Yūrakuchō

[Martijn Meerts]

Been a while since I had a look at your progress, but I can safely say you're still insane 😉

 

 

[cteno4]

Always good to have your insanity checked by others to make sure it’s still intact!

 

jeff

[Kamome442]

Thank you @Martijn Meerts, it's good to see I have passed my annual insanity check up.

 

I have been a little busy in the past week getting Christmas orders out for my Etsy shop but by the weekend I will be back on Yurakucho. 

Just it reassure that I am not loosing my insanity, for my final lighting project on the arches I thought I would have a go at making up these spot lights.

Source: Google Streetview

 

Originally I thought there was not possible way to have them functional without looking stupidly oversized. Since then I discovered the existence of a 0201 LED. The measurements for these are L:0.65mm, W:0.35mm, H:0.2mm and you can buy them pre soldered. So yes of course I ordered a few to play around with. My plan is to shove them down a small piece of 1mm brass tube. Below is an illustration of how I am thinking of going about it.

 

The side view is a little deceptive and makes it look like there is ample room. From the head on view you can see that is a very tight fit indeed. I am going to carefully cut a small channel down the brass tube to allow the wire exit out of the side and fix the LED in place with resin. I may need to cap the back with foil to prevent light bleed. This one really does feel like a step too far and might not work at all. That said I thought that about making my own street lights so I figured it can't hurt to have a go.

 

I have confirmation that these little critters are in the post, once they arrive I will post the results of my attempt good or bad. And anyway there is such a thing as a 01005 LED if I really want to loose my mind.

 

Joe

[cteno4]

Wow I thought the 0402 were the smallest you could get wired! Where did you order them from?

 

jeff

[Madsing]

Pre-wired 0201 LEDs are available on AliExpress. They used to be more expensive, they still are but it is getting better. Currently I only see cool white and warm white.

https://www.aliexpress.com/item/1005001800818069.html

[cteno4]

Lol I had just found those in another one of the same sellers listing but with higher price but free shipping! Ones with shipping work out a tad better.

 

jeff

[Kamome442]

21 hours ago, cteno4 said:

Wow I thought the 0402 were the smallest you could get wired! Where did you order them from?

 

I know it is insane how small they are. The 0402's still seem like like witch craft to me, looking forward to getting hold of an even smaller LED. I ordered mine from here:

https://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/313029457147

 

There are a few sites that sell them wired now, thank you @Madsing for posting an alternate. 

[cteno4]

He’s a witch I tell you, burn him at the stake! 
 

actually Joe, many of the things you build makes you look like a witch! Beginning to think you don’t build them you just shrink prototype stuff 150 times using witchcraft! All these drawings and such you do are just a cover so you don’t get burned alive or drown.

 

jeff

[Kamome442]

Well I do float like wood but I weigh more than a duck so I guess the jury is still out on my witching status 😉

 

10 hours ago, cteno4 said:

Beginning to think you don’t build them you just shrink prototype stuff 150 times

 

I was going to do an April 1st post this year explaining how I made a 150:1 scale ¥1 coin and that I had taken with me when I visited Yurakucho. I found image of me rolling a massive coin around the streets of Tokyo and taking pictures of it near train tracks to fake the existence of a layout oddly amusing. I figured the fact I had not painted my arches spoiled the joke a little.

Edited December 16, 2021 by Kamome442

[maihama eki]

I've bought wired LEDs from this guy many times. He is in Colorado, so I have a slight bias to working with him as an almost neighbor. Anything I order from him is often in my mailbox in 2 or 3 days because he is so close.

 

His "z" size LEDs are listed at 0.65 x 0.36 x 0.4 mm. He has a variety of colors available in that size. I suspect this is an 0201 size chip.

 

I like that his LEDs can all be powered at 3 V - although in many cases a little less (2.8 V) might be preferable. 

 

https://evandesigns.com/products/chip-nano-pico-leds

 

I suspect there is a size 01005 LED out there somewhere (nominally 0.25 x 0.12 mm) too. You would need some very fine wire to solder to those.

Edited December 16, 2021 by maihama eki

[cteno4]

17 hours ago, Kamome442 said:

Well I do float like wood but I weigh more than a duck so I guess the jury is still out on my witching status 😉

That just means they burn you at the stake if all the other things don’t give a clear answer then you must be a witch…

 

id love to float like wood, I sink like tungsten… 

 

jeff

[Kamome442]

My Plans For Christmas

 

One of the perks of teaching is having set holidays. Our autumn term has now finished and I am not back in school until January, this gives me a good week and a bit to finish up some projects and get on with some modelling.

 

I spent the last day or so drawing up that last set of manhole covers and other little greeblies that pepper the pavement in front of the alley. The top three rows are mostly used on the pavement and outside edge of the roads, the smallest two on the third row have a diameter of just 1.5mm. The tolerances on the detailing is slightly below the recommended minimum so I will have to wait and see how they turn out. I honest don't mind if they are mushy in places it will just make them look more weathered. The bottom row are a lift up bollard in its lowered position and two variants on the uplighter (one with a little deflector to direct light towards the wall).

 

I also had time to play around with my new fence jig. I am really happy with the results so far. The main reason for making a new jig was to try and get something with a little more flexibility. It is a lot smaller than the last version as I was finding that the elastic would sag a little over a larger span this meant that rows were no longer parallel towards the centre and in some cases even had enough slack to twist around each other. 

 

Here is a picture of it all disassembled, it is hard to see in the picture but each plate has a small notch near the top to hold the elastic in place. Once all the layers are build up and the top half of the jig is bolted on a tightened I can remove the finished part. I do this using little frames made from chopped up barbecue skewers, I coat 2 sides with superglue and place it on the elastic strands between the two uprights of the frame. Once the glue is dry I carefully cut the elastic on the outside of the frame releasing it from the jig. 

 

Once I have two frames made up I can place them (one facing up and one facing down) on top of each other so that elastic on each frame is touching. Everything is held in place with a small dab of wood glue on each corner. I can alter the alignment of each frame get different mesh patterns using the same jig (shown below). For some patterns this does lead to wasted elastic in the corners however I will keep some of these strands to use on the catenary wires later on.

 

 

I can also use this jig to create more complex patterns, each plate creates a gap of 0.25mm however by stacking multiple plates between the elastic I can make gaps of 0.5mm, 0.75mm and so on. It has taken me a while to source some fine white elastic rigging wire, now that I have some there is something I have been wanting to try out for a while. I am going to have a go at making little mesh screens to fit over the front of my 3D printed AC units. It will look much finer than any 3D printed or etched grill and should allow me to get some nice layered detail to see the fan blades inside.

Source of AC images: www.daikin.co.uk

 

The focus now is getting the second board ready for track laying. I am going to spend the next week getting the bridges set up in their final positions and completing the road along the front and under the bridges. I also need to build the streetlights under the bridges and check that they can be removed and replaced before everything is painted and permanently fixed in place. 

 

I will be perfectly honest I had planned to be laying track over this week however, in the summer, I discovered a pretty major issue with the track I have already put down lifting and buckling. I haven't mentioned it until now as wanted find a solution before posting. I did some research and apparently track is considered to be quite important on a model railway. So I have actually spent most of my time in the last 5 months working on this and I think I finally have a robust method that I am very pleased with. Essentially it uses an etched metal track tie that holds the rail with two small legs that drop through the sleeper and into the baseboard, imagine a tiny split pin.

 

I will need to make up a longer section of track and stress test it but I am confident I have a good technique going forward. I will go into more details once I have made up a couple more sections. The aim now is work on the third board in the new year and use the Easter holiday to get at least some of the track laid on boards two and three. 

 

Joe

 

 

Edited December 22, 2021 by Kamome442

[cteno4]

One of my favorite little coffee table books is Drainspotting: Japanese Manhole Covers

 

https://smile.amazon.com/Drainspotting-Japanese-Manhole-Remo-Camerota/dp/0982075472/ref=sr_1_12?crid=1PX03KZV9B2LR&keywords=japan+manhole+cover+book&qid=1640200752&sprefix=Japan+manh%2Caps%2C49&sr=8-12

 

sadly now out of print and quite expensive. 
 

cheers,
 

jeff

[Kamome442]

23 minutes ago, cteno4 said:

One of my favorite little coffee table books is Drainspotting: Japanese Manhole Covers

 

There is something strangely rewarding in receiving a sheet of etched manhole covers, I could loose a LOT of hours of my life if ever saw the inside of that book!

[cteno4]

I can’t wait to see your results. I played with printing a few manholes and found that I could just do some colored dots basically to make the patterned ones. B/w didn’t do as well at scale. But the flower patterns sort of worked in color.

 

it is a lovely little book and sad it’s hard to get now, it is a neat little book. I mean who picks up a book on manhole covers! 

 

jeff

[cteno4]

I would say you were mad as a hatter doing those grills for the ac units, but it dawned on me that at the angle we look at layouts and models most of the time it’s one of the details most prevalent to the eye on the sides of building and on rooftops.

 

so you dab every cross connection with some glue? Wonder if light spray on each side with hair spray might set then all together (does it on hair in what ever patterns!). I kind of have this memory from making model ship rails a long long time ago and using wax paper over the pattern and the using hair spray with find thread. 
 

It’s really a wonderful jig. Did you buy it premade or did you have those spacers cut?

 

jeff

[Kamome442]

12 hours ago, cteno4 said:

I played with printing a few manholes and found that I could just do some colored dots basically to make the patterned ones. B/w didn’t do as well at scale. But the flower patterns sort of worked in color.

 

Wow Jeff, you are braver than me! thankfully all the ones around Yurakucho are just bare metal. I can't imagine trying to paint all the separate panels in N. I will just be painting mine gunmetal with a dirt wash to highlight the details. One day I may have to draw up some of the more interesting designs in HO, I imagine you would be able to get most of the detail in a slightly larger scale.

 

12 hours ago, cteno4 said:

it is a lovely little book and sad it’s hard to get now, it is a neat little book. I mean who picks up a book on manhole covers! 

 

It certainly isn't the first subject I would consider for and engaging book, always nice to find a little hidden gem. I bet it was an interesting conversation when they pitched that to the publisher.

I once found a documentary, while channel hopping, called 'The Box'. It was about how the invention of the shipping container utterly changed trade around the world. It was not something I would have gone out of my way to watch but it turned out to be one of the most interesting documentaries I have seen in years.

 

11 hours ago, cteno4 said:

I would say you were mad as a hatter doing those grills for the ac units, but it dawned on me that at the angle we look at layouts and models most of the time it’s one of the details most prevalent to the eye on the sides of building and on rooftops.

 

Ha ha, it's quite possible I am as mad as hatter for thinking of putting grilles on AC units! My thinking is similar to yours, there are a little clusters of them mounted on the arches above the shops in several places. This grouping is just south of the station.

Source: Google Streetview

 

These will be about 2cm from the front of the layout and just below the track where, I hope, most people will be looking. There a plenty of the bigger roof mounted units at eye level behind the tracks. I am sure most people won't notice them but for the few that stick around and study the layout between trains I want them keep finding lots of little details. 

 

For those that are more hidden I will just use 3D prints without the grilles after using up any early attempts that didn't go so well. I did draw the line at workings fans, I think that is quite restrained for me 😌

[Kamome442]

12 hours ago, cteno4 said:

so you dab every cross connection with some glue? Wonder if light spray on each side with hair spray might set then all together (does it on hair in what ever patterns!).

 

I am planning to etch some little rings that will act like the wooden frames I used to get the wires off the jig.

Something like this:

 

Then I will coat one side with a thin layer of cyanoacrylate and place it face down on the elastic (possibly face up if I accidentally to glue it to my finger). This will stick each end of a strand to the frame, all the points that elastic crosses each other in the middle will be left unglued. There is enough tension on such a short length of elastic that it will hold its shape. 

 

Interesting, I hadn't considered using hairspray to set them. I am thinking of putting a frame in a sealed container with an open bottle of cyanoacrylate glue. I am hoping the fumes would fuse the strands so that I can use this technique to make large sections of netting for under the bridges. My feeling is it will only fuse some not all of the joints and even if it does connect them all that the elastic will become very brittle and break to easily. 

 

I may have to do some experimenting, as I have never found a fabric that does't look over-scaled and I don't want to spoil the look of the finished bridge.

Either way I am not going to sit and glue each point of contact by hand, on the finest mesh version, I have no idea how many there but I would loose my mind.

 

13 hours ago, cteno4 said:

It’s really a wonderful jig. Did you buy it premade or did you have those spacers cut?

 

Thanks Jeff, it came out well, this is my own design, I drew up the plates and frame (with a fold line) and had it etched in 0.25 nickel silver, the threaded bolts are 30mm M2's glued to one of the frames. I would say there is more flexibility in the frame that I would like, the elastic does start to pull the bolts towards the middle once you have a lot of layers. Putting on the second frame pulls it all back into shape. A slightly thicker or stronger metal might have been better for the outer frame but I am happy with it.

This the artwork I drew up, to get an idea of how it looked as an etched sheet.

 

 

[cteno4]

Wow Joe, you are the king of the etch! It’s an awesome jig. I totally love a good jig. My father was big into making them so I was brought up making them in the wood shop all the time. I have loads of them floating around the shop, as if I need to do much repetition of holes or cuts I end up making one. I have a hard time tossing them even though I won’t do the same thing again probably but I do salvage parts off of them time to time. I have picked up a few adjustable jigs for hole drilling that are easy to set and reuse and that’s cut down on having to make a lot as well as better drill press table and fence with lots of tracks for stops.

 

ahh the ring should do the trick. Maybe put the ring on a piece of wax paper and then the mesh on top of it then pipet the ca glue on the back. That way no parts stuck to fingers or forceps! No, I’ve never done that! But I just remembered it’s two frames put together so I guess the ring would need to sit up on a little square block high enough for the one frame to fit over. Might be able to dense pack the rings on the wax paper/block so when the mesh goes over you get max amount out of screens of your piece of mesh.

 

to do the ca evaporation I think you need to heat the ca glue some. Wonder what a couple very light coats of just dull coat would do. But since it’s elastic under some tension I guess you will always need a frame anyway. Things that tiny I suspect if you just tried to lightly affix all the joints with something it would not survive the knife well when trying to chop it up.

 

just curious have you tried fine tread on this, non elastic.

 

the only material I’ve seen premade like this is some mesh ribbons, but those are at the smallest like 2 inch grid. Works well for wire fencing.

 

I’ll put this to a 1/144 miniaturist friend as she is a store house of knowledge on these sorts of things.

 

jeff

[Kamome442]

2 hours ago, cteno4 said:

Wow Joe, you are the king of the etch!

 

 I'm not sure I can claim that title, but I'll take it😃

 

I have to agree you cannot beat a good jig, it is a great time saver, keeps everything consistent and is very satisfying when you get it all finely tuned.

 

2 hours ago, cteno4 said:

Maybe put the ring on a piece of wax paper and then the mesh on top of it then pipet the ca glue on the back.

 

Huh, that is a very logical solution! I have a roll of wax paper about a foot away from where I am siting. I will give a go and see if can reduce the number of Charlie Brown 'AAUGH!' moments.

 

2 hours ago, cteno4 said:

just curious have you tried fine tread on this, non elastic.

 

Well that opens the door of opportunity, I hadn't really considered using the jig for other materials. Thank you @cteno4 for the suggestion. I have just spent the last half hour searching for fine thread. I haven't found anything below 0.01mm but that should be fine enough to give a good effect. I will give it a go and share the results. The big advantage with this will be that it won't be under tension like the elastic so it should hold its shape better.

 

The 0201 LED's arrived today, I will post a side by side with 0402's I have been using tomorrow. I will need to be wide awake when I have a go at using these fiddly little buggers.

[cteno4]

LOL, with I had a dollar for every small part glued to a fingertip! perfect applicator would be the little micro dental glue applicators.
 

0.01mm should be damn close to scale at 1.5mm, actually even to tiny maybe! This was why I was wondering then if a spray coat or the fumed ca glue could stiffen it all up to just chop it up into squares then. Wonder how like 50g relay wire would work. Might not glue as well as thread though, could go in and solder every joint with a very little soldering tip! 😜

 

ohh your 0201s came fast mine are somewhere still in China I think! 
 

Jeff

 

 

[cteno4]

On 12/15/2021 at 4:34 PM, Kamome442 said:

I know it is insane how small they are. The 0402's still seem like like witch craft to me, looking forward to getting hold of an even smaller LED. I ordered mine from here:

https://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/313029457147

So the ones Joe got look to be standard 20mA max leds, but in looking around at specs I’ve seen some 0201 leds at 15 and 10mA max forward current. So on some ebay and aliexpress they are not stating the forward current, so best to just run them low. I may hook one of mine up (no current listed) at 20ma and let it run for a few days to see if it burns out.

 

jeff

[Kamome442]

13 hours ago, cteno4 said:

0.01mm should be damn close to scale at 1.5mm, actually even to tiny maybe!

 

You are not wrong! I meant to type 0.1mm, I was looking for something around 0.01mm-0.03mm so that must have been in my head. I have now found some polyester thread at 0.01mm and placed an order. It will be interesting to see what results I can get.

 

14 hours ago, cteno4 said:

ohh your 0201s came fast mine are somewhere still in China I think! 

 

I know, it caught me off guard too, I didn't even check the delivery date I just assumed it would be sometime in mid January.

Well I have had a chance to look at them a little more closely. I carefully poked one into the end of 1mm brass tube and they appear to fit.

Here is a side by side with the now gigantic look 0402. Not the easiest thing to photograph.

 

It helps to show they are smaller but doesn't give a great sense of scale so here they are next to a ball point pen.

 

I can also confirm mine are standard 20mA, I hadn't noticed other sellers had different specs, something to pay attention to when ordering for sure. That said despite knowing the specs I am sure I will find a way to destroy a least a couple 😁

[Madsing]

7 hours ago, cteno4 said:

So the ones Joe got look to be standard 20mA max leds, but in looking around at specs I’ve seen some 0201 leds at 15 and 10mA max forward current. So on some ebay and aliexpress they are not stating the forward current, so best to just run them low. I may hook one of mine up (no current listed) at 20ma and let it run for a few days to see if it burns out.

 

1 hour ago, Kamome442 said:

I can also confirm mine are standard 20mA, I hadn't noticed other sellers had different specs, something to pay attention to when ordering for sure. That said despite knowing the specs I am sure I will find a way to destroy a least a couple 😁

 

Try 1 to 2 mA and they should be bright enough for the application anyway. I have set most of the LEDs I use to work at around 10% of their maximum current. 

[Madsing]

On 12/23/2021 at 7:10 AM, cteno4 said:

I would say you were mad as a hatter doing those grills for the ac units

English is not my mother tongue and I have been scratching my head about "hatters" for a couple of days (what are they talking about?), until this morning, when I googled "mad as a hatter" 😅🤣