Currently I’m building a small pillar type crane for my Cliffside Mine. It’s mostly brass and a few other metal parts. The boom is made from 1:48 scale nickle-silver rail. The sheave (pulley wheel) on the end of the boom was built up from a pair of small washers and some bits of telescoping brass tube.
I’ve never done much work with metal before, but so far this is turning out to be quite enjoyable. The most I’d done previously was when I built the “wood” frame of my hoist house out of brass.
I’m also using a few non-metal parts, such as nylon gears for the winch. Some of these came from my old printer. For the largest gear on the winch, I used my dremel to carve spokes out of the nylon gear.
This crane is actually much more elaborate than I’d originally planned but I really like the looks of it. It’s based on photos I found online of a 1:48 scale model being sold in Australia. I don’t have any dimensions, I’m just eyeballing it.
I’ll post pics when I get some.