zephyr1934

Nice!

There was an article on the Legoland trains in Railbricks 6. I believe the Lego Discovery Centers use off the shelf model railroad parts, probably S gauge. If you are going big, the standard track might still work, otherwise I suspect G is the next easiest step up in scale.

Can a 9v battery deliver enough power for two L motors? (that is a serious question, I'm not trying to be a rhetorical goofball) Also, are your 3 axle trucks rigid? If so, that would certainly cause binding in the curves, but your engine doesn't seem to slow down much in the curves... but that might just be the fact that it doesn't go too fast in the straights either. If you are doing a rigid truck I've had luck replacing the bands on the 1st and 3rd axle with thicker o-rings, that seems to lift the middle pair of wheels (with no bands) off the track enough that the middle axle does not cause problems in the curves.

Classic!

Eiffel Tower

I've used a small piece of folded over packing tape. For the power you could make your own switches and connectors for a lot cheaper than any pure lego solution, but pole reversers will do the trick. It might be cheaper to use PF pole reversers and the PF to 9v connection instead of the 9v pole reversers.

How sad to see such a regal locomotive demoted like that, but I guess a few more years of operation life is better than the alternatives It might be this other bucket that only came in a collectable minifig set But there is this part that is the same shape, a little smaller radius, and it is available in black

Yeah, with the extended period of quiet I was also starting to think that I escaped. While I had no desire to set up a new storefront, having now put in the effort I think it is a big improvement. So it worked out well, Bricklink gave me a venue to get up and running, making additions in an incremental fashion, and now that I am there I was able to step out on my own. I don't think I could have done it all in one step and I can't imagine launching a standalone shop with only a few items. I could imagine there are legal precedents here, e.g., if they passively let custom parts in to a Lego owned site it might create a loophole for clone bricks. I would think that they could set up a special path for approval, but they are a big company and do not have time to deal with dozens or hundreds of individual sellers. I would also imagine that it would be a money losing venture for them. Thanks for the kind words, and it is a great honor that I can help so many of you make such wonderful steam engines. I can do them on demand. They are so stupid expensive to make that I have been reluctant to list them on my store. But if there is demand for them I would be happy to start listing them. Meanwhile, I have a few ideas that might bring the costs down but I have not yet had a chance to experiment. For the current design in black I probably cannot beat the price on shapeways. Unlike the rods, the motor sides do not generally require finishing, so that is a fine option. For gray, the shapeways gray is closer to dark blay (and is even stupider expensive) while the gray I use for the rods is close to light blay and I could fab for the price of the parts in black on Shapeways. So if you are looking for the three axle motor sides in light blay drop me a PM here or use the contact link on the new web page.

That is a crazy looking prototype, but a good rendition of it in brick. I like the streamlined stack in the last of the inspiration photos, of 2926.

These look fantastic, it is amazing what you've done while still being period accurate to the part availability

Unless you bring your own tables shims can only go so far. Warped tables are quite popular at venues. Of course my club is not so good either what with standing on the tables to assemble skyscrapers. I've had to resort to some serious suspension. Oh, those things are great, I've used them for suspension on unpowered drivers. What about mounting the motors to the drivers and let the motors float inside the boiler? That way you could do away with the CV joint. Several people have done that for powered trucks.

Wow, that is an amazing layout, very impressive

Don't forget that the Emerald Night was 9 wide at the rods. So there is evidence that 9 wide will work and clear most things. I would lean towards 9 wide loco to 8 wide cars to save on weight and costs. Many of my steam engines step from 8 wide cab to 7 wide tender to 6 wide cars. But on the other hand, a full train at 9 wide would look super sharp. Keep in mind that you will need large radius curves (R104?) and roller bearings for all of the cars. Fortunately they exist in this day and age. Well, there might be some logic to checking out the local clubs to see what their standards are. If you are going to join a club it will probably be local after all. Don't worry too much about the here and now, if they are a reasonable group they will certainly entertain converting to larger curves (especially if you offer to build them). Or worst case, on day 1 just use unballasted curves "outside" of the decorated part of the layout.

Nice!!

Okay, the video begs the question... did the train ever stay on the track? Looks like had a fun time and I like the single track mainline. OMG!

The day has come. After getting my eviction notice last week I just spent the past few hours clearing out the last of my custom parts on Bricklink. My non-custom items remain on BL. Meanwhile, I have a new store front up and running at my old URL, TrainedBricks.com . You should also see many of my parts showing up on BrickTrainDepot.com in the coming days. They already have a few exclusives of mine, like a set of instructions for my Amtrak F40.

This is looking great and you've tackled some seriously challenging angles/curves with the modifications. I was looking at the pilot truck (and probably the cylinders) as being a massive challenge. If you work really really hard you can make most articulation cracks to be less than 1 plate (e.g., using snotted cheese bricks at the point where the truck swivels into/out of the skirting) but integrating that with a smooth flowing curve is nigh impossible. One thought for the Mercury (if you wind up shelving it) is to make it a non-powered static model for straight track. You could slowly collect the parts over time too. As for the gap between the two quarter... what are those, wedges? Anyway, maybe making a sequence of flat parts could fill the gap, either surfaces of tiles at different angles or a sequence of hinge bricks come to mind.

Is that a home office lego train layout or a work desk wasting consuming valuable space in a lego layout? (grin) Looks fun either way. I would agree with the earlier comment about the curves, R40 are pretty tight to begin with. I could see some space saving with crossover switches either homemade or third party. If you are really tight on space doing an open ended track would be a huge space saver, but it is a lot harder to just set the train loose to run on its own.

Very nice build!

A thing of beauty (both the prototype and the MOCs)

That thing is insane, what is it 18 wide? Great detailing and a Tank Girl feel to it

That looks like great fun. Standouts for me were the TEE and the white/blue/yellow double decker (regional?) train

I vote for NYC because that was an iconic locomotive. But ultimately, I would say build to your interests.

Excellent! I would echo this point and maybe even expand on it to include the tender to make sure there are no clearance problems there either. The cab and tender can both be one brick tall, you are only looking for conflicts parallel to the ground plane. Also include enough of your rods to make sure the cylinder design works and does not conflict with the pilot truck (pilot trucks and cylinders are a unique challenge on R40 curves). If you don't ever run it, maybe save the hassle and cost of powering it and just build a display piece. If you do build it to run, you'll fall in love with it and then want to take it to a show. It could take a day of futzing to get everything working in harmony but it is worth it in the end (if you could get two L motors in the boiler, getting the trucks to work should be doable).

Wow! That's amazing! That's hilarious but makes total sense