3D printed Sentinel tram loco

Retiarius · April 30, 2013, 22:54

I came across a post on another forum which alerted me to the existence of the 009 Sentinel tram loco body designed by Tom Bell (tebee) and available from Shapeways.com which is designed to fit the Kato 11-103 chassis.

It is over 30 years since I have done any railway modelling and I thought it would be a nice, inexpensive, reintroduction to 009 modelling. Little did I know that there is no such thing as an inexpensive model!

The body was ordered and delivered in about 3 weeks from Shapeways.

The first job was to fit handrails using medium handrails knobs from Nairnshire Model Supplies and ballast the loco using Liquid Gravity pellets.

I had decided to try my hand at designing a layout run using DCC and so a Digitrax DZ125 decoder was purchased and tried in the water tank.

Space is tight in this model and I found I had to break the piston assembly in the cab to raise it by 1mm to enable wire for the directional headlamp LEDs to pass under it. The rear of the boiler was also cut away to ease the fitting of the decoder.

To enable seperation of chassis and body and provide power to the directional lighting a 3-pin micro plug was fitted into an enlarged hole where the N-gauge coupler pocket had fitted.

and wired via another pre-existing hole

The model was then primed with Halfords Red Oxide primer and then sprayed with Vallejo Black Green acrylic paint.

The model was then finished by being weathered with a light and dark weathering sprays applied by airbrush, 2mm LNER yellow numbers and a Mike's Models whiremetal loco crew, one in each cab facing opposite directions.

Not yet having a layout of my own I took the model to the 009 Society AGM show and Rainford and several members kindly let me pose it on their layout so that I could get an impression of how it will look. My many thanks to those members.

This has been a model of many firsts for me:

First model loco in 30 years
First 3D printed model
First use of an airbrush and acrylic paints
First DCC model

It won't be the last I am sure!

Graeme Dunbar · May 01, 2013, 09:52

Excellent! I like all of it but especially the clever and neat way you have used the 3-pin plug.

Hugh Norwood · May 01, 2013, 10:38

That is nice!

Sven · May 08, 2013, 17:48

So you mean you have more pictures? ;)

Frank · May 08, 2013, 18:13

That looks a very nice job, very neat and well turned out.

The use of the three pin plug is an excellent idea which I will look at for the next time I use a Kato chassis. Trailing wires can be a nightmare, too short and you can't separate body and chassis, too long and they get in the way of seating the body.

Very impressed!!!

Frank

Otty · May 09, 2013, 18:34

Looks great :-)

Ordered one at the weekend, can't wait for it to arrive.

It'll be my first 3D printed model. I've read a fair amount that the "prints" need work to get them smooth, did you need to do much ?

Retiarius · May 09, 2013, 18:56

Quote from: Otty on May 09, 2013, 18:34
Looks great :-)

Ordered one at the weekend, can't wait for it to arrive.

It'll be my first 3D printed model. I've read a fair amount that the "prints" need work to get them smooth, did you need to do much ?

The kit looked OK to me but in hindsight it could have done with being polished, but how you do that I have no idea as this was my first build as well. I used an airbrush for most of the model but hand-painted the roofs with 'neat' undiluted paint so as fill in fine lines.

I am satisfied that it, to me, meets the '2ft rule' re its appearance.

Just be careful when building it as the HD plastic is quite brittle compared to polystyrene kits.

The Kato 11-103 chassis has 2 'lugs' on the side of the motor housing, one each side. I found the chassis hard to fit without first making two recesses in the body frame to accommodate them. The body grips the chassis well enough without using these lugs.

Have fun :D

tedp · May 10, 2013, 09:21

A nice little model and the 3D printed body looks well enough. I built a 3D printed battery electric recently and if the surface is treated with several coats of paint, the texture will smooth out without obliterating the detail. Mine was painted with acrylics.

Your work on internal wiring and fitting a decoder and LEDs is very interesting in such a small model. I myself fit LEDs to many of my locos but I use finer wire than yours making it easier to fold away. The decoder plug is very neat by the way.

Otty · May 10, 2013, 12:24

Quote from: Retiarius on May 09, 2013, 18:56Just be careful when building it as the HD plastic is quite brittle compared to polystyrene kits.

The Kato 11-103 chassis has 2 'lugs' on the side of the motor housing, one each side. I found the chassis hard to fit without first making two recesses in the body frame to accommodate them. The body grips the chassis well enough without using these lugs.

Have fun :D

Many thanks for the advice, really appreciated :)

If mine looks half as good as yours, I'll be very happy

Retiarius · May 10, 2013, 14:27

Quote from: tedp on May 10, 2013, 09:21
Your work on internal wiring and fitting a decoder and LEDs is very interesting in such a small model. I myself fit LEDs to many of my locos but I use finer wire than yours making it easier to fold away. The decoder plug is very neat by the way.

Thanks for all the kind comments about my model

I bought my connectors from the USA but have now found something similar far cheaper at Maplins.

http://www.maplin.co.uk/modular-connectors-5348

The wire you see in my photos is the original wire from the Digitrax decoder. I too use a far thinner wire if I do any extensions or interior lighting.

As for fitting a Digitrax DZ125 chip in this loco, my current project is to fit a Digitrax SDN144PS sound decoder into an A1 Models A03 boxcab loco with lights, sound and occupied cabs!

I must be a glutton for punishment!