Petri Sallinen

Sorry — it is not a centrifugal clutch. It is only a flywheel. Petri

Mashimas have very good quality and they work well, but they are also expensive. You are able to buy three pole Mitsumis under one euro, but the price of five pole Mashimas is typically almost ten euros or more. Technically five pole Mashimas are better than three pole Mitsumis, but not ten times better. In many cases three pole Mitsumis is enough for giving good running for locomotives. That´s why massproduction locomotive models have cheaper motors than Mashimas. I have used coreless motors like Maxon or Faulhaber in many models and also in many kits we have produced in Finland. In my personal opinion Maxons are one of the best motors I have every used — they are small and powerfull and silent and they work extremely well when you are driving slowly. But they are also very expensive — about 30-50 euros depending on how many motors you are buying at once. Typically enthusiasts are not ready to pay 30-50 euros extra price for getting the kit with coreless motor — Mitsumis like motors are typically enough for most of enthusiasts, especially in DCC times. You are able to test this by producing the kit with alternative motors choice — 15 euros extra price for Mashimas and 50 extra price for Maxons. Here is the underframe of Finnish locomotive kit with coreless Maxon — too expensive for most of enthusiasts. Underframe with Mitsumi like or Mashima like motor is typically enough.

At this moment we have the winter time in Finland and that´s why we have winter also in our layout Petri

I took these pictures some years ago in Scaleforum exhibition — three different gauges in same rails. Fantastic layout and excellent work — all handmade and trains worked very well. Petri

Sanitary MDF is same as the moisture resistant MDF. It has different glue (=resin) inside than standard MDF has. http://www.builderdepot.co.uk/moisture-resistant-mdf-board-9mm-x-1220mm-x-2440mm.html

Many of us are using different kinds of wood based material for making layout because it is more simple to handle than metals — despite of problems of wooden material. MDF is quite useful material (maybe the best of wooden based materials) — especially sanitary quality or weatherproof MDF that is used for making outdoors for Finnish houses. Marine ply is also available or different kinds of coated plys (for example plastic coated) — we have the huge amounts of plys because our industry is making them. One of the best might be aircraft ply, but this is not easy to get any more. Foam based insulating plates are also popular material. Personally I am not using any plys. Here you will find a lot of information of Finnish plywood if you like — all in English. http://www.wisaplywood.com/Products/product-catalogue/Pages/default.aspx This is the baseboard of my N scale layout. The underframe was made by using square steel tubes. Over the steel frame I have used sanitary MDF that is waterproof and over that is foam insulatiing plate. The track bead is 3 mm MDF that I have painted. Petri

Varying of temperature is not our problem — I think that temperature in our rooms is about 20 degrees all around the year Humidity of air is varying in Finland very much between summer and winter times. In winter time air is very dry — moisture percent of air is about 18 and in summer time it might be about 80 percent. This kind of varying is very hard thing for wooden construction. Believe me — we are living from forestry industry and we are building mainly wooden houses. We know the limitation of Finnish plywood — that´s why we have used for example steel in our layout frames

Hello all, This is the sample of Fremo module made in aluminum from Helsinki Model Railway Club. Humidity of air is one of the biggest problem when using wood. This might be the possible decision for our problem. Please enjoy Petri Sallinen Helsinki Finland

This small motor is very popular in Japanese H0 narrow gauge locomotives and in small normal gauge H0 bogies. I have used the motor in some small H0 16,5 mm gauge rail tractors etc. The voltage of motor is 9V but you are also able to give it 12V without any problems. I think this motor might also work in 2MM scale models. The price of motor is about 10 euros. In pictures you can see bogies (16,5 mm gauge in H0) made by Japanese ARU Model using this motor. The motor with double shaft is also available as you can see in the last picture. Motor bogies (in several WBs) made by ARU Model are in kit format — very nice design and easy to build. Both motors and bogie kits are available via Toma Model Works (Mr. Kenji Toma) using email in English. http://tomamw.c.ooco.jp/index-e.html Here is some information of motors. http://arumo.a.la9.jp/rp0001.htm

Most of trees in our layout are pines that is typical wood type in Finland. We have adopted methods from books written by Gordon Gravett (Wild Swan). We have used thin copper wire for making trunks. Trunks are covered by water based building filler that was diluted with water and strengthen by wood glue. The mixture has to be so thin that you are able to daub it by paintbrush. You have to add mixture to trunks two or three times. When the surface is still wet you are able to roughen it by tooth brush. This makes the surface very lively — this is very important. After that we have painted trunks by matte acrylic paints. The foliage is made by HEKI — the type is Micro Floor (conifer green) that is finer than usual foliage nets. At this moment we have made about 60 pines for two blocks. I think we need some hundreds pines for six blocks. Petri

I thank you for your kind feedback. At this moment we are working with the station area — I will let you know when we have got it ready. Petri

I have start building with my brother the Finnish exhibition layout in H0 scale that consists of six blocks. At this moment the first block is almost ready — some details are still missing. The prototype of locomotive shed comes from the beginning of 1900´s century and it is the oldest type of Finnish locomotive sheds. The model is handmade. We have used plastic brick stone plate made by Kibri to make masters for resin castings. When we have molds for any parts of the shed then we are able to cast sheds with different amounts of stalls if we like — quite easy way. The track material is code 70 made by Micro Engineering. I have made #6 turnouts by soldering using the jig made by Canadian Fastracks. The turntable is originally the N scale model made by Peco but the height was suitable for the small H0 turntable so I was broaden the gauge to 16,5 mm (the right gauge in H0 scale would be 17,5 mm because of Finnish five feet gauge, but we typically used to use 16,5 mm in our models). I also made the new plank covering on the turntable. The body and the tender of the steam locomotive are handmade, but the chassis comes from the locomotive made by Fleischmann. The DMU unit is the etched small series kit. All buildings are handmade. Please enjoy my pictures. I will send more when we have got other blocks ready.

You have very interesting topic! Hopefully my writing is not off topic (this model is in H0 scale) - but maybe someone will get new information. We have produced Finnish small series kits using the German made printer named EnvisionTec for making master. For example by using this printer you are able to draw rivets in 0,15 mm diameter, but in my opinion 0,2 mm works better. Typically many resin casting companies own nowadays high quality printers like EnvisionTec. I think they do not sell only 3D-printing services, but when you are making small series kits their services are quite economic (they would like to get mainly your casting work, 3D-printing is only the service for get this:)). I have also heard that EnvisionTec printers are able to print direct the silicon rubber molds so master parts are not needed any moere. By this way the job will be cheaper. I have not tested this way but maybe I will. Petri Helsinki, Finland This is the ready made body made in resin. As you are able to see there are cavities for hatches and grills that are made by etching. In some cases etched parts are still better looking than printed. Typically the run of 50 pcs is the minimum amount by this way. The run of 100 pcs is about 30 percent cheaper per one body. This is the ready locomotive modell in H0 scale. The prototype (Litt Sv11) comes from the beginning of 1950´s. That was the first bigger Finnish made diesel locomotive mady by VALMET (= The Finnish Aircraft Industries). ... and here you are able to see how it works.

Some UK made locomotives in Finland. Petri A1 4-4-0 Canada Works A2 4-4-0 Canada Works A3 4-4-0 Dübs B1 0-4-2T Beyer Peacock B2 0-4-2T Beyer Peacock C1 0-6-0 Neilson C2 0-6-0 Avonside

Please let me know more about this loco (I do not know this loco). The Bagnalls of Stafford book tells that 1515/1898 supplied to Carlos Yensen to Spain (not in Finland). Petri

We had three Bagnalls (1512/1897, 1538/1898 and 1539/1898) in Finland. This picture shows one in Kallavesi in 1898. Here is the other one in Harviala. You are also able to see Finnish made (=Tampella) locomotives in left and right handside. All three locos are here in Punkaharju in 1905. We also had one Hudswell Clarke 0-6-0Wt 1318/1919. Petri Helsinki, Finland

We had UK made steam locomotives for five feet gauge here in Finland made by Avonside Engine Co (Bristol); Beyer, Peacock & Co, Gorton Foundry (Manchester); Peto, Brassey & Betts, Canada Works (Birkenhead); Dübs & Co, Glasgow Locomotive Works (Glasgow) and Neilson & Co, Springburn Works (Glasgow). These might be export models - I do not know (maybe someone knows here better than I). We also had UK made narrow gauge locos for example made by Bagnall. Petri Helsinki, Finland

Michael, you are right. Squares and hard edges are difficult to keep sharp when sanding and filling, but not impossible. In our model sides of window openings were difficult, because corners have to be sharp. I also found the terrible surprise: window openings are not exactly in same size, although they might be. We made one origin and one mold for making main windows by casting them in transparent resin, but making windows this way caused that some on them were too big and some of them were be too small in openings. When using rough 3D-printer, filling and sanding there are risk that you fill openings smaller or sand them bigger and sometimes 3D-prints are not accurate enough for this kind of production planning. In our case differences between same size openings varies 0,1 mm or 0,2 mm. We made corrections in the first resin part and we also had to make new mold, but next time we will know that. Petri

Hi all, You have very interesting discussion. We have also used 3D-printing for different kinds of projects here in Finland. My sample is the Finnish style motorwagon body from 1950´s in H0 scale. Normally we do not use printings for making individual models — the main purpose of use is origin for making silicon rubber molds. We have also found that it is very difficult to find printing service with very fine quality. In pictures I enclose here you will find one possible way to make origin or maybe the individual model from quite rough printing. The sanding and detailing of this project took about 35 hours. Because the printing is quite a rough we did not make any small details in our drawing. We filled the rough surface with filling primer (=spray can for car restoration). After every layer we had to sand the surface with a fine water sanding paper (also with water). In picture we have made five layers and five sandings: three first layers with car filling primer and two last layers with Mr. Surfacer 500 made by Japanese Gunze. We have found that suitable water sanding paper is number 1500-2000 or finer one. After that we glued details made by brass and polystyrene. Details were glued by Loctite After adding details we painted three layers Surfacer 1200 made by Gunze making water sanding after every layer. In the picture you will find the ready-made origin, that we will use for making resin castings. Petri Sallinen Helsinki, Finland