HO scale 4 ft Florescent Lights

[Anonymous]

I needed a bunch of HO scale florescent lights for the N&W lube house I'm scratch building. However I didn't find any on the market, so I made my own.

A picture is worth a thousand words, right? Well, they are simple to make.
I'll spare you from reading a couple thousand words on making them. Here's the photos. I'm sure you'll get the idea. They're non-operating but I'm working on an idea to light them up.




The ends are made from scrap .010 styrene. The 1/8" brass channel (short piece shown for photographic purposes) is used as an assembly jig to glue the lamp fixtures end to end.

[AntonioFP45]

Gsetter,

Good going, but did you check in the 2005 Walther's Catalog and look at Miller Engineering? They make verly skinny, "4 long and "8 long Flourescent lights with drivers included. I just purchased an 8" tube for my diesel servicing building. My LHS rep orderd it and it arrived in one week.

Miller's website is currently under reconstruction, but checked it out a month ago and was impressed . Very nice lighting kits for buildings, including neon signs. There were photo samples of the kits in use. Incredibly realistic.

The owner is customer friendly and answers e-mails. He's the one that informed me that his company that will be producing a lighting kit for passenger cars using L.E.Ds so that it resembles flourescent lighting. This would be much more accurate for streamlined American passenger cars from the 1950s thru today as well as subway and commuter cars. I was very happy to hear this as most lighting kits, including the Walthers, feature incadescent lighting.

Let us know of your results!

Cheers!

[Anonymous]

AntonioFP45
I looked into the mini floresent lights at first. All Electronics sells the lamps and drivers also.
However, they're too large in diameter for my needs and I would need 16 - 8" and 8 - 4" bulbs and 12 inverters to drive them! Cost about $214.24!
I also experimented with fiber optics, but they don't shine enough light from the sides. I did find that if I shined the end of the fiber through clear resin, the resin glowed. The resin isn't pure like the glass fiber. I think It will work.

My idea to light them is to assemble several of them end to end and use that as a master to make a mold. Then I'll cast it in clear resin.

Here's the interior of the building I'm modeling.

[AntonioFP45]

That's going to look nice!

Please, post your photos when she's done!

Looking forward to seeing them.