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2mm Distillery: Dail-uaine


justin1985
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On 23/08/2019 at 16:32, Lacathedrale said:

That's really coming along well bud, it looks fantastic. Do you have any closer shots of the siding with the check rails in place?

 

Check rail visible in this pic. The contrast in the rail tops is pretty dramatic!

 

IMG_20190820_235714.jpg.4db1e6608532ccf0662dddda49985038.jpg

 

The 3D print of the malt kiln ventilator failed, which was annoying, but the mini version for the engine shed turned out pretty well. Posed on the card mockup.

 

IMG_20190824_213829.jpg.94f39dee3aac89a008a6a2fe2cb3740f.jpg

 

The first shot stills were a bit small, and some of the print supports failed, but I think they still look good with a coat of copper :)

 

IMG_20190824_213604.jpg.0e541cecf29a1fe4fc79389cf81147e6.jpg

 

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Just a  warning to be careful,  the groups shunting plank has stalled to a full stop as the tramway with inset check rails was covered in plaster and working ok however it  expanded in the spring/summer heat  and now requires ripping up and or starting again;  think if done again would leave more expansion joints and someway of a leaving some expansion gaps in the surface 

 

Nick

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9 hours ago, nick_bastable said:

Just a  warning to be careful,  the groups shunting plank has stalled to a full stop as the tramway with inset check rails was covered in plaster and working ok however it  expanded in the spring/summer heat  and now requires ripping up and or starting again;  think if done again would leave more expansion joints and someway of a leaving some expansion gaps in the surface 

 

Nick

 

Thanks Nick, that sounds like a really useful tip.

 

You mean that, as well as expansion gaps within the length of the rail, you'd try and allow some kind of expansion gap between rail and plaster?

 

Perhaps by tucking something thin and non-stick (an offcut of silicone baking sheet?) between rail and plaster/clay when bedding it in?

 

I had been wondering about using offcuts of plasticard or something to fill in between the sleepers and reduce the depth of the clay, to avoid issues with shrinkage as it dries. Were your issues more with the rail expansion, or the plaster?

 

For the paved point, I was planning to use a generous amount of wooden planks to make it more easily taken out/adjusted. Thinking of whether to try and laser cut in very thin ply, or 3D print with a kind of "comb" to lock between the sleeper gaps?

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2 hours ago, justin1985 said:

 

Thanks Nick, that sounds like a really useful tip.

 

You mean that, as well as expansion gaps within the length of the rail, you'd try and allow some kind of expansion gap between rail and plaster?

 

Perhaps by tucking something thin and non-stick (an offcut of silicone baking sheet?) between rail and plaster/clay when bedding it in?

 

I had been wondering about using offcuts of plasticard or something to fill in between the sleepers and reduce the depth of the clay, to avoid issues with shrinkage as it dries. Were your issues more with the rail expansion, or the plaster?

 

For the paved point, I was planning to use a generous amount of wooden planks to make it more easily taken out/adjusted. Thinking of whether to try and laser cut in very thin ply, or 3D print with a kind of "comb" to lock between the sleeper gaps?

what happened is the rail  expanded and forced the  plaster up and out buckling the underlying rail a total mess. 0.8mm ply would work and leave the rail clear enough to clean without damage to the "paved" finish assuming no solder bumps on the underlying sleepers,  Do you have a laser to experiment with ?   indeed you have given me a idea on how to do a crossing for my own DJLC plank :good:

 

Nick

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Thanks Nick, really helpful.

 

34 minutes ago, nick_bastable said:

0.8mm ply would work and leave the rail clear enough to clean without damage to the "paved" finish assuming no solder bumps on the underlying sleepers,  Do you have a laser to experiment with ?   indeed you have given me a idea on how to do a crossing for my own DJLC plank :good:

 

Nick

 

I don't have my own laser, but I am a member of a MakerSpace that has a rather nice Trotec laser. I've not used anything as thin as 0.8mm yet - I suspect that's in the territory where it will need to be held down with magnets.

 

I was thinking of exporting the track plan from Templot as a DXF and using as a template in AutoCAD to create the design for the wooden inserts. 

 

 

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There's a fair bit of inset track on TM and the colliery and I must admit I've never had a problem. I used polyfilla mixed with PVA and filled over the entire area. I didnt bother with a check rail, I simply used a scraper ground from an old screwdriver to scrape out the flangways when dry. I found that if you fill and smooth to rail height it will shrink back very slightly on drying - just enough to allow the rails to be cleaned.

Its well known that I don't know how to drive a computer so for inset walkways I make a track rubbing of the rails then cut out thin ply of plasticard accordingly.

 

Jerry

IMG_1490.PNG.3268bfd435292a025f395960b330e5fd.PNG

 

19-9412577.jpg.ee9a040a051c8d878868b143cbeed4ed.jpg

 

 

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  • 2 weeks later...

As per the thread in the "Railways of Scotland" sub forum, I've made some changes to the shape of the malt kiln roof. The walls of the kiln are laminated together from a sheet of Slater's embossed plasticard and two more sheets of 0.5mm - and currently sitting under a heavy flat slab of marble to try and minimise bowing. 

 

At the 2mm AGM yesterday I managed to get hold of some wheels on the right length axles for the Dapol wagons I'm converting to run for the BR era. I also found seeing Corrieshalloch and chatting to Anthony Yates really inspirational - especially in terms of pairing BR blue and pre-group on the same layout.

 

Here are all of the BR blue period wagons that I've got finished for the layout. I've really enjoyed the weathering on the steel wagons - quite a change for me!

 

IMG_20190908_191809.jpg.7238ecaa5b1e576ff61375c1ce9d6a8a.jpg

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On 27/05/2019 at 16:31, Caley Jim said:

Like Tom, I think these cobbles look really good.  I will have some to do for Kirkallanmuir and I'll be borrowing that idea.

 

As far as cleaning the track goes, I made this little tool out of 30 thou brass and find it very effective.

1696048660_Railcleaningtool.JPG.370eb505a35e363b614a396aaeedbaf1.JPG

The idea was to be able to clean the top of the running rails without taking the 'rust' off the check and wing rails.  The little prongs fit in the gap, with the 'step' rubbing on the rails.  I'm not a fan of using abrasives to clean track, although I do use the very finest surface of a nail buffer on plain track from time to time.  This tool scrapes off any deposit and at the same time burnishes the surface to some extent.

 

As an aside, I feel that the most important area to keep clean is the top inside edge of the rail as that is where the cones wheel tread makes most of its contact.

 

Jim

Jim kindly sent me a test sample for this and have to say it works a treat 

 

well done that man

 

Nick

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4 hours ago, nick_bastable said:

Jim kindly sent me a test sample for this and have to say it works a treat 

 

well done that man

Thank, Nick.

 

I've sent a sample to the Association Products Officer to see whether he would see it as a shop item.  If not I will add it to my Buchanan Kits range.

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A little bit of progress - I've been working on some of the buildings for this layout using multiple laminations of 0.5mm plasticard cut on a Silhouette cutter.

 

IMG_20190922_184812.jpg.24f8367a5d6ffcbf5bedd5a54fbc7fea.jpg

 

Conclusion: next time, I'll try a different method! Pleased with the result, but even following the advice to use an odd number of laminations and weighting heavily when drying (under a slab of marble) each side ended up with a lot of warping. I ended up putting in a lot of internal bracing and false floors to counteract that.

 

I also pretty much gave up on MEK as a solvent - PlasticWeld seems SOOO much more effective, and easier to work with.

 

I still want to use the embossed Plasticard as the surface of the other buildings though. Would laminating it to mountboard card going to work any better?

 

J

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On 22/09/2019 at 19:28, justin1985 said:

.

 

I also pretty much gave up on MEK as a solvent - PlasticWeld seems SOOO much more effective, and easier to work with.

 

I still want to use the embossed Plasticard as the surface of the other buildings though. Would laminating it to mountboard card going to work any better?

 

J

 

You might try Di-Limonene as a solvent for polystyrene sheet. It's much less aggressive and less prone to causing warping.

Evo-stik also works well for laminating plastic sheet to dissimilar material if used very thinly and allowed to nearly dry before fixing.

 

Mark

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On ‎27‎/‎09‎/‎2019 at 19:56, 2mmMark said:

 

You might try Di-Limonene as a solvent for polystyrene sheet. It's much less aggressive and less prone to causing warping.

Evo-stik also works well for laminating plastic sheet to dissimilar material if used very thinly and allowed to nearly dry before fixing.

 

Mark

 

There are a range of solvent-free contact adhesives available, UniBond as an example, and a gentleman I met last year at a local exhibition was demonstrating their use for laminating styrene sheets in building construction. I believe the adhesives are acrylic based, the Selleys brand I use (Australian) is certainly labelled as such.

 

Michael

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I believe you get better grip with a solvent based contact adhesive but having said that, the Easitrac adhesive is non-solvent and that seems to hold very well.

The reason for letting Evo-stik go off is that you're not trapping wet glue within the joint.

 

Mark.

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On 22/09/2019 at 20:28, justin1985 said:

 I ended up putting in a lot of internal bracing and false floors to counteract that.

 

I think you will find that, with buildings of that size, you will need a lot of internal bracing regardless of wall thickness.

 

BTW, the layout's shaping up to be something special.

 

David

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It's looking very impressive, Justin.

 

With regard to buildings, I've found that by far and away the most reliable way of keeping them warp free is to build the carcasses from 60 thou'. Granted, this is in 4mm so proportionately there's probably a difference but with a modicum of bracing of corners and the use of internal floors and walls they survive. I've come to the conclusion that you need to be cleverer than I am to manage the multiple lamination method (though I can make it work with quite large wagons on occasion). In 2mm you could probably get away with 40 thou' as a base because the buildings are smaller.

 

Adam

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Many thanks for the comments and suggestions! I've been very busy with work in the last few weeks and haven't had the chance to do any modelling, or even look at RMWeb properly.

 

Yes I think I've come to the same conclusion as @Adam re: multiple laminations. The point of going down that route was to be able to use the Silhouette cutter to cut all of the material, theoretically saving time and effort. But the effort involved in laminating seems to cancel that out! 

 

For the next building I've cut the textured plasticard on the silhouette cutter but cut the carcass from mount board and laminated using UHU-hart (which I'd been using for laser cut card kits) which seems to be working well so far. No pictures at the moment I'm afraid though.

 

Annoyingly I'd forgotten to include cut outs for the lintels and window ledges when cutting the textured plasticard on the Silhouette, so that's been a tedious job!

 

J

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For lintels and sills you could simply scrape away the textured surface with a No 15 scalpel blade and then put a 5thou strip over the top, Justin. On my brick buildings the lintels are always done that way on CF.

 

Tim

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  • 4 weeks later...

I've had the chance to spend a bit more time on this layout over the weekend. Quite a lot of work, but not a huge amount of visible progress. At least all track is now fixed down, including the NBR style bufferstops.

 

IMG_20191104_222700.jpg.6817e885d19cf2850f8a63097c3cd095.jpg

 

Most of the work was actually underneath. Everything is now wired up, and point motors are fitted and working. Please excuse the messy wiring - I simply used offcuts of fibreglass type PCB to link together the power buses - simple and effective - but very ugly. 

 

I've used Conrad point motors this time - they're fast acting stall motors, rather than solenoids or slow action motors - but they are nicely low profile. The actuating arms have quite a long travel, but on two of the points I was able to use the thinnest, springiest, actuating wire to link to the Association 3D printed under baseboard tiebars. One of these proved to be very stiff though, so I had to use a stouter wire to get it to work. I'm a little concerned how well these might last, in terms of wearing the holes in the 3D printed parts out wider, or even damaging the attachment between actuating wire and arm, which feels a little flimsy. Still, they were cheap, easy to fit, and didn't need too much adjustment to the re-used baseboard that hadn't been designed with the depth for motors. 

 

 

IMG_20191104_150414.jpg.32c76cba13823b8cfb79c370448d4155.jpg

 

I'm now experimenting with ballast and track painting. Here is an offcut of plain PCB track painted with Halfords grey primer plus Tamiya Flat Brown. From left to right the ballast samples, all fitted using Pledge Floor Wax (Klear) are:

 

Woodland Scenics - Fine Grey

Attwoods Aggregates "MC Road Stone" - acquired at a recent exhibition 

Polak - 5231 - N Scale "Hornblende grey-brown"

Treemendus Normandy EarthIMG_20191104_221522.jpg.f796b79555586ca8c45ae830970cbc11.jpg

 

Perhaps controversially, given how popular the Treemendus Normandy Earth powder seems to be with many 2mm modellers, I didn't actually find it that great to use and I'm not that convinced by the result. There seems to be quite a lot of variation in size within the earth powder, including a lot of actual dust - I found it very difficult to smooth into shape. It also feels actually too smooth for "real" ballast - but ideal for slightly overgrown or finer areas like neglected sidings and cess paths. 

 

I don't actually think the Woodland Scenics stuff is as bad as is sometimes made out, but in terms of size and texture, I think the Attwood and Polak products seem to stand out as "looking" right to me. In that they seem to have texture without the individual stones jumping out at you as the Woodland Scenics ones do.

 

I think the MC in the product code for the Attwood product stands for Meldon Quarry - its certainly got a rich honey like colour. The Polak blend seems very inoffensive in tone, although it has a bit of a sand-like translucent quality to it. It was nice to work with though.

 

IMG_20191104_221550.jpg.6c8fc59ab96cb163eb011895d1750cf4.jpg

 

Any thoughts on which to use on this project?

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9 hours ago, justin1985 said:

I think the MC in the product code for the Attwood product stands for Meldon Quarry - its certainly got a rich honey like colour. The Polak blend seems very inoffensive in tone, although it has a bit of a sand-like translucent quality to it. It was nice to work with though.

 

IMG_20191104_221550.jpg.6c8fc59ab96cb163eb011895d1750cf4.jpg

 

 

Hi Justin,

 

Having talked to Mr Attwood on several occasions, that isn't his Meldon stone, which he sells separately as it's namesake.

 

The description from his stand is 'MC is a limestone. It is used as ballast around the Plymouth area. The quarry is currently supplying aggregate to Southern England'

 

Apologies for my pedantry. If it looks like the right thing to you, I'd say to just to use it...

 

Best regards 

 

Chris 

 

 

 

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How much does colour affect our judgement?  I'd suggest finishing the WS, AA and Polak in the same colours. That said if the Polak product is your favourite to work with by a fair margin then if I were you I would perhaps skip a step and select that.

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