Ropefish

2-8-8-4 AC-9 "yellowstone"

Recommended Posts

Hey all, I've been lurking in the forums for a month or so after i saw a lego big boy some time ago by morningstrummer, Ive long wanted to get back into a model railroad hobby but never could very much due to living conditions or expense and now i find my self at an odd crossroads of sorts. The skinny is I've since made a WIP MOC of the Southern Pacific AC-9 based on morningstrummer's big boy in Stud.IO ( I have a thing for articulated locomotives ) but find myself after having just nearly finished the whole loco and its tender thinking of going with an O Scale set instead as both layouts, add-ons, rolling stock, etc. etc. will end up costing me the same but both lack things i enjoy of both hobbies. One is building with lego's, stepping back and seeing the creation ( move and make sound even! ) then two being the wider availability and setup of O Scale and to stretch even HO for that matter. At this point i just really don't know what direction i should take the dive, as i wont be able to do both by a monetary standpoint, and y'all seem to have the wealth of information.

Oh and here is my wip, Spoilered for convenience.

Spoiler

1ee0600446321606c2fcb8fa17d22b40.png

 

Edited by Ropefish

Share this post


Link to post
Share on other sites

Getting into Lego trains, especially the aftermarket parts like Trainedbricks and BrickTrax, is nearly as expensive as O-Scale models if the Lego model is detailed enough. It is honestly comes down to your choice on which medium of model railroading you choose.

Share this post


Link to post
Share on other sites

Welcome to the forums and it looks like you have a good start on a nice MOC. Indeed, follow your interests. If you are not sure, maybe buy the crocodile set recognizing that even if you wind up going O the set makes a nice display piece. Then see how you like the building experience. I would say a lot of stock O scale trains are similar in detail to some of better lego MOCs (but that's an opinion call and obviously you should make that one yourself). Lego builds will not reach the high end of O scale detailed models. So if you want hyper realism go with O. On the other hand, if you like the building experience, Lego might ultimately be more to your liking. Especially if you like the design process but are not to the point where you want to kitbash O scale trains. One of the things I like about Lego trains is just how easy it is to customize them.

Share this post


Link to post
Share on other sites

As a rule of thumb: MOCs are generally like twice the price of sets, TLG is like twice the price of alternate manufacturers, 8w is like... maybe... 50% more expensive than 6w. So you sure found the most expensive end of our hobby! =)

Share this post


Link to post
Share on other sites
7 hours ago, High_Admiral said:

Getting into Lego trains, especially the aftermarket parts like Trainedbricks and BrickTrax, is nearly as expensive as O-Scale models if the Lego model is detailed enough. It is honestly comes down to your choice on which medium of model railroading you choose.

6 hours ago, zephyr1934 said:

Welcome to the forums and it looks like you have a good start on a nice MOC. Indeed, follow your interests. If you are not sure, maybe buy the crocodile set recognizing that even if you wind up going O the set makes a nice display piece. Then see how you like the building experience. I would say a lot of stock O scale trains are similar in detail to some of better lego MOCs (but that's an opinion call and obviously you should make that one yourself). Lego builds will not reach the high end of O scale detailed models. So if you want hyper realism go with O. On the other hand, if you like the building experience, Lego might ultimately be more to your liking. Especially if you like the design process but are not to the point where you want to kitbash O scale trains. One of the things I like about Lego trains is just how easy it is to customize them.

Both these points really bring up my dilemma! I think in the end ill go with lego as i've already saved and sourced a lot of info for it all.
 

 

1 hour ago, Black Knight said:

As a rule of thumb: MOCs are generally like twice the price of sets, TLG is like twice the price of alternate manufacturers, 8w is like... maybe... 50% more expensive than 6w. So you sure found the most expensive end of our hobby! =)

Oh yea that's the other thing haha, Price will be similar to O with what i want to build, but i can at least budget out groups of parts over time unlike with a whole fully built O scale locomotive.

Share this post


Link to post
Share on other sites

Welcome aboard.  With LEGO you can disassemble or raid a MOC and reuse the parts in another MOC.  Spend once, build many.  :classic:

Share this post


Link to post
Share on other sites
31 minutes ago, SteamSewnEmpire said:

Can we see the cab 'front?' Interested to see how you resolved those angles.

Sadly uh i just lost the file to Studio overwriting the entire thing with 0 bricks! ( but i had uploaded the final version's parts to bricklink ) I used some wedge plates and a technic brick, then inverted slopes on the inside of the cab front to trick the eye when looking at it from outside angles.
f8319976b9a772904306b4d332b0ac61.png

There are two versions, one requires the modification of the plates and retains a better visual from the front while the other has a bit of that detracted with no modification

Share this post


Link to post
Share on other sites
10 minutes ago, SteamSewnEmpire said:

God I hate Studio. Good luck recreating it :/.

Yea unfortunately its the best alternative, I should be mostly alright as the bulk of the model is a hollow core ( besides some supports ) and the drives are based around Morningstrummer's 4-8-8-4 drives which i purchased the instructions of.

Share this post


Link to post
Share on other sites
16 hours ago, Ropefish said:

Oh yea that's the other thing haha, Price will be similar to O with what i want to build, but i can at least budget out groups of parts over time unlike with a whole fully built O scale locomotive.

Whichever route you go, I'd suggest joining a club so that you can run on a large layout.

 

9 hours ago, Ropefish said:

Sadly uh i just lost the file to Studio overwriting the entire thing with 0 bricks! ( but i had uploaded the final version's parts to bricklink ) I used some wedge plates and a technic brick, then inverted slopes on the inside of the cab front to trick the eye when looking at it from outside angles.

ARRRRRGH!!! So sorry to hear, but glad you are rolling with it so well. Make frequent backup copies (at least one per session) so you never lose much. When I build digitally I am continually saving my revisions with a slightly new name: v10, v11, etc.. That way I can also easily undo some experiment that eventually turns bad. And if you know stud.io could cause problems, make a backup before launching it. All of the extra backups might seem like a hassle at first, but it quickly becomes a habit you don't even have to think about and the next time a file gets corrupted you will be so happy. And storage space really isn't an issue the file sizes are puny compared to modern drives.

Share this post


Link to post
Share on other sites
7 minutes ago, zephyr1934 said:

Whichever route you go, I'd suggest joining a club so that you can run on a large layout.

 

ARRRRRGH!!! So sorry to hear, but glad you are rolling with it so well. Make frequent backup copies (at least one per session) so you never lose much. When I build digitally I am continually saving my revisions with a slightly new name: v10, v11, etc.. That way I can also easily undo some experiment that eventually turns bad. And if you know stud.io could cause problems, make a backup before launching it. All of the extra backups might seem like a hassle at first, but it quickly becomes a habit you don't even have to think about and the next time a file gets corrupted you will be so happy. And storage space really isn't an issue the file sizes are puny compared to modern drives.

Or put your folder where you save your files in Git :)

Share this post


Link to post
Share on other sites
3 hours ago, Phil B said:

Or put your folder where you save your files in Git :)

Or Google Drive ;-)

Share this post


Link to post
Share on other sites

While Google Drive is a fine alternative, a cloud is just other's people computers. Git can be cumbersome for a non-experienced user, so I just "Save as.." and give sequential numbers. I've lost count how many times that happened when I was a noobie starting with computers in Windows 3.1 and especially 95 ;)

Actually I've just did this to an image file I was constructing with a lot of LEGO stickers so I can go tomorrow to print in adhesive paper :D Sticker-01.xcf, Sticker-02.xcf, etc.

 

On-topic, I'd just go with other people's opinion and state that it is really an expensive hobby. My suggestion would be for you to focus on one theme only (in this case Trains), because if you try to diversify a lot, (very) soon you'll end up with no money and with plenty of frustration ;)

Edited by hsousa

Share this post


Link to post
Share on other sites

From the ashes!

7c6e978646d09212b2e90d754fed1802.png

Well, i found myself redesigning the driving unit and adding some suspension ( though one of them will have to be modified ) this is an older-ish version but it now has a stop axle to help guide it to stop wibble wobby effects. I just need to remmember how i built the forward one, despite it being a based on the Morningstrummer BigBoy it was more heavily changed...

Share this post


Link to post
Share on other sites

Well its been almost but not quiet a year yet, I just recently picked the project back up and there have been a lot of design changes but the model is now much closer to its real world counterpart.
unknown.png

but as I've gone through building this, Ive slowly been inching towards redoing the entire wheel drive system.... Im happy with how it is now but i feel that redoing it in a more classic way via Technic bricks/bars on a forward articulated drive then having the rear powered from a motor inside the locomotive body or just making the tender powered and having the both drives be dummies. The only thing stopping me is i really do like the idea of the locomotive drivers being powered... in all likelihood ill probably end up making another separate drive to interchange. Regardless getting close to begin building this as a physical model, making extra sure to get extra pieces for the inevitable. (  and lots of backups of my locomotives file )

Share this post


Link to post
Share on other sites
3 hours ago, zephyr1934 said:

Nice progress! And I'm jealous, even with your six month break you are moving faster than me on my steam project.

haha thanks, i still have the tender to go then i need to go through and solidify a lot of connections. I got a long ways yet till its Physicalized.

Share this post


Link to post
Share on other sites

2-4-4-8_AC-9_Side.png

Quick render, this is 99% the completed digital model. there will be a lot more tweaking to do on the drive train and fiddling with the core for stability.

Share this post


Link to post
Share on other sites

Holy Cow! Beautiful AC-9! Curious that you went for the original coal fired configuration, you really don't see much of that. 

Share this post


Link to post
Share on other sites
3 hours ago, High_Admiral said:

Holy Cow! Beautiful AC-9! Curious that you went for the original coal fired configuration, you really don't see much of that. 

feb19f990decf39ca21bf71dd2531d86.png

8533ecd64788f4c68be0fb98c65a1744.png
( the "coal" in this photo is just floating above some tiling, it will be loose in the physical model )

 

1 hour ago, Glenn Holland said:

Looks awesome!

oh man thanks, im a huge fan of your work and a few others here. Don't think id be able to actually build any of this without the plethora of reference material and techniques ya'll have mastered here.

Share this post


Link to post
Share on other sites

a small update, the orignal drive train was bothering me with how exposed the motors were so i redid the whole thing, it allowed me to give it a more robust suspension and now i can use the LL #10 Drivers (63' ), this allowed me to adjust things for better accuracy as well, and i figured out a way to run both drives off one motor though im unsure if it will really work till i test it IRL ( if it doesn't removing it wont effect the designs connection ), In all reality I should sacrifice accuracy for default Lego curves but watching articulated trains on those bothers me to no end....

unknown.png

However I now have a smaller problem, due to the offsetting of connections for the LL Drivers/Wheels means ill need to find a way to get some custom drive rods to compensate for said offset ( addendum, I can't get zephyr's drive rods to import into Studio without them showing up as invisible but the Valve rods go in fine )

cc7d5515b54dca166718d1164034868a.png
 

Edited by Ropefish
removed duplicate image

Share this post


Link to post
Share on other sites
3 hours ago, Craig Strader said:

Where did you find the link to those drivers, if not the other wheels such as the #10?

I made them myself based off comparing sizes to XL Shupp drivers to the normal lego drivers

Share this post


Link to post
Share on other sites

Create an account or sign in to comment

You need to be a member in order to leave a comment

Create an account

Sign up for a new account in our community. It's easy!

Register a new account

Sign in

Already have an account? Sign in here.

Sign In Now

  • Recently Browsing   0 members

    No registered users viewing this page.