Shupp

I agree with Tony and others here. I don't bother with anything fancier than label paper and a printer. I don't have a very good printer myself, so I go to my local shop and run off my stuff there. I start with the CMYK values given on the peeron color chart for background colors and, sometimes with a little trial and error, get the color close enough for my tastes. Every printer will be a little different, so you just have to be patient. I design the stickers in Photoshop, making sure to keep the image dpi pretty high. For logos and graphics and tend to steal them from the internet when I can find a high-res enough version, and for lettering and shapes I design them myself. I prefer basic stickers because they go on very easily, and can be replaced just as easily. I've recently got into using contact paper for really thin stripes as well, but haven't tried any printing with it. If you're building relatively large, you can also get away with o scale model train decals sometimes. At least I've heard of and seen others do it to pretty good effect.

I made a pair of E7s with Power Functions. They're probably bigger than you want to go, but maybe the truck design will be helpful. I prefer vertical mounting of the motors because it usually involves fewer steps with the gears, and I find it holds together better. With the vertical arrangement you can just directly attach motors to the trucks and let them free float in the locomotive like in this example here:

That's very impressive in a 6 wide package, and you still managed to get a lot of detail in!

Well, you might want standard gauge and narrow gauge in the same layout, in which case you'd want two different sizes of track rather than two different sizes of locomotive. Because I build exclusively Power Functions at this point, I wasn't hugely excited for ME Models' straight track (wider curves will be awesome though) but it really is perfect for narrow gauge. Gives me ideas.

I could. That probably would improve the overall look. The coaches are even a bit wider than the AEM-7s as well. The problem is that, by the numbers, it's not really the coach that's too short; it's the locomotive that's too tall, and that's to fit all the PF stuff, so it can't be made any shorter. If anyone was looking for a prototype to render 7-wide, this would probably be it. AEM-7s really are pretty small. At any rate, a height change to the coach will require scrapping it and starting from nothing, so it'll have to wait for another day.

Thanks for the comments! I hope to have the full train done in the next couple months. I need to get a bunch more 2x4 curves and train wheels to do it, though. I've actually started to run out of stock train wheel sets to pull apart. Yeah, when I did the math on the windows originally, I realized they should be about 3.5 plates tall relative to the car height I have here, rather than the 3 plates tall I went with. I chose not to make them taller because it would make the car sides overly complex.

Putting the motor in the boiler is definitely worth a try. You want as much weight as possible on the driving wheels, I would think.

Thanks! We at PennLUG do take our trains seriously. Oh, and seeing as I haven't said it here, I'm a big fan of this locomotive. I had the chance to run it at our last show and was really impressed with its performance. And, of course, it looks great going down the track.

I'm fairly new to these forums, but I've been building Train MOCs for several years now. This is my most recent project: Since I joined PennLUG and started doing shows, I've been interested in building full train sets, rather than just locomotives, and I wanted them to run well. When you've got a big crowd at an event you can't be chasing down derailments every five minutes, and you can't have your equipment needing repairs when you're trying to run for 10 hours straight. My first big success in this area was my New York Central 20th Century Limited. I've mostly modeled older equipment up to now, but I live in a major city, so I interact with operating trains pretty frequently, and I do have an interest in modern equipment. I wasn't exactly sure what I wanted to do, though, until I watched an Amtrak AEM-7 pulling a set of Amfleet cars through the station in Trenton, NJ: I've seen trains like this a hundred times before but, for whatever reason, this time I was inspired. So, a little history. Amtrak inherited a whole bunch of equipment from its predecessors, both rolling stock and power, and only introduced new equipment as needed: it wasn't really a fresh start when they were formed. In the northeastern United States, where the main lines were electrified, Amtrak was still using Pennsy's famous GG1s into the 80s. They hoped to get an adequate replacement in the form of GE's E60. The E60 was not originally designed for passenger service, though, and they were not able to safely achieve the 100+ mph speed Amtrak was hoping for. They were mostly retired after a short service life. The GG1s were only finally replaced by the AEM-7, based on a Swedish design, in the late '70s and early '80s. The AEM-7s were smaller, lighter and faster than their predecessors and proved ideal for Amtrak's needs. They are still used in the U.S. Northeast to this day for regular regional service. Much like the AEM-7s, Amtrak's iconic Amfleet coaches were intended to finally replace much of Amtrak's inherited equipment. Their round shape and relatively low profile made them ideal for service through the narrow tunnels and low clearances in the Northeast. For my model, I began with the prototype Amfleet coach, utilizing the new 2x4 curve slope with bottom tubes for the round shape. I felt getting the shape right was more important than the silver color or corrugated texture of the coaches. Silver obviously would have been very expensive, and I couldn't conceive of a way to do the corrugated sides that would even get close to the right shape. From diaphragm to diaphragm, my Amfleet coach is 64 studs long, a similar length to my 20th Century Limited Pullman coaches (both were 85 feet long in reality). I only have one coach built now, but I plan to build three more when I get around to getting the parts. I didn't plan on building the AEM-7 right away, but I was inspired by a new PF powered truck design of Cale's, used in his new B&O Mikado. The truck design allows for gearing up a PF motor with a 20:12 step up in the truck itself. I thought that combining this with some more gearing up outside of the trucks could create a lot of speed. I mocked up the power system fairly quickly as seen here: I have 2 PF XL motors with 36 tooth gears attached to them. These are fixed to the body of the locomotive, and geared up to 12 tooth gears, which transfer power to the trucks. Within the trucks, Cale's design steps up the speed even further. I am very pleased with the performance of this engine. It is most certainly fast, and should have no difficulty pulling the 4 Amfleet coaches I have planned for it. (I tested it on some of my other long coaches.) I'm excited by these results, because it gives me hope that a design like this with two steps up can be used in a more complicated power train, such as might be in a steam locomotive. Here are some more pictures: And more on flickr. I don't consider it 100% finished, especially the coaches, so I am open to any suggestions for improvement!

My honest suggestion is to avoid using one piece train bases when you can. It severely limits how you can attach your motors. In general, having only one powered axle just doesn't work very well, and to power more axles you really need to attach the motor in the middle of the truck rather than over one end, which it doesn't look like you can do with that train base. Is there maybe a solution to get that same body shape using 6087 for extra strength? Not using the train base lets you get the exact length you want, as well, if you're worried about overhang.

Here's a picture to help illustrate it: S2 Tender Interior by Shuppiluliumas, on Flickr In this case, I used 5x5 square holes for the motor to sit in. The XL motor is perfect for this because it's a 5x5 cylinder, and rotates freely in the square opening. As roamingstudio said, the weight of the tender just rests on top of the trucks, and the technic pins keep the motor from dropping out when you pick the thing up. The speed issue can be a problem. Direct-driven XL or even M motors with small train wheels are pretty slow. My experience is, if you're going to gear up for more speed, use XL motors. When I gear up (or even gear down) M motors there just isn't much power left there. My current project uses two heavily geared up XL motors and yet it's still a pretty good puller. Depending on how you want to build the side frames, it's sort of possible to have three axles with a train motor. PF train motors have the same weird sorta-hole in the middle that every train motor has had, and you can make use of it. I don't really have a great photo, but the tender for this 2-4-0 steamer I made uses one of the RC train motors, which is the same shape. Prussian P 3 Locomotive 2-4-0 by Shuppiluliumas, on Flickr The middle wheel is attached by a 2 length technic axle just resting in the hole in the side, and is kept from falling out by the red plate with hole piece. Depending on the design you could probably use a 7 length thin technic liftarm as well. I've been planning a locomotive that would use two PF train motors for the tender, so we'll see if I can make the 3 axle thing work with them.

No problem. I think we may need to make an updated PF building resource at some point. Sava has posted some good guides on Railbricks, but we're all still learning new things with each build. A lot of people dump their truck designs in the Lego Train Ideas group on Flickr, so there way be more things hiding in there as well. This is what I would recommend when you can do it. I didn't do it on my E7 because I wanted to gear the motor up for a little more speed before powering the trucks. With the small train wheels there's not much you can do to change the speed within the truck design, because you can basically only use 12 tooth gears in there reliably. Anything bigger will be wider than the diameter of your wheels. When the motor is not directly connected to a free-moving truck, the truck will want to spin in place a bit from the rotation of the drive axle. You can see this if you pick up something you've built this way while it's running. That means a little lost power and possible problems going into switches. Connecting motor and truck directly eliminates this issue, and also makes it harder for the motor to pull apart from what it's powering. Cale's engines, especially that second example you posted, are absolutely reliable. So his truck designs there would be a fair bet as well, though I still think it's best to use the 4x4 technic box brick when you can. Also, the sideframes on his EM-1 were a big inspiration for what I did on my E7.

I would say "high degree." I got into this hobby without caring too much about where my prototypes came from, though all but one was American, but I've come to focus more on the American northeast, where I live now. Now all the projects I have in mind are based on local railroad history. Partially this comes from living in the area and seeing the remains of that history around, but for me it also has to do specifically with being able to more easily visit surviving equipment in local museums. The other thing that influences me is the fact that, at least for American prototypes, there is just so much that hasn't ever really been done. Modeling the 20th Century Limited got me doing research on lots of NYC prototypes, and I found that most of them had never been rendered in Lego, so I can definitely draw a lot of inspiration for future projects from that. After all, if you make the first Lego model of something, you can feel like you made the best one!

Thanks! I don't know that I'm an expert or anything quite like that. I do think working on trains has made me a better builder though! It's definitely nice to see so many people interested in the hobby here, and I hope to have more MOCs to share soon. Oh, and because I forgot it before, my flickr: http://www.flickr.com/photos/34338074@N06/

Very nice (re)discovery! I found one of these at a flea market a couple years ago, and it was basically the opposite situation you have. It had the box, instructions and all of the working components; motor, transformer, wheels, magnets, track, etc. but most of the basic parts of the actual train were missing. Some of those can get pretty expensive, like the light grey 1x2x2 windows. I'd like to complete mine someday as well, but the cost has kept me from doing it. I would definitely recommend Bricklink for parts, especially if you'd like to get it all together fairly quickly I've bought 12 volt motors there and had good luck with them. Good sellers will specifically state that a motor is tested and working. If you're still concerned there's no reason not to ask them about it. Also, as far as the wire goes, I have often bought just the connector ends on Bricklink, and gotten wire after market. It can be much cheaper that way, and you can just cut whatever length you want. I have a related question I may as well ask here. Sorry if this has been/is being discussed elsewhere, but what do people do about cleaning the contacts on their 12 volt motors? I find mine corrode very quickly with use, and I'm worred continued use of abrasives is going to permanently damage them.

Well, like I said, the gear cannot move downward with the design I posted there. The other problem could be the axle retreating into the motor, or just upward if it's not directly connected to the motor. An axle with stop would certainly prevent that from happening. I used one on one of my models where the motor was mounted horizontally in the body of the locomotive becuase I was having the issue of the axle creeping upward, although I actually managed to break a gear because of how hard the axle was pulling up on it! If your motor is mounted vertically you can also just make sure there's no room for upward play at all, but that may not be possible depending on what you're doing, I suppose. If I've mounted the motors vertically, I usually attach them directly to the trucks and not to the body of the locomotive. This works especially well with XL motors. Their natural roundness allows them to rotate freely in the right sized space. If the motor is fixed securely to the powered truck, and there's no room for play in the axle, that can also solve the problem. At any rate, I'm glad you found a solution that works!

Hello, everyone! I'm Shuppiluliumas, and I've been building Lego Trains for about two years now. I'm not quite sure how I missed joining up here for so long, but I thought I'd share a bit about what I've done since getting into train building seriously. I'm honestly not sure how it started now, but I've always had an interest in the Trains theme, though I didn't really have any as a kid. At some point I decided I really liked the look of steam locomotives and decided trying to model one would be a good way to get out of my dark ages. I picked the UP Big Boy because, well, it's pretty big. Building this mostly taught me what not to do. I learned that I should consider how best to power a locomotive before doing anything else, and I also learned that structural stability is pretty important. On top of that, this MOC helped introduce me to other AFOLs when I took it to the NMRA show in Hartford, CT in 2009. That led to me joining PennLUG and getting much more involved in building and in the AFOL community. I also decided I should try to model more trains, but pick prototypes that hadn't been done before. My next MOC was another Union Pacific locomotive, the 9000 class. Also really big. It didn't run at the time I first made it, but now it sports two PF medum motors in the tender and works well enough. I discovered Power Functions when the Emerald Night came out, and also through converstaions with Cale. I decided my next MOC should not only feature Power Functions, but be weirder than the last one. I built a Triplex. Originally, this thing had the same gear setup as Emerald Night, with everything in the tender section. I've reworked it a bit since then, but this is still the first really successful train MOC I made. As a kid, I thought 12 volt trains were the coolest thing Lego had made, but I never had any, unfortunately. I just stared at them in catalogs. I decided to start collecting 12v a while back, and have made a couple MOCs with it, including a subway station for PennLUG's train layout. My last steam engine was made about a year ago, and it's the one I'm most happy with. I like to think I've gotten a little better each time I've made a locomotive and, at least as far as function goes, this last steam engine is my best. In keeping with my tastes, it's big and weird, the PRR Q1 duplex locomotive. I do like to make MOCs in other themes, but I always seem to come back to Trains. As I've done more shows (BrickFair, Brickworld, Lego Kidsfest and others) I decided I wanted to do more than just make models of weird prototypes. I really wanted a locomotive that would run reliably,(that is, for 6-8 hours a day without any problems) and I also wanted to build a full train. I settled on New York Central's 20th Century Limited, which I finished in time for Brickworld 2011 I love Lego for sure, but making trains in particular showed me how much fun making models with Lego can be. Trains have the added bonus of needing to not only look good, but work properly, which I find a fun challenge. What else to say... well, my favorite system is definitely 12 volt, but my favorite sets are all from the 9v era; the Load n Haul Railroad especially. I don't really collect sets much, but I definitely try to keep up with the new sets as they come out. Anyway, I've met a lot of cool people getting into this hobby, and learned quite a bit. If anyone's on the fence about getting involved with it, I say give it a shot.

I did an E7 A+B set recently- It used PF XL motors geared to three axle trucks. I've actually found you don't really need a sliding middle axle unless your wheels have a 2 stud or more gap between them if you do a slight modification. What I did was use the stock Lego train wheels, (the ones with grooves for rubber bands) removed the stock rubber from all of them and replaced the it with #35 plumbing o-rings, as outlined by Tony Sava on Railbricks. I only put the o-rings on the powered axles, that is, the first and third axles, leaving the middle axle wheels rubberless. The difference in diameter between the wheels with rubber and those without is enough to negotiate curves. The reason I didn't do a sliding middle axle on these trucks is that I find most sliding axle designs are weaker than those without (This includes my design that peterab posted above. I honestly can't recommend it for heavy pulling). The design I used on my E7s is primarily made up of 3 32324s pinned together and attached with plates on the top and bottom. It's bascially indestructable and the 32324 bricks are just the right size for 12 tooth bevel gears. Here's a mockup- http://www.flickr.com/photos/34338074@N06/5966342136/in/photostream Normally you can't put plates on the underside of the technic bricks, but the slightly thicker rubber lets you get away with it. In this case it probably isn't even needed, but why not make it even stronger if you can? If you don't like the bulkiness of the specific design I posted, you could use 1x10 technic bricks for the side frames. As for dressing up the sides, here's what I did on my MOC- http://www.flickr.com/photos/34338074@N06/5527713693/in/set-72157625841592802 Using the flex tubing keeps it relatively thin. I see you found a solution but I figure I'll weigh in anyway. The trick to keeping the gear on the axle is making sure it has nowhere to go. The mockup photo I posted above is an example. The axle and gear coming from the motor are stopped by the pin joiner in the middle, and the axles leading to the wheels are also stopped by the pin joiner and the thin bushings on the drive axles. As long as nothing can move, then nothing should fall off!