New member - looking for pointers

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dtp
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New member - looking for pointers

Post by dtp » Wed May 31, 2023 5:22 pm

Hi all. Been wanting to do a garden railroad for a LONG time and now that our backyard is in pretty good shape and we know we are in the house we will be in for a long time to come now seems to be a good time to finally take the plunge.

I am in central California so lots of great weather. Our backyard is being transformed into "native species" which is low-water use and pollinator/hummingbird friendly. Soo... I am thinking a "wild west" theme will be best here. I won an LGB Passenger starter set for only $71 on eBay... don't have it in-hand yet so don't know its condition but it looks to come with extra track from the pictures so probably a good buy just for that. I also found the blue Lake George & Boulder set on sale online and bought that too. Should be here early next week.

I hope to be putting my 3D printer and woodworking skills/shop to good use here too.

So I have decided two other major things which leads to some questions:

1) I definitely want to go battery/RC. I have extensive Arduino/microcontroller experience and have even hacked a Hasbro R2D2 toy into full RC control using and Arduino and an off-the-shelf RC transmitter/receiver set meant for model aircraft. I see great possibilities here. So, is there a good general reference on converting these LGB locos to battery power or should I go with .... see questions 2 & 3 ... ?

2) I have found some online dealers of loco/stock kits but they are all in the UK. I have been searching online but I am having a hard time finding a source of kits in the USA. Any pointers here would be appreciated. I am especially interested in a coal tender car for my locos that could also serve as battery storage to start with. I didn't really see any on Thingiverse to print but I may have missed them. A LOT of stuff comes up with a search term of "g scale".

3) Is it worth the effort to convert one or both of the starter kit locos I will have soon or should I just get a kit (or other off-the-shelf loco) for conversion to battery? Or maybe there are cost-effective off-the-shelf battery locos I have not run across?

Thanks everyone!

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Re: New member - looking for pointers

Post by philipy » Wed May 31, 2023 8:29 pm

Hi and welcome.

I can't help directly with any of your queries I'm afraid. However for converting LGB loco's you should get a some pointers from Rik's 'Peckforton' Blog since he frequently uses LGB motor blocks under his own bodies and uses battery power exclusively.
https://riksrailway.blogspot.com/p/contents.html
Philip

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Re: New member - looking for pointers

Post by dtp » Wed May 31, 2023 11:17 pm

Thanks! I have already been to his blog and there is a LOT of info there! I will look for this.

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Re: New member - looking for pointers

Post by Phil.P » Thu Jun 01, 2023 10:44 am

It can be dead easy to add a battery car to a LGB loco, as many have an auxiliary socket on the back..

If you are fully dead-rail, with just one loco on the track, you don't even need to remove the pickups. - Do remove them eventually, unless you want to switch between track-power and battery.

You also do not need to go to 20-odd volts of battery:
9.6V will run a Stainz, or small diesel, at a prototypical speed, with no chance of it flying off the track, if someone is over exuberant with the controller.
You would probably want a '3S' Lipo, or 14.4V NiMH pack, for a two-motor express or larger goods formation?
Enjoy!

Phil.P

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Re: New member - looking for pointers

Post by GAP » Thu Jun 01, 2023 11:33 am

dtp wrote: Wed May 31, 2023 5:22 pm Hi all. Been wanting to do a garden railroad for a LONG time and now that our backyard is in pretty good shape and we know we are in the house we will be in for a long time to come now seems to be a good time to finally take the plunge.

I am in central California so lots of great weather. Our backyard is being transformed into "native species" which is low-water use and pollinator/hummingbird friendly. Soo... I am thinking a "wild west" theme will be best here. I won an LGB Passenger starter set for only $71 on eBay... don't have it in-hand yet so don't know its condition but it looks to come with extra track from the pictures so probably a good buy just for that. I also found the blue Lake George & Boulder set on sale online and bought that too. Should be here early next week.

I hope to be putting my 3D printer and woodworking skills/shop to good use here too.

So I have decided two other major things which leads to some questions:

1) I definitely want to go battery/RC. I have extensive Arduino/microcontroller experience and have even hacked a Hasbro R2D2 toy into full RC control using and Arduino and an off-the-shelf RC transmitter/receiver set meant for model aircraft. I see great possibilities here. So, is there a good general reference on converting these LGB locos to battery power or should I go with .... see questions 2 & 3 ... ?

2) I have found some online dealers of loco/stock kits but they are all in the UK. I have been searching online but I am having a hard time finding a source of kits in the USA. Any pointers here would be appreciated. I am especially interested in a coal tender car for my locos that could also serve as battery storage to start with. I didn't really see any on Thingiverse to print but I may have missed them. A LOT of stuff comes up with a search term of "g scale".

3) Is it worth the effort to convert one or both of the starter kit locos I will have soon or should I just get a kit (or other off-the-shelf loco) for conversion to battery? Or maybe there are cost-effective off-the-shelf battery locos I have not run across?

Thanks everyone!
Welcome to the forum from Australia.

Seeing as you mentioned Arduino I am posting this which is something I saw this morning.
https://dcc-ex.com/news/posts/20230515.html

Good luck with your endevours and remember there is no such thing as a silly question if you don't ask you will never find out.

My blog may be of some help for battery R/C on a shoe string budget.
https://ringbalin-light-railway.blogspo ... -page.html
Graeme
From the home of the Ringbalin Light Railway
https://ringbalin-light-railway.blogspo ... -page.html

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Re: New member - looking for pointers

Post by ge_rik » Thu Jun 01, 2023 1:20 pm

Hi and welcome to the forum
By coincidence, Part 2 of an article I wrote about using Arduino and 2.4gHz RC will be appearing in the coming issue of Garden Rail.
I've also used Arduino and a phone app - see Part 1/4 - https://riksrailway.blogspot.com/2019/0 ... phone.html

Rik
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Peckforton Light Railway - Blog Facebook Youtube

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Re: New member - looking for pointers

Post by dtp » Thu Jun 01, 2023 6:37 pm

ge_rik wrote: Thu Jun 01, 2023 1:20 pm Hi and welcome to the forum
By coincidence, Part 2 of an article I wrote about using Arduino and 2.4gHz RC will be appearing in the coming issue of Garden Rail.
I've also used Arduino and a phone app - see Part 1/4 - https://riksrailway.blogspot.com/2019/0 ... phone.html

Rik
That's awesome! Thanks I will look for it!

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Re: New member - looking for pointers

Post by Old Man Aaron » Sat Jun 10, 2023 3:43 pm

Welcome to the forum!

LGB gear ain't cheap, as I'm sure you already know. $71 for a starter set is a steal in any condition. 8)
You won't regret going R/C, I don't miss dealing with track power in HO.. I'm not aware of any ready-made R/C US-outline locos, but I'll echo that track powered stuff is generally very easy to convert.
A site I found helpful when starting out was George Schreyer's Geologically Improbable Railroad. Ozark Miniatures and The Train Department are US-based suppliers of kits and detail parts, both good to deal with. There's many others but I can't recall any of them.. :roll:
Regards,
Aaron - Scum Class Works

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Re: New member - looking for pointers

Post by GAP » Mon Jun 12, 2023 11:16 pm

dtp wrote: Wed May 31, 2023 5:22 pm Hi all. Been wanting to do a garden railroad for a LONG time and now that our backyard is in pretty good shape and we know we are in the house we will be in for a long time to come now seems to be a good time to finally take the plunge.

I am in central California so lots of great weather. Our backyard is being transformed into "native species" which is low-water use and pollinator/hummingbird friendly. Soo... I am thinking a "wild west" theme will be best here. I won an LGB Passenger starter set for only $71 on eBay... don't have it in-hand yet so don't know its condition but it looks to come with extra track from the pictures so probably a good buy just for that. I also found the blue Lake George & Boulder set on sale online and bought that too. Should be here early next week.

I hope to be putting my 3D printer and woodworking skills/shop to good use here too.

So I have decided two other major things which leads to some questions:

1) I definitely want to go battery/RC. I have extensive Arduino/microcontroller experience and have even hacked a Hasbro R2D2 toy into full RC control using and Arduino and an off-the-shelf RC transmitter/receiver set meant for model aircraft. I see great possibilities here. So, is there a good general reference on converting these LGB locos to battery power or should I go with .... see questions 2 & 3 ... ?

2) I have found some online dealers of loco/stock kits but they are all in the UK. I have been searching online but I am having a hard time finding a source of kits in the USA. Any pointers here would be appreciated. I am especially interested in a coal tender car for my locos that could also serve as battery storage to start with. I didn't really see any on Thingiverse to print but I may have missed them. A LOT of stuff comes up with a search term of "g scale".

3) Is it worth the effort to convert one or both of the starter kit locos I will have soon or should I just get a kit (or other off-the-shelf loco) for conversion to battery? Or maybe there are cost-effective off-the-shelf battery locos I have not run across?

Thanks everyone!
I found this on Yeggi it may suit your purpose.
https://www.thingiverse.com/thing:893402

I have had some success with downloading 3D models stl files from Thingaverse ( I use Yeggi and stl Finder to search) and importing them into Tinkercad a to resize them, plus I have also used my slicer to resize models.
I recently hashed a HO coal load for my hoppers that turned out quite well
For searching I use the prefixes "Large Scale", "LGB", "G scale" and "garden Railway", also 1:32 scale.
My method of converting locos is to rip out all the electronics except the motor and light fittings then starting over. I do not plan to ever sell any of my locos.
Graeme
From the home of the Ringbalin Light Railway
https://ringbalin-light-railway.blogspo ... -page.html

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