Kitbashing Lionel 450 signal bridges to span 3 tracks

Good work there, Elliot.....    Very useful and looks great!  We are only limited by our imaginations.....

Jesse    TCA

great idea! Looks like I need to pick up some more 450s. how did you solder...small torch?

Elliot: Your project makes me wonder if a #452 single signal bridge could also be combined with a #450 double bridge to come up with the same spacing? Of course, you'd likely have to saw off the angled end of the #452 or maybe it would combine easily with the end of a #450......

The other issue is finding #452 single bridges as they are more scarce than the #450s.

Thanks Jesse, this one wasn't even my imagination, since I had been looking at the monster quad for years. It was on my to do list for a long time, but yesterday it got "to done".

Dave, I don't own a torch, just did it with my soldering station. Full process described below.

D&H, the only problem that might come up using the 452 would be, that it is cut off at that angle on the end. I'm not sure if that little bit of lower girder would have to be added back. Back in the day, that was a rather sought after piece, until Lionel reproduced it. You know, it would work perfectly to take two 450's and make and make a triple track and have a 452 leftover. This project technically used three 450's to make two triples, with two legs to spare. I never throw anything away, they're in a box somewhere, I saw them a couple years ago.

How to info for everyone: I made the cut with tin snips, then used the small yellow handle needle nose pliers to straighten the bent bits back up. I used my bench top belt sander to clean up the cut end of the piece to be spliced. The other cut end was capped off by the leg piece and was hidden.

I took my Dremel and put a sanding drum in it and removed the paint, getting nice shiny metal, on the inside of the upper and lower platforms, then soldered on small brass strips. Then I cleaned the paint from the other side to be joined, and turned it into one piece. With the alignment set, I just filled in the small gaps with solder, and used the Dremel to knock down the excess.

This was just a quick and dirty project. I'm sure there are much more refined ways of doing this. But, like I said, a little paint and a lot of signal heads to distract the eye, you'll never notice the imperfections.

Yeah, I wouldn't be too certain whether I would use any 452s for this conversion.  I do have several, some in original packaging, and they are more difficult to come by, and price is going up.  To make use of the repro 450s is more practical, and economical.  Call me old fashion, but I am of the mindset where I never do anything to change or harm my PW/PreW Lionel.  I do run most of it, use the accessories I have, but prefer to keep in original condition as much as possible.  As with the fantastic layout you are constructing, Elliot, this "hobby" lends itself to encourage and stimulate many imaginations and advance the learning and skills of us all.  What more could you ask of any endeavor in life?  And the aspect of spouses, kids, grandkids, friends, neighbors, entire communities becoming involved......   Aside from the economic factors (and that can be minimalized), and adding others as exhibited by the use of this forum... Life Is Good !!!

Jesse   TCA 

Elliot,

Very very nice work !!

Alex

Thank you Alex, this has been a fun little project. I didn't actually get involved when quad bridge was spliced. I just looked at it, said to myself, "I can do this", and winged it.

Thank s Jesse, those are some deep thoughts regarding the hobby, and I wholeheartedly agree. The 450 may very well be the most common accessory ever produced, thanks to MPC, LTI, Lionel LLC, and I think even MTH. Even though I have gotten over much of the sentimentality over postwar, I would never do this to anything with collector value, either. There are always listings on eBay for these. I've been following a bunch for the last couple weeks, and sale prices have ranged from just under $20 to around $35 depending on condition. There's one crazy auction, for a lot of 3 nice moderns, at $155. Not sure what those guys are thinking.

I agree, I wouldn't use Postwar pieces, but there are plenty of MTH ones out there.

BTW guys, all the signal heads from these and a few other bridges are available for purchase. I have something like a dozen. I will be building my own signal heads and masts, using these targets from We Honest, and 5mm bi-color LED's.

I'll also be working with forum member Scalerail (Don) to do some of the free standing signals. He has a 3D printer and the design to do bases, platforms and ladders to do something like this.

The reason I bring this up is, he suggested that I use the Plasticville bridges because they are scale, and I have picked up a couple off the bay this week. I worry that they are too delicate to cut, splice and carry weight like the 450. I'm willing to forego a little scale accuracy on this project, in favor of something rugged.

I've modified a number of 450 signal bridges to span more than 2 tracks or span two tracks that are far apart.  In most cases I wasn't particularly interested in looks rather than structural integrity. I simply cut the bridge in half and inserted a piece of 3/4 inch pine into the each end of the bisected bridge.   Attached the pine to the bridge with screws top and bottom and repainted.  I relocated the signal lights accordingly.  I used the modified 450's to support elevated track so for the most part the patched mid-section is not noticeable.

I was able to purchase junker 450's easily on ebay or shows for $5 -$25.  I had an application for the 452 single signal bridge, also for elevated track support but it's structural integrity was lacking.  A used a MTH single signal bridge (much stronger) instead which worked great.

Elliot

Nice work!

Many years ago, one of our former members did the same thing for our old layout. The bridge made the move to our new location and recently got installed on our current layout using signals from Custom Signals.

Very cool Elliot. It will look great with all the detail up and some trains running under them.

That's an interesting idea Steve, using them for support structure. That never really occurred to me, but someone else here might find some inspiration in that concept.

John, that's a beautiful example of the look I'm going for. It is very easy to overlook the toy nature of the bridge with all the realistic signals on it.

Elliot,

Very nice Job on joining the two Signal Bridges together their. 

What type of Wiring Schematic our using for the Signals ? 

Very nice Look great. 

Good luck, John

kb2agpjohn@aol.com 

Thanks John, wiring will be very straight forward, just two very fine wires from each LED running across the bridge and down the leg. That's still a lot of wires, 18 to start, maybe more if I include block signals facing the other direction. From there they will go to a special CMRI circuit, one per LED, that will change the colors to R,Y, or G using 2 output bits from the computer. The computer will calculate the correct aspect to display based on track conditions and turnout positions.

Elliot,

As always, your thinking and skills are a notch above........

Jesse    TCA

Elliot, is there a way to rewire the signal bridge without having to use a special  CMRI circuit and still have it work like original?

Thanks Jesse, sorry I missed your post earlier.

Mike, I sent you an email outlining a couple easier options.

Here's what the bridge looks like now. It still needs some more paint and weathering, but you get the idea.

This card has 12 identical circuits. Each one drives a single bi-color LED,and can produce a yellow aspect as well as red, green and dark.

Please post a picture with your Signal Bridge lit up down the road.

Good luck, John 

NYC,SUBWAY TRANSIT SIGNAL posted:

Please post a picture with your Signal Bridge lit up down the road.

Good luck, John 

I'd love to John, but it will take a while. There's a bug in those circuit boards where voltage is leaking through the red side. Soon as I get that resolved, I can do a permanent hookup to the LED's with test power to the inputs to light it up.

Thanks Marty, I have 3 Plasticvilles that I'm going to do with these homemade LED signals. I just glued the first one together the other day. They won't have as many heads on them though, just a pair of singles facing the same direction.

Wow, those are really neat!!! You snuck those pics in after my post.

Ok !  I hope you can figure it out.  If not. Then please get in contact Tim, from integrated Signals Systems, maybe he could give you some direction how to reserve the leakage   problem.

Maybe just by adding a dole somewhere in the circuit to stop your back feed may help.

Thanks, John   

Has anyone know how to extend the mth prr signal bridge.

texastrain posted:

Good work there, Elliot.....    Very useful and looks great!  We are only limited by our imaginations.....

Jesse    TCA

And our budgets...

Very nice work Elliot. I would have considered doing a splice project if I had 2 450's to work with.  Instead, I looked at the PRR drawings online and scratch built one with wood.  It's not as nice as yours but it works.  I think photos of it are on my "not quite a complete redo . . . " thread.  You have good skill sets Elliot.  Thanks for the tips.

Elliot, I have a bunch of bases for block signals made if you need them. I have fixed the problem with my printer. Don

Excellent Don! Yes, I'm still interested. I was just thinking about getting my signals assembled. Your timing is perfect. I'll email you.

pennsynut posted:

Very nice work Elliot. I would have considered doing a splice project if I had 2 450's to work with.  Instead, I looked at the PRR drawings online and scratch built one with wood.  It's not as nice as yours but it works.  I think photos of it are on my "not quite a complete redo . . . " thread.  You have good skill sets Elliot.  Thanks for the tips.

Thanks Pennsynut! I had accumulated quite a few of the 450's for enterTRAINment at the Mall of America, so that was the easy part, digging them out after a quarter century. As for my skills, I used to build architectural models for a living, and have been doing trains seriously for more than 40 years. You pick things up along the way. I'll go check out your topic.