Representing Brake Gear - More Art Than Science

[iandrewmartin]

The finest chain that I've been able to locate is 40 links per inch, at least twice as large as it should be...perhaps even three times as large as chain that would be to-scale.

I usually get it from Detail Associates, but I'm not sure if that company is even still extant.  I did find some on-line last year and got three feet of the same chain for only a couple of bucks.  I wish now that I'd bought more, but I have at least 5' or 6' of it on-hand, and not a lot of rolling stock yet to be built - five 40' single sheathed automobile cars and a number of wood-sheathed head-end cars to scratchbuild, and a few Train Miniature cars to work-over a bit.  I have a bunch of hoppers to do, too, but they won't likely require any chain.
I'd also like to build a few specialty cars for MoW service, but they'll have to wait until my backlog of locomotive conversions is cleared-up.

Wayne

Wayne;

I have some chain that I bought a while back. I have thought though of buying model ship chain. That seems to be about right for some of the smaller scales. Looking on AliExpress this morning I found this seller and they have chain as small as 1.6mm (0.063 thou) x 2mm (0.079 thou). You can see that page here and they ship for free to Aus too. And for 3 metres of the stuff for $15 AU, I figure that it is very cheap considering that I'd need only a few links per car.

You can see that seller's offering here if you are interested. 

Also, there is this seller who has 1:700 scale anchor chain available.

So, there are a couple of options out there. And these might also work for tie-down chains as well. Just a thought.

All the best and talk to you later on. Back to building some small scale deep space vessels for a change.