# Rotary snowplow



## Cap'nBill (Dec 27, 2008)

Thought I'd throw these pics up, might provide some ideas for someone thinking about building one. I've started with a piece of rectangular floor vent from Lowe's, a geared motor from one of my old electric RC planes (Master Airscrew gearbox), and a vacuum cleaner blade slightly turned down. The motor can work off track power(tested this way), or could be on a battery pack and RC controlled. At this point don't know how I'll go. I'll solder on a discharge chute, brace the housing later, and use an old 'boose or boxcar body. The frame is what's left of a Bachmann tender. Sound would be great too! Bill


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## Torby (Jan 2, 2008)

I think, even if track powered, that you want to power the blade by a battery so it'll be going full bore as you slowly push it into a big snow drift.


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## Ron Senek (Jan 2, 2008)

Track power and metal frame don't mix.


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## Jerry Barnes (Jan 2, 2008)

Good point Ron. I'm using track power on my rotary, but have a plastic housing. Was gonna have some brass scrapers, so glad you posted that. Darn, had them bent already. I'll just have a gap in them so if both touch the rails at the same time it would not matter. Battery for the rotor motor is very necessary to spin it as fast as you can. Ron advised me to use 18 volts into my 12 volt drill motor and it was a good idea. I have some pix posted of my rotary in the modeling forum here, might look it over.


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## San Juan (Jan 3, 2008)

Go for battery/RC control over track power.

When conditions are right to plow, they are rarely right for track power. 


Ice on the rail heads is a real pain with track power. And it is a lot easier to increase the plow blade speed if it is not using track power. Otherwise if you try increasing the blade speed with track power, your pushing locos (if also on track power) will be going too fast for any effective plowing. That is if you don't hit any rail ice losing your track power connection.

Pretty easy to make a plow battery/RC controlled. Instead of hooking up the batteries to truck motors, hook it up to your plow blade motor. If it's on RC then increase the throttle to increase blade speed. And you can even change the discharge direction by reversing the polarity (changing the RC direction).


The only other advice I would give is to try and find a metal vacuum or similar blade. Metal cuts through hard snow a lot easier then plastic.


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## Cap'nBill (Dec 27, 2008)

Good points, all! My 'master' plan is to add some brass wings, plastic on the bottom, using piano hinge to finish out the front. I'd like to make some scale looking blades to put in front of the vaccum blade. I was watching a VHS movie called 'Choo-Choo Trains' I picked up for the grandkids, had some nice shots of the front of a working rotary. I guess by your comments, speed is more important than torque in scaling down. Bottom line, I agree the RC/battery is the better solution. Couple of pics of my favorite model, think it was on eBay a year, or so ago.


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## San Juan (Jan 3, 2008)

Beautiful RGS rotary model.

We recently had our USA Trains rotary converted to battery/RC control. It even has phoenix sound. The rotary sounds add a lot. Not only does it have impressive chugging and other plow sounds, but tooting the "peanut" whistle for communication to the pushing locos is a lot of fun too.


We're looking forward to giving it a try at some powdery snow this year.


Back before we converted the rotary to battery power, we had little luck with track power. It kept dying on icy track. But it still looked neat:


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## Cap'nBill (Dec 27, 2008)

As with most 'scale' things, the sound effects really add a lot. The benefit in using an RC system would be to scale down the speed of the blade. In my case, it would just as neat to run one on our club layout, operating at a slower, scale-like speed. I keep trying to observe how the full-size blades worked. They appear to have hinged individual blades that somehow flex. While actual 'flex' may not be necessary for our purpose, a set of "V' shaped blades would look better......... Now, as to how to do it!


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## rwjenkins (Jan 2, 2008)

The point of the hinged V-shaped blades on the prototype is that they can change pitch of the blades to adjust for different snow conditions or change the direction of throw. I imagine on a working model, strength is more important than having adjustable blades, but they can certainly be made to look more to scale than a vacuum impeller.


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## Cap'nBill (Dec 27, 2008)

I was watching a You-Tube video clip of a rotary they were doing a short demo on. As it slowed down, the hinged V blades were 'collapsing' on themselves, making a pretty clunky sound. Looks as though the centrifigal force flattens them out. Wish I could find some drawings, or something. I got the idea if I take some smallish brass hinges....or cut up some piano hinge.... I could make some fairly scale looking blades. cutting them down to tapered 'windmill' shape will take a little time but worth the effort, I think. Whether the 'cleaner' blade would add, or even be necessary, behind the scale blades, remains to be seen.


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