0 Gauge in Paper & a Build Thread

[Plumdragon]

Hello Friends Some more for your perusal; more installments in my 'cheating because I've built it already' thread! Hope you find this of interest, and if you have any technical (or other) questions, please feel free to ask
Plumdragon

[Plumdragon]

As you can see, the basic design is now done. For anyone embarking on doing a railway locomotive in paper, I would definitely recommend a simple machine like this to cut your teeth on, although I have to be honest and admit that my first attempt at 0 Gauge was the Milwaukee Road "Hiawatha" 4-4-2 steam streamliner loco, which was done for a very dear American friend to sit with his collection of old Lionel stock. It was a big challenge to make that one run on 27" radius track! Anyway, hope you find something useful in these....
Plumdragon

[Vermin_King]

Thank you for sharing this. Very enlightening

[Plumdragon]

There are a couple of 'real-time' projects on the bench at the moment, so from time to time I will chuck in a few 'diversions' to let you know what else is going on
This is a very simple open truck, in this case from the G.C.R (I know it's a different rail company - but it's my railway! )
Without access to modeling books, it is hard to find dimensions for a lot of stock, especially older units, so by utilising a good broadside photo a decent compromise can be had; in this case, I simply scaled the picture until the buffer height was at my standard measure, and that's near enough for my purposes! As it happened, the wheels came out 'true' to a set I already have made up, so it can't be far out.
In the red outline are full-size pieces of the artwork. I make a point when 'assembling' fittings from lines, curves and other pieces, to always save the part-finished sections; it's so much easier to re-work anything. A case in point is the chain; trying to alter anything on the look of that would be nigh-on impossible if it's all stuck together with the peg and strapping....
Plumdragon

[Plumdragon]

These are full-sized renders of lettering etc for varous 0 Gauge models I have designed. In this scale, with care and patience, it is possible to produce really satisfying results in this sort of work, hence my love of this scale
Some of the fonts are modified standard ones, but the majority are assembled from little bits and pieces of fonts, lines, dots, curves etc etc. It sounds finicky, and it is, but the results are really gratifying to me, especially as they can so clearly be seen on a large scale model.
For comparison, in the green box at the bottom is an N Scale B.R. Lion & Wheel totem; that took more effort to make it look convincing at such a tiny size than any of the bigger styles, and at 0.6pt font size was just too ridiculously small to work with (or print out cleanly!)
Again, I hope I'm not boring you all and that there's something of interest here for railfans
Plumdragon

[richie]

You are definitely the best in your art.

[nighthawk78]

This is an interesting way to design a model, and the result defiantly shows it the model is good as-well...
NH78

[Don Boose]

This is all fascinating. The tutorial on the locomotive build is really excellent. The engine looks deceptively simple, but it is clear that a lot of thought, engineering, and design - not to mention modeling skill - went into the construction.

I hope to see much more of this wonderful stuff.

Don

[Plumdragon]

Thank you, Gentlemen, for your kind words. And Richie, that is high praise indeed! I'm flattered and honoured that you think so highly of my work :-) Hopefully, you may find something here that will inspire you in your own endeavours....
Plumdragon

[Plumdragon]

Hello again As mentioned before, I had a mind to motorize this model, although choosing a point half way through designing it was probably not very sensible! The main issue was getting the clockwork motor to sit right in the frames, ensuring key access and room for the brake lever, and tilting the motor because it has to sit over the front rolled paper axle of the model, the wheelbase of the motor being too short to use both the axles in it. The motor was 'wrapped' in stout card, which meant I could use card to pack it out and glue it directly to the beefed up side frames - it needs to be strong because even though it's a little 00 motor, it's got a lot of torque in the spring and takes some winding!
Anyway, on to the pictures
Plumdragon