Does anyone produce or has anyone made a working roller shutter door?

[Dungrange]

I'm looking to build a modern rail connected building in which vans are loaded and unloaded undercover and was thinking of using several of the Wills Industrial / Retail units to produce the building (https://peco-uk.com/collections/4mm-oo/products/industrial-retail-unit-base-kit).  Obviously if I'm going to shunt wagons inside the building, I need the roller shutter doors across the tracks to be open, but I'd also like to be able to close the doors as well and I'm wondering if anyone has a solution for an operational door - either available to purchase or something they have build themselves.

 

I've seen solutions where a solid door is simply raised vertically, but such a solution requires a building that is at least twice as high as the door and the Wills units are not tall enough for that as a solution.  As such, I think any door would have to be semi-flexible, so that it would perhaps move from being vertical when down to horizontal up near the roof, but I'm looking for ideas to copy.

 

Thanks in advance.

  

[Huw Griffiths]

I can't help wondering exactly how deep individual slats on one of these doors would be, if modelled to the same scale as your buildings, layout etc.

 

My guess is probably not very deep - so perhaps it might make sense to just print or draw lines for the slat edges onto something thin and flexible (paper?) - then roll your "shutter doors" onto a concealed bobbin / reel, connected via gears to a motor.

 

OK - I suspect that somebody might be along soon to say "don't do this because ..." - but it's how I'd probably be tempted to go about it.

 

 

Huw.

[HillsideDepot]

I'm trying to remember the detail of a raising doors I made many years ago. It was strips of plasticard, stuck to Sellotape and running in brass U shaped channels at the sides. I'm struggling to recall how the door stayed in the open position, but I think it simply rested on two horizontal rails. As the inside of the warehouse was accessible from the fiddle yard, operation was purely manual from behind the scenes. 

This harsh, flash-lit, photo is all I can find at the moment, and probably not quite what you want, but it might start a few ideas flowing.

 

Edited August 21, 2020 by HillsideDepot
to remove second copy of photo

[Dungrange]

Thanks guys,

 

I'd have envisaged paper being a bit flimsy, but I note that Evergreen produce five thou sheets of styrene, which is probably about the thickness of two sheets of paper and may be a bit more robust (although arguably less flexible).  I hadn't thought of sellotape to hold pieces of plasticard together, although I suspect that the tape may lose its stickiness over time.  Was that a problem?  I certainly don't have any issues with a manual approach, but the issue is how to hold the doors in a raised position which isn't twice the height of the door (since the Wills kits wouldn't provide the headroom.

 

Interestingly I've found a video of the Proses H0/00 Engine House with working motorised doors, which is nice, but a bit expensive (especially when I don't want the building).  Interestingly the door seems to be similar to horizontal strips of plasticard, but there seems to be two vertical threads though the door that hold it together, so I assume it has been injection moulded as a single piece.  I'm assuming that it wouldn't be available as a spare part, but it might be worth asking.

 

 

Any other ideas welcome.

[Paul H Vigor]

Just a thought, but might a similar effect be achieved using a cut down, redundant bamboo roller blind?

[Enterprisingwestern]

 

The door in smaller scales doesn't need to actually be a roller shutter door, it can just ride round underneath the roof in guide rails as a flat sheet, then all that is needed is a linear drive system much less complicated. The 5 thou sheet previously mentioned would probably suffice.

 

Mike.

[Michael Edge]

There's one on my Cwmafon layout at the back of the steelworks loco shed.

It's just a sheet of corrugated plastikard with a length of brass angle glued on the bottom. It runs in brass guides on the inside of the building which curve over into the roof - just visible at the top here with the door partly open. It works very well and as one of our operators discovered it springs off without any damage if accidentally driven into from the inside - "what door?" was the reaction to "did you open the door before you parked that loco there?"

[HillsideDepot]

I've had a look for any other photos of my doors, but couldn't find anything. But i did find a photo of a real door which shows the sort of arrangement I had inside the building

I remember that the top section of door was slightly taller, (but the extra height was above the door opening so it didn't show) and the horizontal track was designed so the top section came off the end and hung vertically when the door was open. Being taller it was just a little bit heavier than the bottom section which stayed vertical at the top of the door opening to keep the whole thing in the vertical tracks ready for closing.

The sellotape probably would have dried up eventually, but I don't recall any problems and I think I had that layout for about 10 years. 

[newbryford]

 

[Dungrange]

3 hours ago, Michael Edge said:

There's one on my Cwmafon layout at the back of the steelworks loco shed.

It's just a sheet of corrugated plastikard with a length of brass angle glued on the bottom. It runs in brass guides on the inside of the building which curve over into the roof - just visible at the top here with the door partly open. It works very well and as one of our operators discovered it springs off without any damage if accidentally driven into from the inside - "what door?" was the reaction to "did you open the door before you parked that loco there?"

 

That looks suitable and prompts a couple of questions.  Do you know what thickness of plastikard you used?  Slaters seem to have a sheet (0436) described as '4mm Scale Corrugations White 0.015" thick', but a lot of other embossed sheets seem to be at least 0.5 mm / 20 thou.  The thinner sheets all being plain.  If 15 thou thickness would work, I may take a trip to my local model shop, since they usually stock Slater's products. 

 

Also, was the brass angle glued to the bottom just to provide weight or was the lifting mechanism connected to this.  I perhaps should have said I'd like two doors (a bit like @HillsideDepot's photograph above) so a lifting mechanism that involved lifting the door from the bottom wouldn't be ideal, unless both doors were to lift at the same time, which is perhaps not as realistic as being able to open / close the doors independently.

[Wheatley]

Lego do one as part of the fire station sets (no doubt amongst others). I'm not suggesting you use unadulterated lego but it might be a short cut ! 

 

https://www.bricklink.com/v2/catalog/catalogitem.page?P=4218&name=Garage Roller Door Section without Handle&category=[Garage]#T=C

[Dungrange]

42 minutes ago, newbryford said:

 

 

That's a great video and they do work, but I note the issue was that the doors couldn't be left in the open position, which would be important.  The weights were necessary to stop the doors from curling up, but there would also need to be some form of friction stop, to keep the weights up and the door open.  It certainly works closer to how I thought real doors work.

 

48 minutes ago, HillsideDepot said:

I've had a look for any other photos of my doors, but couldn't find anything. But i did find a photo of a real door which shows the sort of arrangement I had inside the building

I remember that the top section of door was slightly taller, (but the extra height was above the door opening so it didn't show) and the horizontal track was designed so the top section came off the end and hung vertically when the door was open. Being taller it was just a little bit heavier than the bottom section which stayed vertical at the top of the door opening to keep the whole thing in the vertical tracks ready for closing.

The sellotape probably would have dried up eventually, but I don't recall any problems and I think I had that layout for about 10 years. 

 

I think this picture shows the solution that I am beginning to favour.  I didn't realise that some real doors lie flat at an angle (I had thought they were all rolled up).  Measuring the Wills kit, I think I have about 38 mm between the top of the door opening and the underside of the roof.  The larger the radius between the vertical and the horizontal (or slightly sloping) sections, the less flexible the door would need to be.  Unfortunately the doors in the kit are 1 mm thick, with raised detail that about another 0.25 mm which means it's much too rigid to do anything but a straight vertical lift (which there is not the headroom for).  I guess what I'm unsure of at the moment is how to form that curved guide rail.

[Joseph_Pestell]

Ben Ando and friends have one on the steel stockholder shed on their Dibben Jct layout (called something else now???)

 

Edited August 22, 2020 by Joseph_Pestell

[Michael Edge]

20 minutes ago, Dungrange said:

 

That looks suitable and prompts a couple of questions.  Do you know what thickness of plastikard you used?  Slaters seem to have a sheet (0436) described as '4mm Scale Corrugations White 0.015" thick', but a lot of other embossed sheets seem to be at least 0.5 mm / 20 thou.  The thinner sheets all being plain.  If 15 thou thickness would work, I may take a trip to my local model shop, since they usually stock Slater's products. 

 

Also, was the brass angle glued to the bottom just to provide weight or was the lifting mechanism connected to this.  I perhaps should have said I'd like two doors (a bit like @HillsideDepot's photograph above) so a lifting mechanism that involved lifting the door from the bottom wouldn't be ideal, unless both doors were to lift at the same time, which is perhaps not as realistic as being able to open / close the doors independently.

It's Slater's corrugated plastikard, the brass angle is to keep the bottom edge straight and provides a handle to lift the door. There's no mechanism, it's just hand operated - on the layout it's the backyard of the loco depot with CISL's last steam loco parked out of use (but kept as a pet).

[Dungrange]

24 minutes ago, Wheatley said:

Lego do one as part of the fire station sets (no doubt amongst others). I'm not suggesting you use unadulterated lego but it might be a short cut ! 

 

https://www.bricklink.com/v2/catalog/catalogitem.page?P=4218&name=Garage Roller Door Section without Handle&category=[Garage]#T=C

 

That's not something that I'd have thought of.  The main issue is the width of the doors.  Looking at the pictures of the sets in which these doors are used, the doors seem to be eight studs wide which would make them 64 mm wide, whereas the door opening in the Wills kit is just 52 mm.  However, if I'm unsuccessful with the other ideas, then it's possibly a workable solution as it would be possible to set them back behind the inside wall.  I'm just not sure how it would look. 

[Wheatley]

You could chop the middle bit out of each slat and cover the glued-back-together bit with Slaters corrugated sheet to reinforce it, at least that way Lego are doing the runner/slot engineering bit.   Whether that would be less faff than scratchbuilding is debatable though.  

[Revolution Ben]

 

Hi there,

 

The doors on the steel terminal on Horseley Fields did work, but were fairly basic, and because the building was tall did not need to roll up - they were just fashioned from thick plasticard, painted and used a simple pulley drive to raise and lower them in guides either side.  We did have to weight the lower edge to ensure they slid down reliably.

 

Here are some images, not the best I am afraid, showing the building under construction and completed... we also installed a light inside and a small signal beside the door.

 

 

 

cheers

 

Ben A.

Edited August 22, 2020 by Ben A
Images added.

[DGO]

This is not cheap but works https://www.modellbahnshop-lippe.com/Landscape+%26+Decoration/Decoration/Viessmann-5172/gb/modell_301344.html

 

However it's effectively the same as the DIY doors, pulley on the end of the rod of the diy doors and a counterweight would balance the door weights, drive with a small servo with a large gear driving a tiny gear and you are sorted, you can make for about £5 a door maybe less including a servo, but you need a servo controller or an arduino and a bit of basic programing