Surprise, surprise

My son had a "bubble gun" for lack of a better explanation... one of those things that blows oodles of bubbles. It died after a trip to the beach, gee I wonder why.

So, I opened it up to clean the sand out and see if I could fix it. What did I spot inside? The motor for the bubble machine is almost the exact same thing that was in one of my engines (some of you remember my Rock Island). I know its not the greatest, but you can get these coo bubble machines including the motor, some gears, easily removed electrical contacts, and more for $10 standard price or $3 on clearance at the end of the season.

The brand is Placo and it was bought at Kmart!

:thumb:
 

MasonJar

It's not rocket surgery
I always thought that junked toys would be a great source of parts... also the disposable electric toothbrushes as well.

TrainClown does a lot of neat animated stuff with "found" parts, and other members (far more talented and brave than I) have also used VCR parts, Walkman components, and other scrap electronics to work wonders with their trains and animated layouts.

Andrew
 

Cannonball

More Trains Than Brains
I think my wife would flip if I started turning household stuff into more trains. :D
Aww.... C'mon, Sweetie, you don't really need a hair dryer, do you?
sign1
 

LoudMusic

Member
MasonJar said:
I always thought that junked toys would be a great source of parts... also the disposable electric toothbrushes as well.

TrainClown does a lot of neat animated stuff with "found" parts, and other members (far more talented and brave than I) have also used VCR parts, Walkman components, and other scrap electronics to work wonders with their trains and animated layouts.

Andrew

I'm using an electric toothbrush these days and everytime I paste it up and flick it on I start thinking about all the wonderful uses for that high RPM motor :)
 

Relic

Member
You want some 'lectric motors? Rip {gently} open one of those vibrating/heating seat covers from CTC.Tey have ,I think six motors,and yes they will rum in both directions
 

CNWman

CNW Fan
LoudMusic said:
I'm using an electric toothbrush these days and everytime I paste it up and flick it on I start thinking about all the wonderful uses for that high RPM motor :(

Wait for the bristles to be unsusable for brushing, and then viola! a vibrating toothbrush high-rate RPM motor:D Or option no.2, buy the powered ones for your kids so when your kids get to big for them, bingo! the same thing:D Maybe this entire thread should be added to the thread in the academy for 'uses for household materials'?:D
 

60103

Pooh Bah
I took apart a hair dryer after the operting switch went kablooie on us. (The operating switch looked to be a more complex version of a slide switch and was full of soot.) It did yield a small motor that looked useful. I haven't tried anthing yet with it.
 
N

nachoman

thrift stores are great places for electronics salvage. Spend a buck or two on an old cd player or a tape deck and a few hours with a soldering iron and you will have a whole pile of motors, switches, and useful items. Some of the gears and shafts in these things also look cool as flatcar loads or to add to junk piles.

kevin
 

rogerw

Active Member
old pc printers have a lot of good parts in them. I want to build a transfer table and the printer head belt and stepper motor should work ( I hope)
 
I have stripped down several old car radios in my time. The motors for the cassette players are ideal, as they already run on 12 volts. I have also salvaged LEDs, micro-switches, and many other useable parts from other appliances over the years as well. Many of these I still have in "storage".
 
Speaking of electric toothbrushes, there's a fairly large selection of replaceable bristle attachments in a variety of shapes and sizes, most of which make for excellant HO scale topiearies. Could probably work for larger N scale landscaping, too. Just paint green, and add a little fine ground foam.


Chris
 
Household motors

When my Unimat SL lathe ate up its motor & I found a replacement was not available & I was quoted around 350.00 to adapt a later motor to it, I looked around for something I could use that I could afford. Like free for nuttin' :mrgreen:
We had a Dirt Devil Vacuum cleaner that was not worth a tinkers dam as a vacuum, but did seem to have a small fast powerful motor. It ran the wrong direction , as I found out when I mounted it where the old motor had been( It spun the Jaws out & threw them across the room in about a half second!!!!!)
I fabricated a mount to sit it off the end of the lathe so that it would now spin the lathe in the right direction.
It runs VERY fast so I use a Dremel Dial speed control to slow it down & I find having a variable speed makes the lathe a lot better.
 
thrift stores are great places for electronics salvage. Spend a buck or two on an old cd player or a tape deck and a few hours with a soldering iron and you will have a whole pile of motors, switches, and useful items. Some of the gears and shafts in these things also look cool as flatcar loads or to add to junk piles.

kevin
I've done that on junk day. Got a huge pile of scavenged electronic parts to use and best of all, didn't have to pay for 'em!:mrgreen:

Also, my wife was at a sample sale where she works and found an old Christmas decoration that has shimmering light effects. It was broken so I took it apart. Great find as the shimmering light effects are from a light going through fibre optic threads! And also, a technician swept out a phone room and I got a bag full of the strands of telephone wire (nice long pieces too). The guy told me they were going to be tossed in the garbage. I got them and when I start working on my building models, they are perfect for the lighting inside.

Other bits and pieces, with a bit of imagination, can yield interesting and surprising results.:mrgreen::mrgreen::mrgreen:

Sorry for the long winded post.:eek:ops:
 

alastairq

New Member
Long time ago..I read an article ..possibly in MR....about motorising small HO lorries for ro-rail, using the 'vibrator' motors from old pagers?
 

alastairq

New Member
as a cross-reference to the large scale forum....a cheapo way into large scale garden railroading is to utilise mechanisms from the likes of radio controlled cars etc.........can power a ''trotting turkey'' or two?
 
surprise --surprise

Long time ago..I read an article ..possibly in MR....about motorising small HO lorries for ro-rail, using the 'vibrator' motors from old pagers?

I have used pager motors for animation projects with good results.
The last thing I did with them was to build an arc welding simulation. I used a pager motor with a worn down cutoff disk ( 3/8 inch dia.) with a cigarette lighter flint riding on it, the system was activated intermittently along with a recording of a portable arc welding gas driven generator. This animation was hidden inside a building so all you saw was the sparks generated when running, I had a piece of blue plastic that gave the light generated a blue "arc" cast & the sparks, "welding splatter" went bouncing around the floor.
I had found a source that sold the motors for about a dollar each & bought a stack of them .
I saw a place the other day that was selling bi polar 18 degree stepper motors that were about 1/2 the size of a penny for 1.89 . I am thinking of buying a few --- only problem is , I don't know what to do about building a driver circut for them .
I think that some neat animation could be done with them.
 

60103

Pooh Bah
And also, a technician swept out a phone room and I got a bag full of the strands of telephone wire (nice long pieces too). The guy told me they were going to be tossed in the garbage. I got them and when I start working on my building models, they are perfect for the lighting inside.

make friends with whoever is in charge of the phones or computers in your office. They can let you know when re-wiring is to be done and you may be able to pick up old wires. When we took over another company's space, I went in and removed their old wiring (which was incompatible with ours).
 

alastairq

New Member
telephoon wire is, however, fragile, be warned......but useful for lighting buildings..or even making street lights work.....since it is so small in diameter (if somewhat gaudy)..and isn't 'springy' it can be glued up around walls, inside posts, or even up the inside of plastic angle, to light lamps etc.
 
Top