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Creating N Scale Utility Poles

Written by Ian MacMillan

Friday, 28 April 2006

Telephone poles are another staple of New England. The ground is way too rocky, and the winters too harsh, to really try and place all utilities underground, so with poles we are stuck. Making realist poles from real wood can be easy, even for N scalers.

Materials List
- Q-Tip wooden applicators (Found at Radio Shack in the computer cleaning section)
- Minwax Golden Oak Stain
- Elmers Glue
- India Ink
- Berkshire Junction "EZ-Line"
- Black button thread.
- Scale ruler
- Awl
- Liquid Super Glue
- Alligator Clips

That's pretty much all that you need for this project.

Typical New England Utility Pole

Begin by researching the line poles in your area. Here in New Hampshire most roadside line poles are 40' tall, about 80' - 100' feet apart and about 10' from the edge of the roadway. Generally there is an upper primary, a lower, and then your phone and cable wires about 10' below the top of the pole. Most primary wires are taut, while the phone and cable tend to have some sag due to their weight. You will also find junction boxes and transformers on certain poles.

Figure 1

Figure 1 shows a typical house install. A signal primary wire, phone, and cable run from the pole to the conduit located on the outside wall. The power will run to the outside meter, while the phone and cable will run into exterior junction boxes.

To model the poles, begin by cutting the cotton swab tip off of the wooden applicators. Using Minwax Golden Oak stain (I prefer the kind in the stain pen) stain a group of the applicators. Once the stain is dry, give the applicators a wash of India ink. This will help to tone down the gloss, and highlight the details. Try adding several applications of the India ink at the base of the pole to darken it like real poles.

Take your scale ruler and use an awl to punch holes into the scenery so that you can plant your poles. Place a small amount of white glue into the hole and install your poles. Again using your scale ruler, make sure that the pole is at the right height. Wait for the glue to fully cure.

The poles I made do not have crossarms because they are rural poles. If you would like to add cross arms to yours, I would suggest using strip wood, and stain them like the poles. Begin by installing your primary power wires using the Berkshire Junction EZ-Line. Using an alligator clip, position your EZ-Line where you would like it, and then clamp it with the alligator clip. Once clamped, place a spot of super glue on the EZ-Line. Once it sets, remove the clamp, and stretch the line to the next pole. Position the EZ-Line so that it is in the same spot on the new pole as on the first, and add a drop of super glue. Continue on down the line, completing all your poles.

Typical line setup

Next you will want to add your phone and cable lines. For these lines you will use button thread. Try to get thread that has a tight wind so that there is little fuzz. Attach the thread to the poles in the same way as you did with the EZ-Line. Phone/Cable lines are heavier than primary power wires, so make sure that you add a little sag between poles. Phone/Cable lines are generally close together, so your 2nd string should be about a scale 1' below the first Phone/Cable wire.

Since I could not find N scale transformers, I decided to use trash cans painted silver left over from DPM kits. You could use styrene rod painted silver if you wanted also. Mount the transformers to the poles using super glue at locations where there will be a drop to a house or business. Mount the transformer towards the top of the pole by the primary wires. At this time you can also install small rectangles of styrene to represent phone junction boxes.

The finished scene

You can install cast metal meters on your buildings, or you can attach the incoming lines directly to the eves of the building if you prefer. Install a single Phone/Cable wire from button thread, and a power wire from EZ-Line from the pole, to the building. Since N scale is so small you may not be able to make the lines coming from the transformer look like they are actually coming from it, like you can in HO. Carefully gluing them to the underside of the transformer looks fine in N scale.

And that is pretty much it. String up all of your buildings, and add some additional details like guy wires (using EZ-Line) or push poles if you prefer, and enjoy your newly detailed scene.

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