When you have 4 fans all in the same airflow, the pitch of the blades needs to increase with each fan. When you use all four fans with the same pitch, the three behind the first one aren't doing anything because the airflow is already up to the speed of the next fan. Each fan needs to do work in order to provide thrust to push the thing forwards. If you could 3D print your four fans with increasing pitch, every fan would contribute to making it go faster, Woof!
Perhaps also shape the intake side like a speed stack, so it can grab more air. Maybe also put a reversed cone on the back where the fast flowing air can drag in more ambient air to accelerate it. Like a rudimentary air multiplier.
Propellers aren't like wheels with perfect grip, increasing pitch could possibly improve performance, but all the propellers contributes in this case. At low speeds and low loads additional propellers might cause more drag than thrust, but in this case, feeding 100 V to 12 V motors, and even som undisclosed voltage, possibly even higher than 100 V, also accelerating from a standstill, that situation is very very far from an idealized idea of how a propeller works. Also, he had the second motor spin in the opposite direction, which turns the rotation of the air the first motor caused into directional thrust. That can actually improve efficiency compared to having just one propeller.
You should add stators too, i think. Rotors add spin as well as linear movement, stators (in a steam or gas turbine) turn that spin back into axial movement.
Please give us a link to the specific motors and upload this design to thingiverse for the dragster 😂. I’d love to have one of those whipping around on my or a club layout.
Love these style of videos Sam mate. Every now and again, a mad experiment is very welcome. I can see some thought and planning has gone into what you’ve achieved. Nice one.
personally i would suggest using larger loco wheels - eg steam loco wheels to give the larger turning radius which will help give you theoretical higher speeds, look at land speed road vehicles they always have large wheels
🤣🤣 You mad man LOL. Better start building a mini maglev with your amazing engineering skills and see how fast that can go hahah. 2000 mph at least we bet 🤣🤣 We just love your mad experiments 😄
All good fun Sam, but be careful....above 50v is considered dangerous to health. But most importantly you are using a variac which is a variable auto transformer...and is not isolating. This means one rail could easily be at mains potential and therefore potentially life threatening. Keep safe 👍
Hey Sam, after seeing your lastest loco its safe to say you are a master of 3d printing. Just a suggestion, what if you tried to 3d print some scenery or railway infrastructure?
Nice video. It might be good to consider Ohm's law, you don't double the power when you double the voltage over a given resistance, you quadruple the power when you double the voltage over a given resistance, as doubling the voltage makes the amperage double. So, as your motors represent a given resistance, the actual power changes with the square of the change in voltage. That means, increasing voltage from 12 to 100 volt increases the power almost 70 times, disregarding the increased losses in the conductors. And that is assuming other things, like that the connection is still maintained. So, if your speed doesn't increase much when you double the voltage, your system have some issue, and resolving that should help more than increasing power even further. As long as you're still accelerating, the fact that kinetic energy also increases with v² (the square of the velocity) means the increase in velocity should be the same as the increase in voltage, when disregarding friction and other aspects. But at low speeds the acceleration should be roughly the same as the increase in voltage. Aerodynamic drag typically have little influence in such speeds, but that also increases with v², but as velocity increase that means your fighting that increased drag of a longer distance in a given amount of time, which makes the power required to overcome drag increase more than v². But, at a few mph (true) speed drag typically have little influence. If you're going to push this further, which seems like a good idea, you might want to try a longer track, and measure if the speed still increases significantly at the end. Maybe try creating some downforce.
Oh yeah, maybe if you hide a motor and fan in those Walther’s tank cars you reviewed recently (and cut out the tank end caps) you’d have the fastest tank cars in ANY scale! 😄😄
you know, something that might be up your alley are slot car motors. ive seen readings to 50k rpm and above. they are also usually the same size and shape as those can motors in most model trains. i could only imagine how much power those would draw through the rails though. maybe some carbon brushes against the rails directly? thanks for the vid!❤
bet that dragster could do a lot better with some proper downforce and rubber allowing it to get the power down… but then it’s probably more of a model dragster than a model train
Hey Sam. I am noticing your camerawork is getting really good. You have picked a very good angle for your talking shots. And the lighting is perfect. Just Wow 👏 Keep having fun with your filming techniques 😂
Have you tried bullfrog snot to improve the traction? You'll probably have to apply it to the drive wheels and then have an extra axle just for the electrical pickup.
MEANWHILE on his second channel, Sam'sBubbleWrap... "Today we'll be testing the shock absorbing impact of the Riley 3822, which we all know to be exceptional in pop quality and surface integrity. I have these model trains set up to give it a good workout, so let's see how it stands up to some high-voltage impacts!" 🙂
Well, I'm impressed, and the upcoming November 5th celebrations suggest how this project could be taken a step further, as follows: Step 1: Visit your local dodgy-looking Fireworks Emporium. Best to extinguish all cigarettes before entering. Step 2: Ask for their most powerful, largest and really scary Rocket. Ignore the warning labels plastered all over it. Step 3: Carry it home. Avoid passing the local Police Station. Step 4: Manoeuvre Rocket up into your loft, carefully demolishing walls as necessary. Step 5: Glue Rocket to a handy HO scale loco. Mr Stephenson's iconic design seems appropriate... Step 6: Check that your House Insurance covers 'All Risks'. You can't be too careful, you know. Step 7: Collect together all available fire extinguishers, hoses, buckets of water etc. Safety First, remember... Step 8: Light the blue touch paper. Run! Step 9: Realise that the GoPros were not turned on to immortalise the results. Whoops. Step 9.5: Repeat from Step 1. That gives you a whole year to rebuild the house...
You need a bench power supply instead of using a non-isolated variac styel supply. This is extremely dangerous as you are not isolated from the mains power. The motors actually ran faster when the voltage dropped off when the pickups started arcing more. Also, I think the two motors were not synced with each other, and the fans were fighting each other, with a vortex being formed inside. It would likely run faster with 1 motor and only 2 fans. Stripping the tunnel off kind of lends some credence to the vortex issue I noticed in your dragster testing it was always derailing at the same point every time, so I feel it may have been the track causing the derailment rather than the wheels. The movement of the track would be more than the wobble of the wheels
One way to get a little extra speed from the propeller version is to hold the car in place until the props come up to speed. Take care if you're running at volts!
Sam, believe it or not, several early electric locos in America were built like your dragster, having lots and LOTS of wheels because of the low torque, They ran on the legendary Milwaukee Road.
Well done! Great video I've been waiting for a vid to come and its come! Keep up with the great content + videos. (You are also the only person i know who likes to risk there life, power bill and his trains for content!)
seeing the insulating fishplates makes me think it would be fun to have the polarity reversed on the other side of them, to both have a jet engine style of braking, and potentially to create a shuttle up-and-back demo layout
TREMBLIN' TRACKS, WHAT A SPECTACULARLY SPECTACULAR VIDEO STRAIGHT THROUGH FROM START TO FINISH DESPITE SOME ISSUES ON AN OFFICIALLY RADICAL SCORE OF EXACTLY 1OO/1OO JOTTED DOWN DIRECTLY OVER IN MY OWN OFFICIAL MENTALLY MADE SCOREBOOK FOR SURE!!!!
Sam, I think there is a significant possibility that you are a loony! Leaving that aside, the dragster should have been fitted with your pet hate - traction tyres. For sure you'd have had to devise an alternative way to pick up the power, but if you pop up to Santa Pod and watch real dragsters you'll notice that the rear tyres are basically made of chewing gum in order to get max traction and therefore acceleration. BUT, the real biggie you missed is that the track you are using at 16.5mm gauge is actually HO scale so you should base your speeds on multiplying by 87 and not 76.2. Great fun by the way.
You could do with a set of brakes to hold the thing on full power before releasing it. Similar to what pilots do if they've craned a few too many Americans on board... I'm fairly sure with your skills you coukd engineer something that'd do the job nicely. Though nothing springs instantly to my mind, I'm sure yours is a good deal more agile. :) P.S. apologies to any yankeedoodles reading this.
Not at all, I’m well familiar with high voltages and acted safely. I made multiple warnings throughout the video stating not to try this at home. Nothing irresponsible at all. Thanks for watching - Sam :)
Me watching mark robor:cool scientist channel funny jokes to Sams trains:you know i think sams trains is my favrite ytber why it mixes mad scientist experiments with model trains and some good comedy
You ought to make a flipbook with steam engine stickers on each square paper page. You need as many square paper sheets (quite small, not tiny) as you want to make the book, a pen or pencil to mark the numbers on each page, a clipboard clip and some funky steam engine and scenery stickers. You can try creating the stickers with a 3D printer. Create the flipbook however you want to, and give it a name: Sam's Trains Flipbook. Or any fitting name you think of. Clamp the pages in order together with the clipboard clip on the left hand side, and flip away. Try it.
Sam, I see you are working from the false assumption that scale speed is calculated simply by multiplying the real speed of the model by scale. The actual formula for calculating the scale speed of any model is as follows: scale speed (SS) = real speed (RS) / square root of scale (S). SS=RS/SQRT(S) This is the formula naval architects use to calculate the scale speed of ship hull models. It applies to all models. The final speed of your dragster was 15 mph. The square root of 1:76 scale is 0.1147. 15 mph divided by 0.1147 makes a scale speed of 130.76 mph. So, how fast would your model dragster have to travel to reach a scale speed of 1000 mph? That is calculated by multiplying the square root of scale with the speed of the full-size vehicle. In this case that would be 0.1147 x 1000 mph = 114,7 mph. Your teeny tiny dragster would actually have to reach that speed to hit the 1000 mph scale speed. Real life top fuel dragsters have only reached 338.94 mph (Guinness World Record 2022). So you see how insane a speed of 1000 mph really is. We may have to agree to disagree on how scale speed is calculated. Nevertheless, a very entertaining video. Thank you, take care!
No, that's definitely not right - 130mph would only make this about the same speed as Mallard's record breaking run.... looking at my footage, it's clearly much faster than that. I don't see the problem of multiplying the speed by the scale - 1 scale mile of track is 76x smaller than 1 real scale mile of track... so how could scale speed not be proportional to scale? Thanks for watching - Sam :)
@@SamsTrains I beg to differ. There are two types of "scale speed". The first is the type you have employed: If a real train takes one second to pass a distance, then a 1:76 train (to appear to be traveling the same speed) should also take one second to pass the distance, and therefore travel at speed / 76. However, the second "scale speed" is usually that which provides the most realistic performance, i.e. that speed where the scale model performs in a scale manner. This speed is found by muliplying "real" speed by one over the square root of the scale. In the above example, this would be 1/8.71 or 0.1147. A 1:76 train at 100 mph would perform like a real train at 871 mph. *This relationship is known as Froude's Number and is used in wind tunnel tests to obtain valid results from scale models.* If Froude's Number is applicable to model cars, boats and aeroplanes, why should model trains be exempt? We need to apply logic here.
Sam your crazy 100v for that oh no this is going to end badly for the turbo train and at 20:08 the TURBO TRAIN went extremely fast where you can't see it at all 🤯🤯🤯🤯🤯🤯🤯🤯🤯🤯🤯🤯🤯🤯🤯🤯🤯🤯
Wonderfully bonkers. Could you modify a Triang Hornby Battle Space Turbo Car? Might be worth remembering to wear insulating (vinyl?) gloves. Next step might be a wheeled variation on a Maglev?
Ok, challenge accepted! 🤣 But so we are measuring like for like, what was the actual track length and how did you measure the speed? Just by number of frames on high speed video? I can do that. But no way I'll be using that undisclosed voltage, I thought 100v was crazy! A great fun video Sam and I've gotta give it a go. It's ok I'm an adult and take full responsibility for my stupidity. 😁
I really thought we were gonna have to call it "The World's Fastest Model Train Car". ???Vs that got that thing that fast, I'm surprised it didn't fry your home. I'm glad it didn't cause that was very VERY FAST!😨🤯
Ah yes the mad scientist Mr. Sam's strains is back! Yes direct drive - remove all that stands between your wheels and POWEEEER. Very spectacular, so if there is a next time it will have to be on longer track and probably outside? Certainly can go faster, lighter materials, less solid frame (hexagons, triangles or what have you) higher rated motors, hobbyists have 12/24 as general use so there should be something in that range no doubt but there could be 42V as well. i imagine overclocking those could be fun. or at least scary.
I think your rail-racer needs some down force on the front wheels. You’ve got a spoiler in the back, but you need to counter-balance that with down force in front, like Formula-1 race cars. I suspect the crashes at the highest voltage were caused by it doing a pop-a-wheelie there near the middle of the track. But don’t worry, Sam. Even real (prototype) drag racers can be super unstable! 😊 Just do a YT search for Drag Race Crash. 😅
Good video, Sam. Very interesting. Re the dragster running at the higher voltages, I suspect your limiting factor is wheelspin. In this case you change from static friction between tire and rail to sliding friction, which would remain constant regardless of the wheels' rotational velocity. This would likely occur very early in the run since the weight of the vehicle is light, i.e. the normal reaction between wheel and rail would be low. This would possibly explain why you saw no speed improvement as the voltage and current increased. Maybe set up a funicular cog drive system using your fancy printers?🙂😀😁 (Pssst... btw, voltage goes across the motors and current goes through them)
Hi sam, love to see your inventions pushing the limits of modelling. Do you think an entirely self sufficient track cleaner would be possible? I know this must be the bane of many modellers existence. The dapol one is nice but not really abrasive enough if you ask me. I was just brain storming of building a grinder car with two spinning pads underneath, followed by dapol's car set to 'vacuum' mode followed by a tank car with cleaning cloth underneath, but it struck me that it was the kind of invention I feel you could take on. I don't mean to suggest but I would love to see you tackle it. sorry for the novel!
Just use N gauge and you will go twice as fast. I race slot cars and the strap motors used in the fastest class es develop about half a horse power and rev to 150,000 rpm on 12 volts, so put one of them in a chassis and it should beat your record easily. You would need to have some form of tyre on the wheels though otherwise it would sit there spinning them. Strap motors are expensive though and need a lot of amps. The latest development is using brushless motors from drones, modified to work with slot cars. They don't use much power and are rated by the revs per volt so an 8000kv will do 96,000 revs at 12 volts. You would need an ecom as well as they need 3 phase electric. An ecom costs about £50 depending on where you get it from and the motors are about £10 each from China although you would probably have to buy 4 to get them at that price. You then need to modify them as the shaft comes out the wrong end but it is easy to do. I've done several in the last 9 months. You can get higher rated ones which have been purpose made for slot cars but they are going for stupid money at the moment. 13,500kv for about 300 euros for instance. I know it's just fun but there isn't any such thing as scale speed really. 16mph is 16mph whatever size the object is.
Hey man ur awesome 100% mate I think you need to look at a brushless slotcar motor and esc on a crown and pinion or rubber band rear drive to one or both axles for us with some drag racing funny car aerodynamics! I know you're the man for the job please!!!
I think there is a limit on the dragster motors. I dont know the spec rotation per second max as designed, or how much past that you could reasonably go without frying it. I do wonder though about the wheel slippage. Any goo drag racer would tell you that areo is highly important. Being bith axles are powered....(I wonder if a half rotation difference between the two is also combating for dominance...) I would add a front downforce wing and a rear down force wing. Nothing extravengant. Just a flat panel above the front wheels and one above the cockpit. Just enough surface to provide enough downforce to keep the wheels engaged with the track. Imho. Lol This was loads of fun!
For the dragster, I'd ditch one of the motors. Drive only the front wheels, and use the back wheels for picking up power, that way you could run traction tyres on the driven wheels. Maybe run 2 rear axles just so it's only half the power through each pick up.
Have you considered model rocket engines? Back in the early 2000s I took part in a tv series called technogames (like robot olympics, made by the people who made robot wars). Our model rocket cars could reach 75miles per hour (true speed) in under a second
As mentioned already the pitch MUST be increased for each blade otherwise your wasting your time. Still , it’s fun to watch you over clocking the attempts 😊
The thing that does not get scaled is the properties of the air. This is always the problem with scale models the natural elements do not scale. So in the real world of model testing, for air reduced pressure and humidity chambers are used, for water it replaced with lower surface tension fluids. etc.. Your dragster would be suffering from imbalance from any imperfections in is wheel structure, mounting or machining. The only way is to make wheels from solid rolled bar. The power pickups need also run on a smooth surface. Any arcing will cause pitting of the surface.
Looks like Sam's going to have a jet powered crash tender armed with C02 following his sparking record breaking engines. Shame it is scale speed and you cant hear it go through the sound barrier!
I think the direct drive unit could go faster by shaving the weight off wheels and chaise, Using Aerodynamics to push down on the Body to keep it planted to the track about a 15 degree slant from front to the back . It look like a wedge on wheels!
Maybe you should go and film offsite, find a long hallway somewhere that you can set up a much longer track, and then try the dragster on that. Alternatively, you might get something out of giving the dragster some down force to reduce wheel slip.
I did the same thing with a hairdryer turbine fan/motor combo duct taped and wired to a lighted model passenger train. The model train went so fast it flew off the track.❤
1) take the passenger off of the front. It’s ruining your airflow 2) you ruined the fan efficiency by taking off the top half of the duct. Ducted fans need fully ducted and with a very tight tolerance between the blade tips and the ducting for maximum efficiency. With that fixed and thicker gauged pickup wire it will go much much faster.
have a look at rc aircraft motors these are 3 phase ac ad use an onboard driver that converts dc to 3 phase ac include a small lipo battery to fill in power disruptions a ducted fan unit intended for models of jets would be much safer these push model aircraft to over 100 kph or 60 mph. perhaps a longer outdoor track would be better suited and safer anyway this is all good fun
I reckon that the turbo train might have been running into a problem that actual turbines run into, which is having fan after fan actually decreases efficiency which is why they have a static set of blades between each set, Granted that's for fans being moved by the air and not fans moving air, but I do think something similar might have been happening on the initial tests,
I would have considered using an inverted cone on exhaust of fans then airflow would have been compressed and accelerated similar to jet engines with variable efflux and afterburner feathers
Time to start taking these experimental trains outside. A longer run would be better, and soon will be needed. Fun fact, you did break the sound barrier, in scale.
Couldn’t you get a longer piece of straight track running it outside down the garden or driveway? Great little machines; I felt they needed a bit more time to reach their ultimate speed?
Use neodymium magnet to keep the vehicle on the track, shape the body like an inverted wing, and use a model rocket engine.this necessitates using it outside though...
I assume you are calculating the distance on the track not the distance on the tape measure, the distance between the two means the track distance is greater than the distance on the tape measure... good news is this means the speed is greater.
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When you have 4 fans all in the same airflow, the pitch of the blades needs to increase with each fan. When you use all four fans with the same pitch, the three behind the first one aren't doing anything because the airflow is already up to the speed of the next fan. Each fan needs to do work in order to provide thrust to push the thing forwards. If you could 3D print your four fans with increasing pitch, every fan would contribute to making it go faster, Woof!
Perhaps also shape the intake side like a speed stack, so it can grab more air. Maybe also put a reversed cone on the back where the fast flowing air can drag in more ambient air to accelerate it. Like a rudimentary air multiplier.
Propellers aren't like wheels with perfect grip, increasing pitch could possibly improve performance, but all the propellers contributes in this case. At low speeds and low loads additional propellers might cause more drag than thrust, but in this case, feeding 100 V to 12 V motors, and even som undisclosed voltage, possibly even higher than 100 V, also accelerating from a standstill, that situation is very very far from an idealized idea of how a propeller works.
Also, he had the second motor spin in the opposite direction, which turns the rotation of the air the first motor caused into directional thrust. That can actually improve efficiency compared to having just one propeller.
You should add stators too, i think.
Rotors add spin as well as linear movement, stators (in a steam or gas turbine) turn that spin back into axial movement.
Possibly for the next dragster design, add some fins to provide downforce and weights
That was Brillant! 🎉 I'd love to see the dragster under normal power pulling rocket coaches up Gordon's hill
Please give us a link to the specific motors and upload this design to thingiverse for the dragster 😂. I’d love to have one of those whipping around on my or a club layout.
Nutty, but fun!
Great video. Could the driver have been causing a small amount of drag?
Love these style of videos Sam mate. Every now and again, a mad experiment is very welcome. I can see some thought and planning has gone into what you’ve achieved. Nice one.
01:03 You forgot to mention the most important thing you added: Painted-on flames. Everyone knows that flames always make things faster!
truer words were never spoken
Red color works even better :)
personally i would suggest using larger loco wheels - eg steam loco wheels to give the larger turning radius which will help give you theoretical higher speeds, look at land speed road vehicles they always have large wheels
And slower rotation too, less friction on the axle.
The melted blobs on the ends of wheel contacts may reduce the contact bounce (more wire mass at the end)
Sam is really a mad scientist when it comes to model trains, thats for sure
hahaha thank you! ;D
@@SamsTrainsYEAH, TRIAL & ERROR!!!!
Kind of like Victor Frankenstein, but with model trains.
I was just thinking it's lucky he's into model trains because he'd probably be a Bond supervillain if he wasn't.
Hi Sam, I love your wacky experiments. I can't help wondering how fast a Hornby 0-4-0 would go at 100 volts 😉
🤣🤣 You mad man LOL. Better start building a mini maglev with your amazing engineering skills and see how fast that can go hahah. 2000 mph at least we bet 🤣🤣 We just love your mad experiments 😄
All good fun Sam, but be careful....above 50v is considered dangerous to health. But most importantly you are using a variac which is a variable auto transformer...and is not isolating. This means one rail could easily be at mains potential and therefore potentially life threatening.
Keep safe 👍
Hey Sam, after seeing your lastest loco its safe to say you are a master of 3d printing. Just a suggestion, what if you tried to 3d print some scenery or railway infrastructure?
He did a small trolley for putting on his station! It would be nice to see more than that though!
Yes, for improving his layout.
Nice video. It might be good to consider Ohm's law, you don't double the power when you double the voltage over a given resistance, you quadruple the power when you double the voltage over a given resistance, as doubling the voltage makes the amperage double. So, as your motors represent a given resistance, the actual power changes with the square of the change in voltage.
That means, increasing voltage from 12 to 100 volt increases the power almost 70 times, disregarding the increased losses in the conductors. And that is assuming other things, like that the connection is still maintained.
So, if your speed doesn't increase much when you double the voltage, your system have some issue, and resolving that should help more than increasing power even further. As long as you're still accelerating, the fact that kinetic energy also increases with v² (the square of the velocity) means the increase in velocity should be the same as the increase in voltage, when disregarding friction and other aspects. But at low speeds the acceleration should be roughly the same as the increase in voltage.
Aerodynamic drag typically have little influence in such speeds, but that also increases with v², but as velocity increase that means your fighting that increased drag of a longer distance in a given amount of time, which makes the power required to overcome drag increase more than v². But, at a few mph (true) speed drag typically have little influence.
If you're going to push this further, which seems like a good idea, you might want to try a longer track, and measure if the speed still increases significantly at the end. Maybe try creating some downforce.
Is it possible to lay the track diagonally across the room? Corner to corner should be a longer distance. Love the dragster.
Fantastic vid sam, really enjoyed this! Those sparks off the wheels!
Oh yeah, maybe if you hide a motor and fan in those Walther’s tank cars you reviewed recently (and cut out the tank end caps) you’d have the fastest tank cars in ANY scale! 😄😄
you know, something that might be up your alley are slot car motors. ive seen readings to 50k rpm and above. they are also usually the same size and shape as those can motors in most model trains. i could only imagine how much power those would draw through the rails though. maybe some carbon brushes against the rails directly? thanks for the vid!❤
21:26 I hear by declare this model ("The worlds Fastest Rail mounted object that Sam has ever made") Award, lol
Cheers Jasper & Willow
hahaha thank you!!
bet that dragster could do a lot better with some proper downforce and rubber allowing it to get the power down… but then it’s probably more of a model dragster than a model train
Hey Sam. I am noticing your camerawork is getting really good. You have picked a very good angle for your talking shots. And the lighting is perfect. Just Wow 👏
Keep having fun with your filming techniques 😂
Have you tried bullfrog snot to improve the traction? You'll probably have to apply it to the drive wheels and then have an extra axle just for the electrical pickup.
Very well made video Sam! tho i have the feeling your next train is going to be rocket powerd at this point 😂
MEANWHILE on his second channel, Sam'sBubbleWrap... "Today we'll be testing the shock absorbing impact of the Riley 3822, which we all know to be exceptional in pop quality and surface integrity. I have these model trains set up to give it a good workout, so let's see how it stands up to some high-voltage impacts!" 🙂
Well, I'm impressed, and the upcoming November 5th celebrations suggest how this project could be taken a step further, as follows:
Step 1: Visit your local dodgy-looking Fireworks Emporium. Best to extinguish all cigarettes before entering.
Step 2: Ask for their most powerful, largest and really scary Rocket. Ignore the warning labels plastered all over it.
Step 3: Carry it home. Avoid passing the local Police Station.
Step 4: Manoeuvre Rocket up into your loft, carefully demolishing walls as necessary.
Step 5: Glue Rocket to a handy HO scale loco. Mr Stephenson's iconic design seems appropriate...
Step 6: Check that your House Insurance covers 'All Risks'. You can't be too careful, you know.
Step 7: Collect together all available fire extinguishers, hoses, buckets of water etc. Safety First, remember...
Step 8: Light the blue touch paper. Run!
Step 9: Realise that the GoPros were not turned on to immortalise the results. Whoops.
Step 9.5: Repeat from Step 1. That gives you a whole year to rebuild the house...
You need a bench power supply instead of using a non-isolated variac styel supply. This is extremely dangerous as you are not isolated from the mains power.
The motors actually ran faster when the voltage dropped off when the pickups started arcing more. Also, I think the two motors were not synced with each other, and the fans were fighting each other, with a vortex being formed inside. It would likely run faster with 1 motor and only 2 fans. Stripping the tunnel off kind of lends some credence to the vortex issue
I noticed in your dragster testing it was always derailing at the same point every time, so I feel it may have been the track causing the derailment rather than the wheels. The movement of the track would be more than the wobble of the wheels
One way to get a little extra speed from the propeller version is to hold the car in place until the props come up to speed. Take care if you're running at volts!
Surely, this is a measurement of acceleration?
Top speed needs a much longer track.
What about a loft extension? 😂😂😂
Looks like you gave away a future review of a locomotive, the box at the bubble rap was an MTH DCC ready locomotive
Sam, believe it or not, several early electric locos in America were built like your dragster, having lots and LOTS of wheels because of the low torque, They ran on the legendary Milwaukee Road.
Great video, Sam. I think on the last attempt, you need to create a downforce that will keep it on the rails.
Many thanks
Harry
Well done! Great video I've been waiting for a vid to come and its come! Keep up with the great content + videos. (You are also the only person i know who likes to risk there life, power bill and his trains for content!)
Wonderful video Sam. Are you calculating the speed at OO scale or HO scale?
Don't try this at home, next thing that happens power now gone, at your home😂
Great video sam those things were going fast! Wouldn’t want to get hit by one 😆
You did it! Over a thousand miles per hour! Way to go!
seeing the insulating fishplates makes me think it would be fun to have the polarity reversed on the other side of them, to both have a jet engine style of braking, and potentially to create a shuttle up-and-back demo layout
Hello, I love your British style, Hans from Germany!
Sam can’t get enough speed!! I actually have a massive straight on my layout so I could test it again if you want Sam!!😂
I appreciate the efforts here! I do slot car drag racing and they're fascinatingly fast, hitting 60mph in just under 60 feet.
Strongly suggest not using so many fans, stacking only increases static pressure not velocity
TREMBLIN' TRACKS, WHAT A SPECTACULARLY SPECTACULAR VIDEO STRAIGHT THROUGH FROM START TO FINISH DESPITE SOME ISSUES ON AN OFFICIALLY RADICAL SCORE OF EXACTLY 1OO/1OO JOTTED DOWN DIRECTLY OVER IN MY OWN OFFICIAL MENTALLY MADE SCOREBOOK FOR SURE!!!!
BUT, NONETHELESS, WELL DONE!!!
Good work Sam. What I would like to see is how fast can you get a loco to run on 12v, and still have a prototype profile.
Sam, I think there is a significant possibility that you are a loony! Leaving that aside, the dragster should have been fitted with your pet hate - traction tyres. For sure you'd have had to devise an alternative way to pick up the power, but if you pop up to Santa Pod and watch real dragsters you'll notice that the rear tyres are basically made of chewing gum in order to get max traction and therefore acceleration. BUT, the real biggie you missed is that the track you are using at 16.5mm gauge is actually HO scale so you should base your speeds on multiplying by 87 and not 76.2. Great fun by the way.
Try a firework powered train in your garden.
You could do with a set of brakes to hold the thing on full power before releasing it. Similar to what pilots do if they've craned a few too many Americans on board... I'm fairly sure with your skills you coukd engineer something that'd do the job nicely. Though nothing springs instantly to my mind, I'm sure yours is a good deal more agile. :)
P.S. apologies to any yankeedoodles reading this.
Sam, you are working with dangerous voltages. What you did is unsafe. An irresponsible viedo.
Not at all, I’m well familiar with high voltages and acted safely. I made multiple warnings throughout the video stating not to try this at home. Nothing irresponsible at all.
Thanks for watching - Sam :)
Who knows, Hornby may have been onto something, you need traction tires! Haha great video as always Sam!
Imagine if you were crazy enough to actually make a model train actually go 1000 miles an hour
Me watching mark robor:cool scientist channel funny jokes to
Sams trains:you know i think sams trains is my favrite ytber why it mixes mad scientist experiments with model trains and some good comedy
You ought to make a flipbook with steam engine stickers on each square paper page. You need as many square paper sheets (quite small, not tiny) as you want to make the book, a pen or pencil to mark the numbers on each page, a clipboard clip and some funky steam engine and scenery stickers. You can try creating the stickers with a 3D printer. Create the flipbook however you want to, and give it a name: Sam's Trains Flipbook. Or any fitting name you think of. Clamp the pages in order together with the clipboard clip on the left hand side, and flip away. Try it.
That's a very clever idea Kelly - I'll have to try that some time!!
Thanks for watching - Sam :)
You should have it run with ball bearings pressing on the underside of the railhead so it doesn’t fall off. That way, you can test it on curves.
Sam, I see you are working from the false assumption that scale speed is
calculated simply by multiplying the real speed of the model by scale.
The actual formula for calculating the scale speed of any model is as follows:
scale speed (SS) = real speed (RS) / square root of scale (S). SS=RS/SQRT(S)
This is the formula naval architects use to calculate the scale speed of ship hull models.
It applies to all models.
The final speed of your dragster was 15 mph.
The square root of 1:76 scale is 0.1147.
15 mph divided by 0.1147 makes a scale speed of 130.76 mph.
So, how fast would your model dragster have to travel to reach a scale speed of 1000 mph?
That is calculated by multiplying the square root of scale with the speed of the full-size vehicle.
In this case that would be 0.1147 x 1000 mph = 114,7 mph. Your teeny tiny dragster would actually
have to reach that speed to hit the 1000 mph scale speed. Real life top fuel dragsters have only
reached 338.94 mph (Guinness World Record 2022). So you see how insane a speed of 1000 mph really is.
We may have to agree to disagree on how scale speed is calculated.
Nevertheless, a very entertaining video. Thank you, take care!
No, that's definitely not right - 130mph would only make this about the same speed as Mallard's record breaking run.... looking at my footage, it's clearly much faster than that.
I don't see the problem of multiplying the speed by the scale - 1 scale mile of track is 76x smaller than 1 real scale mile of track... so how could scale speed not be proportional to scale?
Thanks for watching - Sam :)
@@SamsTrains I beg to differ.
There are two types of "scale speed". The first is the type you have employed:
If a real train takes one second to pass a distance, then a 1:76 train (to appear to be traveling the same speed) should also take one second to pass the distance, and therefore travel at speed / 76.
However, the second "scale speed" is usually that which provides the most realistic performance, i.e. that speed where the scale model performs in a scale manner. This speed is found by muliplying "real" speed by one over the square root of the scale. In the above example, this would be 1/8.71 or 0.1147. A 1:76 train at 100 mph would perform like a real train at 871 mph. *This relationship is known as Froude's Number and is used in wind tunnel tests to obtain valid results from scale models.*
If Froude's Number is applicable to model cars, boats and aeroplanes, why should model trains be exempt? We need to apply logic here.
You're nuts! 😂 Ya always know how to entertain to the absolute max!
That Thing Runs So Fast That Gordon Is Jealous.. Lol
That Turbo Engine Might Give The Passengers A Fair Fast, And Smooth Ride If Its Possible
Sam your crazy 100v for that oh no this is going to end badly for the turbo train and at 20:08 the TURBO TRAIN went extremely fast where you can't see it at all 🤯🤯🤯🤯🤯🤯🤯🤯🤯🤯🤯🤯🤯🤯🤯🤯🤯🤯
Wonderfully bonkers. Could you modify a Triang Hornby Battle Space Turbo Car? Might be worth remembering to wear insulating (vinyl?) gloves. Next step might be a wheeled variation on a Maglev?
Ok, challenge accepted! 🤣 But so we are measuring like for like, what was the actual track length and how did you measure the speed?
Just by number of frames on high speed video? I can do that. But no way I'll be using that undisclosed voltage, I thought 100v was crazy!
A great fun video Sam and I've gotta give it a go. It's ok I'm an adult and take full responsibility for my stupidity. 😁
I really thought we were gonna have to call it "The World's Fastest Model Train Car". ???Vs that got that thing that fast, I'm surprised it didn't fry your home. I'm glad it didn't cause that was very VERY FAST!😨🤯
The best thing was that you were able to stay serious most of the time. I was laughing most of the time when watching.
Ah yes the mad scientist Mr. Sam's strains is back!
Yes direct drive - remove all that stands between your wheels and POWEEEER.
Very spectacular, so if there is a next time it will have to be on longer track and probably outside?
Certainly can go faster, lighter materials, less solid frame (hexagons, triangles or what have you) higher rated motors, hobbyists have 12/24 as general use so there should be something in that range no doubt but there could be 42V as well. i imagine overclocking those could be fun. or at least scary.
I think your rail-racer needs some down force on the front wheels. You’ve got a spoiler in the back, but you need to counter-balance that with down force in front, like Formula-1 race cars. I suspect the crashes at the highest voltage were caused by it doing a pop-a-wheelie there near the middle of the track. But don’t worry, Sam. Even real (prototype) drag racers can be super unstable! 😊 Just do a YT search for Drag Race Crash. 😅
Good video, Sam. Very interesting. Re the dragster running at the higher voltages, I suspect your limiting factor is wheelspin. In this case you change from static friction between tire and rail to sliding friction, which would remain constant regardless of the wheels' rotational velocity. This would likely occur very early in the run since the weight of the vehicle is light, i.e. the normal reaction between wheel and rail would be low. This would possibly explain why you saw no speed improvement as the voltage and current increased. Maybe set up a funicular cog drive system using your fancy printers?🙂😀😁
(Pssst... btw, voltage goes across the motors and current goes through them)
Hi sam, love to see your inventions pushing the limits of modelling. Do you think an entirely self sufficient track cleaner would be possible? I know this must be the bane of many modellers existence. The dapol one is nice but not really abrasive enough if you ask me. I was just brain storming of building a grinder car with two spinning pads underneath, followed by dapol's car set to 'vacuum' mode followed by a tank car with cleaning cloth underneath, but it struck me that it was the kind of invention I feel you could take on. I don't mean to suggest but I would love to see you tackle it. sorry for the novel!
Just use N gauge and you will go twice as fast.
I race slot cars and the strap motors used in the fastest class es develop about half a horse power and rev to 150,000 rpm on 12 volts, so put one of them in a chassis and it should beat your record easily. You would need to have some form of tyre on the wheels though otherwise it would sit there spinning them. Strap motors are expensive though and need a lot of amps. The latest development is using brushless motors from drones, modified to work with slot cars. They don't use much power and are rated by the revs per volt so an 8000kv will do 96,000 revs at 12 volts. You would need an ecom as well as they need 3 phase electric. An ecom costs about £50 depending on where you get it from and the motors are about £10 each from China although you would probably have to buy 4 to get them at that price. You then need to modify them as the shaft comes out the wrong end but it is easy to do. I've done several in the last 9 months. You can get higher rated ones which have been purpose made for slot cars but they are going for stupid money at the moment. 13,500kv for about 300 euros for instance.
I know it's just fun but there isn't any such thing as scale speed really. 16mph is 16mph whatever size the object is.
Hey man ur awesome 100% mate I think you need to look at a brushless slotcar motor and esc on a crown and pinion or rubber band rear drive to one or both axles for us with some drag racing funny car aerodynamics! I know you're the man for the job please!!!
BLIMEY!!!
You should try the dragracer on a continuous loop of sloped straight tracks, kind of like those "wall of death" motorbike circles but less inclined
I think there is a limit on the dragster motors. I dont know the spec rotation per second max as designed, or how much past that you could reasonably go without frying it.
I do wonder though about the wheel slippage. Any goo drag racer would tell you that areo is highly important. Being bith axles are powered....(I wonder if a half rotation difference between the two is also combating for dominance...) I would add a front downforce wing and a rear down force wing. Nothing extravengant. Just a flat panel above the front wheels and one above the cockpit. Just enough surface to provide enough downforce to keep the wheels engaged with the track.
Imho. Lol
This was loads of fun!
LOVE IT ! Great video. Fan blades at higher RPM may flex forward allowing more spill-off of "working" air. More blade pitch helpful ?
For the dragster, I'd ditch one of the motors. Drive only the front wheels, and use the back wheels for picking up power, that way you could run traction tyres on the driven wheels. Maybe run 2 rear axles just so it's only half the power through each pick up.
Have you considered model rocket engines? Back in the early 2000s I took part in a tv series called technogames (like robot olympics, made by the people who made robot wars). Our model rocket cars could reach 75miles per hour (true speed) in under a second
you'll end up working for an f1 team...surely....if you want that of course...cheers and well done Sam...
As mentioned already the pitch MUST be increased for each blade otherwise your wasting your time. Still , it’s fun to watch you over clocking the attempts 😊
The thing that does not get scaled is the properties of the air. This is always the problem with scale models the natural elements do not scale. So in the real world of model testing, for air reduced pressure and humidity chambers are used, for water it replaced with lower surface tension fluids. etc.. Your dragster would be suffering from imbalance from any imperfections in is wheel structure, mounting or machining. The only way is to make wheels from solid rolled bar. The power pickups need also run on a smooth surface. Any arcing will cause pitting of the surface.
Looks like Sam's going to have a jet powered crash tender armed with C02 following his sparking record breaking engines. Shame it is scale speed and you cant hear it go through the sound barrier!
I think the direct drive unit could go faster by shaving the weight off wheels and chaise, Using Aerodynamics to push down on the Body to keep it planted to the track about a 15 degree slant from front to the back . It look like a wedge on wheels!
Hi Sam, I love your wacky experiments. I can't help wondering how fast a Hornby 0-4-0 would go at 100 volts 😉
Great vid Sam. Just for fun, add a bit more weight to the dragster?
Regards, Jas.
VK4FJGS
Rocky Qld.
Maybe you should go and film offsite, find a long hallway somewhere that you can set up a much longer track, and then try the dragster on that. Alternatively, you might get something out of giving the dragster some down force to reduce wheel slip.
Now Sam is in dragsters too .....I love dragsters for the power n acceleration they produce.....n speed too
I did the same thing with a hairdryer turbine fan/motor combo duct taped and wired to a lighted model passenger train. The model train went so fast it flew off the track.❤
1) take the passenger off of the front. It’s ruining your airflow
2) you ruined the fan efficiency by taking off the top half of the duct. Ducted fans need fully ducted and with a very tight tolerance between the blade tips and the ducting for maximum efficiency.
With that fixed and thicker gauged pickup wire it will go much much faster.
You have a Variac? The only other time I've seen one of those was on a channel called PhotonicInduction. he destroyed things with crazy high voltage.
have a look at rc aircraft motors these are 3 phase ac ad use an onboard driver that converts dc to 3 phase ac include a small lipo battery to fill in power disruptions a ducted fan unit intended for models of jets would be much safer these push model aircraft to over 100 kph or 60 mph. perhaps a longer outdoor track would be better suited and safer anyway this is all good fun
I reckon that the turbo train might have been running into a problem that actual turbines run into, which is having fan after fan actually decreases efficiency which is why they have a static set of blades between each set,
Granted that's for fans being moved by the air and not fans moving air, but I do think something similar might have been happening on the initial tests,
Sam you just keep smashing your own record! 🫡😆
Nice. The track is 1:87 scale rather than 1:76 - not sure if this boosts your times but gauge for gauge it's rapid!
Wonder what 2024 is gonna bring. I was thinking why not try out one of those model jet engines. However that seems a tad too flammable.
Please could you do this again, but with it pulling, I don't know, some Dapol egg vans, perhaps?
Imagine a model train that could go 100mph real speed, that would be truly impossible, definitely not at oo gauge
I would have considered using an inverted cone on exhaust of fans then airflow would have been compressed and accelerated similar to jet engines with variable efflux and afterburner feathers
Time to start taking these experimental trains outside. A longer run would be better, and soon will be needed. Fun fact, you did break the sound barrier, in scale.
You need to do a course in aerodynamics. It’s not all about voltage, it’s about the blades and airflow. Just turn up the blade pitch.
Couldn’t you get a longer piece of straight track running it outside down the garden or driveway? Great little machines; I felt they needed a bit more time to reach their ultimate speed?
In other news... Model Railroader Sam's Trains built a hyperloop model.
Use neodymium magnet to keep the vehicle on the track, shape the body like an inverted wing, and use a model rocket engine.this necessitates using it outside though...
Still not as fast as a triang dock shunter at full bore.......i would like to see if an exhaust duct tapering down would increase thrust
I assume you are calculating the distance on the track not the distance on the tape measure, the distance between the two means the track distance is greater than the distance on the tape measure... good news is this means the speed is greater.