I virtually started building my locomotive... literally!!

[Renegade1c]

lucky for me. I'm a student. They give us good discounts. My copy of Solidworks cost my 80 bucks. (you must prove that you are a student/faculty, staff) It is a pretty cool program. I have been working on a Beyer Garrett steam locomotive and have used SolidWorks to design its boiler frame. Its nice too since SolidWorks can be used with the CNC milling machines at school too.

[G60syncro]

Yes, Solidworks is a professional CAD tool... pricey?? You bet!! A licenced version is a couple grand. I get to use it as much as I want after work, so I'd be a fool to pass it by!! There are a number of CAD tools out there that don't have all the bells and whistles but you can still do a lot with them... I would'nt trade the flexibility and foresight itprovides for anything in the world.

Limiting the "oops" factor of any project is a big plus!!

[ereimer]

thanks for the info

[dinwitty]

looks like solidworks is a serious professional tool. What is its price? looks pricey to me.

There are freebie tools out there, like 3ds Max
Rhino, and others free to grab. maybe not as cool as solidworks.

I worked professionaly on a dubner video system so I know that line very well, its the tools have improved vastly and the Dubner is very ancient now, but its design was very smart.

[G60syncro]

Okay, I updated the picture... Unfortunately, I did'nt get to do as much as I wanted to... I got the side-rods in my assembly drawing. The driveline and can motor are'nt in yet because I did'nt do the frame tailpiece.

I also set the gearbox in transparent mode to show that the drivers will actually be geared to the motor.

To answer your question, I'm doing this in Solidworks... I draw stuff on CAD 45+ hours a week so I do get a lot of practice!! Now if you were to start doing this on your own, you'd probably take an hour or so to do one of the wheelset axles. After that you'd get the hang of it pretty fast and you could probably do the wheel in 5 minutes!!

The gears were easy to do since Solidworks includes preset models. So I just had to say what pitch, bore diameter and thickness I wanted and I was done!! I can then specify a "geared relationship" between the worm and worm-gear wit the ratio I want and as the worm rotates, the geartrain follows. I'll even be able to give a "torque" attribute to the motor and run a motion simulation that'll show the whole thing in motion!!

The longest part of the process is gathering information and dimensions... but anybody with basic computer knowlege and the tutorial included in the software can do it. As you get better, you find new tricks to go faster and make more efficient drawings.

[ereimer]

wow that looks neat !
what software are you using , and how long did it take to get good enough to do this ?

[G60syncro]

Yep! in this day and age, something can be litterally virtual!! Case in point:



I finally found the MR issue with the scale drawings from my old project. Now I'm modelling it in actual HO size to determine exact drivetrain clearances and to cheat some dimensions. As of now, the frame is about inch-for-inch exact scale, but obviously it'll be too flimsy. After I ge more of it done, I'll see how I can add some strength without detracting too much from it's appearance.

I hope to get the rods and motor by tomorrow, stay tuned for an update!!