THE POLAR EXPRESS
There are members of my family who live on a Christmas Court in Fulsom California. Christmas Courts are not that uncommon and if you've never experienced one, it's a great way to see Chrismas celebrated in an over-the-top way. It's an outdoor thing and every few years, the decorations and lights wear out from exposure to the wind and rain and need to be replaced. Some of my familys decorations are is at that point so I decided he help them with this years' replacements.
One of my current favorite Christmas movies is The Polar Express with Tom Hanks. So as soon as I got home from Christmas 2025, I started working on this as my next project.
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The Pare Marquette 2-8-4 steam locomotive was the basis for the train in the movie and I have attached some a stock photograph of what she looks like
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I decided to make some slight changes based on the size of the train I could fit into the yard I have to work with.
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The Pare Marquette 2-8-4 steam locomotive was the basis for the train in the movie and I have attached some a stock photograph of what she looks like
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I decided to make some slight changes based on the size of the train I could fit into the yard I have to work with.
​Since I have Solidworks and a decent working knowledge of mechanisms, I CADded up a passable version of the Express and then went about building it.
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With recent additions of two new 3d printers (one filament and one resin) I have the capability to create larger, more complex and more accurate parts.
​​I decided to make some slight changes to the train based on the size of the track I could fit into the yard. ​
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I wanted a locomotive around 2 feet long and that meant about 4" track guage. For a 2-8-4 configuration, that would have meant a minimum curve radius of around 10 ft. I changed the configuration to a 2-6-4 and got the minimum radius down to 6 ft.
The final touches which are being worked on are real smoke from the smokestack and lights inside the cairrages and caboose. Lighting will be by LED strips inside th cars powered directly from the 12v batter which runs the locomotive.
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Smoke is via a handheld smoke effects generator adapted to pump smoke out the smokestack.
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Stay tuned for updates and more videos!