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Focalplane

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  1. Focalplane

    Two photos

    By Focalplane,

    Here are two photos taken during track laying. The turntable well and inspection pits were installed first, the ash pit was cut out ready for a scratch built ash plant. Various locos and scenery were placed for the photos.
     

     
    View from above the shed location toward the turntable and various facilities. Coaling on the left, ash plant on the right
     

     
    Close up of the facilities area
  2. Focalplane
    I am far from the layout at the moment and much of my material is also not with me, so it is difficult to maintain entries in a consistent manner.
     
    However I can relate an ongoing saga with motorizing the Peco turntable kit. I am now reasonably satisfied after buying two kits, two inexpensive motor kits and then replacing the latter with a more robust design using Meccano spares. The motor is DCC controlled and the last time I was in France I was able to test it and it is almost ready to consider a working accessory!
     
    But for this post, an introduction to the kit itself and some minor criticisms of the design and robustness of the kit.
     
    The plastic tray on which the turntable sits is too flexible. I have tried all sorts of strengthening tactics and have abandoned them all in favor of a separate plywood base for the motor, gears etc. this works well but requires a lot of preparation or modification to the underlying baseboard and frame.
     
    The plastic bush attached to the turntable is prone to breakage.
     
    The pickups need to be installed very carefully, the sprung plungers click during operation. And if course the dead zone rule must be obeyed.
     
    Peco do not supply enough plates for fixing around the rim for track connections. I use code 75 and had to adapt some of the code 100s to fit.
     
    The handrails should not be fitted until last. I plan to fit scratch built rails using brass wire, etc.
     
    And most modern LMS turntables were vacuum operated so the turntable needs modifying anyway, at least in my case.
     
    But to be fair, the kit is the best option out there for British modellers. Next up, some motor options.
  3. Focalplane
    My first attempt at motorizing the Peco turntable kit was a good learning experience. First, the motor kit featured in the photo is inexpensive, but this brings with it a number of setbacks, the main one of which is noise.
     
    The photo shows that the motor and gears are fitted directly to the underside of the plastic "dish". The glued strips of wood give the dish strength but I cannot say the result is good (and it looks dreadful!) The slack within the gears also means poor registration but surprisingly the DCC control turned out to be good and with some experience the tracks could be lined up using a very slow control on the motor.
     
    Subsequent improvements included smothering the internal gearbox with lithium grease but the noise was still too much. The worm drive is useful in that the entire mechanism sits within a reasonable thickness of under-baseboard. There is a commercial solution that suspends the motor vertically below the spindle. I am sure this is a great solution, but not for my table top diorama as I simply don't have the space.
     
    This installation was subsequently abandoned as I moved into a new apartment and had even less space to work with. More on that later.
  4. Focalplane
    The second generation of Legge Lane's turntable moves to the new apartment and a smaller diorama footprint. A new base was needed and the Dremel Trio tool began to pay for itself in cutting the well for the second Peco kit.
     
    I had cut up an old hardwood framed futon base and this came in useful for the new baseboard. The first idea I came up with was to tap three holes in the base of the turntable well and pin down the flexible base for the motor.
     

     
    three tapped holes in the base took appropriate bolts locked to brass bars screwed to the baseboard frame.
     

     
    The turntable shaft was then threaded through a rigid U shaped brass channel and the rig tested. This seemed to work quite well but I was not satisfied as the setting that worked best seemed to cause binding between the turntable and the well.
     
    So, yet another solution was sought but this will have to wait until I can take some photos on my return to France. To be continued. . . .
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