Hi gang. Just wondering what you guys use for power lines. I’m an N scaler and have always used black sewing thread but it’s a real pain to tie on the poles and also to give it just the right amount of slack so that it’s not too tight or lose between poles. I’ve noticed that some people don’t even wire thier poles because it’s too much trouble for one thing and because it’s a hazard when reaching across their layout and too easy to get tangled up in it. So what do you use?.
The go-to answer is EZ Line. I have used it for some diorama’s and it works as advertised. People are also using it to represent cables on machinery since it does stretch nicely.
Perhaps N-scale power lines would not be visable to the naked eye, and therefore you do not need them… Just a thought.
Garry,You can sure enough see when the wires are missing even at my age.
I would look at 1 pound fishing line or the rope they use for rigging for those ship in the bottle models.
The current SIW has no power lines because they get in the way as you said but EZ line does work.
I’m with GARRY on this one, even with HO. Sure, they are visible under the right light, but you just don’t miss them. It’s one of those tricks of the eye useful in model railroading, fake in the power line with poles and let the imagination do the rest.
On the other hand, you could spend valuable modeling time stringing lines, only to snag it and have to start over. For display or show entry, it could be worth the trouble, but if you have visitors operating, you’re just setting yourself up for a lotta work that’s not strictly necessary IMO.
My layout is HO and .015” piano wire works good for my power lines. I drill #78 holes where I want to anchor the wires. Vertical holes in cross arms and horizontal holes in structures. I heat the end of the piano wire over a flame to remove the temper then a sharp bend and drop them in. There are five things I really like about using steel wire for power lines.
- They are easily removable if need be.
- The steel wire doesn’t attract dust as fast as other materials and its a lot easier to clean than thread.
- I can put a realistic sag in the wire that stays put.
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Take an old zip cord such as a lamp cord.
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Strip the insulation from it
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recover a single strand of the wire.
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use seed beads for insulators, or in N scal maybe a drop of glue will do. Maybe us the head of a straight pin right through the pole or cross beam.
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the strand of wire will wrap arund these perfectly.
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they will even conduct electricity should you want to place street or yard lamps on your poles.
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If you are not careful with them they will throw a very prototypical arc.
They are so fine that you cannot even see them in this photo, but they do power the yard lights. The power gets to these poles where the wire to the table is disguised as a guy wire.
ROAR
One’s decision to do this work hinges on what one wants in the way of realism, and that, in turn, depends on the acuity of the imaging device, be it the Mk I Eyeball or the camera. From the typical standing viewpoint of your average 30 year old modeler, trains at arm’s length are really a scale 180 yards away. You won’t see the wires unless they are silhouetted against the sky. Against mottled ground, fallen leaves, bushes, rocks, etc, you won’t detect them with the eye. However, get your camera down onto the ‘ground’ and take a realistic shot of a nice scene, you’re probably going to want to see as much realism and details as the camera’s sensor and lens can show. That low, the camera’s view will probably have a lot of things silhouetted. With poles as close as 100 scale feet from the lens, I would say adding the filaments might be worth the time and effort.
Even so, some people just like knowing that something is there, represented, even if it can’t be seen. It’s what fills the market nicely for brass and Rapido passenger cars and RCS’, and such…some folks just like knowing that they have a strongly representative example, in scale, of the real thing.
Selector is correct! I only have power lines close to the edge of my layout, none more than 30” from the edge.
I forgot my turntable. I used .015” brass rod for my turntable power drop and it actually carries power to the bridge. I use the power drop to the bridge for one rail and the motor shaft for the other rail. The power pole is brass tubing.
Yes,the old Hollywood affect works quite well in far away power lines and more detailed close to the forefront.
I use to us black elastic thread so that if I bump into it I wouldn’t pull down all of my power poles. However I got sick of looking at the dust on the wires. Also if you look closely at the real thing you will see that there are several wires of different sizes and some of them are not insulated so you just see the bare aluminum.
The wires highest on the poles are high voltage DC from the power plant. They feed transformers which are located about every two or three poles which convert the DC to standard voltage AC for houses and businesses. Below that are cable television and telephone wires. So there are three drops to every structure.
I have no interest in modeling all of that so I just use my imagination. If you watch a movie or TV show, unless they are specifically showing the wires, they are too thin to be seen and drop out of the picture. Also if I don’t run wires then I can just place the poles where I want to for part of the scene instead of having to hook them up to a bunch of other poles.
My current layout under construction will have a dam with a hydro-electric plant as well as a coal-fired generating plant. There will also be 8 or 10 transmission towers in between to connect the plants to the national grid via 500 KV lines. I will not have any wires or threads on my layout (too many issues); just the towers. N scale.
Robert
I don’t like the look of EZ Line because it is rectangular in cross section. Since the line twists it looks like the width of the line is different from point to point. It really shows up in photographs. I think Pro Line (made by Pro Tech) is much better, particularly in n scale or to model HO light gage telegraph line. It may not have a perfectlyround cross section but it looks really good. It is quite thin but will look a little thicker when some fine dust collects.
I did what Lion suggested one time on a layout long ago. It was actually CTC code lines I was setting up.