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Sep. 4th, 2019 10:57 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
psipsyRecently, I went through the boxes of my model railroad items. This is stuff that I boxed up and put into storage to make room back at the trailer, and then it sat in a back room here at the house, effectively inactive for at least 5 years. I'm not sure what sparked this formerly dormant interest back to life, that's something that happens regularly with me.
For perspective, model trains have been part of my life for about as long as Lego has. I had been intending to build a fully-scenicked train layout for quite some time. Naturally, the constraints of the trailer didn't permit that, and the most I could do there was to put some sectional track together in a simple oval on the kitchen floor. Eventually I put all my model railroading stuff into storage under the premise of "someday". But! Someday has come, forced to the present by my own hands, and now I have the room.
There are a couple tables in that room, one being a rather fancy table/desk from Ikea (or at least what's fancy for Ikea), and the other is a simple folding table. I have another simple oval on there, to at least test out the locomotives and some of the rolling stock. Those tables will not be the permanent home of this theoretical layout.
The locomotives range in age from a few years old to almost as old as me, and with varying degrees of functionality. The ones from the Tyco/Bachmann/Life-like train sets, those don't work well if at all. I'm not surprised, those were built as cheaply as possible, and they were generally thrashed by a much younger me. These were the ones with the electric pickup at one end and the motor on the other. This turned out to be a serious design flaw for multiple reasons. It reduced the number of contact points so it didn't take much for a dirty spot of track to bring the whole thing to a stop. It reduced the number of drive wheels so the loco would often struggle and spin the wheels (and put dead spots on the tracks). And while the weight would be over the drive wheels, it wouldn't be over the electrical pickup. Also, if I need any parts for those? Forget it.
On the other hand, the Athearn engines (many dating back to the early 1990s) still run like new. Those are designed much better. All of the wheels do both electric pickup and driving, there are flywheels on the motor to carry it past any serious dead spots on the track, they weigh more so they're more likely to stay in contact with the rails, and I can still get parts for them. There's one in particular that I suspect is much older; I picked it up at a yard sale in the mid 90s and the motor looks different, like an earlier version. Again, that one runs fine.
I had mentioned Bachmann and Life-like; both of those eventually upped their game. Life-like in particular came out with their Proto2000 line, with a high level of detail and performance to match. Their kits for rolling stock were also complex, requiring xacto blades, the Dremel, tweezers, miniature files, jigs, at least 2 different kinds of glue, and would take me upwards of 4 hours to complete, even in ADHD:Hyperfocus. Then in the mid-2000s they were bought out by Walthers, who eventually did away with kits entirely because the target audience was getting too old to see and handle the individual parts. All told, the P2k line was the polar opposite of the more kid-centric offerings.
It's not to say that the P2k engines were trouble-free; one issue is that they were often over-lubricated at the factory, then if they sat idle for too long, that lubricant would actually get gummy and almost turn to glue. I had one that I had to disassemble in order to get to the affected parts, clean them, reassemble, and once I did that it worked fine. Oddly enough, they used the same mechanisms as the Athearns, which did not have that issue.
Since I have various leftover bits from kits, spare parts, and styrene sheets/bars, I'm going to try my hand at producing a usable train car. It's not going to be a model of an existing railcar used in real life. What makes it special is what it's meant to do on model train tracks. That is, to carry a small video camera.
A lot of "somedays" are happening lately.
For perspective, model trains have been part of my life for about as long as Lego has. I had been intending to build a fully-scenicked train layout for quite some time. Naturally, the constraints of the trailer didn't permit that, and the most I could do there was to put some sectional track together in a simple oval on the kitchen floor. Eventually I put all my model railroading stuff into storage under the premise of "someday". But! Someday has come, forced to the present by my own hands, and now I have the room.
There are a couple tables in that room, one being a rather fancy table/desk from Ikea (or at least what's fancy for Ikea), and the other is a simple folding table. I have another simple oval on there, to at least test out the locomotives and some of the rolling stock. Those tables will not be the permanent home of this theoretical layout.
The locomotives range in age from a few years old to almost as old as me, and with varying degrees of functionality. The ones from the Tyco/Bachmann/Life-like train sets, those don't work well if at all. I'm not surprised, those were built as cheaply as possible, and they were generally thrashed by a much younger me. These were the ones with the electric pickup at one end and the motor on the other. This turned out to be a serious design flaw for multiple reasons. It reduced the number of contact points so it didn't take much for a dirty spot of track to bring the whole thing to a stop. It reduced the number of drive wheels so the loco would often struggle and spin the wheels (and put dead spots on the tracks). And while the weight would be over the drive wheels, it wouldn't be over the electrical pickup. Also, if I need any parts for those? Forget it.
On the other hand, the Athearn engines (many dating back to the early 1990s) still run like new. Those are designed much better. All of the wheels do both electric pickup and driving, there are flywheels on the motor to carry it past any serious dead spots on the track, they weigh more so they're more likely to stay in contact with the rails, and I can still get parts for them. There's one in particular that I suspect is much older; I picked it up at a yard sale in the mid 90s and the motor looks different, like an earlier version. Again, that one runs fine.
I had mentioned Bachmann and Life-like; both of those eventually upped their game. Life-like in particular came out with their Proto2000 line, with a high level of detail and performance to match. Their kits for rolling stock were also complex, requiring xacto blades, the Dremel, tweezers, miniature files, jigs, at least 2 different kinds of glue, and would take me upwards of 4 hours to complete, even in ADHD:Hyperfocus. Then in the mid-2000s they were bought out by Walthers, who eventually did away with kits entirely because the target audience was getting too old to see and handle the individual parts. All told, the P2k line was the polar opposite of the more kid-centric offerings.
It's not to say that the P2k engines were trouble-free; one issue is that they were often over-lubricated at the factory, then if they sat idle for too long, that lubricant would actually get gummy and almost turn to glue. I had one that I had to disassemble in order to get to the affected parts, clean them, reassemble, and once I did that it worked fine. Oddly enough, they used the same mechanisms as the Athearns, which did not have that issue.
Since I have various leftover bits from kits, spare parts, and styrene sheets/bars, I'm going to try my hand at producing a usable train car. It's not going to be a model of an existing railcar used in real life. What makes it special is what it's meant to do on model train tracks. That is, to carry a small video camera.
A lot of "somedays" are happening lately.
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