Ashi Valkoinen

Thanks for both of you. Hopefully I can shot a video of the train going around in two weeks. :)

And for today I'll post about a train I posted about in 2014. Since 8W trains cost a lot (each of my trains are working), it took 3 years to collect parts and finish, today I received the last missing 60 green seat parts. I'd like to introduce the brick-built version of Hungarian BVmot (nickname: "Samu", 434 series) train, which is a four-car electric motor unit designed for long distance (InterCity) travel in 1994. Only three of them were built due to financial reasons, however they could have been the base of Hungarian InterCity travel. Each train consists of four cars - a 2nd motor car, a 1st class middle car, a 2nd class middle car and a 2nd class driver car. The motor car and the driver car was challenging, the angular patterns (orange-white, white-blue, blue-yellow) took lot of cheese slopes, but the designed I dreamed about in LDD worked fine in reality. I used quite lot of SNOT around doors - they are built mostly in SNOT, but the positioning and size of train door window required some SOT parts inside the SNOT design. Closer photo of motor car: Other challenge was offered by the middle cars - they have the same length but the 2nd class has 11, the 1st class car has 10 large windows n each side. I used regular blue train windows on 2nd class car, but a different solution was needed for 1st class car - I could not fit a simple tile between each window, because they are 9 plates high and one 1×4 tile put between with SNOT is 10 plates high... So I decided to throw train window and design something having approx. the same size. It resulted in SNOT transparent bricks and plates, with separation of 1×3 SNOT brick. The top of the windows were closed with half-plate thing brackets (9 plate height of normal windows = 1 tile, 7,5 plates height of 3 SNOT studs, 0,5 plates height of bracket. With this technique every unique window separation could be done in LEGO. Just make sure you push everything strongly together, it is quite hard to fit! The train is driven with two PF train motors, controlled with PF IR v2 (v1 simply won't make it move on curves). The train is able to work properly on standard track geometry (including points after points and 180 degree turnbacks), however it would look better on custom large radius curves. In the future I plan to built indoor lights and front/tail lights as well (total of 14 PF leds will be used for this), but because of the cost of LEDs and extension cables it will take couple of months. The LDD-design is available to be downloaded from this folder: http://www.brickshelf.com/cgi-bin/gallery.cgi?f=560755 Comments and critics, as always, welcome.

Still, your point of lacking bogie details is valid as well, I'll try to design something that fits the model and my expectations about not being so fragile. :) Hopefully this train will be finished this year or in the first months of 2018.

Very nice tram-train model! I read lot of articles about the "karlsruher model", I always loved it for the mobility it offers, very nice to see a render in LEGO. The tram's body and the solution for bogies is perfect, the only thing could be improved is the coupling and the gap between cars. Since there is only one pivot point around each gap, maybe this method could also work for you to hide the gap: http://www.brickshelf.com/gallery/AshiValkoinen/Trams/CAFUrbos3/caf_08.png

Maaan, this is wonderful! Lots of creative solutions, but still simple and clean lines! Amazing! The only thing I'm missing is the video while these locos and carriages going around.

Nice and simple solution, with a dedicated sticker set it could be easily a locomotive of a nice selling MOC set. :) I often think about to give some try to 6W, simple MOC trains as an "enter level" for kids in age 6-10, but I always end up with designing some 8W monster. :D

Very nice layout, but man, how many hours did you spend to assemble it and how long could you play with it before dismantling? :D My favourite is the commuter train running on a smaller loop. You should have more MOC trains going around and less official sets, the newest white passenger train is deeply below the average quality of the trains running on your layout! 7740, and trains from that 12V era are totally different (and better) than nowadays train sets, however there was less part diversity in those times.

Yes, those gaps will be filled with cheese slopes. LDD won't allow to place them there, because as I found two cheese slopes facing each other result in 2.6 plates width (a little more than one stud which is 2.5 in plates), but this method of stressing work fine in reality. Most of the cheese slope mosaics use the same dimensions as the "smallest" unit. The upper part of missing yellow cheese slopes will be filled with 1×2×2/3 slope (double), since there is no stud next to driver's cab's window to put it on. You are right about bogies, they are the weak point of almost all of my models, I prefer to keep them clean since these trains run many real kilometres on shows, I simply don't like when trains derail on parts they lost on previous loop. I wish I could build a framework around bogies which are strong enough to resist forces awaking when bogies enter sharp curves and points.

While my BVmot train still waits for some parts (seats and curved slopes for roof) finally I decided to make a try with Stadler FLIRT3 train front. Those who follow this topic from the beginning, or at least for a while could know that I built 3 differently colored Stadler FLIRT units in 8 wide, 1~42 scale. The original FLIRT design has to go for real - the changing standards for safety in the case of collisions made Stadler to redesign the train itself and sell the next generation of FLIRTs named FLIRT3. The Austrian-Hungarian railway company, GySEV/ROeEE owns 10 Stadlert FLIRT units from the first series and they ordered 10 additional FLIRTs, but these will be FLIRT3-s as they are not allowed to buy the older and less safe design. There will be some changes - slight variation of coloring, increased car length and placing 2 toilettes instead of one makes FLIRT3 looks different. And of course, the front part. So, here is the result of work in LDD. I plan to build this for real, planting SBrick into it will make it able to run with older sister (also shown in screenshots). Old (back) and new (front) FLIRT trains of GySEV/ROeEE. Comments and critics, as always, welcome.

Thanks. :) That pattern you mentioned through the last two window was one of the reasons (other was pricing) led me to discard train windows and design a SNOT, brick-built version. I looks like pixels still (no space between two windows for SNOT cheese slopes), but at least the pattern is there. Thank you! Since almost everything I need can be found in LDD, I can take my time and try to contain as many details to my models as many reasonable can be done. For freight train, they are really not for me. I built four of those simple cars (they are not even model of something, just fantasy-cars), then later I built 3 additional ones for one train, but I'm not impressed by long freight trains, I prefer those which carry minifigs. And real passenger cars are more colorful, I like sloping or curved fronts, endings and patterns, freight cars doesn't offer these details (however they offer many challenges and there are wonderful MOCs around the internet, but personally I'm not interested in them).

For the time I'm waiting for the final parts to arrive to my BVmot train I started to design its sister, BVhmot train in LDD as well. Both train sets consists of four wagons, a motor unit, two normal train cars and a control unit, but BVmot with orange pattern is designed for long distance traffic, BVhmot is the suburban version. These vehicles were the last products of the Hungarian Ganz-Hunslet company - three of BVmot trains and two of BVhmot trains were built. They are also compatible with each other - a BVmot motor unit can handle a suburban train set and vica versa. First screenshot shows the whole train herself. The front is slightly narrowing and it has a side window on the narrowing part - this part of the train's front and the angular color patterns right behind the front offered a lot of challenge in LDD. Front view - it narrows from 8 stud to 7 studs, and I had to fit the driver's front window and room for lights as well. Motor unit. The control car:, note the window design. Since blue train window parts and their glasses cost a lot in the quantities I need them I decided to leave them and look up for other solution - the SNOT-built trans-clear parts allow to construct windows having almost the same size as the train window offers. Other advantage of this technique is that you can have nice amount of variations - the window spacing, the width of windows can be changed from plates to plates instead of studs. It also enabled me to have the angular white-blue pattern border between the first two windows on the side after the driver's cab - this is impossible to build with traditional train windows. The entire train again, unfortunately there is a long way until I can build it - MÁV KISS and GySEV FLIRT3 trains are waiting for to be built...

For dual-motor horizon express or metroliner V1 receiver will work fine. If you are thinking about bigger (8w) and heavier trains, go for V2. For example my Bombardier Talent train was equipped first with V1 but on curves the current output of V1 receiver was simply not enough to keep the speed of train or starting the train on the curve. Since I changed receivers in my PF-based trains to V2 I have no traction problems.

While I'm waiting for real bricks to arrive for my previous project MÁV BVmot EMU I grabbed my LDD and designed the newest IC (InterCity) cars of GySEV/ROeEE railway company. These wagons are not brand new - GySEV bought them from ÖBB railway company. The whole train car: The real thing (photo by GySEV/ROeEE company): Seat inside, four seats for each cabin, cabins separated by tiles hanging from roof with bracket parts: 3-wide SNOT door with SOT glass inside - 7.5 plate width built using yellow brackets: Train car's end - some SNOT inside: Three cars after each other - I need to design a locomotive for them as well. Maybe the brand new GySEV Vectron will be good for them. :)

Nice layout and lots of work hours put into that, however I adore your MOC trains, they are wonderful!

Panels: older design, ID 4215 https://www.bricklink.com/v2/catalog/catalogitem.page?P=4215#T=C newer design, ID 60581 https://www.bricklink.com/v2/catalog/catalogitem.page?P=60581#T=C on 60581 there is a side support to prevent accidental break of the part, since it mean thicker material from side view, in case of trans black panel it looks almost black from side view. I looked around for photos on my laptop, if I have any about the trans black part, but currently I haven't any photos like this. It is good to develop MOC only in LDD, but it happened to me more than once that something I liked in LDD I dislike in real life, and I started to order parts after the first build. In some cases some builds are not stable enough to run it for many days without cracking apart, and with my Stadler FLIRT I designed a totally renewed front after 5 years I built the first train. So there was no chance to fix it in LDD. :D I'm looking forward for the finished MOC, if they were supposed to run in Hungary, I would build this color-variation of Desiro ML: http://www.tauernbahn.at/img/201610/4744_301_REX_Lanzendorf-Rannersdorf_12_09_2016_Alfred_Schmid_1024.jpg

Some video shots of my trains running. Fortunately the place where our last event was held had a nice balcony, perfect for taking longer shots of my trains going around. Coupled FLIRTs (SBrick and 9V :D ), Bombardier Talent (after 3 years of moving nowhere), one loco pulling 7 of 60 stud longs coaches and my first (and I think last) freight train shown in the video.

Hello, sorry for the late reply. I think your updated design is better, but it is my personal point of view. I see the pain you (and all those who build such a complex MOC, I mean curves and narrow differently colored strips) have, you have always the decision which detail you leave to go and which you keep. And still, it is a wonderful MOC, I hope we can see it for real in the future. Windows: The black window frames you use are 3 bricks high (72 LDU, LEGO Digital Unit), and 4 studs wide (80 LDU, 1 stud is 8 mm, 20 LDU, 1 brick is 9,6 mm, 24 LDU), so if you use some SNOT technique with increased window height (with only one plate, 8 LDU), you can build a window with brick-built black frame around it. It means some additional weight compared to train window parts, but availability and costs is an important factor. :) Also I just remembered that new version trans black panel (with side supports) look exactly from side view as they have black frame, since the edges has the "side support" which looks almost black compared to the whole surface of trans black panel, and the bottom and the top of the panel looks black, too, where you connect it to other bricks. I think it is worth to try how it looks on your train.

According to my experiences with long cars, a train car with length of 64 studs can be operated easily on standard track geometry. You wrote that your train ended up with 210 studs in total, which is 70 studs for each car, I suppose to have 64 studs for middle car as long as end cars shouldn't be connected to other locomotives or cars on their ends with driver cabs. I also recommend to run it with at least two train motors (PF) and with PF IR receiver V2, with V1 it will slow down or even stop on sharp curves thanks to the high current consumption of PF train motors (...one motor needs less current, but won't run this train). Alltogether it is a really nice design, however I dislike the side of driver's cab - the black curved slope and the grey arch next to each other don't match the real thing, maybe with differently angled SNOT-slopes you can achieve closer match to the original train. You may also consider to drop the usage of old-fashioned black train windows - they are quite expensive and don't match the modern-looking train, consider to use trans-black panels instead.

Hello everyone, CEO of Stadler and CEO of Hungarian State Railway (MÁV) signed the contract of delivering 10 brand new Stadler KISS electric motor units to Hungary in 2019, so having three LEGO Stadler FLIRT in my inventory I felt obligated to design the double-deck train of MÁV. I didn't start from zero, I have my Westbahn Stadler KISS LDD design for years by now, and I used that file to start with. The front should have been totally redesigned since the MÁV KISS trains arrive with new fronts (according to the changing TSI-standards the manufacturer redesigned it, just as by FLIRT 3 trains). Total piece count will be 9300-9400 when all details designed, however I'm still waiting for exact technical drawings about the window distribution on lower floor and toliet arrangement (there will be 5 of them and one for disabled people). The entire train. Due to its weights it will be driven (similarly to my Railjet train) with two SBricks on 1-1 battery boxes using 4 or 6 train motor in total. I left spaces for Power Function led lights for front/tail lights. Total lenght will be 3.3 metres. The hardest part during design was the new front and some details around it. The middle cars are quite easy builds, but the angled black tile in the middle of side window of driver's cab, the asymmetric blue curve on the side needed lot of work hours. I recommend everyone to "explore" the possibilities of bracket - they offer half-plate thing surface which allows you to build SNOTs in odd numbers of studs. (Some cheese slopes missing in LDD, but fit for real.) The "real" train on the graphic of Stadler:

The hungarian version is not uploaded as .pdf, but an article on our train blog. Here you can read it: http://mlvk.blog.hu/2017/03/08/orr-problemak_modern_mozdonyoknal_es_motorvonatoknal

Thanks for feedback, if you find it useful, please share it to those LUG/TLC-members, who don't read EuroBricks! Thanks!

Two weeks ago I finished an article about modern train fronts and their LEGO-interpretation in Hungarian, now I finished with translation to English so I want to share it with the community. Please note, that my English is not the best since it is not my native language, and the building techniques and part usage in this article can't cover every solution, different trains may need different ideas. I hope this article helps beginner to get started with their own designs. https://drive.google.com/file/d/0B2pGVpZyXf5hdDBDMnJFOVlkeDg/view

Some recent photos I'd like to share. However we still don't have enough 9V tracks for grand curves on our events, before opening I assembled some PF tracks for my full set of railjet train. It looks much better on tracks like this than on curves built from R40 LEGO tracks. I hope ME-models will ship with acceptable prices to Europe... Other build is redesigning my Stadler FLIRT lights once more. With the new front designed I had not enough space for all four led lights to put them next to each other, so leds for red (tail) lights got their place deeper in the front design. But this 3 studs distance from the trans red tile on the front made the tail light almost invisible from outside, so I had to figure out something. I remembered the fiber optic cables I used long years ago in a Star Trek movie based MOC, so I made a try with them. They work really excellent, so I'm sure I'll use them later in other MOCs as well, they conduct light very nicely even when the cable is curved back in 180 degrees!

Maybe the are models instruction for sale online, but most design are available for free, or just ask the author of the "new build". For example, I put online almost all of my LDD-models. I don't think many people want to rebuild my 8W trains, but they can get ideas and building tricks from those models.

I was thinking for a while now about changing the front design of my Stadler FLIRT EMU to capture some details better than I did it on previous front design. So here is the result of the brick-engineering I did on the train, truly said it was a really hard build to put everything into their place and keep front/tail lights as well. It is funny that I thought after testing SBrick with my red and blue Stadler FLIRT units that I'm finally done with this train, it seems I'm not, and blue and yellow-green FLIRTs are waiting for the updated front design as well. :)