homemade signals

[HOmainline]

All, Thanks to everyone for sharing your photos, diagrams and links to signal building. All very helpful!

[RR_Mel]

Trevor

 

My original signals (2001) used 2mm red/green bicolor LEDs and worked great.  They have changed the way that they are manufactured because all of the newer LEDs have the red and green too far apart internally.  They have a hot spot of red and green for yellow.  I bought around a dozen from different manufactures (I think) and all of them looked nearly the same, all have hot spots.  I tried common anode, common cathode and bicolor.  The bicolor LEDs made 20 years ago didn’t have hot spots.

 

The hot spots just didn’t do it for me so I attempted to fix it using a separate yellow micro LED at the rear of a three lead red/green LED.  I filed one corner of the rear of the 2mm LED at about a 45° angle and attached the micro LED using CA. 

 

https://www.ebay.com/itm/SMD-SMT-LED-0402-0603-0805-1206-Red-Blue-Green-White-Pink-Yellow-UV/132295416813?ssPageName=STRK%3AMEBIDX%3AIT&var=431620581734&_trksid=p2060353.m1438.l2649

 

I used a single wire from a stranded #30 wire to connect a common Anode.  I use the brass mast for common and #46 stranded red, yellow, green micro Litz wire for the Cathodes.

 

https://www.ebay.com/itm/T028G-10m-GREEN-0-28mm-Teflon-Micro-Litz-Wire-Solder-High-temperature-10m-1pcs/192365069908?hash=item2cc9da0654:g:Kw4AAOSwzgRWz7-V

 

The eBay seller above has all colors of the micro wire.

 

My Mel LEDs look great, no hotspots on yellow.

 

 

 

Mel

 

Modeling the early to mid 1950s SP in HO scale since 1951

 

 

My Model Railroad   

http://melvineperry.blogspot.com/

 

Bakersfield, California

 

I'm beginning to realize that aging is not for wimps.

 

[xdford]

Hi Mel,

Thanks for the feedback and glad you think it worthy!

For the lights I use an AC input governed in one direction by a diode in forward for Green and another in reverse for Red. The third feed bypasses the two diodes and feeds AC to the LED and it becomes Yellow. It does not show quite as well as I would like but it is definitely discernible as yellow. 

Here in Australia, the AC frequency is 50 Hz whereas in North America it is 60 Hz so the yellow should (in theory anyway) be a bit clearer.

I could have used a 555 timer but IC circuitry is not among my better knowledge fields but I believe it is possible to get the frequency higher than 5-6Khz and the "yellower it should appear. If you need a circuit diagram, let me know!

My costs would also have been around the $3-4 mark including the switches, although you could say I cheated a little ... my brother located me some English made ladders that he made a gift for me but with a few other things, including the recent move, I have not had a chance to think about fitting them.

Hope this helps

Regards from Australia

Trevor

[RR_Mel]

Trevor, great site!

 

I really like the way you laid out your signal concept.  Many years ago I found some manufactured styrene or plastic signal heads hard to work with, single target searchlight and three color vertical.  I didn’t do well working with plastic, after many attempts I gave up.  I’m good with my soldering irons so I went with NJI brass heads but availability was poor at best.

 

I bought an Oregon Rail signal kit (brass/styrene) and used it for a go-by.  The post on my blog is rather old and I hadn’t updated it since 2014.  I updated it this morning with the info and picture below.  I found some #6S brass washers at Home Depot that are very close to HO scale and eliminated the need to make my own.

 

I used the Oregon Rail signal base or cabinet to make a mold and duplicated them with a brass tube signal mast and a Mel made Resin base. 

 

 

Brass ladder stock is hard to come by now days, ISS (Integrated Signal Systems) has 6” ladder stock at $1.50 per 6".  Several other manufacturers at double the cost.

 

Total cost per signal is about $4 for everything, LEDs, Brass washers & tube, wire and resin.  I reto fitted a SMD 603 Yellow LED (1.5mm) to the back of a 2mm bicolor Red/Green LED.  The bicolor LEDs don't do well with Yellow so I added the micro LED to the rear of the 2mm LED pointing forward and it looks like the 2mm LED is yellow. 

 

I don’t own a lathe so I’m limited to using my bench drill press to turn objects, not the best way of turning things.  

 

I enjoyed your Web Site, good info.

 

 

Mel

 

Modeling the early to mid 1950s SP in HO scale since 1951

 

 

My Model Railroad   

http://melvineperry.blogspot.com/

 

Bakersfield, California

 

I'm beginning to realize that aging is not for wimps.

 

[xdford]

Hi there,

I have also built some relatively simple signals which you can see on http://xdford.freeasphost.net/stag13.html 

To make the targets, I drilled a series of 3mm or 1/8" holes in the lid of a margarine container at even spaces  cut them into about 11mm or 7/16" squares with the holes in the centre and screwed a lot of them (about 30 or so) on a screw thread tightened by a nut.

I then turned them on a lathe to get the 9mm disc shape. You will lose a few on the outer ends due to fraying and tearing etc but you should get between 20 and 25 heads for about 10 minutes work and the cost, practically zilch.

My own lathe is out of action at the moment because we have just moved house but should you need some, I can pop some in an envelope and send them gratis but you may know someone who owns a lathe anyway... PM me!

Good Luck

Cheers from Australia

Trevor

 

[ricktrains4824]

Oregon Rail signal kits use brass tubing for masts, so that is where I would start.

Benefit is that the brass tubing can be the ground for all the led's that are present.

[BroadwayLion]

Here is one that LION built (two layouts ago). The mast is 1/16th" welding rod which is also ground, ladder is insulated wire, +vdc = Red; -vDC=Green.

Target is a washer, 5mm led is set in a peice of cable jacket. Clearly this is a nome signal controlled by lever 25.

So much for a first attempt.

 

NYCT uses signals that look almost just like this.

LION used 3/16th" square stock, drilled 9/64th" holes, used a walmart coffe stirrer for the lens hood (reamed it out with the 1/8th" bit.)

 

Other projects included...

ROAR

[RR_Mel]

Hi Scott

 

I built all of my signals so I know where you are coming from.  Early on I was buying the signal heads from NJI but they didn’t keep up with sales and got very hard to get.  I really liked the NJI heads so I decided to try making them myself.  It turned out to be quite easy and I ended up making over forty heads.

 

I did a post on my blog on the construction of my signal system if you care to look at. 

 

http://melvineperry.blogspot.com/p/page-17.html

 

The post is two years old, I haven’t updated it showing the LED improvement but I do have an updated post for the Arduino MEGA controller.

 

http://melvineperry.blogspot.com/2017/02/february-3-2017-arduino-mega-signal.html

 

My original post on my signal system used a controller from the early 90s, it used a Rob Paisley circuit and it worked very good for many years.

 

TrainCat has a good assortment of etched brass signal kits.  I bought a pair of his SP Cantilevered Bridge kits, they are a bit touchy to assemble (solder) because of the delicate detail but they make excellent signal bridges.

 

http://www.traincat2.com/

 

Since I did the post on my blog I have completely redone my signal system.  I was never satisfied with the bicolor LEDs for a three color signal head.  In the rebuild I added a micro yellow SMT LED to every signal head and used an Arduino MEGA for the signal controller.

 

I’m quite happy with the way it turned out using the micro LED add-ons, now I get a good looking true Red, Yellow, Green signal from every head.

 

 

 

Mel

 

Modeling the early to mid 1950s SP in HO scale since 1951

 

 

My Model Railroad   

http://melvineperry.blogspot.com/

 

Bakersfield, California

 

I'm beginning to realize that aging is not for wimps.

 

[trevorsmith3489]

bnsf0823

I'm looking for advice on how to make home made signals. I would like them to be a prototypical modern day looking signal like the BLMA signals that are out on the market. Actually im going to use the BLMA heads so i just need to learn how to build the masts from scratch. If anyone could give me material ideas and some instruction on how to build these that would be great. The first signal that i need to make will be a back to back singal headed on each side.  The scale is ho and like i said modern is the look that im shooting for.  

Thank,   pictures of your signals would be nice too!

Scott

 

Hi Scott

This might be of some use:

https://kaleyyard.wordpress.com/13-signals/

Trevor

[mlehman]

Scott,

You might find parts of my signal installation relevant to some of your questons.

http://cs.trains.com/mrr/f/88/t/253256.aspx

[bnsf0823]

I'm looking for advice on how to make home made signals. I would like them to be a prototypical modern day looking signal like the BLMA signals that are out on the market. Actually im going to use the BLMA heads so i just need to learn how to build the masts from scratch. If anyone could give me material ideas and some instruction on how to build these that would be great. The first signal that i need to make will be a back to back singal headed on each side.  The scale is ho and like i said modern is the look that im shooting for.  

Thank,   pictures of your signals would be nice too!

Scott