Great Chesterford Junction Part Two

G`day Folks,
The latest bit on the Goods Shed is the lighting tracks.
I am using two separate wires ( positive & negative ) to hang inside one side of the roof trusses, and those two fixed tracks will have LEDs suspended between them to form a lighting circuit.
The short ends of the wires, one with a resistor, and one with just a wire connection, will be set into the corners of the Goods Shed allowing the wire feeds to pass down behind the open main doors and effectively hide them from view.





The ends of the wires will then be soldered to brass plates below the doors.
The brass plates are folded over the bottom of the wall to allow them to sit on top of two more brass plates set flat on top of the baseboard.
The theory is that the shed will be able to be lifted off easily without worrying about electrical connections, and then placed back on top of its brass plate connections to complete the lighting circuit.





The other end.......both ends are tinned waiting for the wire connection to arrive





Once all the connections have been made, the soldered brass plate will be painted to disguise it a bit more, although I think it will be hidden by the internal paving up to track level in the shed.
This wall surface is also facing away from the viewer / operator so will be extremely difficult to see when in place.
A couple of lights being prepared.......two or three coats of paint required to stop light bleed




More as it happens
Gormo

 

Electrical connections now have been completed
The set up is similar to the Engine Shed I completed some time back, however this building will be easier to remove from the layout.
Just to recap, the lights are suspended between the positive and negative feeds for the LEDs which to all intents and purposes are lighting support tracks.
The light covers are made from plastic screw end caps with a 3mm hole drilled through them.....the LEDs are a push fit through the holes and require no adhesive
The light covers have had two coats of Black blackboard paint and have now passed the light bleed test.





Here we are testing the lights after soldering into position





And with the room lights off





And from track level




So now the roof panels can be fitted and then there is a small office to be made and added onto the right hand side
Getting there.......

Gormo

 

G`day Folks,
Well I put the lid on the building today
It`s come up as expected, in that, the building is quite rigid now and has considerable weight for a card building.





And here it is in position on the layout..........electrical connections still need to be done to have it fully operational, and of course the office has to be built.

























There are faults in the building, as with any hand made project, but they are minor and of no consequence to the overall model, so I am happy with how it`s turning out
More to follow
Gormo

 

G`day Folks,
I fitted the electrical connections today.
They are simply just two brass plates. A stiff copper wire is soldered to the underside perpendicular to the face and holes are drilled into the board to allow the wires to pass through.
The brass plates are fixed down with Super glue.
The wires go to a serial bus under the board, specifically for lighting.





The matching plates on the underside of the Goods Shed wall sit on top of the baseboard plates to create electrical contact.
The Goods Shed is therefore very easy to lift off for track maintenance and easy to replace with electrical contact sorted.
The lights are on in the pic below, but night time shots will follow to better show the effect.





















Gormo

 

G`day Folks,
We`re onto the last part of the Goods Shed build now which is the office that has to be attached to the main building.
The parts have been cut out using the usual techniques
One of the gable ends will be glued to the main building





The parts were then covered in brick paper.
The front and back walls have an extra flap of paper at either end that will overlap the edges of the gable end walls.
The chimney stack has already be added.
The chimney will be wrapped with a flap from the same sheet of brick paper covering the wall





Window and door apertures have been cut out and finished off, and the chimney has been wrapped.





A dry fit to see how it all goes together




Gormo

 

G`day Chris,
Thanks for the comments...
From what I understand about magnets as conductors, it seems they may not be appropriate as electrical connections.
Apparently the current can actually reduce the magnetism and in some cases cause the magnet to get hot.
In the case of neodymium magnets, someone told me in the dim dark distant past that it`s possible they could explode when applying solder to them.
From the scant information I have on the subject, I think more research would be appropriate before proceeding with experiments....it could be dangerous....who knows.....
This train of thought leads me to thinking that magnets and electrical connections possibly could work beside, and independent of each other to achieve the same result.
Little Bardfield and Bamford used to belong to Gary`s friend Murray........when I first received the boards, there were electrical connectors built in to receive signals......signals that could be removed.
I don`t know what the connectors are called but Gary may be able to shed some light on the subject........they could possibly be a better solution because they were quite small ????
Gormo

 

I think you are on the right track Chris,
In your diagram, the method would require something like tin plate to work with one magnet, however you could use brass plate with two magnets.
I think it has potential.........
Gormo