Has anyone thought about powering a train model

[card]

G'day all,

I was wondering if anyone has tinkered with the idea of trying to make a train model actually work. I'm interested in trying something in one of the larger scales, 1:25.

I'd be interested to hear of anyones experiences, thankyou all!

[murphyaa]

Depends on what you mean. I know there's a guy on here that sells paper railroad cars. All you add is the trucks and couplers.

[N96HBK]

I thought of making one too. At railway model shops ask if they have motor cars in that scale, they might have them. This is for OO/HO or N gauge, but if you want one in 1/25, it might be hard to find at shops.

[card]

Thanks murphyaa. I'm tinkering with the idea of actually making them work, run on my garden line. My idea was to laminate the frames to styrene for strength. Replace the obvious paper wheels and axles with suitable plastic or steel ones from the various suppliers. Steam locomotives would be out with their paper valve gear, but diesels would be half viable i would think...
N96HK, i agree. But i'm thinking the cost of trying this would put me in front, model trains in large scales is expensive, i'm just considering cheaper options...

[RunwayOneSixRight]

Originally Posted by murphyaa

Depends on what you mean. I know there's a guy on here that sells paper railroad cars. All you add is the trucks and couplers.

This?

RXRModels.com

-RunwayOneSixRight (Matthew)

[darter]

Hi card, Well I bin playing trains and selling trains for a long time and while I'm not an expert I've learnt a lot. I love building strange and odd rail stuff in ON30. Stuff you simply can't buy. But the principals remain the same in any scale. Mostly I use various cards and papers. At the moment I'm working on a Lombard Log hauler ( Google that ). Rolling stock is simple in any scale due to the availability of wheels and couplers etc. However when it comes to locomotion that is a new ball game. Scratch building a powered chassis for each loco is time consuming. expensive and no simple matter. So much simpler to use a suitable donor chassis. Not so cheap in large scale though. One trick I use at times is to build the loco as a dummy. All wheels unpowered and free running. I have several simple powered wagons that can be used anywhere in the rake behind any loco. No one knows it is being pushed and not pulling.You can build as many locos as you like for almost no cost. One more tip. Sitting under palms in FNQ??? Hello, coconuts????.. Clive.

[Kevin WS]

There is one right here in this thread finished a couple of weeks ago in Z scale.

Armoured train in Z scale

He did a great job and using the method he used it would be easy to motorised and scales if you have the old stock. He shows his methods clearly and I think this is a really good method.

[otherDoc]

A couple of GN15 paper models

I model in GN15 (1/2" scale on HO track for 15" narrow gauge. You use old HO mechanisms and G-scale scenery and buildings.

Check out GN15 or The Gnatterbox. Many paper models including Jim Snee designs for free.

otherDoc

[clevermod01]

We have been powering our card stock trains for some time. Incredibly small japanese motors. Its great to see peoples reactions at trane shows.

[card]

thankyou all for your input. Some interesting links to look at. Clevermod, very nice little critters.