - the use of bars and liftarms is the same. 

Only one thing (just for prototyping's sake) - instead of a square, imagine more a pentagon shape for the diamond pantograph, since the lower bars do not share the same articulation point (they normally are connected to a substructure,which is then fixed to the roof). 

See you later! 

 

 

 

 

[XG BC]

yea i see where you are coming from and you are absolutely correct in that. i need to redesign mine aswell i which i based yours off of.

[XG BC]

i took your comment about the pantograph into consideration and i made this:

i also improved the looks of the mounting solution of the pantograph to make it look more like the sbs 10 pantograph used on the prototype

[Paperinik77pk]

Hi there! 

On 10/24/2021 at 6:45 PM, XG BC said:

i took your comment about the pantograph into consideration and i made this:

i also improved the looks of the mounting solution of the pantograph to make it look more like the sbs 10 pantograph used on the prototype

Nice solution, surely more refined than mine!!! 

 

Ciao! 

Davide

[XG BC]

yours fits the style of your locomotive pretty good so id say your solution is good aswell!

[Paperinik77pk]

4 hours ago, XG BC said:

yours fits the style of your locomotive pretty good so id say your solution is good aswell!

Thanks , when the OcTRAINBER ends, we can prepare a good render! 

 

In the meantime, last parts for the Fiat 500 "Draisina" arrived, so I have now the "telephone mudguards". One plate higher, since the wheels were hitting the clips.

There are some adjustments to electronics to be done (soldering on the switch simply decided to break). Draisine is complete now,and needs some work on stickers. The real one has a small yellow  trailer - I think it will be a nice addon! 

That's all for the moment!

Ciao,

Davide

[XG BC]

23 hours ago, Paperinik77pk said:

Thanks , when the OcTRAINBER ends, we can prepare a good render! 

 

In the meantime, last parts for the Fiat 500 "Draisina" arrived, so I have now the "telephone mudguards". One plate higher, since the wheels were hitting the clips.

There are some adjustments to electronics to be done (soldering on the switch simply decided to break). Draisine is complete now,and needs some work on stickers. The real one has a small yellow  trailer - I think it will be a nice addon! 

That's all for the moment!

Ciao,

Davide

cant wait to see the draisina complete. nice work!

[Hod Carrier]

That's some great work being done there. Getting power and drive into that tiny FIAT van is just incredible!! How are you finding the twisted band drive solution? Is it as good as having gears or are you having any issues with slipping?

Regarding the pantographs, I was wondering whether there was enough space to use the top dark bley bar as a mounting point for the collector head. Some clip plates (PN:15712) and Belville ice skates (PN:42013) should look just about right.