What's on your workbench?

[81F]

 I currently have a GEM Ex-Cambrian Railways 2-4-0T in need of much TLC.

 

It was bought as a non runner off ebay but have now fixed this by replacing the motor and fitting a DCC chip. but one of the Crank-pins keeps unscrewing!

 

Assuming I can fix this i will attempt to touch up the paint, fit new whistle and varnish.

[morairamike]

A4 Mallard awaiting the fitting of TTS decoder and speaker, whidch arrived last week

Castle class awaiting fitting of TTS still to be delivered.

Hoirnby 2-BIL having passengers fitted and interior lights and third rail pickup spark LEDs. Thes erea the kits that come with own battery and swicth off when there is no movemenmt detected after a time lapse. The spark is genrated radomly by motion/bump.

 

Currently also building staion buildings and platforms, soldering feeder wires to new track and building new control box for points and signals.

[Twintop]

I have been continuing to progressing the installaton of a 2 metre long carriage or DMU stabling siding. The second metre of track is now pinned down. wired up for cab control including section switches on the control panel and tested. Looks good with Lima class 117 and Hornby class 101 3 car units stabled there.

Painting the rail sides and ballasting are now needed.

I also re-wired 3 point motors for the high level branch goods yard - needed as my drill with a wood bit on slipped and caught wires and wound them around the drill.....  Anyway, its all sorted again so not an issue.

Next job though is to parcel up the Gaugemaster D controller and send off to be repaired. One of the track outputs has a fault, the current is full on all the time. It is about 25 years old though, so no complaints. 

 

 

[LMSFan72]

Well, I had a spare ESU HST decoder and an old 3-pole ringfield HST, so, I thought I'd see if I could make it an acceptable performer! I have added pick ups to both sides of the front bogie, running on top of the wheels, and an additional set of pick ups to the ringfield's insulated drive wheels - these are bonded to the side frame and run across the outer faces (see photo). Frankly, I'm amazed! It crawls amazingly well and the sound is brilliiant. I haven't needed to use my homemade stay alive, but I might. Top speed seems low but I haven't checked the CVs yet. I know the decoder is worth about 10 times the HST, but, it's surprisingly good!!! I'd recommend the pick up method to anybody.....

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[walkingthedog]

Nice work LMS. I have added pickups in the past to Lima locos in a similar but not quite the same way. Makes a considerable difference. 

[37lover]

Caiptean,

And that's the wonder of this hobby; personally I wouldn't spot things like the dynomo belts [and I suspect many others wouldn't too] but you get your enjoyment from carrying out those modifications. I haven't run any locos for over a year but get great satisfaction from the model[layout] building and for example converting sets to run on DCC.

[96RAF]

Class 56 ringfield has been running fine lately, until I took the body off to take some photos of the lights and speaker and since then the motor has been playing up - gears seem stiff and it won't run without heavy throttle. Tried a lube but suspect that the extra pickups I installed are dragging too much.

 

I can see this one going on shed until I can find a suitable set of other model variant gear-tower bogies to convert it to a central motor drive.

 

Rob

[2e0dtoeric]

A 3.7 metre span electric-powered radio-controlled glider - but you didn't really want to know that! :-)

[2e0dtoeric]

Yes, Cap, electric power to get it to height, a lot less complicated than using another powered model to tow it, or a ground-based winch, bungee (a bit like a catapult), or a towline (too much running about!) - so - a short(ish) squirt of power, then floating about until it gets low - a squirt of power - and so on.

Thje model is designed for a sub-section called ALES - Altitude Limited Electric Soaring, which is a big 'thing' in the States, from the launch, you have 30 seconds of power - or a set height - after which motor power is cut by an electronic circuit, and then the last one down wins that set.

I'll not be using it for that, though, just for pleasure.

[96RAF]

That's over 15 ft, so you must have a big workbench and a big workshop to put it in. Some of the full size gliders I have flown in were 15m - 20m span (only 3 to 4 times the size of your model and lumping 2 people aloft).

 

ALES is the electric powered glider equivalent of the engine powered competition model aircraft I used to fly. Max chat in a tight spiral climb for a set time whereupon a mechanical timer device strangled the fuel supply then it was a glider until a slo-burning fuse burnt through the elastic band holding the tailplane, which then popped up to fully stall the aircraft (Virgin Galactic style) and it drifted safely to earth - best time wins.

Rob

[Jeff Mennell]

A few minor things on my workbench. Railway workers need a lick of Mattcote and they will be finished. I want to paint some parts of the 75 ton crane I bought the other day. And a few bits and pieces of signaling that I should be able to cobble together to make a complete working signal.

[2e0dtoeric]

And I thought MY maths were dodgy! 3.7 metres is about 12 feet, not fifteen!

The wing comes in six pieces, and can be assembled in various configurations, to suit transport space - a complete left half and right half, a fixed centre and two plug in thirds, etc, or even left as six pieces, plugged together at the field.

The biggest fixed component is the fuselage, at 1.86 mtrs. The tail feathers come off with a couple of nylon bolts, so they don't get damaged.

[walkingthedog]

Caiptean there are quite a few full sized powered gliders about. Gliders have to get airborne one way or the other. Some are towed by another acft, some are launched using a giant bungee and others with a winch. The engine is another option. 

[2e0dtoeric]

Fourniers, Super Dimona's, and Grob 119, for a start! Many others.  :-)

[walkingthedog]

There was of course a plan to launch one from the roof of a prison.

[Bulleidboy]

Prior to adding lighting, I've just given the Scalescenes Shillingstone station building interior, two coats of matt black primer, when dry, two coats of grey primer, and finally a coat of white emulsion - end result, no light bleed through the resin walls and roof.

[Froggie]

Hi, Froggie here,

On my work-bench? Hard to say as I haven't got a work-bench for the time being as I use the dining room table (when SWMBO isn't looking ;))) - but here are a few of the outstanding things I have to 'get done' that are railway related:

Get new flooring down on an upper deck in the barn that includes changing all the beams first so that I can get that layout started that I promised myself 40 years ago. Hopefully this spring will see the start of the flooring - beams arriving this weekend :)). My work-bench will go in there once finished.

Two layouts for the grandsons to be completed scenery wise - shamefully the one I promised to be ready two birthdays ago :(((.

About 40 locos, mostly Jouef, Roco, Piko, Rivarossi, a few Hornby-Acho, Fleischmann and Trix from my late father's collection to be stripped down, de-greased, re-oiled and re-tyred. The tyres are the worst as no two locos seem to have the same tyres :(((.

A number of low-relief buildings to be completed in card for a module I'm doing for our club - yay - a UK module amongst dozens of French ones - only a year late mind you!

My collection of assorted UK outline steam and diesel locos from Hornby, Bachmann, Heljan and Dapol waiting to be sound chipped - as and when funds allow.

A new Hornby HST in GWR green plus 8 trailers waiting to be re-numbered and transfers applied to create 'The Welshman' unit (as I'm originally from Wales), and;

Trying to finalise a plan on my laptop to make the best use of a 7.5m x 5.5m area to create this layout.

Do you think that's enough on my 'work-bench' for the moment ;) .

Cheers,

Phil

[LMSFan72]

A series of extra pickups for my Class 08s and my Lima Class 47. The 08 ones just get super strong blu tak to the chassis bottom. It's amazing how well it works. No wire connections needed as long as there is at least one original pick up in contact at each side. Worst case I have to solder the wires to the original connections in the futuere but I havent needed to yet!! The Class 47 get glued inside the chassis so that the contact on the wheel outer faces./media/tinymce_upload/359c588cd73b05ae3bffd539ca6c723b.jpg

[96RAF]

...And I thought MY maths were dodgy! 3.7 metres is about 12 feet, not fifteen!...

 

My dodgy Specsavers glasses definitely read that as 4.7m. Maybe thats why they are called varifocals.

Rob

[2e0dtoeric]

WTD - I think you will find that the prison rooftop one (WW2) was a catapult launch - achieved by dropping a weight on a rope through holes in all the floors.

It never flew, because the war finished first - but a replica was built a few years ago (vid on You-tube) and that did fly. IIRC it was towed by a car, initially.

[LMSFan72]

/media/tinymce_upload/ae2f964a6f98a6a0952b69a911ce6f3c.jpgSome track mimic diagrams on 6mm perspex fitted with red/green LEDs and miniature SPST switches to operate my points! These will work in conjunction with both my select walkabout/elite and railmaster using my DCC Concepts solenoid decoders...... A lot of soldering (this is the small one of 3!)

[walkingthedog]

WTD - I think you will find that the prison rooftop one (WW2) was a catapult launch - achieved by dropping a weight on a rope through holes in all the floors.

It never flew, because the war finished first - but a replica was built a few years ago (vid on You-tube) and that did fly. IIRC it was towed by a car, initially.

That's right Eric. The things they tried are amazing. Guess it kept them busy. I met somebody who escaped from Colditz. He escaped inside a matress and then planned to run to Switzerland dressed as a member of the Hitler Youth. I was in his house and he had a picture of the castle. I said that looks familiar where is it and he then told me his tale. 

[Howbi]

Just fitted a TTS decoder into the tender of the Hornby LNER B12/3 loco........surprised to find that the weight was specifically shaped to sit over the supplied speaker so the install was very easy.......didn't sound very good with the tender body off but once fitted it was totally different and very acceptable so, on this occasion, I will not fit a 'Sugar Cube'.......As a result of previous experience with TTS I changed CV150 to =1 but this was not good so reverted back to =0 and loco ran perfectly (Castle Class TTS).......... 😀..........HB

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[Buz]

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Hi all

Just for something different I dont norrmaly work in card, and I was bored with the railway budget for the year gone.

I thought I would put together a paper kit I found on the internet somewhere, I stuck the print onto a piece of thin card.

This made the kit to thick so it turned into a bit of a job it was also quite fiddly due to its small size

The roof was covered in masking tape and painted black for tar paper to give the roof some texture but thats another photo

which at the moment I can't find.

All it needs now is barge boards which I will do in pasticard strip, and yes those are Japanese characters on the name board

It will get put on my very small narrow gauge Egger Bahn railway probably with the back to the viewer, but maybe I will put front on as its not that obviouse its Japanese from the normal viewing angle.

regards John

[81F]

 Nothing much on my work bench other than three Hornby GWR Dining Cars waiting for my 3D printed Gas tanks to come from shapeways