Wichendon Machine Shop (restart)

[deemery]

Thanks, James.   I remember seeing and hearing the machine shop at the Henry Ford museum.  And I think there's a belt driven machine shop in Springfield VT that they occasionally run.  If I ever got to the "sound detailing" stage, a recording of that would be cool to play underneath.  (But then, I'd want to get similar recordings for my large cloth mill buildings.  I've heard -1- loom run at the museum in Lowell, I can only imagine the racket made by a hall of 100 of them!)

dave

[Jerry]

Well your off to a good start and haven't even had to build anything yet.

And I do believe you were waiting to find people for it??

Looks like a great kit to do. 

Jerry 

[deemery]

Since I want to do a full interior with the belt runs, there's A Lot of planning here.  I need to work out the position of the tools, the belt runs, the pieces I need to add to the joists to hang the belt shafts, the location of the machine operators, and the weathering on the floor.   Those are all inter-connected.  I'm thinking I'll create a paper footprint template for each machine, to use in floor weathering.  The other thing to consider is adding lighting, I'll need to work out the location of the LEDs and the wiring, making sure the 2nd story floor sits flat on the joists (probably means cutting little notches into the joists for the wiring.)

On the belt shafts, I need to decide if I'll add the shifter rods.  This site has a bunch of great photos of belt-drive machine shops:  https://industrialscenery.blogspot.com/2016/11/jack-shaft-and-leather-belts-revisited.html  But none of them show the mechanism that moves a tool drive belt from the drive wheel to an idler wheel (so the belt down to the tool is not moving....)  I've seen these, it's a lever that pivots to push the belt from a driven pulley to an idler pulley and vice versa.  But studying those photos in that link, they weren't as common as I thought they were in the set of photos.  I guess if nothing else, I should have a way to move the primary drive belt from the powered shaft.  So some more research needed.
  
dave

[craftsmankits]

I'm really looking forward to this.  For this is my white whale of shelf orphans.  I started this kit years ago, and there it sits, collecting dust.  Can't wait to see how you tackle the machine placements and belt applications, your work should provide the kick start I need to finally finish this one up.  Good luck, and thanks for posting.  Mark

[deemery]

I'm really looking forward to this.  For this is my white whale of shelf orphans.  I started this kit years ago, and there it sits, collecting dust.  Can't wait to see how you tackle the machine placements and belt applications, your work should provide the kick start I need to finally finish this one up.  Good luck, and thanks for posting.  Mark

Mark, did you get the associated machine tool and boiler, etc, set?  I did not, I assembled my own machine tools and kitbashed a boiler.  A lot of the machine tools are the old long-gone Model Masterpieces machine tools.  Also, some Rio Grande Models kits. 


dave

[craftsmankits]

Hi Dave,

Yeah, I purchased everything.  I assembled the machines and painted them years ago.  My father owned a steel office furniture company in Aurora Il.  Bentson Industries, and they had punch presses galore, with trays of stamping equipment, complete tool shop, welding department, paint line, ovens, you name it, and I'll bet there are few if any pictures of the interior. 

The building was torn down a few years ago, it stood in various forms for over one hundred years.  Most of his machines were painted shades of green, some were built around 1912, many were from the 30's and 40's.  They had their own motors, and many had huge fly wheels.  I worked there in the summers, while I was attending college. I did various tasks including final assembly and working in the shipping area, and front office. 

This kit is a real challenge, looking forward to seeing your efforts.  Mark

[jbvb]

Dave, if you want a recording of the Lowell National Historic Park weaving room, get it soon. A little bird told me their budget is being cut severely.

[deemery]

James, that's really sad to hear, although unfortunately it's not surprising.  I wonder if I could "magnify" a recording of a single loom to create the racket of a mill full of them...

I went through my sets of belt drive hardware.  I wish I had more Model Masterpieces sets.   But Crow River sells shaft hangers and pulley wheels, so I've ordered a couple more of them.  (SS Ltd also has these.)  I need 9 hangers, 4 for one shaft, and 5 for the other.  My inclination at this point would be to install the shaft and hangers first, with the pulleys loose on the shaft.  Then as I position each tool, I can then glue the pulley into position.  I still haven't decided if I'll do the 'belt shifters'.

SS Ltd's belt drive part set comes with a 'shifter', and instructions on how it's installed.  That approach uses a single shifter (or "clutch") to handle all the tools on a single shaft.  I'll need to look at that to see if I can work it into my setup. 

add:  I found this video which answers 3 obvious questions about belt drives:  (1) how do you connect ends of the belt to make it continuous?  (2) how do belt shifters work, to move the belt from driving a machine to running free?;  (3) how do you keep the tension on the belt?   https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0VXJwe-2244  The nice thing about this video is that it's a very simple shop, so there's no "clutter" to distract from their discussion of the topics. 

dave

[swisstrain]

I initially obsessed with machine shop research and how machines would be arranged in the most logical way.

At some point, realizing that visibility of the interior would be severely limited by what you see through the windows, I gave up on exact machine placement and decided to implement something that creates the illusion of a working machine shop when the building is lit up. Since there is no realistic way to create a removable roof and make the interior visible anyway, unless one personally needs to absolutely know that the interior must be a working machine shop layout, I did not think there was a point to obsess over over exact placement of machines.

As a result, I ended up with what is shown in the picture below.  This is before I toned down the colors of the backs of the "binders" in the shelving of the office.

I also made significant changes vs what is proposed in the instructions to the lighting.  For the second floor, I pulled all wiring up into the roof, and then came back down to the second floor.

[deemery]

It's great to see this, it helps me visualize some parts of the structure when it's assembled.   How did you run the wires for the ground floor lighting?  Did you cut notches in the ceiling joists?

Today I did more work on the belt runs and realized two of my proposed tool runs won't work, it would have two tools trying to connect to the -same- pulley.  So I reworked those tools, so that won't be a problem.  I also thought more about the pulleys and shifters.  My current thought is to assemble each line shaft onto 'sticks' cut to length, then glue those 'sticks' to the ceiling joists.  I have enough parts to finish the design, but will have to wait for some stuff I'll order to finish the assembly.  And I think I can position the machines and operators while waiting for line shaft parts.

dave

[swisstrain]

For the first floor lighting, I also went via the roof, since due to the open floor plan on the first floor, it was not possible to come in from the bottom without having cables in plain view, and I could not accomplish to run leads through notches in the ceiling joist went.

In the picture below, you can see how I finally worked it out. You notice a set of wires to the left of the bookcase coming from the attic going through the floor, and another set hidden in the niche by the wall to the right.  I covered them in dark grey paint to camouflage them as pipes.

The power comes up to the attic in a small space in the first floor office (not shown in this picture), and then I created a power distribution circuit in the attic. Unfortunately, I never took a picture of that.

I realize that the detailing would not hold up to scrutiny for an observer directly looking at the scene, but once everything is behind windows, even when lit, the scene looks pretty convincing.

[ReadingBob]

That's some seriously impressive modeling on everyone's part! 

[PRR Modeler]

Swisstrain that is outstanding.

[swisstrain]

Thanks for the kudos.  Nevertheless, I really don't want to hijack Dave's thread, my posts were intended to support him with his interior layout.  I can relate, I went through the same process.

[deemery]

I'm always very happy to see how others tackle the same kit or similar problems, so no worries from me about hijacking!

dave