HO train projects

The following are several of the HO train projects i am working on.
RC Helicopters on flatbeds that take off. You've seen the copters, i am sure. This is a simple : add sideboards to a flatcar project. The sideboards actually help the helicopter take off without spinning in circles. The first one I did was from an 89' with a shack from a crane helper on the back, but changed things all around since then. That flat now carries a SD90 shell.

This is a picture of several missile launchers using servos to lift the tube. You can see the several versions on my You-tube channel: http://www.youtube.com/user/HOtrainHobby
The servos glitch, which is why i changed from using the auto carrier and now have servo modules that go inside 86' boxcars. The roof was raised by 2 servos in tandem and the tube was raised by a retract servo. When the retract servo glitched with the roof down it would bend the raising arm. Now the servos raise the tube and the tube pushes the roof open. The roof closes using a piece of elastic string. Next i will make a flatcar to launch the red missile sans tube.


A 72' wood chip Bethgon with tub floors (Freightcar America) i bashed from some Coalgons. This and its follow on cars will be used with a rotary dumper i will scratchbuild... someday. One of the Coalgons i broke fixing something i glued together wrong. Being careful with the second, you will notice (well, its actually not visible here) i still managed to glue the brake wheel to one end and the cylinder to the other. Since 'kits' are not made anymore, it will be a while before i 'break' any other Coalgons and feel no loss at bashing them into something else. This car is almost ready for the 'paint shop' as AAR type J314 class GT Plate F is used by 'International Paper Corporation' with the reporting marks FPBX of 'old' acquired Federal Paper Board company, not BNSF. The cover is similar to one i saw on woodchip cars, seems a lot better than having to crawl across the load to place netting over the chips to keep them from flying off and away.













The (Walthers) Rotary dumper i am working on. It will use Bethgon Coalgons. The rotary couplers are made by Paul Mack and the command-control will use Parallax controllers with servos and light sensors similar to Wayne Roderick's . Similar yet different, this dumper will have a horizontally adjacent train positioner to move the cars into position. The positioning will be critical as there is no room for error with the couplers connected. Subtle adjustment to the position will be made with an under car 'brake'. The coal will probably be the 'dyed in the wool walnut shells' as other bits i have tried are too heavy ( gravel, aquarium gravel, aquarium? plastic beads, etc). Now to find the shells and try them... Cabela's size is 1/32", too small to be coal... Meanwhile i will be transporting transparent coal that will fall through the bottomless pit into the invisible conveyor.