Hi Mark,

The early C track base would get brittle in any temperature.
Since about 2004-6? the base used a different composition with no susceptibility to brittleness.

I look at it this way:-
This is an example in ABS plastic.
The molding is done at an injection nozzle temperature above 200° C and and in the mold temperature between 50 and 90° C.
If the product withstands those temperatures in manufacture, I doubt you have much to worry about.

Kimball

I have been in 47°C on holidays in Mildura Australia. At least it was a dry heat.

Can you knock up a styrene extruded foam box, which is easy to cut without all the mess of the white styrene foam.

Sit it on the floor upsidedown and also place inside the foam box together with rolling stock a load of old soft drink bottles filled with water so there is a large thermal mass for stable temperature. Maybe the floor temperature is cool enough for passive heat control. Chuck a few dooners, blankets, towels etc over the top for even more stability.

At least you won't have any electricity costs.

From a chance conversation about climate change, bushfires and the coming Australian summer with an elderly lady at the local Scrabble Club!

She makes lots of jams and preserves and has her storage area air conditioned to stop the temperature going over about 36. She sets the air conditioner controller to 32 - the highest selectable via the hand control - but an A/C guy in her family modified the A/C in some way so that the actual temperature it regulates to is 36. The unit is left on and just dormant until it fires up on a hot day.

Sounds like a simple solution. I presume that I have the electronics and electrical knowledge to do the same.

Don't underestimate older ladies ...

An architectural job years ago in an small but expensive apartment block. The garbage room was air conditioned very cold to keep smells down.

Hi again Kimball,

Here's three little snippets I found. I don't know if any of it is relevant but I'll get some MEK and see how C track likes it. Might come in handy when making those "custom" pieces.

1. Up until the early 2000's, LGB used BASF Luran-S plastic for body shells. After the early 2000's LGB switched to BASF Ultraform and Ultramid. As LGB moved to smaller production batches, the new resins facilitated smaller lots of custom colors.

2. Examples of solvents suitable for adhesive bonding are methyl ethyl ketone, dichloroethylene and cyclohexanone. Parts made from different grades of Luran S may be bonded to one another, and furthermore parts made from Luran S may be bonded to parts made from ABS or SAN.

3. LGB Germany used Luran S a trademark of BASF. I think it was never published what it was, some people claim it was a derivative of HDPE, I doubt it. But one thing is for sure, LGB Plastic doesn't glue well at all. The way to "fuse" LGB plastic together is MEK (Methyl Ethyl Ketone). In some lucky states Lowes carries it in their paint department in most states you need to find a chemical supply store to buy it. I don't if you find mail order.

The trick is to use enough time and liquid to soften the plastic ends and then press them together. The softened plastic hardens out and the joint is as good as new, with a little welt (more or less). Unfortunately, you will lose 1/32" or maybe 1/16" in the length. Alternatively, you can use a piece of ABS and melt it in a little jar with MEK, briefly wet the LGB parts and then dip them in the melted ABS and then join them together and you may not lose the 1/32 - 1/16.

Any glue I ever tried failed - sooner or later (more sooner).

Another thought. You could just install a 2.5kW Daikin or Mitsubishi in the garage. The 2.5kW split systems are extremely efficient.

On another forum, the 2.5kW split systems is the size air conditioner people are installing when running off batteries and solar systems in their caravans.

Have it installed back to back to save money. Being only a 2.5kW output, there are no issues to piggy back on an existing circuit & the air conditioning installers can do this at no extra fee.

Best to book an installation in now before the summer circus!

Technically it will be too small for the space, but the purpose is to knock off the high temperatures.


You can also get it networked to your phone for not much extra when you order the AC. So then look at BOM (Long term Aussie weather acronym, with current political madness!) & if it's going to be a scorcher, turn it on 6am (I think that is the time council allows AC to be turned on).

Hi Toosmall.

The small garage where the layout is located is 22sqm, brick wall, very thick concrete floor, R4+ insulated ceiling, one PA door and small window and, except for around the door frame, reasonably well sealed. It has a Daikin 3.5kW back-to-back system and can hold 24C in there on the lowest (night) setting when the outside temp is around 40. Very quiet and inaudible to us and neighbours.

I'm thinking that just setting it to 32 when I'm not in there will do for now. Of course, that will mean it will run non-stop for days in peak summer when morning temperatures don't drop very far. But the cost of holding the room at 32 will be much less than the standard 24.

I'll investigate moving the set point higher - fairly easy if it has an analogue sensor - may be problematic if it uses the digital type with a serial connection.

That said - from my digging into Marklin plastics above - cooling may not be necessary at all. My concern started in this area because of some quadcopter parts that did not do so well in past summers.

I built an underground fire bunker at the house we had before - always cool in there!

Cheers and thanks,

Mark

Cooked an offcut from the side of some C track to see what would happen. Blame the weather, boredom and the red wine ...

Screwed it to the top of a Delrin block and baked it at 10 degree C steps from 20 to 100 at intervals of 20 minutes and measured the "droop".

Started at 121mm high - first small drop seen to 120mm at 70 degrees - very sad at 22mm at 100 degrees - no comment.

Not scientific - but there you go.

So, unless under a high load, should no problems when stored at 52 degrees?

I wonder if the same material is used for HO rolling stock?