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Ark Royal

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  1. Link To Previous Posts Having completed the station road bridge my attentions have turned to the Gallery and Footbridge. Many may remember this the 3D Printed Station Footbridge frm Shapeways printed many moons ago. Unfortunaltely these parts are very delicate and it became apparent that transportation to venues and continual handling would not bode well for this item. With the station road bridge permanently attached to the layout and the Station platforms and buildings removeable for transportation it was apparent that the footbridge would also need to be a removeable item. Many iterations of the same concept have been explored but i feel the latest is by far the best solution. Footbridge Support Trestles These have always remained a 3D printed item. Although relatively thin wall profile by there very design nature they are quite rugged. I attempted home printing of these items and although they came out looking like the items the definition when it came to change in cross section of the diagonal braces was slightly underwhelming. In fairness the change is cross section is only 0.30mm in this scale so it is hardly surprising. A 3d CAD view of the offending items The solution was to have these printed by Shapeways as the layer resolution was 0.016 (left) opposed to 0.05 with the elegoo (right) The LH one is the shapeways version and the surface finish isn't as smooth the originals are made of wood so theywouldn't be smooth The 4 plynths painted and ready to fit Luggage Chute This was also printed by shapeways in the same material The Gallery Above : The Real Thing. The Gallery is scratch built from brass and sits on a brass sheet. This then sits onto the PCB that forms the roof of the Station bridge. This allows the entire footbridge and gallery to be removed for transportation The plynths and luggage chute will be glued to the underside of the gallery and staircase structure. This is still being worked so the woof cladding has only been taped for measuring purposed For the Gallery Windows i created an etch. This has the gallery windows and gallery window platform on. Left: Main WIndow - with internal version below and bars below that. Centre: Gallery falsework that holds the 3 handrail supports. Below are the walkway and Kickboard. Below that the 2 side windows and bars RH: Gallery Window platform Handrails and Brackets. Smoke Deflector Brackets (?) Each of the windows is formed of 2 etches. These are housed within a carrier. The carrier has holes areound it to aid alignment when the 2 parts are brought together. The red (1/2 etched) portions with the window, house a full metal bar to give the necessary relief. Additionally an extra 1/2 etch bar is added to the main supports (wide 1/2 etch section) Once each window section is soldered together they are painted and then a clear styrene sheet is sandwiched between the 2 layers before they are cut from the carrier. Current state of affairs Above: Main Gallery Windows Above: Side Gallery Windows Above: Gallery Window Platform Handrails These are all awaiting assembly to the gallery once the staircases are attached Footbridge Staircases Above : The Real Thing I had considered making the flights of stairs from brass strip but that was a totally insane idea ! Then i thought of having them etched which was not so insane. But finally i found my sanity whilst tinkering with the 3D CAD for the staircase structure and combined the staircse to the kickboard to give the some rigidity and had them printed. As these are hidden from sight mostly i chose to get them printed in versatile plastic from shapeways which has a grainy surface but is cheap, unfortunately they don't fit in my Elegoo Mars printer in one piece. The top stair incorporates the angle which will throw the staircase off at the correct angle to align with the canopy columns and gallery sides (Hopefully !) They have been designed to fit into the rebates in the staircase plynths and into the rebates on the underside of the gallery floor. Why Southern Region couldn't extend the gallery and make them at 90 degrees i will never know. Obviously to challenge the modeller ! Staircase Structure Above : The Real Thing. Having given some thought about having these printed and attaching them to the gallery by means of some glue i felt that this would then be the weakest link in the combined structure and with the constant handling and transportation may lead to future issues. For that reason i have gone for another etch. This is a hefty 0.90 mm thick (wanted to be 1mm as the posts are 2mm square) etch. Each of the 4 sides have to have the 3 main vertical posts soldered to them (the 4th is on the gallery). In doing this the top of the post are half etched to form a channel for the upper roof support to be fitted into. On the upper edge of each side runs a wooden handrail on the original structure, which sits flush with the vertical post on the inside but protrudes by 3 inches on the outside giving them a total thicknes of 9 inches or 3mm scale. This means that the handrails need to scratch built and then added to each side. Each of the relevant pairs of sides is then oined by the horiontal upper roof braces (pictured bottom of etch above). I have never tackled an etch this thick before and had therefore had not realised how much each part would need to remove the cusps from the etching process. That said - "it's the journey not the finishing that counts" Above: LH Staircase Pair (inner face) with vertical posts added. Above: RH Staircase Assembled Above: RH Staircase Structure Cleaned and Etch Primed Above: Temporarily assembeld with staircase More to follow once i had more time to model. Mark
  2. Mike Ainsworth has been busy with the Station platform area. Platform Canopies He has built the canopies from scratch using brass sections to form the main canopy structures. The canopy columns were reused from Eridge mk 1. These structures are suitably robust enough to remove them for transportation of the layout to exhibitions They were then clad in plastikard sheeting and individual sheet join ribs were represented with semi-circular plastic rod before the structures were glazed. The end face were clad with 4mm wood cladding represented plastikard. Finally given there coat of paint and weathering Platform Edging Brickwork Following the trial of the 3D home printed Brick Edging Strips (More Information Here) these have been applied to the platform surfaces before the face brickwork was re-applied. The platform upper surfaces have been lightly coated in chinchilla dust and await painting.
  3. For continuity i have kept the title of this section of the blog the same as Part 1 and 2 of the Road Bridge build. Anyone wishing to view these can do so HERE I would never have thought that it would take me this long to complete this project but it has ! I guess that the loss of our old club building to acquiring the new premises did not help much. As Richard Stevens (Club Member) said " Its not the fiinshing but the journey that matters" how true he is Last week i finally planted the Road Bridge on Eridge for the final time and it now resides as part of the scenery. Having re-read those entries its clear that much changed during that build. The original structure was built from styrene sheeting and the warp effect took its toll over a relatively short time so that version was sent to the scrap heap! The new version will not warp. Each of the 4 bridge pillars are made up of numerous layers of laser cut MDF clad in platikard brick sheeting. The Up and Down Mainline Pillars and the Down Bay incorporate the drop in which is on the original bridge structure quite noticeable if viewed from the northern and southern side of the bridge. During this transition the exposed steel beams change to arched brick recesses as pictured below. I wanted to keep this feature on the new version , although never seen by the general public, i believe that when a photo is taken looking through the bridge this will be clearly evidient and so worthy of the effort needed to model it. The original plastikard bridge used styrene homemade "I" Beams to replicate this, on the new version these are brass. The reason for this is the pillars will be permanently fixed to the board (bolted down ust in case the track needs major repairs) so the roof of the bridge structure is now removeable for minor repairs. These brass "I" Beams are mounted on PCB Board and the arched brickwork then formed onto the "I" Beams. Unfortunately it appears no photos of the build process were taken (note to self). EDIT: Found Them Pictures Inserted The curved butress walls were 3D printed on my Elegoo Mars and then the brick cladding appled. Brick Cladding was applied to all faces of the bridge and curved walls before colouring them. On that note Thanks to RexAshton (of this manor) for the advice on using Watercolour pencils to colour the brickwork without which this structure still would not be finished. i love this technique Before ruining it After Weathering The Almost Finished Article. Brighton Side London Side I'll add a photo view showing through the bridge later
  4. Thanks for your comments. There were some excellent layouts to view and the added bonus was that unlike exhibitions you got a ring side seat and learnt a lot about the layouts and operations. IMHO i'd like to see one produced for every Scaleforum, but it is a lot of work to produce. Hats off to all those involved. Made for a couple of interesting running sessions to capture the footage and who needs an excuse to run trains
  5. For those that want to watch the video we made as part of "Virtual Scaleforum 2020" I have posted the link below Eridge Scaleforum 2020 All the layouts featured can be found Here I'm not entirely sure how long they will remain on the web, so don't delay. Mark
  6. Hmmm The review sings the praises of the Saturn and its hard to see why it wouldn't for a machine in this price range and specifications I feel my resistance fading to the Saturn fading somewhat and the wallet creeking open.... From a company point of view , no pun intended, this will be the launching platform to the development of the next generation (maybe Neptune) and the sucess of that development will depend on the Saturn and its preformance. It could make or break the reputation and market. From a personal point of view, given the relatively limited experience in the 3D printing field, all of which has been documented here , i have always been very impressed with the Mars and what it is capable of delivering, i've had very few bad experiences and have found the machine easy to use and continue to be amazed at the quality of prints that have been produced. To that point, here is the 2nd print of the Diagram 1386 20T Mineral Wagon, with update CAD file for strapping definition and coach bolt representation. Its not perfect but i very much doubt the real wagons were. Photo taken at 3.8x magnification on a standard smart phone, coach bolt heads (0.30mm dia, 0.30mm projection) If the Mars is capable of this, it begs the question what the Saturn could produce.
  7. monkeysarefun Will you be the first on the forum to fill the extra large bed completely and post your triumphs......no pressure lmao. Mark
  8. Tom I'm sure there will be many more oppertunities to come. Its good for us the consumer and the company that the demand is high. Mark
  9. Hi monkeysarefun File is okay so demons at work Good luck for tonight, have you syncronized your clock ? Mark
  10. "Lockdown Fun" With plenty to do during the "lockdown" period i have been mindful of my own well-being and mental health, so have afforded myself some time to do some therapy modelling. Well that's what i like to kid myself. As part of my therapy i have done a couple of CAD files for wagons. I already had a CAD file for a Diagram 1771 Tunny Wagon but i have more than enough of those. So i have started simple with a mineral wagon. Diagram 1386 20T Mineral Wagon. A bit of a rare beast and not available in ready to run, limited quantities built, so an odd wagon in a rake scenario. I decided to go for an etch for the chassis as P4 scale prefers some suspension. Again auto supported in Prusa Slice at 80% and auto-orientated Defintion of detail is fairly crisp but the upper 2 corners are slightly rounded. This was really a test print for the definition of body strapping. The CAD file has been updated and the wagon bodyside now completed with the addition of the 504 bolt heads.. Re-sliced with additional supports and printer whirring in the background. Print Time: 6hr 41min Cost: £0.43 Electric Cost: £0.47 Total Cost £0.90 The second wagon Diagram 1745 20T Hopper Wagon (S.E & C.R) Another limited build hopper wagon with no ready to run model. Certainly not up to modern H&S laws as open the chute doors you had to run along with the train! Well this is a challenge from a friend. Again an initial print. The artwork is by no means finished, with lots to think about for the construction side of things. Some real design challenges here. The Hopper strapping is a "U" shaped channel that protrudes from the solebars. Not much to go on in the drawings so in order to get the door shapes correct (interpretation) all the joints needed to have motion attached to them to prove they would work in real life, ofcourse linked to their respective handwheels. Still some work to do but promising results. Weirdest thing happened on the print of the Hopper Wagon. Got to the end layer and then started printing a full screen for several layers before i noticed and halted it ? Have checked the slicing and the slice stops at the correct last layer. Has anyone come across this before ? Fortunately i saved the model from sure disaster with minimal damage. Stay Safe Mark
  11. More Eridge Footbridge My last post saw me starting the task of building a new footbridge for Eridge P4 our club layout by printing the trestles and luggage chute. My attention has now turned to the footbridge itself. Clearly from the previous post it was not going to be possible to use the old Fusion 360 CAD file to create seperate components. With the station road bridge now well on the way to completion and a new height datum i set about the new artwork. Shapeways printed 1st attempt footbridge. I discovered whilst doing this artwork the reason for the 10mm difference in length on the original Shapeway complete footbridge print. I knew that the down line staircase was not at 90 degrees to the building but had measured the up line staircase to be close to 90 degrees. In fact it turns out that its not close at all its 92 1/2 degrees and that 2 1/2 degree angle difference given the length of the staircase equates to a 10 mm shortfall. At least i cleared up the why ! As the layout is for the exhibiton circuit and the footbridge structure being fairly delicate it needs to be robust enoughto be removed from the layout and transported seperately. Having seen the flexibility of the 3D printed full footbridge my thoughts turned to a brass construction. TBH i didn't relish the thought of constucting 2 staircases from scratch but from an etch was a different matter. The Gallery As this is in essence the only thing connects the removable footbridge structure to the station road bridge and building i decided to create this out of nickel silver framework with 3D printed windows and falsework which will be clad both sides in plastikard wood cladding. It re-affirmed the notion of scratchbuilding the staircases to and acceptable tolerance would not be an option without jigs and etching. Gallery Metal Framework The blue insulation blocks represent the platform height. I had to use some artistic licence with the roofing supports, in reality they are meant to be like those in the 1st picture with no rear support at the peak of the roof. Whilst a deviation from reality it would be pointless sticking to it if the model roof sagged under the weight of the corrugated cladding. Its worth pointing out here that i have now switched my resin from water washable resin to standard resin. No other reason but i purchased 2 bottles before "lock-down" and have nearly finished the water soluble ( small prints only). Ironically it was more expensive than the water washable resin. 3D printed Galley Windows The base was added to create a larger surface area for adhesion to the build plate. The thickness at the bottom is 1.5 mm when this is removed. The window frames are to scale but tbh could do with a tad more thickness ( a scale inch 0.333 mm would surfice). Gallery Side Windows Installed. The criss-cross support structure will be clad with plastikard wood planking, as well as the area above the window as per below Gallery Front Windows with old staircases. Staircases The staircases shown above were printed by Shapeways in versatile plastic. Unfortunately they include the rear posts and are at the wrong angle to use. They were temporarily installed to check alignment with the Canopy support pillars. It did however give food for thought as this part of the staircase being effectively a box structure is quite rigid. When these were printed, many moons ago, someone commented that on this forum "all very well and nice but how would you paint them". I'd not given that much thought until that comment and in truth the comment is very justified. With that in mind and the thought of the staircases being printed i uploaded them to shapeways, this time each staircase as a structure and a seperate staircase. The thought being the structure could be clad and then painted and the staircase married up once it had been painted. There's been much hype on the increases to have parts printed, they have their overheads, but this has driven me away from them as the total for 2 parts ( 1 staircase) came to £134.00. The total cost for both staircases would exceed what i paid for the entire footbridge to be printed as one file. Unfortunately the size of the staircase excludes the Elegoo Mars as a platform to build it....... Or Does It ? Station Bridge Rear Wall I add this here as it bears relevance to the question posed. Sometime ago i printed (in this topic) the coping stones for the bridge rear wall. These were to be glued onto an existing piece of the structure (pre elegoo owner) and this was done with less than satisfactory results. So much so that i printed the entire wall including the coping stones in 3 pieces. Each with a tang and slot to "glue" them together using resin and curing. The results of this are far more pleasing. 3D Render of Rear Wall. Sorry no photo of parts New Wall in temporary position Back to the Footbridge No room to put tabs or slots to joint the parts together as structure is sub 2mm but maybe an option to drill a 0.5mm hole into both parts and add a brass rod, using resin to bond. Having re-designed the footbridge staircase already it was just a case of spliting the structure in 2 parts and then the staircase. I have chosen the aft transition between the middle landing part of the staircase as the splitting point for the staircase and the forward end of the gallery middle landing as the splitting point of the straircase structure. In theory...... as the joints are at different locations the parts will interlock forming there own joining mechanisms :/ This is the 1st part of the LH Staircase from the footbridge gallery to the middle landing. Most of the print came out well but as you can see certain areas of the 1.10mm centre upright post and 2mm middle landing upright posts have not faired so well. This was supported in Prusa Slice at 80% . In the past posts i've been warned about using supports but my feeling was with so much going on and riding on the sucessful printing of these parts it was better to have some clean - up work to do than feel that it was un-achievable. So i have reprinted the part with my own multitude of sins (Supports) and the results are much better. Print Time: 7hr 09min Cost: £0.77 Electric Cost: £0.49 Printed 2nd time. Total Cost £2.52 A long way to go before i reach the Shapeways costings. Hopefully not too many re-prints ! More to follow. Stay Safe Mark
  12. Lots Happening here so Thank You to everyone that has posted For those that have just gone out and brought a Elegoo Mars, Mars Pro or Indeed Saturn or have upgraded to a newer version of the Elegoo please feel free to post your creations here. Mark
  13. I have just recieved notification that my request has been accepted so i'm in the queue Clearly wasn't doing it right the 1st time i tried Mark
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