Now that you have your 3D printer and don't know what to use it for here is an idea: Make me replacement handrails for Athearn Blue Box locomotives. The metal handrails were always the worst. They are ugly and always crooked and bent.
Start with SD40-2 and SD40T-2, GP38, GP50, GP7, SD9, UBoats, Dash 9s, etc. K Thx.
Lone Wolf and Santa Fe...They are ugly and always crooked and bent.
I dunno....if they're installed properly, I think that they look pretty good, and certainly better that the ones from the same time period which were cast, in plastic, as an integral part of the locomotive's hood and walkway. None of the Blue Box diesels were r-t-r, so if they're "ugly, crooked and bent", who's to blame for that?
Here's one of those LifeLike (Proto-no-thousand) diesels with plastic handrails cast as part of the walkway. I replaced them with Athearn stanchions and handrails bent-to-fit using music wire...
Same story for these...
...and these are pretty much the standard ones which came with the kit...
While it's true that the Athearn stanchions weren't accurate representations of any of the real ones, combined with the music wire handrails they offered a durable and reasonable-looking handrail compared to most of what was available at that time.The early plastic ones were an attempt to be more accurate, but were grossly oversize, and recent to-scale offerings are flimsy and I've seen many that seemingly can't be straightened.
Here's an older Atlas RS-1, with the original Atlas stanchions suppporting music wire handrails, a fairly strong combination that, in my opinion, looks pretty decent...
If 3D printed stanchions could be made strong enough, they might make good handrails when combined with music wire for the railings...but that would lead back to the modeller being responsible for the "ugly, crooked and bent" results.
Wayne
Agree, Wayne. They are sturdier than the current RTR hand rails, and I don't think 3D printed rails would be any sturdier. Some diesel detailers say they are way out of scale, but piano wire, as you mentioned, is a great alternative, along with Smokey Valley.
If they are bent, or crooked, it's not the railings fault.
Mike.
My You Tube
I like Smokey Valley handrails, they are cast brass and brass wire. A lot seem to be out of stock at Walthers. I use the SD-9 rails for my GP-7s. I think they would be more robust for handling than 3D printed
https://www.walthers.com/products/scale/ho-scale/manufacturer-name/smokey-valley-rr-products/mode/list/show/120?match=AND
George In Midcoast Maine, 'bout halfway up the Rockland branch
Just to ad to my last post, there is also plenty of the factory Athearn RTR handrails on Ebay, from a couple of different sellers.
Smokey Valley does seem to be the hand rail / stanchion of choice in the detailer crowd, the stanchions are great.
While some of the 3-D printers (both the machines themselves and the services) could print scale-sized handrails in HO scale, the material is rather brittle, so printing them as one piece would be even more fragile than what's out there now.
The finer and more to scale the handrails, the more of a beating they seem to take in actual operation of use of the model. Perhaps the problem, or one of the problems, is that it is either necessary from a practical standpoint, or we have acquired bad habits, to touch and pick up our locomotives and rolling stock in ways that today's detailing standards simply cannot withstand. (Witness the instruction sheet that came with the Exactrail centerbeam flatcar about how and how not to pick up the model).
The Athearn blue box handrails would indeed bend if too much pressure was applied to them when picking up the locomotive but they were surprisingly resistant to that. They lacked the exact details of the stanchions but if assembled with care looked ok to my eyes. Between exact detail but with handrails that look as straight as cooked bacon versus generic detail but some physical durability -- I'll take durability.
Dave Nelson
Lone Wolf and Santa Fe Now that you have your 3D printer and don't know what to use it for here is an idea: Make me replacement handrails for Athearn Blue Box locomotives. The metal handrails were always the worst. They are ugly and always crooked and bent. Start with SD40-2 and SD40T-2, GP38, GP50, GP7, SD9, UBoats, Dash 9s, etc. K Thx.
And end up with more fragile handrails that comes broken or warped. No thanks.
I'm slowly replacing those spaghetti thin handrails on my Athearn RTR as they break with older BB metal handrails..
Larry
Conductor.
Summerset Ry.
"Stay Alert, Don't get hurt Safety First!"
Unfortunately, this is impractical since the resulting handrails would be too brittle in any material that would give a decent result.
Steve Hunter
Shapeways Materials Probably something that would make strong, durable, close to scale handrails.
https://www.shapeways.com/materials
I tried to sell my two cents worth, but no one would give me a plug nickel for it.
I don't have a leg to stand on.
I’m sorry. What I meant was that all of the blue box handrails that I have assembled looked ugly and crooked. I am never critical of anyone else’s work. Your’s all look very nice. I have dozens of Athearn blue box locomotives and the only handrails which I think look nice are the plastic ones which were an option on the most recent runs. I built a New Old Stock model last night and reamed out all of the holes in the body perfectly so as not to have to force the stanchions in yet one ended up being jacked up due to the factory not having the correct 90 degree angle bend causing it to be the wrong height ever so slightly and bending the handrail. Trying to get the stanchions to align straight up and down is hard too. Maybe my Atlas yellow box GP40 set the bar too high. The plastic handrails on it are 40 years old and never broke even when I was a kid and was probably much less careful while handling it. I’ve had Walther’s Dash 8’s since the 1990s with plastic handrails which look nice. They have never broke either. They might be a little fat but a little fat can be good. 3D metal printing might be an idea. Someone needs to build a better mouse trap.
I only have one Athearn blue box locomotive with handrails, a Trainmaster.
.
I have been very satisfied with the handrails. They are not a prototypical as others, but they seem to be the most durable I have.
-Kevin
Living the dream.
I think 3D printed handrails would work very well. I am not sure where everyone is getting the brittle material from. I just had my co-op at work design and print a crude oil storage tank and the handrails are much stronger that any kit handrail or engine handrails I have. They are really quite impressive. They may need a tiny amount of sanding but i would definitely consider using 3D to print new ones if I broke any
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I didn't think 3D could offer materials that were more durable than the plastic in current handrails. IIRC, Steve is a 3D manufacturer and he lacks confidence in 3D materials for this application.
I did a set of stanchions on Shapeways. The Frosted Ultra Detail material is extremely fragile, think potato chip strong. I also did a brass version that passed their automatic checks but failed their manual checks. At a minimum, you need to drill out the railing hole on each stanchion. Nobody is buying the Frosted Ultra Detail material and I'm not surprised.
Lee