Duq

Very nice. The yellow probably works better than the red version in the Marklin catalogue.

Hey James, good to see some new work from your hand. My favourites are the ICE and the original TGV. Your poetic descriptions, what can I say? In the spirit of Harry and Sally: I'll have whatever you had for breakfast ;-)

Doh! Steinkopf - Brickhead. Should have known...

I really like your train. The old train doors work well and you've got some nice details on the roof. I noticed from the URL of your images that they're hosted on Flickr but I can't find them there. Can you give us a link to your Flickr page?

A long time ago John Neal and his son did some brilliant 2-wide trains. Unfortunately their Brickshelf folder seems to have disappeared...

I grew up in a house with an attic full of N-scale trains. As a child I never had Lego trains because "we had enough trains in the house already". Once I had left the dark ages behind me I started making up for lost time... I still read (model) railway magazines for inspiration; the things some people build are just amazing. A few years ago I took part in some Lego displays with lowlug.nl at model railway shows in Holland. This year with Brick.ie we exhibited at two model railway shows in Ireland, the first time there was Lego at those shows in Ireland. The experience was similar; on set-up day you see the looks from the 'serious' builders and you hear some comments like "Tsk, Lego, what are those guys doing here?" Then as described in a number of posts the public come in and they all love the Lego display. Gradually the other builders come and have a look and are amazed by what's possible with Lego. Organisers of shows love to have a Lego display as it brings in a younger audience to their show. Model trains as a hobby has a bit of an image problem as it tends to be mainly for men over 50... A number of people have said that traditional model railway builders don't build their trains but just buy them. That's true for some but there are also many Lego fans who are happy to run unmodified sets on their tracks. The same can be said for buildings. However there are many model train builders who create landscapes and buildings from scratch/scrap. Their challenge is to use whatever material they happen to have or can get their hands on to create as realistic a model as possible. For me the challenge with Lego trains is to build as realistic a train model as I can within the constraints of the available parts. It's a different challenge and it's hard to say which would be harder. Lego trains will never compete with N-scale, HO-scale etc on pure realism. As a creative challenge though I think it can match the traditional train hobby.

My comments are based on what I was told by one of the developers at Lego...

In this picture Maersk blue seems almost identical to light blue although there's no medium blue to compare...

Nope, you can't use that hole in the side. I believe it was meant for the decorative side part and has no other use. A Technic 3/4 pin won't hold in it. If you would modify a part to fit in it you would wear out the motor casing as the plastic is too soft to withstand the force of a spinning axle. You have two options really for a 3-axle bogie: build around the motor and add a dummy third wheel or forget about this motor, use a PF M or XM motor and build your own bogie.

4434 Dump Truck by hmillington, on Flickr 4434 Dump Truck by hmillington, on Flickr

This is Lego. They do backward compatibility very well so yes, 9V and PF track do connect.

Is saving weight your only goal here? You do realise that the capacity of 9V batteries is much lower than AAA batteries? So you're saving 50 gram on the weight of a train but it'll still only run half as long. My KoF shunter uses a 9V battery and I can tell you from experience it doesn't last long on track.

I think this thread just shows what has gone wrong with Cuusoo; it's turned into a suggestion box for future licensed themes instead of a platform to get really good MOCs turned into sets.

I live in Ireland. We only have one season here really but when the rest of Europe has winter here in Ireland it's a bit darker and not quite as mild as the rest of the year... Seriously though, that's a nice picture. Can't find the bunny though :-P

I've emailed my solution to challenge[at]railbricks.com. The guys do have a day job so you won't get a reply the same day but they will eventually get back to you. The next issue may well be appearing some time into the new year, so you need to be patient...

I'm sure it is and there's nothing wrong with keeping your children safe. All I'm saying is that the 9V or 12V of a Lego is perfectly safe and harmless or else Lego wouldn't be selling it.

Nice example. Only.... those light Bricks are NOT PF elements...

I'm sorry but this is total rubbish. 9V or 12V on a train layout is completely harmless. You can touch the track when the train is at full speed and you'll feel nothing. If you manage to lick both tracks while the train is running (and you need quite a tongue for that!) you may feel a slight tingle in your tongue, that's all. Now back to the actual question. Lego minifig world is roughly 1:40 scale. N-scale is 1:160, H0 is 1:87 (O-scale is 1:43.5 by the way which is close to minifig. H0 is literally Half 0). So Lego trains have relatively wide track though; N-scale has 9mm gauge, H0 has 16mm, 0-scale has 32mm while Lego has 40mm. The calculation above from 4x8 to 6x10 is wrong. 4x8 in H0 would be 8x16 in Lego if not bigger; it's the length and the width that double, not the area. Having said that, Lego tracks ridiculously tight curves (compared to normal model railway) helps keep layouts a bit smaller. To give you an idea: a circle of track in L-gauge is about 2 1/2 feet in diameter. So should you go for Lego or N/H0? It depends what you want to get out of it but because of the children I'd say go for Lego. Your daughter will be able to take part in another year or so. It'll probably be another 10 years before she can put H0-scale scenery together.

Clever use of parts for the cab. I think this is the best Lego-City-style representation of this train that I've seen sofar. The mention of its Japanese cousin is also interesting; I never knew it existed.

Yes, wheels have changed over the years, as have the coupling magnets, but the track gauge hasn't. You can buy set 721 from 1969 and it'll run on the same track as last years 7939 and pull its cars as well.

Sorry, I have comment on this. First of all, there is no such thing as current across the tracks. There is a potential difference or electric tension between the tracks. Until something connects them there is no current. If that something is an electric motor then the current will run through the motor making it turn. If that something is your fingers then there will be a tiny current running through you but not enough to feel. If you would manage to lick the tracks you would feel a little tingle in your tongue. So nothing nasty is exposed with 9V or 12V. For a layout at home PF is fine but I've found that at events, in a larger room with fluorescent lighting, the signal can be a problem, even at only 5 meters. A big advantage of the PF system for play value is that you can have a number of trains on the same track. So it depends what you want; for home I would just go PF; as mentioned above it's easily available, track is cheap and it's fun to play with. If you want to take part in events then 9V may be a better choice. Either way, safety should no play part in your decision.

That's a good looking train. Nice colour scheme for both the engine and carriages. I particularly like the bogies for the passenger carriages. Interesting design.

It was popular with the (younger) kids though: they all wanted to see a train coming out of the tunnel...

For track end buffers have a look in this topic. I think your layout is trying to do too many things at once. The tracks in the station and the freight yard are so short that a parked train block other tracks. My advice would be: think 'less is more'...

While trains pass eachother relatively close there is still room for a drivers head to stick out the window. Like you said, you don't steer trains, you only control the speed. For that you need to be able to see the signals on the side of the track and they are visible from the little windows that look out along the boiler. There have been some experimental designs of steam engines with the cab at the front (I remember seeing one done in Lego as well) but they weren't succesful.