I wanted my scratch-buit radio repair shop to have fluorescent lights, but of course there are no working fluorescent lights in 1/24th scale. However I had an idea for a way to possibly simulate the appearance of working fluorescents…
I started by using 1/16" acrylic rods to represent the tubes. Small rounded bits of styrene strip were glued to the ends:
The base of the fixture was made from a strip of .100" x .250" styrene. Three 1/8" holes were drilled through it:
I used thin sheet brass to make the reflectors:
After painting the fixture white, I glued on the tubes. To help disperse the light and to give the tubes a somewhat frosted look, I brushed on a very thin coat of fluorescent white paint that I had leftover from a Halloween project years ago:
I marked the positions of the three holes and drilled three larger holes in the ceiling. Then the fixture was glued in place. Three 3mm LEDs were inserted into the fixture, through the holes in the ceiling. You can just barely see the rounded ends of the LEDs showing through in this photo:
When I first connected a battery to the leads I was disappointed… the beam from the LEDs simply made three bright spots on the acrylic rods. Howe
Have been enjoying your posts and photos immensely. The lights are very, very cool! Truly superb work and inventiveness. If I didn’t know better I’d think I had stepped back in time and was looking at an honest to goodness radio shop.
1/24 is such an obvious scale for a large scale RR, as it’s already an established scale in other areas. Why it never became a standard is beyond me.
Ive followed your work before, really liked the big chicken adventure. As a 1/24-1/25 model and diorama builder also (but not RR), I can really appreciate your work here. Your power cords and plugs for example, are the right thickness that goes a long way in a scene like this where thick ones would ruin the whole effect. Good stuff! Those radios are beautiful. Are they scratchbuilt? Dan
Dan, the radios are scratch-built. The smaller ones on the shelves are pretty simple, I used photos of real radios printed onto self-adhesive vinyl and just stuck them on blocks of Sintra PVC. Then I cut them to shape and painted the exposed plastic to blend into the image. I also glued on small bits of styrene rod for the knobs.
The two console radios were built up and carved/sanded to shape, with vinyl images used for the dial and speaker cloth one of them.
Just curious … wonder how effective it would be if you lightly sanded the acrylic tubes and glued a surface mount LED to both ends of the tube ? The SMD LED would be no bigger than the diameter of the tube and could hide inside the two end plates.
Might not be as bright as what you have, but the tube itself would glow …
