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Hello Eurobricks, This is a post I've been excited to complete for a long time. I have scoured the Internet for information regarding opening/repairing a 12v motor, and found 2 excellent posts on Eurobricks a while back, but didn't have the supplies to do it myself. At this point, I have a pretty good collection of 12v train motors- 2 red and 3 black functional (and in sets), and another 1 red and 1 black broken/spare, both of which I had received in that condition. I had been holding on to the broken red one for a while, but only recently received the broken black one, which upped my count of broken motors to 2. Some of my other motors have some minor problems as well, such as worn contacts, hair wrapped around an axle, and one had a stripped axle that had little torque. This increased my motivation to open both nonfunctional ones up, see what was wrong, and hopefully repair one or both of them. A couple weeks ago I decided to take the plunge and even though I was still lacking information I purchased the supplies that would hopefully be adequate- these being: 1) Razor blades for opening the motor(s) (I purchased a case of 10 replacement blades for shaving razors at CVS which you will see in the video- any type of blade similar to this should work, as long as it's very sharp) 2) Lubricant- I used synthetic PTFE grease- for relubricating the worm gears and axles (link to what I bought: https://www.amazon.com/Super-Lube-21030-Synthetic-Grease/dp/B000XBH9HI/ref=sr_1_3? and no it's not affilate) 3) Super glue for reassembly of the motor(s) (link to what I bought: https://www.amazon.com/Loctite-Liquid-5-Gram-Longneck-230992/dp/B000BQMQJQ/ref=sr_1_2? and again no it's not affilate) I also made a custom jig out of Legos to hold a motor while I opened it, which are covered in-depth during the video, and I had rubbing alcohol and a rag on hand to clean the internals of the motor(s). After opening the broken red one up by breaking the seal of glue with the razor blade while the motor was in the jig and then disassembling everything, I concluded that there were several things wrong with it: -The wiring disc's solder had broken and the disc itself had snapped in half, leaving it loose in the motor -One axle had a cracked plastic gear, which was no longer holding to the axle allowing it to spin freely with little connection to the motor itself -Worst of all: The commutator had melted. This is a vital piece that transfers electricity from the 2 metal blocks labeled "A" and "B" to the actual DC motor in the center. As a result of running under too much load for too long, the motor had over time run hot too much and the plastic piece which should hold the metal parts (and wiring disc) in place was warped, wavy, and overall badly deformed. From everything I've found on the Internet, this is almost certainly unrepairable. I suppose I could attempt to melt the plastic and try to reform the commutator, but I don't have the equipment for that and would probably mess it up even more. The only way that it might be fixable is to find a replacement DC motor from a train hobby shop or something, but I've had no luck yet. There was a thread here a while back about replacement 12v motors and someone mentioned the Motraxx 265 or Motraxx 260- I checked the website and they can't be shipped to the US. So for now, I don't think a broken commutator is a fixable issue for me. If anyone here has details of a DC motor that is the same size and takes the same power, I would really appreciate it if you let me know- I could definitely use those. I proceeded to open the broken black motor and what do you know, it's the same issue. The commutator on this one was even more deformed- one of the metal plates had lost its connection to the plastic entirely. Plus the wiring disc had come unsoldered. So both broken motors are to my knowledge beyond repair without having to replace the DC motor itself. A valuable lesson to all owners of 12v motors: Do not run your motors under too much load. Maybe 3 long wagons in addition to a long engine (such as 7740 with 7815) for a single motor is probably the limit- any more and you will likely burn the motor out and cause irreversable damage which will render the motor unusable. If you run more wagons, you should use more motors. Here is where the story starts to take a turn for the better, though. About a year ago I had purchased a red motor as the one I originally got in my 7730 was broken (I sent it back to the seller for a partial refund). The replacement motor, I learned quickly, was basically only functioning on one axle. The other axle was not connected to the drivetrain, and I thought for a while that the plastic gear on it was stripped. Running on one axle is quite bad- the motor is slower, has less torque, and overall the resistance that the motor encounters is uneven. It's also very inconvenient for trains (like 7730!) with those nice connecting rods- because you have a good axle doing the work of both axles AND trying to "push" the bad axle through the connecting rods, the locomotive often got stuck on curves and points and the connecting rods would become misaligned often. I had been running it with the stripped axle for a long time. However, the good axle ran smoothly, so I suspected the DC motor inside was good. Because I had opened both broken motors and determined they're not getting repaired anytime soon, I had many spare parts- including a spare axle which I intended to swap into the red motor with the bad axle. So, I opened the red motor running in 7730, and I was correct- the DC motor inside was still in good condition. However, the the gear on the front axle, instead of being stripped like I originally thought, was cracked and like the first red motor not holding to the axle. No problem- I disassembled everything, cleaned it with alcohol, reassembled it with the bad axle replaced by a good one, and tested it with the transformer to make sure it worked (it did!). I then put lubricant on: -Motor axle (just a small amount with a paper towel, so it would spin smoothly on the rectangle plates that held it) -Metal worm gears on the motor axle and plastic gears on the wheel axles -Wheel axles ends inside the bearing sleeves Everything was then reassembled inside the bottom part of the motor housing. I applied a small amount of super glue to the outside of the bottom part of the motor housing to prepare for re-gluing. This ensured that when I put the 2 parts of the housing together, all excess glue would be pushed outside the motor and not inside. If the glue is pushed inside and dries there, you will probably have a very hard time opening it up again if needed, as super glue "welds" ABS plastic together. Finally, I pushed the top of the motor housing down and held it to ensure the glue dried. After a few tests, the motor was performing on par with my other motors and was running smooth! I would call that a success- even though I didn't manage to repair either of the broken motors, I was able to use parts from them to repair a third motor which was (before its repair) functioning questionably, and I learned a lot about the internals of a 12v motor. I should also say this: It was not as easy as I make it sound, I was working on the motors over the course of several days and it took a while to go through the process of opening them, cleaning the parts, troubleshooting, and repairing. That's not even mentioning the many hours I spent researching plastic-safe lubricants and types of glue that wouldn't damage ABS, plus the time spent gathering information on the motors themselves. It was particularly tricky to find out what types of lubricant and glue to use, but I think I managed OK as the motor runs smooth and is firmly glued after the repair. This post (and the video) are the result of a lot of work, and I hope that those who need this information can save a lot of time by reading/watching the content I have created. A picture is worth a thousand words- but a video is quite literally worth thousands of pictures. So, I have inserted a 20-minute YouTube video that I made below with most of this information plus more, and a thorough explanation of the internals of a motor. It also explains the custom jig that I made. I hope you got a lot of information from this post- I am all too aware that there is almost no information on the internals of these rare motors, so I contribute this post in the hope that it will be very useful to those who need this information down the road (or, down the 12v track ). I am hoping that the video is adequate for visual content, but I took photos as well during the repair and am happy to post them, if requested (it's just a bit tedious to post images here). For those of you that have been following my YT channel, tomorrow marks one year since I posted my first video, and I have some special content planned- if you haven't checked out my channel and are interested in 12v trains, be sure to drop by! And of course, if you have questions about the motor repair, I'm more than happy to answer them here or if you comment on any of my videos I will respond there. -Reker1000000-
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Animation for the promotion of "THE CENTRAL PERK" lego ideas project on opening "I'll be there for you" :-) What do you think? Link removed by WhiteFang Thank you.
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Lego animation Opening F.R.I.E.N.D.S . Stop motion with LDD and bluerender. What do you think.
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I made this as a Christmas gift for my mom. It was my first attempt making a functional LEGO model, and I'm quite pleased with it. See more pictures here: link Thanks for looking
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Lego Luctor 544 opens a dutch 35-year business anniversary!
896gerard posted a topic in LEGO Technic, Mindstorms, Model Team and Scale Modeling
Dear eager eurobricks readers, After my Luctor adventure (see http://mocpages.com/moc.php/414168), I thought the story was all over and that it would dust away in a corner, yellowing faster than a ripening banana. However, the company that I sold it to asked me if it could open their 35-year business anniversary by driving through a polystyrene wall! They didn't prepare me for the terror that was coming.... Nearly crushed a one-year priceless Lego creation! But what a good use of a vehicle to give it one last appearance before it dusts away in the history books! Enjoy the video! (in Dutch, sorry...) More videos to get you informed about the Luctor: More about the Luctor itself (this video has already sometime ago been posted here) Can you think of a bigger reward for building a Lego MOC? -
Well here is what I've been working on for just a bit over a month: Kaldrfell Castle. I took inspiration from many different castle builders, but here are some that inspired specific sections or details in the castle: Ecclesiastes, Kayne, Eklund, peggyjdb, Buurli Burri, Andhe, and legonardo. There is a full interior in every building, and the keep lifts off and hinges open. Also every door/trapdoor, and the drawbridge and portcullis are all functional. Interior buildings inside the castle include: a smithy, servant's house, stable, and chicken coop. And I think I came up with a new archer slit design, it can be seen on all the buildings except the rounded tower. Basically you center a 1x3 arch so that it has a half stud offset on each side and the use brick modified with stud to hold tiles to fill the gaps. You could make pretty much the same windows with going to the bother of centering them, but I like the texture you get when you do. The pictures should explain the design much better than this description. Kaldrfell Castle looks out onto a small lake in the Heavenly Mountains and protects the city of Kaldrfell which is built around the lake. Lord Nordan and Lady Deonne, Glorfindel's parents, rule Kaldrfell. Here Glorfindel pays them a visit: There are tons of details so be sure to check out more pics here: link All C&C greatly appreciated
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The main focus of this build was the large waterfall, which features a new waterfall technique (more info on that later in this post). The small tower doesn't have an interior as there wasn't space for one with the SNOT design, but the larger towers do and the whole build opens up to reveal tunnels, rooms, and a stairway created by the dwarves. Credit for the snow on the bushes design goes to Brother Steven. Credit for the slope corners of the lower tower goes to Daniel Church. The Fossgard Falls are some of the most famous waterfalls in Historica. The dwarves of Fossgard have many tunnels and fortresses built around these falls, but are willing to allow sightseers from any of the guilds to come enjoy the falls' splendour: Left tower interior: Right tower interior: The waterfall design is quite simple, it uses mainly 3 pieces: clear 1x2 bricks, clear 1x2 plates, and clear 1x1 round plates. Using those pieces you build a wall 2 studs thick in front of white bricks. You use the white bricks to define the shape of the fall, for mine I used 6 studs as the width for the center of the fall, then stepped back a stud and did 4 studs wide on either side of the 6 studs, then stepped back another stud and did 2 studs wide on the outside edges of the 4 stud sections. While building the wall of clear, you attach 1x2 plates so that they stick out one stud from the rest of the wall every so often, and you put 1x1 round plates or cheese slopes on top of the protruding edge of the 1x2 plate. Also as you build the wall every three or four brick layers, you step the whole fall back a stud by moving the white bricks back one stud then keeping the clear wall in front only two studs thick. These two pictures should help show what I mean. This one shows the use of 1x2 plates and 1x1 round plates or cheese slopes in the waterfall: This picture shows how the fall steps back: Hopefully that long-winded description makes sense There are more pictures here: link Any Comments/Criticism greatly appreciated
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Inspired by castles built by Karrde, 2 Much Caffeine, LL, vdubguy67, and de Gothia. There used to be a lot of castles built on only a 32x32 baseplate, but I haven't seen many lately. I also haven't seen many castles with hinged walls/opening interiors and this was built with those two main goals in mind. The castle lifts off of the baseplate then can hinge open. All the doors/trapdoors work and every building has a full interior. Some of the rooms include: a storage room, an armory, a dining room, a chapel, and a bedroom. This is my favorite castle yet. Manaor Castle is the Home of Drottin Manaor (my candidate for Prime Minister) and protects the city of Sveithaven which Drottin rules: Lifted off of the baseplate: Lots more detail pics here: link All C&C appreciated
