Here we go again! First step in this mod is picking out the right Atlas motor. The belt driven #304 or the older gear driven # 301. I want to mount and drive the tt from the bottom or 2 " back from the origional mounting place on top. I haven’t been able to see either to consider the best to mod. The idea is to sink the Atlas tt in the 2" foam base,and use the brown deck as the bottom of the pit, make a 2" pit extention and pit wall back up to grade. Then use a bridge mounted above the “pit” track for the new track height and look. Jump the wiring from rail to rail, indexing, all remain the same as all turn on the origional plater, and I hope to end up with a 12 1/2 " tt ! Any ideas as to what might be the way to go! [?] [:)]
MR did an article about this a few years back, which of course I can’t find at the moment.
Nick
that would be the Feb 2002 issue , page 94
an online variation can be found here http://www.2guyzandsumtrains.com/Content/pa=showpage/pid=11.html
i’ll be doing the same thing sometime , i’d love to see photos of yours when you get it done
I too would like for you to keep us posted on your progress. I’ll be doing it also in a couple of months… I hope. My problem is I’ll be mounting it in 4 inches of foam but something tells me it doesn’t matter how thick the foam is.
JaRRell
I’m thinking of that, too, a long time in the future. I would try to suspend a false pit bottom above the rotating deck, though, so it would not appear to rotate with the bridge. This would mean that the bridge would only be mounted in the center, but the wide bridge in the article should allow for a fairly solid center-only mount. I’m assuming that the pit rail and bogies are only dummies, and don’t support the bridge.
I checked out the link ereimer gave! It has some of the some of the same ideas I want to use . ( he got there first ! ) His motor looks to be the gear mount but need another opinion on that. Mounting it upside down looks to be possible as the gear engages from the end of the mount. That will alow for a larger tt. The pit rail will take up area outside of the rotating pit. His ideas with flex track are just the ticket. The motor choice is still the question before I get out he dremel! Thanks for the great input. Lots of work on this railroad still ahead.