Toastie

Hi Teddy, Not yet, but I guess I can take some pics ... it is rather simple and straight forward though! Give me a couple of days ... Oh my, don't wait much longer to show some pics! Even preliminary! A LEGO BR 01 ... a must see. And I am very curious to see your running gear solution, it sounds very interesting!!! That will work for sure, you don't need any sophisticated stuff at all. I guess the most important thing is the right choice of the O-ring. I don't have any BBB-XL wheels, but the "red" LEGO O-ring (from the "red blue white" series, they are even better than the new red O-rings from the new large flanged LEGO train wheels) may be too small in diameter. Let me dig-up something here as well, diameter and width-wise. Need to find the camera ... Best regards, Thorsten

Well, here is my take - I am not connected to any of the LEGO high-balls, nor to any of the people who are allowed to talk to them, nor to any of the people who are talking to people allowed to talk to ... it is just my sense of what is going on. TLC is not was it was before, back then, in the good'ol days ... TLC is just that: A globally operating high-powered enterprise. They found their way: Make top-quality products (and yes, they had to learn the usual Chinese story ALL major global players appear to go through ...) and sell them for - well - a lot of money. Nothing wrong with that - I am spending way too much on LEGOs (as judged by the comments of the other members of the family), and chances are I'll keep doing it. The thing appears to be that TLC is simply looking at what sells best, and then a sh*t load of TLC marketing Gurus are running their spread sheets to figure out how to maximize profit. My take is that they must have figured out the maximum revenue approach - and it appears to be flextrack and straights in one box. I HATE that. I HATE plastic rails. Remember the "Make 9V survive" websites out there? Well - Gone. They do what they want/need to do to maximize profit (as every other major company does and NEEDS to do, they have an endless payroll to compensate) and not what seems to be reasonable to AFOLs. It would be very helpful to show us numbers. I guess an educated community as this one would really have a much better time and understanding if numbers would show us: Sorry, if we pack flextrack and straights into one box then thinking costs + developing costs + molding machine costs + packaging costs + advertising costs + PUT YOUR PROFIT HERE costs are matching nicely with the amount of money that comes in. But they never will. OK, ready to take the blows ... Best regards, Thorsten

D - a - n - g i - t! Of course, should have mentioned that: The drivers are wonderful BBB-wheels. Made grooves next to the flanges (axle + wheel + drill press + small round file) and put the red LEGO rubber band on - this tip came from Ben when I asked him about serious wheel slip issues. It works perfectly well. Just make the rubber band almost disappear in the groove, no fine-tuning necessary. Well, actually the guy in front of Lotso is the bad one (can't remember where I picked him up, he has dark gray hands ... could be a movie guy) - he wants to run the 23 another couple of rounds, but Lotso is telling him to just g o a w a y. The Alien's screwed up during the casting for this movie, well we all know them, always trouble ... (so much for the really important information!) Actually there is no wheel slip when the engine is controlled with the large PF remote. The wheel slip occurs (as shown in the movie) when the bang-bang remote is used switching from 0 to full forward at once. The wheels are BBB wheels - see the other reply. And thank you very much for the kind words. Best regards Thorsten

Dear All, I’d like to share a couple of pictures and thoughts upon “motorizing” Ben Beneke’s BR23 LEGO model – my all-time favorite steam locomotive. Has been done before, true enough, but … … this version is another “best of both worlds” train. The engine is equipped with two 9V mini motors (#71427/#43362) powered from the PF rechargeable battery (#8878) and the PF receiver (#8884). I am not aware of any attempts to power the engine of a steam locomotive driving six side rod coupled flanged wheels, which are running in a rigid engine undercarriage – but I may be very well wrong here. To be absolutely clear: Ben has mastered all the BR23 design challenges way back in 2005; see his BrickShelf gallery here or this building instruction here (link to direct PDF download from RailBricks). This is just a report on how I modified his model for engine motorization. For an overview, here is a video clip showing the performance of the motorized BR23: You may want to skip the remaining part of this post - it is just a very long story For me, the most important aspects when motorizing this beauty were: Retaining the “light” running gear appearance Ben has replicated in his model. This gives the model the right look-and-feel of a real “Neubau-Dampflokomotive”. The Emerald Night on the other hand features a more or less “strongly reinforced brick-and-mortar” version of running gear – well I guess it simply needs that, with all the XL power on board. And next of course the six flanged driving wheel design with the spring loaded split middle axle, simply amazing. Further, the driving and piston rods built with Flex system parts match the undercarriage construction nicely in size. Finally the detailing on the upper structure of this 7-wide LEGO model is simply fascinating to me. And it appears as if a good number of builders have used Ben’s ideas and techniques for their own steam locomotive creations. As far as I know, all motorized 23’s (and engines alike) out there are “pushed” by either their motorized tender or car body. That works perfectly well – but one thing does simply not work: (Long boring story ahead …) When I was a kid back in the late 60’s, sigh, steam locomotives were still frequently operated in Northern Germany. They suddenly appeared as rolling thunder from the South or North on their way to haul cargo to and from Denmark. Sometimes the trains needed to stop in a small village called Juebek (Elevation 35 ft, Population 1200 souls, back then). This happens to be the place where I grew up, right in the middle of nowhere, but when these locomotives started-up again, all hell broke loose and the gigantic driving wheels sometimes where actually slipping! I simply could not believe that these monsters had that much power; that was the time when I desperately wanted to become a train driver ... ... and since that never happened, I am trying to make this dream come true in the LEGO Universe. But is it possible to keep the appearance of Ben’s BR23 “intact” and have a reasonably powered engine at the same time - with lift arms and flex system pieces delivering the motor torque to the front/middle axle? Or even a locomotive that can pull some decent number of cars and show some driving wheel slip? Well, see the movie around 6 min 37 sec … Here is my personal list of challenges: Retain the “light” driving gear appearance, particularly around the now powered rear axle. Powering the front driving axle took too much effort – the middle axle needed to remain split and spring loaded to keep all 6 driving wheels flanged – that left me with the rear axle: Use the space in the driver’s cabin for the motor without significant change to the cabin’s outer appearance, particularly the characteristic “shielded” front windows. This means no PF motors since they are too long (the cabin would then have no back “door” or needed to be one stud longer, definitely a no go). The XL motor is furthermore too wide for the tilted side window construction. That meant playing around with good-old 4-wide studded(!) 9V mini motors ... When I finished the first version and saw it running, I was very happy. Emailed Ben, he was excited as well … but soon I found out that the engine is more or less running close to the limits just on its own. So more power was needed and that meant modifying the boiler/firebox section to create space for a second motor, but again, not screwing up the entire model appearance: Next thing was to find space in the tender as enclosure for the PF LiPo and the PF receiver and the bloody rigid PF cables. Then get wiring from the engine to the tender in a way that neither or both derail on tough track layouts; 9V cables are the first choice here … And the model should run decently fast forward and backward, as the real locomotive could do (“Wendezug”) – at least to some extent. And finally, the model should not fall apart after a couple of tough layout rounds or when pulling some load. One more thing which may be specific to this model: The driving wheel set of the engine negotiates curves by pushing-in the respective part of the split middle axle. This creates some considerable “uplifting” forces in the front section, particularly when the engine body is heavier in the rear section. This is the case, since both motors are located here. In other words, the engine needed a “sliding bearing” underneath the cabin, which restricts any severe uplift possibly leading to derailing, see below, modification of the trailing truck. Now, it took me almost two years to get this going – not in one stretch, just every now and then a couple of hours. I am simply not smart enough as so many other builders are. First I tried one motor – not enough power, then two; then at least five preliminary running gear/cabin drive combinations – none worked to the extent that satisfactorily met my challenge list. Sometimes frictional losses were too high; sometimes the gears on the driving axle could not withstand the torque created by the two motors. And then there was this nasty fractional plate height “offset” I was literally fighting with, created by Ben’s use of both, Technic (1/2) beams, e.g., #2825 and Technic plates with holes, e.g., #4442. The main changes to Ben’s design are as follows: The pilot truck has been (minimally) modified to act as a "sliding bearing", since the engine tends to lift in the rear section when running backwards and pushing some load. The trailing truck has been modified. Ben’s original design kept the entire locomotive horizontically well balanced on the track. The changes made here tilt the locomotive (barely noticeable) in the forward direction; there is some load “resting” on the trailing truck. Again, some sort of "sliding bearing" adds tremendous stability with respect to hauling severe loads, particularly in curved stretches of track. Shear forces on the truck are considerable in this case and without the mechanical cabin/locomotive “pressure” acting on the trailing truck, the engine derails rather easily. The piston rod “enclosures” have been moved to the extent that they don’t leave the piston rod exposed in the full forward position. Here are some more pictures, in case you are interested. Oh yes, almost forgot – building across multiple themes – here’s BR23 relaxing and refueling at a coaling point and taking in some good amount of water. It was a long, tough day after all: The crane (which an almost perfect fit to the German cranes used for that purpose) and most of the other “coal supply hardware” is from The Toy Story set #7596 (Trash Compactor Escape), the water crane design is basically a copy of the ingenious Monteur’s version, see his BrickShelf gallery here (and take a look around, this is fantastic stuff!). The rails in the back is future work, here is where the coal is arriving, preferentially in hopper cars. The coal weighing hopper in the front turns 360 degrees, so both tracks can be served … did the LEGO guys have all that in mind when designing #7596? I believe so. The refueling “power” for the PF LiPo rechargeable in the tender comes from the track – I have 12V DC on my entire layout, so this is available anywhere. The 9V train power delivery cable (#10087) is of course a cool power pick-up cable as well. This one is modified with a bridge rectifier (inside the yellow Technic pin joiner #75535) so I don’t need to pay attention on the charging voltage polarity. Guess this is it for the moment. Thanks for reading and Play Well! Thorsten

Yep, totally agreed on!!! (I was just throwing in some ideas you can plainly purchase and get back the heat into the ... ... thread still active on "how to make the ultimate train micro controller". Furthermore, we have all sorts of people willing to contribute, hardware freaks like you, dreamers like me, programmers, lurkers, enthusiasts, you name it ... it does nor get any better, I am just waiting. I guess your Arduino is close to the optimum ... how do we want to organize this? Rock on, Thorsten.

But without line of sight you may get into trouble ... my BR23 just jump off the track at full fwd (and then 1 foot down = a lot of BR23 fragments) because it did not see the remote ... And yes, a smart IR receiver as your Arduino may actually not react to "bang-bang" commands at all. I don't see any benefit in the on/off "small IR" remote command as well ... "set to 7 full fwd/bwd" is good enough. Guess this has to do with on-going LEGO development - these folks may be tripped off by their own progress ... Rock on, Thorsten

Hi JopieK, I believe that the latest firmware in the newest PF receivers have the extra address bit a enabled (and some more - as far as I am concerned - resasonable changes, here is a discussion. (Just in case here's a link to the v1.20 update from February 2010). Which gives some extra space ... but I am still not convinced that this is enough. Automation of switch points needs quite some address space, even when routing signals to several switch point drives from one group controller. And lights in houses, and and and .. but you know all that. Regards, Thorsten

Well, almost all has been said; just to wrap up: The IR commands from the remote #8885 (bang-bang or more nicely on fwd/bwd as long as the IR signal from the remote is present) need to be in line of sight, if not the motor/light stop/go off. The IR commands from the remote #8879 are "set and forget". And then: Every cheap rf "TV/DVD/AV/... remote control extender" works beautifully well with all LEGO IR stuff, PF, RC, Manas, RCX, ... all that stuff runs on 38kHz modulated IR light - as the all the other plan vanilla remotes do as well. Just put the extender(s, use as many as you want/need) where there is no line of sight and you'll have full control, even in the dark ... Regards, Thorsten

You are very welcome ... The "software" I was referring to is comprised of two things: 1) The "firmware" of the RCX (the stuff thant makes that thing tick) 2) The programming environment that allows you to generate code that is "in line" with the firmware on the RCX - making it understand what you transmit ... LEGO gave us some firmware. "In line" with that is NQC. NQC translates plain text code into byte code, which the RCX running standard LEGO firmware "understands": Here you go. If you want "full power enabled" on the RCX than (as far as I am concerned) this is what you want: http://www.robotc.net/. You got ot be careful though: They have not (yet) announced that the RCX is not supported anymore. Version 2.01 works very well with the RCX: Here you get both, an updated firmware for the RCX as well as a wonderful programming environment. If you have any further questions, don't hesitate to contact me - I do run several RCX PBricks - and they are simply wonderful! Best regards, Thorsten

Hi Johan, sorry for bumping in, I am just reading this and I am finalizing my video and some pictures of a motorized "Ben Beneke BR23" (and showing it's performance on wildly curved track, including switch points and flex track): As far as my knowledge goes there is no way build or copy or mirror the doubly bent "curved road of a point" (wikipedia defines this as the diverging track , just checked - I had no idea) with individual curved pieces of tracks. This has been giving a bloody hard time in the past; Mark is absolutely right, this is a great benefit of the flex track. I also like very much that you can offset these annoying mismatches when building a rather "non-linear" layout (I have mine built into my office - no other space available - track running under my desk, through book shelves, now with flex track this has become a fun thing to expand!) Best regards, Thorsten

It depends ... Does your boyfriend own a good number of LEGO bricks? This set comes with a decent amount of (Technic) bricks, but if he is already stocked with Technic stuff you won't really need all that and the $150 would be too much: The heart of this set is the RCX PBrick, the LEGO IR tower and some software. The original software is way outdated, and there are several alternatives available either for free (NQC/BricxCC) or for some $30 (RobotC). The former is a purely graphical environment aiming at kids, the latter are (more or less downgraded) C-like-versions, with RobotC being extermely powerful. You can get an RCX PBrick at BrickLink for much less than $150, I recently got one for $35; same is true for the IR tower. If you want all the LEGO bricks as well though, well then $150 might be ok, depending on the wear and tear of course. The RCX1.5 is "software wise" compatible with the RCX1.0 and 2.0 versions. It does not have a DC in power jack as 1.0, so you have to live on batteries. The RCX is generally not compatible with the newer NXT PBricks - but again, it all depends on what you are aiming at and what you have already in the house. Maybe you can give some more hints ... Best regards, Thorsten

Hi JopieK, sounds all very good. Lets wait for the servo (and actualy switch point setup) story. But then - if we want to go further towards a more general "LEGO train PBrick" - lets first talk about what do people really want (i.e. what is generally featured in the guts of that PBrick), and how do we want to implement that. Currently I don't think that many people are really interested in such a device, given the number of replies in this thread. That is perfectly ok with me, maybe we are discussing a topic that is not very much appealing to the general public. Rock on, Thorsten

Hi Buddha Bricks, well, I guess the thing is that the LEGO LiPo already hosts a fully blown charger circuit with all bells and whistles. You don't need any sophisticated electronics to make the LEGO LiPo happy. It has everything on board. All it needs is some DC in; it appears as if 12 V from a plain vanilla wall wart is a good choice. Regards, Thorsten

Hehe, I saw that one coming, guess this thread may go ballistic ... OK, first things first: I pledge allegiance to TLC and to their ideas, their creativity, the way they form communities, the more-than-fantastic brick, this list is endless. I really do. I don't know how much time I have spent playing with LEGOs, have thought about solutions, and it was worth every single minute. I did when I was three and ten years old, I am doing it now, at age 48. I don't have any other plastic building blocks other than LEGO bricks in my house; and chances are, there never will be. TLC has invented the brick, they shall get all the credit. And I REALLY mean all that. But lets not just put us and TLC in the center of the world: I am lucky enough that I can afford this extremely high-priced toy - therefore I simply expect that the bricks do behave as they do: Superior. There are people around the world that may not be as lucky as me though. I am traveling from time to time to Bangladesh - these folks are very, very happy that these dirt cheap plastic bricks even exist. You won't believe what they pay for this stuff; it becomes very clear that Enlighten must make a HUGE amount of revenue in Western Worlds! LEGO is not even on the market over there. Hmm. See above. Principally, you are right. But TLC has turned into a globally operating high-power player. At thatr point you should not rely on 30 years old patents. None of comparable companies do (SONY, BMW, BASF ...). Yes, true again. But lets face reality; patents do have a lifetime. 30 years of protection may also lead to some sort of "ebony tower" tinking ... once again MAY! Here is a link, there a millions more about this topic. Here we go: Introducing "Bley" ... and not telling people before. I have at least 4 different shades of red on my red bricks. Apparently they were made in China, and they screwed up over there ... ... we can go on with this list. Well I am with you. Particularly with the bad chemicals being present in most of the Dragon Empires plastic. I was solely talking about my choice of maybe considering such bricks (for me only dirt cheap track counts) - I am a chemist as well, and yes, this is the most concerning topic. I would not eat the stuff, would not put in my mouth, would probably careful when scratching begins. We should ease-up at least a little though - how many tons Dragon Empire Plastic do we all have in the house? A shitload ... (this is an adult forum, right? ) Ever driven a Mercedes Benz, top class? I never have but when we would compare "cars" - it may get into an unfair competition, particularly when looking at my uhmm car ... No, not me. I don't want to live with all the problems, I want superiour quality - I am paying for. Citation: "The choice has been made - Oh no, I didnt choose anything, did you - ..." yes, from the GhostBusters movie, my all time favorite. I have so many pieces of LEGO in the house - I can't possibly count them. There are about ten LEGO trains running through my office, all the real thing. By the way, I have motorized Ben Benekes BR23 (not the "pushing" approach, all powered from the engine(!) - can't wait to show it off, but I need ot order some individual bricks from TLC (THAT was novel) ... Summary: You are right. Bashing TLC? No. High priced = high quality. Low price = maybe crap. We are grown-up and should make our choices. I have outlined my above. Other may very well go another route and be very happy as well. Finally: I very much liked your comments - it was fun to reply! That's is the main reason I stick aroud this forum. Rock on, Thorsten

I do well agree on that ... Have fun, Thorsten

Folks, I am impressed and a little excited, particularly regarding the report of frogstudio and the above message. Rip-offs or not, who on earth really cares about that? Honestly, this is a free world, at least that's what I heard. IF that stuff is as good as reported: OK, TLC invented it. OK, I am willing to pay considerable amounts of money just because of that - hey they were the only ones in the past! But be careful: If somebody is making comparable stuff at "unreasonable" low prices, who is riping off whom? Oh yes, TLC did all the development, and oh yes their stuff is BRILLIANT! But hearing that clutc is not that bad and hearing that some folks are not just trashing it because there is no TLC stamp on it - hey come on. TLC discontinued 9V because of revenue. NO OTHER freaking reason. TLC discontinues whatever they want for that reason. Because they are a globally operating power player. We are building according to their rules - never use what has not been approved. If TLC's stuff is superior, yes, I shall obey the rules. I give you one hint in the other direction: 10V wall wart power supplys for the LiPo selling for 25 Euros. That is an insult. The 10V were a lie, the 25 Euros were 20 Euros too much. The Dragon Empire have them for Euro 5 and they work very well. It makes me think. Once again: If quality and inspiration is at top: I am in. When patents run out: Do something exciting and novel. I am in again. But if 9V track is converted to all-plastic crap selling at close to 9V prices, it's creeping into me. OK, kill me, I am ready. Rock on , Thorsten

Well, I have heard that before and it may very well be! But - have you checked on the performance of the rubber o-rings rather than blaming it on the motor itself? The old RC rings a crap - again as far as I am concerned - regarding grip. The "new" small train wheels run sort of uneasy - check #7938, just push the train over straight RC track and it is not smooth, as in the olden days. I guess what TLC has done is increasing the grip by using different o-rings. The old rings resulted in smooth track operation but lousy grip, the new ones have strong grip, but ... I have changed the o-rings from the PF to the RC motor and have run the mod with 9V motors - to be honest - I have a hard time in determining which motor is better or worse. Philo has done serious measurements on power consumption and tractive effort, but he did not change the hardware, at least as far as I know. I just want to make sure we are talking about the same issue. And yes, the PF motor is performing better but again, maybe not entirely due to motor electrical power dissipation but wheel performance. Regards, Thorsten

Yeap, that should work fine. If space is even more of an issue, you could use an RC train motor with 9V terminal (the one they sell at S&H, #8886), connect a short 9V cable to it, funnel that through and hook that up to a PF extension wire that goes to the receiver. The motor is not as strong as the PF motor (oh well, it may also be the o-rings) but for your purpose it should work well - at least it did for me. Regards Thorsten

Tony, as an expert in train building, how do you rate the Enlighten all-plastic track quality? Do you happen to had the chance of inspecting any of those? I am completely obsessed by original LEGO, no doubts here, but when TLC decides on not continuing the 9V system because they can maximize revenue with all platic rails and bloody batteries, I couldn't care less finding an appropriate 9V track substitue. I am seriously entertaining the idea of putting metal foil on RC track, as has been described elsewhere, but possibly not on the original LEGO stuff, provided the Dragon Empire makes reasonable dead-cheap copies (Sorry TLC, the 9V termination DID hurt, and I am not willing to give in here ...). Regards, Thorsten

Dear All, I believe this is catching up some good momentum. There is a lot of diverse knowledge, there are visions, first tries, serious implementations, creative ideas, and most importantly, there is "drive" - in a very positive sense. And yes, there needs to be a smooth balance; name it work and life. For me this means we don't need to power this through - instead let's try to render this into an attractive approach for the numerous train heads around. Wow, big words eh? Whatever. I'd like to share a couple of very vague ideas before moving in, and I think we should agree on some fundamentals; if you don't agree, give my flak. Here we go: - The thing we are dreaming about seems to be a "train PBrick", right? There were/are LEGO PBricks but they do not really resonate with LEGO trains, they are more like "robot PBricks". - Regardless what we dream up, it should be compatible in some way with what LEGO is giving us, e.g., the PF hardware, PF message protocols, IR communication, all the works, right? We may want (I do!) RF communication, but that should not translate to: "If you want to go with what is dreamed up here you are screwd" (I am trying to say that the RF should not be hardwired to the PBrick but rather an external option ...) - And then we all have our preferences. What should such a "Train PBrick" be capable of? What about ... Large ID space. Which translates to "many trains", "many automated switch points", many "whatever devices" are trackside ... It should be small. Do we need full battery power on board? Or just for the the flash memory? How about optional bi-directional communication? RF is one-way. What about hand-shaking? Anything else? There must be a million more ideas ... If we can agree on - or better come-up with - a list of what is central, what is less important, and how do we keep compatibility at max, I am willing to spend some considerable time here. Not 24/7 but more persistently ... Don't get me wrong: I am new here, it was not my idea to start this activity, I am just having a lot of fun. Others may have well thought about similar things in the past!!! My PhD thesis is some 17 years ago, now I am running a PChem department and still do play with LEGOs and I tell you what: It feels (very) good to be here! All the best, Thorsten

Oh come on - this is fun and yes: Congratulations to All! Just imgaine: The 1001 th topic could be one adapted from the Arabian Nights ... Rock on, Thorsten

Hope is always good ... ... and yes the AA PF box is an option but it is also more challenging to get in into a train. As fas as I am concerned (I run several of my 6 (ok, plus handrails) wide trains with RCX PBricks on board, so they have to go upright into the train. That means you have to "lower" them somehow otherwise the height of the train when you put them upright on train base plate completely violates the scale. (If you want an idea here is an instruction for such a train). With the AA PF battery box it appears to be fairly easy to accomplish such "lowering". I guess this this here may illustrate what I am talking about. Best regards, Thorsten

Wow that price for the 1000mAh LiPo is very attractive! However, adding all the "extra electronics" required would be too much of a hassle: The LEGO LiPo has a nice case, the PWM controlled output, the fixed 7.4V source ouptput, the PF terminal, an on off push button, along with a rather wide input charging voltage range. But maybe others have more experience, maybe Mark could comment on this? Regards, Thorsten There were also some rumors in this forum that the LEGO LiPo may become cheaper after Xmas.

You could use the rechargeable battery (LiPo, #8878) and set the power output dial (PWM) to whatever power setting is appropriate for your layout, lets say 3 or 4 (corresponding to the setting you would on the PF receiver. That thing costs $50 though; on the other hand it is - well - rechargeable . Recharging works very well with any regulated 12V DC source for sure, so you would not need to buy the LEGO charger. Regards, Thorsten ... darn, you were three minutes in advance, sorry for the duplicate entry below!

Dear All, I completely agree on what Teddy wrote. (There are a couple of things I'd like to share in the near future, including some RF stuff as well, but that'll take some time. Mark will certainly ground me on my "ideas" - I am a chemist after all - but I will take that as motivation to carry on!) Talking about "time", Teddy, writing up the PhD thesis - for me that is some years ago, but man, it was good times, don't you agree? In any case, the Arduino platform could become a fantastic base to operate from - once a couple of people are willing to go with it. I happen to use the microchip PIC family but I don't mind switching at all! Regards, Thorsten (Toastie)