[WIP] Lego monorails. [Custom Rail Systems (CRS)]

[Buttermaker]

On 5/16/2022 at 7:36 PM, Trekkie99 said:

Very cool!!! I always dreamed of finding a way to accomplish this!

Thank you 🤗 I will show here soon, how everything works 🤗

[rucolo]

wowowow!!!

I didn't understand how it works?
but what pieces did you use for the electrical contact?

[XG BC]

read through the thread and you will find out. the monorail rides on a single rail (in his case made of the old 12v center rail pieces) using normal lego tires. one or more of them are driven by a lego motor. on the sides it has guides that guide it through corners.

[DoVoMonOgel]

Hi everyone.

12 Volt enthusiast here. All my "normal" trains run on 12 Volt, even with PF train motors (Horizon Express becoming a true express; 10277 heavily modded, running on two normal PF train motors... etc etc. But that's for another forum & time).

First things first. Credits: Most of what I show here is not my inventions. There's been some 12V MRs around before, but I really didn't find too much of it to be honest, despite many hours of searching and following traces. When I get some more time I should make a list of things I took from you other inventors out there who developed what I based my work on. Big t-h-a-n-k-s to all of you and your countless hours of paving the way.

Intended to publish my 12 V Monorail work for ages, never got round to do it. Been working on this for about 4 years on-and-off, taking lots of ideas from all the great contributors here and elsewhere, and trying to combine their solutions for a 12V high-speed boogie-based 12V MR, using standard and common parts as far as possible. Not entirely "pure", maybe a few "illegal" details here and there. But the latest prototype is back to "pure original unmodified" parts (except for the cabling). Rail geometry may need the one or other cut power rail though, settled for the blue 70s stuff as it's cheap and hey, who else does red-blue tracks :-) ?

Below is just one pic of the "snake train" I more or less settled with. I went through about 20 different arrangements of motors, power pickups (some "self-made" experiments but in the end settled for the good old 12V pickups from the 70s/80s), bogies, gearing. Using PF train motors, various wheel arrangements, 9v block motors (settled for them, cheap stuff, robust, can take 12V apparently "forever", heavy, leading to good traction); tried PF motors, too, but don't like them as much.

Overall, aims were:

1. Speed
2. Speed
3. Speed
4. Make the functional internal stuff of the trains 4 wide, to
5. get the trains 6 wide (plus a bit maybe, but generally 6w),
6. and be able to work on the technical internals while keeping the fuselage more or less the same to develop both independently or re-use what had worked okay.
7. hide the bogies as much as possible.

So after many tries over the last years, I now have a "snake train" approach working quite well.

Snake train double power pickup boogie, first car, and first dual-engine powered bogie. There's a driver sitting in front of the bogie actually, but he's part of the fuselage that slips onto the depicted internal module.

Here's a front/rear car cover. Plates on the sides and at the ends of the cars with studs to the sides not fancy, could be tiles eventually. Function first...

20220606_183955 by Tolv Volt, on Flickr

Another working approach is a "locomotive-pulled" train, like in conventional trains. Two bogies powered by two vertically mounted 9v block motors with some top-gear. Eats up more energy, not as fast as the snake approach, and the internal structure tends to "bend" through after a while. Could be fixed by designing a fuselage linked fixed to the internals instead of the "slip-on" cover approach used for now. Not really following this road at the moment.

20220606_185900 by Tolv Volt, on Flickr

So much more to do... make more robust track (it's all quick and dirty "function first"), especially pillars. As my test track had to somehow fit onto the underlying 12V layout, there's no space for more than 2x2 brick pillars leaving the entire track a bit shaky. And inclined curves eventually, to tilt the trains inwards.

Switches... have some prototypes setting out the general geometry. Fine tuning and motorizing them should only be a question of time and technic pieces.

Rotating 2-way switch

20220606_192853 by Tolv Volt, on Flickr

Want to see stuff in action? https://vimeo.com/tolvvolt

Plenty more pictures (all quick and dirty for now; tons more on my phone...) on Flickr. [Edit: removed the embedded photostream here after adding pics on Flickr not directly related to this snake train solution]

 

Looking forward to many adopting 12 Volt MR challenges :-)

Edited June 22, 2022 by DoVoMonOgel
removed embedded Flickr photostream

[XG BC]

looks nice! good work!

[FiliusRucilo]

Finally, after nearly 3 years. of "sleeping" in boxes, we're on the road again. 
My Monorail at Born2Brick 2022 exhibition in Rüsselsheim/Germany. A detail video can be found here: 

The Monorail starts at 12:10:00

 

[XG BC]

thats a giant layout you had there. i like it!

[Holodoc]

Funny! I have seen this photo somewhere else on the internet and instantly thought: This is the CRS!

Hooray for building such a nice display with this system!

[m_tintin]

Hello guys,

I'm new here but I'm really fascinated by Trains and Monorails. All I can say is that the designs posted here are really exceptional. In fact, I was showing this to my 8 year old son - who is a LEGO enthusiast like me - and he asked me if we could build a Monorail together. I know all of them are really great but are there any recommendations for a certain Monorail and track design that are suitable for someone who is just starting?

[Phil B]

3 hours ago, m_tintin said:

Hello guys,

I'm new here but I'm really fascinated by Trains and Monorails. All I can say is that the designs posted here are really exceptional. In fact, I was showing this to my 8 year old son - who is a LEGO enthusiast like me - and he asked me if we could build a Monorail together. I know all of them are really great but are there any recommendations for a certain Monorail and track design that are suitable for someone who is just starting?

I would start with the rollercoaster track as a simple way to get a "mono rail" (though it technically has 2 tracks and is just an elevated rail system). Building a custom true monorail is going to be parts intensive and hence expensive. Alternatively, for similar cost, you can just buy an official LEGO monorail set - but that will set you back a lot of money too as those are expensive on the secondary market.

[zephyr1934]

@m_tintin have a look through this entire thread and get a feel for what is involved in the custom monoral. Do you find yourself saying, "I can do that" and "I have the parts" then that could be where you want to start. If you don't have many parts and parts are hard to get, you might want to start with one of the city train sets. A lot of people love the vintage monorail (lego has not made official monorail sets for over 20 years, so they are expensive). The new roller coaster track is also an option, but that can be expensive on a per part basis, but there are several sets that have enough of a loop, e.g., the recent small creator pirate roller coaster. If you like monorails more than trains, a cheaper option than the two wide monorail track featured prominently in this thread are the duplo road sections that offer a nice curve for an effectively 4 wide monorail guideway

[m_tintin]

5 hours ago, Phil B said:

I would start with the rollercoaster track as a simple way to get a "mono rail" (though it technically has 2 tracks and is just an elevated rail system). Building a custom true monorail is going to be parts intensive and hence expensive. Alternatively, for similar cost, you can just buy an official LEGO monorail set - but that will set you back a lot of money too as those are expensive on the secondary market.

 

5 hours ago, zephyr1934 said:

@m_tintin have a look through this entire thread and get a feel for what is involved in the custom monoral. Do you find yourself saying, "I can do that" and "I have the parts" then that could be where you want to start. If you don't have many parts and parts are hard to get, you might want to start with one of the city train sets. A lot of people love the vintage monorail (lego has not made official monorail sets for over 20 years, so they are expensive). The new roller coaster track is also an option, but that can be expensive on a per part basis, but there are several sets that have enough of a loop, e.g., the recent small creator pirate roller coaster. If you like monorails more than trains, a cheaper option than the two wide monorail track featured prominently in this thread are the duplo road sections that offer a nice curve for an effectively 4 wide monorail guideway

Thanks guys. Appreciate your input.

My son and I built the Cargo Train set and we bought an extra few dozen tracks off blue brixx. He made a couple of nice track layouts.

We're also working on motorizing the Hogwarts Express. We bought all the needed pieces and we'll start working on it very soon. We are following Moon Man Bricks' instructions.

We don't have LEGO stores here in Egypt. I order and ship sets to friends and relatives in the US and Germany.

I went through the thread and there are some designs that seem quite solid and simple to build but off course I lack the the experience so my idea of simple might be subjective. That is why I asked for recommendations. I don't want to end up waiting a couple of months for some pieces that I didn't know I needed. I also got lost with all the tracks designs. I can't decide which is more suitable for us.

 

[zephyr1934]

18 hours ago, m_tintin said:

I went through the thread and there are some designs that seem quite solid and simple to build but off course I lack the the experience so my idea of simple might be subjective. That is why I asked for recommendations. I don't want to end up waiting a couple of months for some pieces that I didn't know I needed. I also got lost with all the tracks designs. I can't decide which is more suitable for us.

It might be a little much for a typical 8 y.o., but the way many of us make sure we are ordering the parts we need is to first build the model virtually. stud.io is probably the most popular virtual building tool.

[Buttermaker]

My next Gen Train is running 🤗
 

I will upload all Fotos of the wiring and so on soon to my newly created Flickr-Account. Thanks for this advise @XG BC

[XG BC]

this is amazing.

[Red Menace]

Hi!

Is there a method for creating a curved track (compatible with Masao Hidaka’s 2-wide track) that doesn’t use illegal techniques?

Thanks

[XG BC]

yes there is: 

on this page of this very topic and one page further

[Trekkie99]

On 8/27/2022 at 4:27 AM, Buttermaker said:

My next Gen Train is running 🤗

*snip*

I will upload all Fotos of the wiring and so on soon to my newly created Flickr-Account. Thanks for this advise @XG BC

That is awesome! Runs pretty clean I'd say. 

43 minutes ago, XG BC said:

yes there is: 

*snip*

on this page of this very topic and one page further

Hey I just wanted to say thanks for helping people out on this topic! It really means a lot. 

[XG BC]

no problem! we fellow monorail guys must help each other.

[FiliusRucilo]

 

Snottingen Monorailways out at Inspiration Modellbau 2022 exhibition, Nieder-Olm, Germany

[Red Menace]

On 9/4/2022 at 6:13 PM, XG BC said:

yes there is: 

on this page of this very topic and one page further

 

Belated thanks! Sorry, I forgot to reply sooner.

I did some quick proof of concept testing with the coupling plates and Technic axle pin. I should have made some notes or taken photos but from memory it seemed like a good solution using legal techniques which I'd like to explore further and document this time around.

Initially I set out to make a length of track that was 32 modules long (when straight) that could be used for a 90º curve or flexible track, but found that there was some asymmetry along the length in where the pivot points were located. I think it was possible to correct this but it requires one segment of the track to be slightly longer or shorter than the others.

 

I wondered if you had any thoughts on an ideal curve radius for a monorail setup, taking space and functional stability into account. Would the original monorail or the train track be a good place to start?

 

I've since taken delivery of a load of rollercoaster track so I'll hopefully have a (not)monorail system to share in the future. Now I need to look into Power Functions/Powered Up.

[XG BC]

the ideal radius is the normal lego curve radius (r40)

[msk6003]

Hello I'm new to train tech forum. Here is my extreme tight turn monorail.

If I operate car in reverse it make very noticeable clicking sound due to teeth on banana gear but overall works well.  

[XG BC]

this is amazing. nice tight curves

[Holodoc]

Indeed - very nice monorail!

It's hard for me to determine: How does the train actually run? On the bricks / top-down, or by the tooths on the side?