WIP PS 54` 4740 cu ft Hopper

[Supplement_Creatif]

Well was planning on posting only once I finished it, but after a quick rethink of the underbody and an good hour or so tonight I really wanted to share the progress so for. I have the overall shape pretty down. The only part I really fear to come is the ladders and a way to make the couplers have two joints because the trucks can only turn a max of 18 degrees or so, not very R40 friendly. Anyways, let me know what you guys think. As always any and all feedback is welcome.

And not to worry I am still chugging away at the loco here and there. But its hardly a train with just one locomotive now is it?

Cheers,

 

 

Edited December 4, 2020 by Supplement_Creatif

[SteamSewnEmpire]

Very nicely done.

[Reker1000000]

Woah... looks simple from the outside but VERY nicely done with the complex internal structure.

[zephyr1934]

Wow, looks great but seeing the inside that is insane (a complement). You could achieve the same effect using door rails and headlight bricks but I'm not sure that would given you any more strength and it would only save you a little weight. If you did not mind the ribs sticking out another 1/2 plate you can go with strictly door rails and studs forward bricks, doing away with the 2x plates and tiles... but you have come this far the extra depth of the ribs would be a step backwards.

For your primary question, the trucks, your coupler extensions are way longer than they need to be. You should build a prototype that is just a simple flatcar that replicates the top-down view of the car and has the trucks in the same spot. Use this to test any and all curves you might use it on including S-curves and switches. That way you can figure out the minimum length to extend the coupler out. You can also gain 1/2 stud on either end by using technic plates instead of the 2x3 with hole to hold the truck on. Also, while not prototypical, you could move the pivot point on the truck one stud closer to the center of the car, that should give you more truck rotation than you currently have.

My 52 stud long passenger cars handle R40's fine with the end of the magnet extending only one stud beyond the end of the 6 wide base (well, the clearance is fine, they created a lot of resistance before I switched them to roller bearings). It looks like you have 7 wide in this build so you might need 1.5 studs beyond. But it looks like you are currently at 5.5 studs beyond the end of the car.

As for the ladders, given your design the easiest solution is probably to use clips along the top ends of the car to suspend a construction that is mostly made up of bars to round out the end of the car. You might be able to get a plate or tile base in the bottom. I would also see if you could do anything with window or door frames.

 

[Supplement_Creatif]

Thanks for all the comments!

@zephyr1934 I had first contemplated using door rails but didn't like its cross section when viewed from top. I was very relieved when I got to the point of just one plate thickness for the ribs. Initial tries with a 2 plate wide rib made the car too long. With the current dimensions its a little long to be strictly 8 studs = 10 feet but I feel like the dimensions of the hopper shoots and the front and back angles make it appeared properly proportioned.

Yeah the initial couplers are definitely way too long. I had just thrown those together quickly trying to reverse engineer the BMR trucks, which I still haven't figured out but I found a solution which works. One day I do want to pick up a Burlington Northern boxcar, man do they make nice models. But anyways I digress. I shortened the coupler length to something that makes a bit more sense. Thinking about making this thing take R40 curves scares me a little since I`d have to take for sure a plate off of the main middle beam, which would make the car appear sitting higher. Eyeing up some BrixTracks R104 switches I might stick with something like that, when I eventually start making some kind of a layout, most likely a grain elevator when I get to it. In terms of testing it on an R40 track section that approach makes a whole lot of sense however I don`t own any Lego track. The only train sets I own being the free gift loco and the dwarves mine, which isn`t a train set but there`s some track and wheels lol. I don`t have much to physically test unfortunately. 

And in terms of the ladders clips are they way I am leaning right now however that window and doorframe idea did get me thinking! Definitely a trick I`ll keep up my sleeve for future projects.

 

I am thinking a couple more hours one night to finish the outside, then one last session to make sure the insides are all sewn up and that the thing looks half decent looking at it from upside down.

I do intend to post the file for the model on here once I finish my first full draft since I`d love to see someone try to make this car lighter. Since the lighter the car, the longer the train, and man is a long grain train fun.

cheers,

 

 

 

[zephyr1934]

7 hours ago, Supplement_Creatif said:

Thinking about making this thing take R40 curves scares me a little since I`d have to take for sure a plate off of the main middle beam, which would make the car appear sitting higher. Eyeing up some BrixTracks R104 switches I might stick with something like that, when I eventually start making some kind of a layout, most likely a grain elevator when I get to it. In terms of testing it on an R40 track section that approach makes a whole lot of sense however I don`t own any Lego track.

Before you ever set out to build custom trains in earnest you should get a simple city train set in whatever mode you think you will use, PF or PUP. It is really valuable to have real tracks and wheels to test clearances. You can typically get switches for relatively cheap on bricklink (or at least that was the case a year ago).

In the case of your hopper cars, if the pivot point was right above the inside axle you would probably be able to take any curve, not sure if it would be stable though and it would look funny on curves (in other words, I'm not suggesting you attempt to go there). But it is nice to be able to navigate R40 switches for yards, if not your home layout then at shows. I'm starting to build trains that will not take a normal R40 curve but I make sure they can take an R40 switch and a single segment of R40 curves.

 

The ladders are looking good, but take a peek at photos of a real hopper, I believe the ladders are not symmetric like you have them right now. I assume you will have some sort of connection at the bottom ends of the car, otherwise, the rotating coupler will almost certainly disrupt the ladder structure. And it would look more prototypical. Everything else is looking great, e.g., the brake line along the side.

 

 

[LEGO Train 12 Volts]

On 12/5/2020 at 9:09 AM, Supplement_Creatif said:

 

 

Excellent construction, I like the new details of the stairs and the steering wheel to open the hoppers!

[Feuer Zug]

Excellent build on the hopper. I do thing the internals will be heavy though. Maybe run 1x1 bricks instead of 1x2s? Can't wait to see it in real bricks.

[zephyr1934]

20 hours ago, Feuer Zug said:

Excellent build on the hopper. I do thing the internals will be heavy though. Maybe run 1x1 bricks instead of 1x2s? Can't wait to see it in real bricks.

Would it be lighter to do the sides out of a series of theses bricks stacked on top of each other:

... probably would be if the sides were 6 studs tall, but they look to be 7 tall. Attempting to work a 1x2 tile in is certainly doable but the ribs would be disrupted. Oh well

 

 

[Supplement_Creatif]

@zephyr1934  I entirely agree that getting a city train set would be extremely beneficial with regards to testing clearances but at this point in time I am so far away, both in terms of available disposable income and time, to invest in purchasing a city train. The Trains that Lego sells currently are also all European based. I have nothing against trains from Europe however they do not have the same appeal to me as North American freight trains. The parts such the trucks do not appeal to me and I would rather start slowly, very slowly, making a fleet or rolling stock and a locomotive which fits the style I want from the get go. The one thing which would be extremely useful would be a loop of track. I do not however have the space for a loop and would rather have a a small yard that doesn`t go anywhere but is more prototypical with rolling stock and locomotives that work more as display. I must say however I was so close from buying the crocodile locomotive. Very much fit in with the Saturn V, good price point and a great model but decided to make my own trains, figured it couldn't be that hard to get something looking half decent... oh boy didn't think of how much work was involved.

In terms of the ladder my plan is to connect the bottom to the rest of the structure. And you are absolutely right on the brake wheel only being on one end. It was getting late when I got to this point therefore I decided to copy the first end onto the other just to get a look of how the ladders will shape up. But this is definitely a detail that will be getting some work next time I have a good couple hours to throw at it.

@Feuer Zug and @zephyr1934 Your are both absolutely correct in that this car will be heavy. However I must say your suggestions are fantastic! The modified tile (don't know why this is a modified tile on Bricklink and not a Modified Plate?) with two studs on top is such as beautiful part! I had completely forgot to think about this one. This makes it so that the third row of bricks that are used to work around the tiles to connect the next section of plate and tiles can be removed. Making the entire section just 2 bricks wide. I will be working on retrofitting the rest of the model this coming weekend but here is a snipet of the heavier construction vs the new light one inspired by your comments!

As always thank you all for the comments and feedback!

cheers,

 

Edited December 9, 2020 by Supplement_Creatif

[KvadratGnezdo]

Great job so far, the insides to me look simply mindbraking!

 

[Matt Dawson]

Looking good!

[kieran]

Looks great, very nice effect 

[Supplement_Creatif]

Hello everyone,

I am back with a small update to this MOC. Got quite busy with the weeks leading up to the holidays and with the announcement of the Brick Train Awards in the past few weeks I figured its time to get back to studio, quite literally.

This latest update came from looking at many photos of prototypes on the web. I noticed that many of these hoppers seem to have changed hands more than once and signs have been welded onto the side of the car. These signs vary a lot in size and placement, and some seem to have a fresh logo on them while others seem to be painted over. If anybody can fill me in on the specifics of this that would be great. My current guess is that its easier and cheaper to weld on a sign with the new company logo than to put on a fresh coat of paint? The renders I am posting have multiple variations of signs on them to test them out. All of them are only attached by a 2x2 plate which I find gives a nice effect of this sign being welded onto the side ribs of the cars, leaving space between the side of the car and the back of the sign. 

The other change I made was making the whole car 1 plate taller. This makes it so that the hoppers chutes and middle structural rib are more visible like the prototype. This also allowed me to put in another slope piece under the car making the underside much cleaner, more cleaning up under there is due however to properly finish it off. The increase in height also allowed me to change the stack of plates and bricks that made up the central rib to 2 brick high panel pieces. This allows me to keep rigidity and structure and making the model lighter as well.

The ends of the car seems to be again an uphill battle. The plan in the next week is to try and find a clever solution to finish the ends up. Once that is done a bottom to top rebuild will ensure I am using pieces as efficiently as possible.

Thank you again for the kind words and comments. I appreciate all the feedback.

Cheers,

 

[Shiva]

Supplement_Creatif, I like the looks of the wagon sides.

[ColletArrow]

That underside shot of the hoppers shows you've got some really nifty building going on here, there's a lot that doesn't show at first glance. It sounds like you've got all of your planned worked sorted out too. I hope you can sort the ends out soon, it should look fantastic!

[zephyr1934]

On 2/7/2021 at 4:10 PM, Supplement_Creatif said:

This latest update came from looking at many photos of prototypes on the web. I noticed that many of these hoppers seem to have changed hands more than once and signs have been welded onto the side of the car.

I think those signs are generally from the original railroad, Milwaukee Road was probably among the last to use them, doing so in the 1970's.

Hoppers these days do not get a full coat of paint too often. You can still spot liveries that disappeared in the early 1980's (e.g., recently spotted Rock Island "The Rock" cars and C&NW cars around here)

[ivanlan9]

@zephyr1934, you must be in or near Chicago. 

Metta,

Ivan

[zephyr1934]

Oh, that wasn't my photo, that was just a quick google search result to illustrate my point

[Supplement_Creatif]

Thanks for all the comments everybody!

@zephyr1934 Thanks for the info with regards to the welded on signs. Looking into it more it seems that a lot of them are welded on by the first owners. In Manitoba at least it seems that in the late 70`s and early 80`s, the provincial government leased a whole variety of different hoppers to free up space in grain elevators to help the farmers move grain. Found a really neat article about it, can read up on it here: http://tracksidetreasure.blogspot.com/2012/05/manitoba-covered-hoppers.html. But this is leading me to design this as a leased hopper from this time period. Plus this would align great with the RS-18 I started designing back in November (the RS-18 is a little on pause after I lost a lot of progress, somehow my file just went missing...very strange...)

Talking about different hoppers, oh boy is there a whole bunch that look very similar but are just different in the wrong places for designing into brick. So here`s the scoop. Started off with designing the PS 4740 hopper. Looking around I found hoppers that looked practically identical except that the roof was curved. Curved in such a way that would make the use of 2 x 2 curved slopes ideal. This is the roof that you can see in my model up to date. But alas this ends up being a different Pullman 4750 (latter version?) hopper with 18 side ribs instead of the 16 I had designed. The 16 side rib cars look exactly like the Milwaukee Car @zephyr1934 posted. So back to the drawing board. 

Here`s the new roof, let me know what you think. I think I am going to stick with the new one as it is flatter and more prototypical for the 16 rib car. Put this whole side rib story is causing me a real headache. The proportions seem to look real good and work themselves out with the technique I am using for 16 ribs. I feel like I am going crazy trying to iron some of these details out, am I pulling teeth here? Still getting sidetracked from the ends however, although I have added in diagonal supports which finishes the bottom center support quite well.

Well enough ramble time for the renders. Included is the 16 rib pullman end and 18 rib other covered hopper with the curved roof. Link to photo of an 18 rib car: https://www.google.ca/search?q=Pullman-Standard+4750+18+rib&tbm=isch&ved=2ahUKEwiW7Mr4zuPuAhUMXqwKHTXmBu8Q2-cCegQIABAA&oq=Pullman-Standard+4750+18+rib&gs_lcp=CgNpbWcQAzIECCMQJzIECCMQJ1CPS1j-TGCcT2gAcAB4AIABeYgB6AGSAQMwLjKYAQCgAQGqAQtnd3Mtd2l6LWltZ8ABAQ&sclient=img&ei=dBImYJZijLyxBbXMm_gO&bih=969&biw=1920&hl=en#imgrc=dxKEiiacYX21eM

Cheers,

 

 

 

[zephyr1934]

It is looking really nice. I wouldn't worry about getting it "perfect", there will always be some desirable detail you have to let go. So 18 ribs when there should be 18, or flat roof when it should be curved, you as the builder will be the only one who knows (but it is also okay to be painstakingly accurate, just don't do it to a point where it causes you angst). That said, the 1x plates supporting the grill tiles in the flat-top seem too wide. What about using something like the clip side of a 1x1 plate with clip for the outward facing support,