Toastie

@Lowa I am really deeply impressed. You guys have so many brilliant ideas (just take the curved switches alone). What I like so much about your software is the "cleanliness". It is very intuitive - and at the same time very powerful. I mean, you can run your own python scripts, operate BLE and 4DBrix WiFi devices … and all that is tile oriented and highly modular. And: It is a track designer on the side … Wow. This is so well thought out! Plus: Help from your side comes fast and efficient. Really nice. Best regards, Thorsten

As others have said - a beautiful steam engine - one of the most beautiful steamers I have seen. What I really really like though is the entire train. She pulls it so nicely and smoothly - and everything is "in harmony". Wow. Congratulations! Best regards, Thorsten

Wow. That is really really nice. I am all 9V; nevertheless I do share all the excitement! Moving the switches into curved track segments even with perfect half cross overs is an extremely nice solution. Thanks for the note! Best Thorsten

These are really nice! Particularly the single cross is really attractive. Would electrification still work in that case? This would call for a very compact switch mechanism for the drive between the two tracks, right? In that case it would be of benefit to move the throwing mechanism to the other (straight) side, right? @Haddock51 wanted to do a similar modification - however due to other reasons. Best, Thorsten

Too bad there is no handheld ABS detector thingy. I live about an hour or two from the Netherland's shores away. Vacation time would be LEGO skimming time for me Best Thorsten

Oh, from an ecological point of view TLG should stop making LEGO bricks at all. (ABS is not necessarily that environmentally friendly to make nor does it biodegrade over decades and decades - this is why we can still use the bricks from the early days of TLG. However, no one in the world will throw LEGO bricks into the garbage - and this is why the latter is not an issue at all, of course) Plus: A chemical plant is not intrinsically "polluting". Plus: No chemical plants = no nothing other than what nature provides us with. And: No LEGO bricks at all; wooden bricks won't clutch as nicely … nor would the have any other color as "wooden" and biodegrade rather rapidly - particularly as the usage of any long-lived precious wood is not environmentally tolerable as well, of course. From that perspective, TLG should really release the set as it is the reason of existence of TLG. Which adds an even existential philosophy dimension to the set All the best, Thorsten

Oh that would be really nice. I bought them in even smaller sizes back then … but all had one color. The good'ol days

Same here, Emanuele and @Ymarilego. And more than pity. Question Ymarilego: Do you plan on/have already/want to sell/want to share building instructions? I love to have this my office (there is more LEGO already) - this would really stand out and make my point: Having fun and doing hard work go very well with each other - when you want that. All the best, Thorsten

Same here - as do the "bulk" brick boxes - so many colors, but so few bricks of the same "size" Best Thorsten

@Haddock51, @Duq (Experiments done, spent hours in the lab the past days with a bunch of my group and we got it to work: We have temperature and electron energy resolved mass spectra of an "interesting" MOCVD compound to be presented next Tuesday in Atlanta - I am happy. "Interesting" as in: These compounds see air - and start to burn - and see water and they explode. Now if this is not off-topic then I don't know) OK, back on topic. I feel like an idiot showing some screen shots of my simple MLCAD file for the switch drive - which is the work of Duq and others, but so be it. And: No renders, simple snipping tool screen shots. Sorry. Here we go: 1 is the entire drive with PF motor attached that you don't want anyway. In 2 all decorative stuff is removed. 3 is the actual brilliant idea. On the left, only the driving mechanism is shown. On the right the end points that prevent any uplifting forces (as all three axles are on one sturdy technic brick) are shown; the arrows mark the stop on either side. The travel path of the #42003 Technic cross block 1x3 is just right to throw the switch, as Duq pointed out above. The entire brick-work in 2 above is just to snap the entire mechanism onto the switch with minimal brick count. It does not have to withstand any shear forces; these are even less of concern, when manually throwing the switch as you won't bang it as hard as the PF motor does. You can also see that the axles easily allow a gearing that will reverse the motion of the throw - it will then point into the way of travel, when invasively modifying the switch, as you are planning. Hope that helps. Once again: This is the work of others! Duq may want to comment on this, as he was deeply involved in designing this mechanism. All the best, Thorsten

@Haddock51 I am very sorry! I thought the images provided above from @Duq were making that useless. Give me time until Wednesday as we are preparing our annual research group "trip" to the US tomorrow and on Tuesday. Best, Thorsten

When this is no leak then it looks incredibly nice. All the fears about Spike Prime colors being inappropriate for LEGO Technic models evaporate into nowhere … and to me it looks like much more model integration options than ever before. And the 4I/O Hub is a blast. I really like that one. I have to admit that after some reluctance in December 2018, which entirely diminished after playing with and programming the 2I/OHub - I am really excited about the PuP line. Best regards, Thorsten

@Haddock51 I am just wildly guessing here; but I am sure others will have brilliant ideas: Let us presume you made the modification as discussed above, i.e. the invasive but nevertheless apparently straight forward modification. Also, let us presume that it is not the yellow throw bar but rather any kind of any bar pointing into the direction of travel. In that case, the brick-built mechanism by Duq/Ben and others can easily be modified with a set of two gears to "reverse" the end position of the then technic axle serving as throw lever. The sturdiness of the mechanism is then sacrificed a little, as any elevation translates to building lifting forces. But: 1) you are throwing your switch points manually and not with a bang-bang type motor drive and 2) once you have the internal switch bar in your hands, you can file-off some material of the extrusions securing the end position of the bar. This will result in a much smoother operation of the switch. When throwing the switch manually, this creates no problem at all. (When operating the switch in bang-bang style with a motor however, the stressed driving axle driven all the way to the corresponding stop may move the point blade back a little - this is why I am using power adjusted RCX outputs for that purpose.) All the best, Thorsten

Sure, but I guess @Haddock51 needs to modify one switch to have the throw on the straight side due to space and layout limitations. Best, Thorsten

@Duq Good evening. Just tried it out. What works (also with more than 2 light sensors on one port): Put sensor port into passive mode ("none" in BricXCC) and select "raw". With one sensor I get a reading of about 490 for dark and 380 for rather bright light. With three sensors this gives 450 for all dark and 380 again for bright light on an individual sensor. Which means that the span between dark and light decreases a little. But it works fine, when the light hits the sensor spot on. Setting the "percent" output works as well - numbers are between 88 (dark) and 100 (light) then. These all depend highly on your setup but in essence I believe it works. With the sensor LED powered ("reflection" mode, sensor LED on) I could not get it to work - the sensor electronic circuity may not like to run in parallel. I bet that @Philo knows exactly why this is. Whatever it is worth. Best Thorsten

@Haddock51 I have actually never thought about this issue. However, I believe it is simply mechanically much more straight forward to it that way. The counterweight for the lever (also present in the LEGO version) points indeed into different directions depending on the location of the throw mechanism, however all switches on main train lines have that signal type thing attached to it, which shows the right point direction even from far away. One could argue that a simple additional mechanism would take care of that in reality, but reliability is much better with as simple as possible mechanics. Best regards, Thorsten

It will also strongly depend on the material used to stain the ABS. This has vastly changed/improved over the years - as has the formulation and treatment of ABS itself. After all ABS, as every plastic material, has its own formulation secrets - there is more than just the ingredients/monomers listed elsewhere. A rather difficult thing is to stain the (e.g. ABS) reaction soup before/during polymerization homogeneously. Plus they don't only use ABS. Depending on production time (age), formulation used then, exposure to heat, light, other chemicals etc. may affect the color. A sealed bag may also be not that much of a seal, when either little fractures are present or vapors have diffused/penetrated the thin PE (or the like) bag. Who knows what the story of the LEGO piece in question would tell … after forty years ... All the best Thorsten

I remember that discussion well. The first thing I did then was to restrict the BLE device scanning to known MAC addresses only. @Cosmik42: As my program has a different philosophy than yours (static frame/control positions on the form, which in turn expands with number of user defined BLE devices allowed - vs. automatically growing with actually found devices (in order of detection), things need to be handled differently, I guess. You also talked about that somewhere. But: Wouldn't it be easy to read (an optional) plain text file at program start, which just lists the "allowed" MAC addresses to scan for? No file found = default behavior as of now, text file present and valid entries present = restriction to the listed devices. You would just need to add a friend's MAC address to the text file (using any plain text editor) and restart the program. There are countless other options of course and you will certainly come up with a nice and sharp solution! Best Thorsten

Your enumeration is right: This is the world of IP. However: When you decide to venture into that world: Don't use the internet, e.g. this forum, to showcase. When you do it, it is violating any IP related things. A post or picture, within the public - kills your IP rights. It is so easy: >Don't< publish anything with regard to your idea/model. And this is exactly my point: Doing that (which is the whole contrast of what EB wants to be) eliminates sharing. All the best, Thorsten

You are very welcome. Looking good - just make sure, the thing does not deliver >15 V DC (without load) - but I don't think so. Best Thorsten

Hi Emanuele! I always knew that you will eventually venture into chemistry. Your approach is perfectly well suited to do that job - the pictures are proving it! May I just add this: You can go much cheaper, when not using a cosmetic or food-safe product, but rather raw but clean material: 5 L of 12% H2O2 solution cost about €10. Type e.g. purux into Google. Or whatever other brand. You can then submerge the pieces in the solution using a flat bowl type thing. The effect of exposure to sun may be also done by a solarium type of thing. Or any other source of tanning radiation. And: I suggest to "wash" (= submerged and leave there for an hour) the pieces in wash petrol before going further. That stuff is really cheap as well. It removes any greasy stuff first and allows the H2O2 to "bite" more efficient. In any case: Your results are very impressive! Very nice: Chemistry@work! All the best Thorsten

In the evolution of this discussion many of you guys have ventured into the deep mud of IP(!), theft, work, making money. Honesty is thrown in, hope and calls for fairness and fair play. Legal action is discussed as well as may other things as for example clone brands, and whatnot. Sorry. If you want to play fair AND make (some or a lot does not matter) money DON'T communicate anything using the internet as vehicle. These worlds are simply incompatible. As of today. You can play fair with people you know very very well. People you trust. Or who do play with some measure of rules - and even here you will find individuals trying to take advantage. Of whatever. But they will. For sure. It seems to be - buried in humans somewhere. Money. Jeroen was not concerning this when he started this thread. But it came up. It always seem to come up. Money. No, when is comes to money, mankind in itself is not prepared for that fair play thing. Look at the world as it is and tell me, where the fair play takes place when money is an issue. Nowhere. The sole reason for IP and the multi-trillion market handling it is almost a proof for that. The internet. A wonderful idea - a beautiful way of growing and spreading knowledge. To share ideas. Yeah. And a place and means which is perfectly suited to steal, threat, copy, make money, cheat, do the worst things that people can come up with. Sorry. I use the internet to communicate ideas - freely - at no charge - and for it is worth for others. And that is it. Oh no there is something else: For fun. For the sole idea of sharing. For growing knowledge, spirit, sparks, participation … without even knowing at all, if that actually works to the modest extent. All the best, Thorsten

@makoy Thanks a million! (as you noticed, it works) Best regards, Thorsten

@Duq and @Haddock51, I don't think we are going off topic - in contrast. We are very much on topic: How to clear way with a mechanism that a) readily attaches with no track elevation required and b) does not fall apart upon repeated operation. I believe @Haddock51 set-up is geometrically very demanding AND he wants to operate his points manually. That sets the stage. Throwing the original yellow lever does not post any threat even when it is required to "reach into" the layout. It will work. When building some bricks around the point and at the same time need to operate this setup flawlessly draws up some serious requirements: These bricks are not allowed to fall apart. And that is challenging. Yes, I do remember that RB challenge very well and no, I don't know who did what when … I am trying to follow, but I am relying on what is printed or available online (no time for LUGs etc.). That is the thing - it >cannot< fall apart. I had so much trouble with my own approaches. All I did to Ben's design was to minimize part count - as said before I am working on a limited budget and I like the challenge going minimalistic. It is all about restricting the throwing mechanism in its own "cage". The two 1x4 Technic bricks take care of everything, when the throwing lever is at the same elevation: You bang all surplus forces into the two restricting axles (as far as I can tell, your design does that as well, right?). I like your design very much! All the best, Thorsten

Dear All, it ay be very well my computer, my OS, my browser (I am always a little fuzzy about that) but I noticed indirectly that others have the same issue from time to time = no highlighted @membername): The "@member name" (drop down list opens, select member, highlighted) option when replying to one or more entries or - to much more important - to enable the (email) notification function or login notification - sometimes works and sometimes it does not. What is the reason for that? Am I doing something wrong, do I need to type special characters when the "@X" sequence does not call the function? Thanks Thorsten