A week or so ago I started researching sawmills and trying to decide what to do about the one I want on the layout. Following is a link to that and some preliminary design work with Fusion 360 .....
https://1fatgmc.com/RailRoad/UP%20Canyon%20Division/page-211.htmlI got a lot of what I want designed but not done with the main building to start printing any of that. I did decide that I could progress on the green chain that will connect to the side of the main mill and did a print yesterday and another today on the first parts of the green chain and associated parts and thought I'd share it here. If there is any interest I'll also post the print files. So with that in mind here is where I'm at now.
Had some some areas after the first printing of the green chain that needed some work. So reinforced those for the second print of the green chain and walkway and it came out well, at least good enough for me. This was a 3 hour print.
This time I got the side that I wanted to look the best printing last. I'm happy with the print but it took probably a half hour to remove the supports as the green chain has some really fragile parts to it. I broke a couple but after getting the print off the raft/supports used some CA to fix the breaks except for two where the piece broke and disappeared. Still there are so many boards in the chain the couple missing ones aren't noticeable and the chain will be under a shed roof.
The supports for the walkway were much easier to remove and only took maybe 5 minutes.
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For the first print the rollers might have been close to real size at 2 inches in diameter and 6 inches long. You could hardly see them even up close at that scale (.013”x.038”). I increase the diameter to .020 inches ( about 3 scale inches) and like it a lot better as at least now you can see they are there.
Above I cut some larger timbers and put them on the chain.
I though about beefing up the frame members under the chain to make it easier to remove the supports but decided against it as I like the look the way it is. If there is interest in this I'll put the print files up and just take it real slow in removing the supports.
I've got about 6 days in the total project so far, the green chain and shed along with a lot of the main building done. I just looked and I've created 392 files in the design stage. I backup often while designing so a number of those are back-ups at different stages of designing. I like it so not complaining but if you bought a printer and plan on designing there is a lot of time that goes into it. I find it to be very rewarding coming up with something where there was nothing there before and like that I can design specifically for my railroad.
To be continued............
A link to this whole build here......
https://1fatgmc.com/RailRoad/UP%20Canyon%20Division/UP%20Canyon%20Division-Index.htmlSumner
