Years ago, during my early forays into On30, I bought a full set of six Bachmann logging camp cars, now long out of production, sadly. They've been sitting on dedicated spurs at Camp #1 for years, collecting dust and spiderwebs while I worked on other parts of the layout. But in recent days, I've begun adding to the nighttime lighting at the camp by finishing the scratchbuilt main office, which will sit beside the engine shed and turntable. That made me wonder about lighting the interior of the camp cars, so that I could have a completed nighttime scene. It stands to reason that after dark, the loggers would be in the cars, eating, playing cards and generally relaxing. And so, I devised a plan to illuminate them with soft, incandescent bulbs that would best mimic the oil lamps that would have been common in the day, using track power so they could still be moved as necessary.
The solution turned out to be simplicity itself. Like the Bachmann cabooses and passenger cars, the trucks had insulted wheels at one end of the axle, meaning I could use the axles themselves are a way of shunting power from the tracks to the light bulbs. I just had to make sure the front and rear truck insulated wheels were on opposite sides.
After painting the interior of the cars black, so that the walls don't glow and the only light comes through the windows, I made simple wipers from strips of brass and popped them into place with the middle over the bolster and the ends under the axles. Since the wipers can't be seen by onlookers, I didn't need to worry about appearance, only function. After that, I drilled a hole through the car's floor, ran the bulb wires through, soldered one to the front truck wiper and one to the rear truck wiper and voila. Double sided tape holds the bulb in place in the middle of the car. The image below shows the underside of a completed car and the inside of the next in line to be wired up.
Though the cars will never be moved by anything else than the great big hand, the axles can still turn if necessary. So far, I've done two of the six and the light streaming through their little windows really adds to the scene. I just have to remember that the tracks they sit on need major cleaning, as do their axles before I install the power pickup strips.
It's such an easy project, I wonder why I didn't do it before.
