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I have used a circular cutter to make 180 degree cuts in 0.040 inch styrene sheet for a couple of tunnel portals that I will install on my N scale model railroad. The cutter is made by Olfa, and I purchased it at a local art supply store rather than a hobby shop that sells train stuff. Art supply stores sell lots of tools, paints, craft items, and materials useful to a model railroader. The circular cutter has a strong, sharp compass point that is mounted on a sturdy head which has an adjustment screw. By loosening the screw, a horizontal beam can slide in or out a variable distance from the center point and then be locked down at the desired distance. The replaceable cutting blade (held into place by another screw) is mounted on the horizontal beam.
Nobody makes an N scale tunnel portal the size and shape that I want, so I had to cut my own. The tunnel opening has a radius of 8 ½ scale feet from the track center line, so that is what I set on my circular cutter. The straight vertical dimension for each side is 20 scale feet above the top on the rails plus another 3 feet for the height of the rails, crossties, and roadbed. Both of the vertical sides have to be exactly tangent to the semicircle above, so determining where to position my straight edge for the first side was the trickiest part of the whole project. From that line, I used a steel drafting triangle (also purchased from the art supply store) to place the cutting point and center compass point. I swung a 180 degree arc to locate the position of the other vertical side. My N scale ruler (shown here) is 10 scale feet wide, so my first vertical cut was 10 scale feet from the edge of the styrene sheet. After the circular cut and both vertical cuts were completely through the plastic, I could easily remove the excess from each side.
Figuring the geometry of where to position my circular cutter and the straight edge to guide my razor blade required a lot of thought before doing any of the actual cutting. Once I began cutting, I had to be careful to keep my blades in the right places, but the cutting itself was very repetitive and time consuming. Each tunnel portal required an hour or two of MANY short, little cuts before I broke through the plastic sheet. Then there was sanding to smooth it out and trimming the overall piece to fit the future mountain that I haven’t built yet. This photo shows the positioning of the circular cutter, but I took the photo after the job was done (and my nails repainted). For all this cutting, I used my Dupli-Cutter to hold my work in place. The Dupli-Cutter has clamps that can be positioned in several places, an adjustable slide sheet held down by the clamps, and a frame whose jaws can be opened up to hold various thicknesses of plastic for making precise, square cuts.
So, these are my 3 most recent builds. Since my aim is building after the real world data to have them all "fitting" to each other, its always interesting to actually see the results and check if it works like that^^
Its really strange how small the Transporter looks next to the cars, but its even more crazy just how long and wide supercars are compared to standard vehicles. Also, the T3 is a vintage car and back in a day, european vehicles were more narrow and small. Today i saw a bmw i8 next to the bigger T4 multivan on a parking lot. Its crazy how much space the bmw used for 2 drivers only, while a van is really economic and space saving^^
Whats cooler though, is that my variety of cars is finally growing :P
My objective with the northbound 'Fellsman' charter on Wednesday 18th July 2013 was twofold; firstly to place not too much emphasis on the train, with the diesel locomotive tucked behind the 'Jubilee' (as fire risk assurance) and secondly, to capture the splendour of typical Settle to Carlisle line scenery on a glorious summer's day, in the sunshine but with a cloudscape, such a relatively rare occurrence coinciding with the passage of a steam charter train. I chose the shadow side of the locomotive and train in order to feature the delightful High Scale farmhouse, with Garsdale and Rise Hill beyond. The previous time that I saw this locomotive on BR metals was when it was dumped at Eastleigh depot of all places, in 1964, before transit to Barry scrapyard. It would be interesting to know when it last worked this route? Before withdrawal the 'Jubilee' was allocated to Chester, so may just have wandered that way during 1964 perhaps?
© Gordon Edgar - All rights reserved. Please do not use my images without my explicit permission
This photo shows how the Terminal UniJoiners connect and power each rail. Remember, in a FORWARD power setting the WHITE wire powers the RIGHT rail, and the BLUE wire powers the LEFT rail.
My layout is small enough to power all the mainline, the passing siding, and my industrial spurs from two S-62F feeder tracks, but each track of my staging yards is powered by a pair of Terminal UniJoiners (Kato item 24-818) that can be inserted between any two pieces of track by substituting them for regular UniJoiners. Each pair of Terminal UniJoiners is plugged into an Adapter Cord (Kato item 24-843) which splits into a pair of wires with spade terminals that are screwed onto the top output terminals of an Atlas Twin. Each track of both Westbound and Eastbound staging yards is physically connected but electrically isolated from the other tracks by using plastic Insulated UniJoiners on both ends of each track block. Since each track of the staging yards loops around in a teardrop shape, it is important to identify and maintain the polarity in order to prevent electrical shorts.
In order to first determine the polarity of the Terminal UniJoiners, I inserted them between a pair of straight track pieces I keep on hand for testing purposes. The DC plug can only be attached one way to the Kato UniTrack power pack, but the individual UniJoiners (with their color coded wires) can be inserted any old way between a couple of pieces of track. This could cause a POLARITY PROBLEM if it is not done in a uniform manner among the various tracks, and unfortunately none of the Kato instructions give any advice. To complete the test, I placed an engine on the track, set the power to FORWARD and noted the direction of travel in respect to the wires. In order to propel the engine FORWARD with that power pack setting, the WHITE wire must be attached to the RIGHT rail, and the BLUE wire must be attached to the LEFT rail. I now keep an index card with polarity settings for Terminal UniJoiners and Terminal tracks in a small basket that holds track, electrical odds and ends, and other spec sheets.
Using a 24-843 Adapter Cord from the Kato UniTrack power pack, the WHITE wire goes to the BOTTOM terminal of the input (left) side of the Atlas Twin, and the BLUE wire goes to the TOP input terminal. On the output (top) side of the Atlas Twin, the WHITE wire to each power block goes on the RIGHT terminal, and the BLUE wire goes on the LEFT terminal. There are two pairs of output terminals on the top side of each Atlas Twin, and the right side of one can be connected to the left side of additional Atlas Twins so that one power pack can feed several separate power blocks. Right now I use three Atlas Twins to control 1 Eastbound and 4 Westbound staging tracks, but in the near future, I will use four of them to control 4 Eastbound and 4 Westbound staging tracks. That will enable me to store 8 complete trains in my yards and operate everything that ran between Albuquerque, New Mexico and La Junta, Colorado.
Comments are welcome. I like reading comments more than watching counters increment up.
I challenged myself to remake the Gryphon but at a much smaller size. Here is the result.
Made for Mobile Frame Zero.
Minifig scale 7 studs wide coach, I took inspiration from Mercedes Coaches and colour scheme from a bus company of my hometown.
Except for the tracked sidewalk snow plow which is 3 studs wide, all the other vehicles are 6 studs wide body, with 5 studs wide cabin. We received a lot of snow this winter, and this is what inspired me to build a fleet of snow removal equipment to clear the roads, apron, taxiways and the landing strip of the airbase. I also wish to pay tribute to our snow removal teams that work in harsh conditions, day and night to clear roads and parking lots so the rest of us can go about their daily business. The "yellow" fleet is made up of two tracked walk way snow plows, two dumper plow trucks, one salter-plow truck, two loaders, two dusters and one blower.
Photo from Virunga national park Democratic republic of Congo, DRC.
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