Monorail Ideas

Hmmm, that is interesting. My first thought is that a monorail needs to go through something, like a building or earthen structure. Also it seems easier to integrate monorail into existing sets displays if it is elevated.

We have had some custom designed monorails in the LUG, mostly space I think … and there is a winter-themed one. If you search the threads for monorail, you might find them.

With the LEGO monorail design you are kind of locked into a really long vehicle that bends in the middle, no? If you are not committed to a town theme, this would be a good design for a caterpillar crawling through a garden … or a jungle … or a zoo.

– just throwing out ideas, @tfdesigns probably has more ideas but is Febru-buried in another project right now

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Great to see another monorail fan in the club! You’ll find monorail is a flexible system and extremely fun.

Here are a few space themed ideas based on my own builds or experiments:
* Inclined plane – monorail can operate on a 45° angle. I used a single monorail base with a boat weight and had the motor pushing. Stop/go switched on either end allow it to run continuously.
* Robot – Using just a monorail motor, the motor cover, and battery box. I mounted the battery box across the track longways, added arms, and a cockpit on top. Probably some pics on the forum somewhere (displayed at PBF ’18 or ’19).
* 60’s style bullet nose train – I built a spacey one modeled on that look. Dubbed it the Thunderbolt, also on the forums somewhere.
* Centercab train – built a cab on top the engine cover and added gondola style hoppers on either end. Displayed this many times so there’s bound to be a pic on Flickr or the forums.
* Monorail rail cars – monorail bogeys can be detached from the based and mount well on Technic plates. I’ve built a number of spacey cars using those based and magentic couplers. Be careful to articular the bogeys and couplers properly if you want to navigate switches and curves with ease.
* Rocket launching train
* Food truck themed train (always wanted to do this one, but haven’t taken the time)
* Space farm automated watering system – mount booms with sprinkler heads off the engine and push a car with battery box and tank
* Undersea (Seatron) monorail
* Mobile orbital defense laser

For collaborative builds most people do Town so here are a few ideas for that:
* Firefighting monorail
* Car hauler (like a ferry)
* Canal connector hauling boats (like the Portage Railroad of local historic game)

Some fantasy ideas:
* Jousting knights
* Sea serpent

Unfortunately I don’t have pictures of many (any?) of my builds on this phone, but many of them are on the forums or club Flickr.

Keep in mind that you needn’t be constrained to the traditional monorail base. You can build your own cars and integrate with the motor via its studs, just treat it as a bogey that doesn’t have built-in articulation. You can use a PF battery box if you have the converter cable (I think I had an IR receiver working with one of my monorail trains). Have fun with it!

Jiminy Crickets! That’s from 1989? Who was doing LEGO displays like that in 1989? Inconthievable!!!

Back in the 80’s there was no bricklink, no LEGO store, no eBay, no internet. This architect was buying sets from ToysRUs or bricks through the LEGO catalog, 100 pieces per bag!

In a separate LUG thread, someone else posted today about getting parts for a location in Bellvue. Perhaps your surplus brick could go there.

Regardless, what a find! Were any of the buildings still intact? You’ll need to have your own Western PA model train museum … right across the street. 🙂

I’d estimate these are about five years old. Here’s an automatic block signalling system I experimented with a few years ago. It worked very well, but I didn’t have a permanent layout at the time and didn’t work on miniaturizing it.

And a simple train outdoors.

Here is a tanker transloading facility.

And an ore hauler car (the couplers didn’t work as well as I would have liked).

LegoDude, this is a real Wunderland. It’s more vertical than anything our LUG has done in a display this large. It is a massive asset and the sort of display we aspire to.

What do you plan to do with it all?

• This reply was modified 3 years, 9 months ago by Tom Frost.

I had a neighbor who was retired and was a member of the WPARRM. I made this suggestion about LEGO at the train museum about 15 years ago and he asked my a whole bunch of questions including who would sit there and monitor the display whenever the museum was open.

I have a decent size monorail that I got for Christmas as a kid and luckily 2 extra track kits. However Something I always wanted to do but still not enough track with my city layout would be a roller coaster like monorail. Something like space mountain for example. Built a half dome of a mountain (would need a ton of big ugly rock pieces too) with some caves that you can see it from the front side pass by. Then the back is all open and can see the whole set up. As someone else said these with run at a 45 degree angle so could be interesting.