Very convincing rivets ! Once you get the grime weathering between the rails, the low/transition to the outer ties will disappear. How well does the turntable center to the stall tracks? Without a stepper motor, many have used the rolling wheel/detent method. Now, I expect you to junk that electronics case and use only the few LED’s you need so there is a nice graphic.
It has a 4 wire stepper motor, and indexes good if it don't slip a gear tooth, however it does slip teeth now and again. The pit is molded oblong on my unit, so the gap between the bridge gets wide and narrow as it rotates. I am sanding the approach tracks back a bit to help prevent the gear skipping teeth. An ever so slight bit of resistance encountered, and it skips teeth, throwing out the index. That's why they added jog buttons to manually correct alignment. Yes I will mount LED's in the front facia, I ordered flat top 2mm LED's with a 4mm long light pipe. I still need to find 4 nice momentary buttons that are low profile.
Looks like they installed the turn table arch a little off to the side : ) After I go here: https://earthexplorer.usgs.gov/ Type in "Lester WA" hit enter. Then go to Data Sets. Click "aerial imagery" and check the 3rd box "aerial photos single frames". Then click results.
And after you get the image it may not be North pointing up. Sometime you have to really study the photo to get just what it is and rotate as needed.
Yeah, I had to use Corel Photo Paint to open it, because it is so large a file, then find my target, then zoom out, and rotate, then zoom back in.
Hi, Robert Are you aware of the Archistories Rokuhan turntable upgrade kit? It's worth a look. Item ARC-103161. Jim
Oh yes, I have looked at the Archistories kit, but it does not look like the Lester turntable. I think with a bit of effort I can get a better match.
The investment seems worth it (necessary) to enhance the appearance. Out of the box looks real toy-like. I like what you are doing: going for the prototypical look. I'm sure it won't look the same when you are done with it. Jim
I was almost done with it today, but ruined it when trying to apply static grass. My static grass machine burned out, and it all clumped up, then the pit warped. So I tore out the bridge sides, and pit floor, and started building a new set out of styrene. I spent the day getting a electronic fly swatter from Harbor Freight, and rebuilding my static grass dispenser. That's OK, I will apply the "styrene pit floor/bridge sides assembly" weathering, and static grass on the bench, then mount in the turntable this weekend. I often go through a few revisions of a model till I get it right anyways.
Made progress, I'm done with the turntable for now, and am working on the roundhouse: So I cut a 1/4" 90 degree which the front of the roundhouse is glued to. The bottom will sit in slots, and the back and sides sit on a .025" step made in the base. I scribed the bricks a scale 6" x 12". The doors are 3 layers of .011" black polybak, with mylar window glazing fitting sandwiched in between the layers. I accidently cut 12 door cores, but only needed 6, and need 12 mullion pieces.
Made some more progress with the roundhouse. Walls are all up, brickwork, concrete, and windows painted, and rear windows are installed. Still working on the boiler room annex that goes to the rear right side of the roundhouse. I have to permanently mount the roundhouse before I can actually connect the track pieces, then cut the ties away to reveal the inspection pits, and before that can start, I need to scenic the backside of the turntable and mount it. I had to build the turntable and roundhouse on removable sheets of material, shaped for the windowbox area, because I will not be able to apply static grass in the tight spaces otherwise. Progress: Zoom in a little to see the brick detail, and rivet detail on the bridge:
Very nice as always Robert! In particular I like how you raised the height of the turntable bottom. Until you did this I never really knew why I didn't like most Z turntables. Now its clear, they are all waaaaaay too deep for scale. Yours captures the proper look.
It's something like a scale 16' drop into the pit from track level, so something had to be done, that plus having that aweful looking gear toothed section was a major turn off. Now it's more like 4 feet down.
Geez I just looked at the Rokuhan TT stock photo and compared to yours they look nothing alike. It looks like you also buried the rails down a little bit.
I am pretty sure that there was an article in N Scale Magazine around 1990 on how to scratch build that coaling tower.
