Working street lamps...

On a layout as stripped back as Beaverbrook one of the signature elements are the parallel row of street lights I need to include along the front edge of the layout...

Although working wasn't originally the plan, through conversation with Chris about the Ballard and Wantage it struck me that it would be neat if they could be made to actually light up. The stumbling block all along was the nature of the prototype lamps. They appeared to be a thin metal arm and lamp head mounted on a thicker post, possibly wood, and I had struggled to find anything suitable other than some £30ea plus discontinued lamps from Atlas, scratch building it would need to be!

When I was wiring up the CF7 last year I blew one of the original filament bulbs and I had bought some LEDs that said they would work on 1.5v (of course, they didn't) but they'd sat idle in my electronics box. These were 2mm x 1.5mm SMD with leads pre-wired onto the back. Taking one out I checked the wire diameter... a touch over 0.25mm diameter... which suggested that I could probably find some suitable thin tube for the arm that would allow one of the wires to pass down the inside. A search on Eileen's (other suppliers are available!) and I found all the materials I would need (detailed below).

This is not new, it is not rocket science, I'm sure it's been done many times before! That said, when I searched on Google, on forums, on Facebook even, I could not find anything written about how it was done, and the materials used - even to suggest it could be done at all! This post is a marker for the internet, so show others that with a steady hand and calm nerves it can be done!

Hopefully the photo here, and video above, go far enough in explaining the simple techniques and materials involved. I didn't use a special soldering iron, just a standard Antex 25W with normal tip. I used some 180deg solder and liquid flux though, rather than electrical solder. It all worked as planned, and now I need to draw up a template and fabricate a set of them for Beaverbrook, it will be interesting to see if they generate enough light for night time operation. Until then, more soon…