Have any of you ever put electric lights in your scenes?

I am planning on putting electic lights down a runway, and inside the hanger buildings on my dio. I hope it will look great at night.

any ideas?

BTW I am building a "area 51" dio during the testing of the F-117.

I was thinking about that myself.
i'm planning a large dio of several smaller dioplates and putting lights in some buildings that are occupied by soldiers but we will see how it will gonna be like making buildings with electric wire in them

In the Hanger the little "blips" are lights. This is the old Revell hanger, it came with lights to be installed. You can't see then real well in this daylite photo but they are there. They're just "pixie lights" you can pick up at your local Model Train Supplier, couple of AA batteries power them. Good luck on your lights.

The Sturmtiger that I just fininshed has an interior light to allow the inside detail to be seen. I used a bulb from a mini Maglight and it worked great. There is a button on the base that the person pushes to light the inside, when it's released the light turns off.

If I was going to put lights into a runway type scene i'd look into fiber optics..

these are very thing wire like tubes that allow light to flow through it like a pipe..

A good place to get em on the cheap is off an old fiber optic christmas tree..

the advantage here is instead of haveing a ton of lights wired up for a runway.. you have one bulb shinning into one end of the fiber optic tube.. and the light coming out along the runway where you want it.... and if you want the lights in a specific color such as red all you have to do is put a peice of clear red plastic in front of the fiber optics to get that color..

I've not done a dio with fiber optics but I once helped a friend do up a starship enterprize that had the windows lighted with em..

One advice : Mind your safety !

- Work with batteries or a power transformer, don't work with bulbs directly on the electricity net.

It might look as a stupid advice, but I've seen people do strange things with electricity.

Well Said Danny , On my job I too have seen some crazy things done with electricity,. We have to consider any heat concerns as well as electrocution. Fiber optics would be a great choice, great for our small applications.


Bruce

Good point Eagle. 2 AA batteries power the light in my tank. Too bad I diden't have enough brains to make the bulb accessable in case it blew out (it did)

My wife has a bunch of Department 56 houses and lights for a Christmas display....the lights work off batteries or AC adapters and seem to be ideal for some things like modelling.

I'd go the Fiber Optics route...

I started building an Airfix Puma chopper with the intention of leaving the cabin doors open and using Fiber Optics as a light source.

Fiber Optics don't create heat, so don't worry about your model melting or something like that

You should be able to pick them up at any Radio Shack

Cougar

For the runway, I vote with previous posts suggesting multiple fibers driven by a single source. Readily available fiber comes in diameters of 0.25mm, 0.5mm, 0.75mm and so on. The bending radius is proportional to diameter, so to realize a thin tarmac I suggest you experiment with different sizes before committing. That is, if you are going 1/48 and want to make the runway lights to scale, I figure the fiber would be several mm thick and these can be downright stiff. My initial thought was drilling perpendicular holes but this would mean 90 degree bends to bring all the fibers to a common point. So depending on the type of runway lights you are modeling, the fibers can come in parallel under the surface and just bend up a few degrees to poke thru at an angle. Experiment with cutting, shaping, and polishing fiber tips with fine grit to increase lateral light projection. An often overlooked advantage of fiber is each tip can be painted to become the modeled lens itself rather than adding polished sprue or whatever.

A single flashlight bulb can easily illuminate dozens of fibers. I assume you are planning for all lights on at once. If you’re thinking of a runway ‘rabbit’ for low visibility landings where the lights run a chase pattern like a theater marque, then that’s a different discussion! Has anyone done this?

A previous post about using xmas tree fiber strands is clever. Or, try fiberopticproducts.com where you can buy by the foot. For example, 0.25mm fiber is 7 cents/ft, 0.5mm is 8 cents/ft, etc.. Most suppliers including above sell bundles of fiber that have a jacket or sleeve over dozens of fibers. This can drive your per foot cost way down if the bundle contains the size you want.

I like the posted suggestion of using 3V or low-voltage. Then, the source can be a flashlight bulb type using 2 x 1.5V batteries. Radio Shack sells 2-cell battery holders (AA, C, etc.) and compatible switches.

As for the hanger, I figure the real one has hundreds of lights. I assume you aren’t that ambitious? IMO the lighting needs to be brighter than the runway to evenly light up the plane. Perhaps you can comment on what effect you are trying to achieve. In addition to end-glow fiber which transfers the light from tip to tip, there are acrylic rods that emit along the tube. For example, modeling a long bank of 8 foot overhead fluorescent tubes to scale can be as simple as masking off every 8 feet to scale.

As for small incandescent bulbs, look for “grain of wheat” bulbs which are just what they sound like. Hobby shops carry them for $1 or more and are common in trains and dollhouses. They come in different voltages, including 3V. Heat can be a problem with incandescent bulbs. There are endless stories of model train passenger cars where overhead bulbs deform the plastic shells – foil reflectors are standard. Another technique is to run a bulb at lower than its rated voltage. While dimmer, bulb life is extended which can be an overlooked practicality in modeling.

Finally, light-emitting-diodes (LEDs) and electroluminescent or EL strips (imagine of a stick of gum that glows) are two more common modeling light types. EL panels themselves are used for formation lights on jets. No need to repeat what others have extensively posted about, except that LEDs can be extremely thin, bright, and low power point sources. 1 mm thick LEDs are fairly practical to work on par with 1/48 scale cockpit detailing. Most white LEDs have a blue-ish tint sort of like discharge headlights in modern cars. I was thinking this can give your hangar a more modern look – considering your subject matter that is. EL panels can make interesting illuminated signs for your hangar walls. LEDs and EL lights have implementation details that can be discussed separately if you get to that point - I’ve probably tripped the long-winded alarm as it is…

Stan

Well the runway has been scrapped. My board is 4 *4 and my hanger is 2 *2! I bought about 10 different types of christmas lights at walmart today for 4 dollars so i will see how it goes. It may not be the safest thing but I will only have them on temporarily and unplug them when not in use.

I will probably take some pictures today and try to post them in the near future.

One strand has 100 little lights on it. I will first tape them to the roof of the hanger....see how well that lights up the floor.....If its adequate I will drill 100 holes in the roof and poke them all through individually. They will be hidden from view unless someone pokes their head in through the hanger door and looks up! I would hope that noone gets that close!!

I am also going to have two larger lights on the outside lighting a paved staging area right outside the hanger.