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More redicoveries

As I am starting to get more adventurous (and also get round to the fiddly bits I left to last, like scratch-building diamond crossings), I have rediscovered a couple of things I used to spend fortunes on in my youth: Plastruct and Milliput. It is hugely pleasing to me that both of these are still available, to all appearances completely unchanged (even the Milliput packet) in over twenty years!

I also bought a bargain packet of warding files on eBay, which was an accidental bargain. About 25 of them, including some really fine rat-tails with pointed ends ideal for cleaning out little crevices, all for under a tenner.

Does anyone know a good source for the odds and sods of Meccano for hand-powering the Peco turntable? Electrics are all very well but I am strongly drawn to the idea of a worm drive and a handle at the baseboard edge. Seems more "real" somehow :-)

Guy

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"To every complex problem there is a solution which is simple, neat and wrong" - HL Mencken

Reply to
Just zis Guy, you know?
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On 26/09/2005 18:51, Just zis Guy, you know? wrote,

eBay???

Reply to
Paul Boyd

Guy,

Here's a list of suppliers of Meccano bits and pieces.

But you might find that your proposal doesn't work as well as you hope. Meccano gears are not reknowned for a high quality fit and you would almost certainly find that the play in the worm drive would be amplified at the ends of your turntable and you might have trouble lining things up, and keeping them lined up. What might work better is a large diameter disk on the turntable shaft and driving it using a small diameter rubber roller which is sprung loaded to bear against the edge of the disk. This will give you a positive drive with no play. Or use the largest Meccano sprocket on the turntable shaft and drive it with the smallest sprocket available and arrange some form of spring tensioner to bear against the chain to keep it tight and stop any play. Then you will probably have to drive the small sprocket through another spur or worm gear reduction to give you reasonable turntable speed for a reasonable hand cranking speed.

Jim.

Reply to
Jim Guthrie

I submit that on or about Mon, 26 Sep 2005 19:46:53 +0100, the person known to the court as Jim Guthrie made a statement ( in Your Honour's bundle) to the following effect:

Ah, Geoff Wright is still going, then? His shop and exhibitiony thing shut down (I used to work round the corner). Fine and dandy.

Possibly. I was hoping that if I used some miniature bearings I have in the spares box to make the driveshaft really stable, and greased the works with lithium grease, it might be OK.

Aha! And these parts can be cannibalised from any old direct-drive record players I might happen to have lying around...

Thanks for the various thoughts. I might even use Lego, the cogs and worm drives in my lads' Technics sets are remarkably good :-)

Guy

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"To every complex problem there is a solution which is simple, neat and wrong" - HL Mencken

Reply to
Just zis Guy, you know?

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