2009 August 19

2009 August 19

 Now that I am finding the defects the shine is starting to wear off a little though!
I am starting to agree with the kiddies on Rail Page.. Maybe the Y is still No1

The headlight is too bright and the light leaks through the plastic on the V/Line ones.
The Class lights go off with the headlight. That is just plain stupid!! The Class lights stay ON at night to locate a stopped locomotive. It can be fixed, but it will be a lot of extra work. I will take pictures as I do it.
My decoder has 6 functions. I will put the number lights at both ends on function 1.
The marker lights will be Function 2 and using Digitrax FX3 I can use the ditch lights feature and run them on all the time, rather than flashing or alternating. I should be able to wire two white number lights front and one red on the rear with a rear white as well, and reversing the engine changes ends for the ditch lights, so that should set the markers up nicely.
Now because I need to have two white forward and one red rear, I will have to use a diode to prevent reverse current, and connect the rear red across to the white on the other side (when running forward both whites would turn on and without the diode the red would light too. Another diode will prevent the white from feeding back as well. I think an easy circuit providing I have room to work inside the body.
I will have to cut the light tubes short and glue 0.8 mm sunny white LED's to each marker light. It is great that a member of Hobson's Bay is selling these so cheaply too.
Time will tell. Now when will I have time to do all this.. And I have 5 B Class coming to boot!
Cheers
Rod

How to write off a $300 investment Ho Ho Ho!!!  

 

For those that want to use the fuel tank as the speaker box. Note the lid has to be snapped out. It has been glued in the corners, but releases fairly easily.
You must remove the switch and you can use the existing wires to connect to your speaker.
You should really replace the lid with an identical flat piece of styrene cut out to support the speaker. You must seal the bottom and the new lid as well as the speaker. Doing this will give an excellent result.

 

I missed one small problem, when I pulled the speaker away from the chassis. A small frame is glued over the attaching screw on the battery box end. This is glued to the battery box and also to the metal frame It breaks away cleanly, but it is a cow of a job to push back in with tweezers.

 

 blurred However this is the piece that fouls the battery box screw Note how it is glued in. I replaced it with difficulty and only glued it to the battery box in case of a "next time"

 To check out internal space I had to pull out all the connectors and then pull the board out of the rubber pads on the outer edges. That's all that holds it in place.

 

 The light board hides some space for a sound project.

I have three choices here. The speaker protrudes into the cab area. I can cut away the cab to allow room. Use a smaller speaker and lose the sound quality, or remove parts of the posts to the right of the speaker. The last will be my prefferred method. However I do not possess a milling machine, so I will need to do it by hand, and it also means that I have to strip the chassis bare.This job is turning into a night mare, and I am still to tackle the lights.

 The cab has the light board attached to the bottom. The cab can be prized up by using a screw driver between the roof and the cab and it is not glued in place.

The light board already uses tiny surface mount LED's

 

A good time to paint up your crew?

 

 Marker lights pull out easily
The red marker lights are white globes with the marker lenses painted red. I will simply paint the red lenses I do not want illuminated black with red over the top to keep it dark.

 

 The white marker lights have a light tube directed towards light board as well as a couple of protrusions that appear to have something to do with the number boards.(notice next picture)

 

The number boards are simply a wrap around light board and appear to be lit by the marker lights. A separate led will have to be added in here to keep the number lights on. I am thinking I can cut off the protrusions on the marker lights glue them to the number boards and attach surface mounts directly to them. The light conversion would then have cost me just 4 LED'sBased on the ease of removal of the cab, and the fact that it is not really detailed at all (and

why would you, you can not really notice the insides anyways. I think my speaker options have just changed. I will remove the back wall sufficiently to clear the small portion of the speaker that

fouls the cab, paint it (speaker) grey and no body will even know I guess I am not ever going to remove the sound unit, so the modification will be permanent, and apart from the obvious, the engine will retain its great looks.

Cheers
Rod

2009 August 25

I finally picked up the shop shelving that our Dahlson's Hardware store offered me, and assembled a couple of the units in the train room.
They lock together and seem to be very sturdy. I will hang boards on both sides, and run the branch line on the top level, and the Wodonga Coal Siding on the lower level with Wodonga Station on the other side.
I will probably rename it to something else, as I need this major station to generate a reason for the railway to exist. So cement, super phosphate, fuel oil and bogie exchange as per the real coal siding, and will in addition have a large grain silo to make use of all the wheat hoppers and GY's I have accumulated
I will also have a small container terminal fed by road to enable the Uncle Ben's container traffic, and create a reason to have some Auscision 4 wheel wagons.
In addition the Wodonga Station will also have two oil sidings, a freight shed and a large stock race.
I must take some pictures tomorrow of this shelving. I think it will do a great job supporting the centre modules. Oh and I am sick again, seems the cough is back, had a feeling the penicillin tablets ran out a day or two too early last time.
Cheers
Rod

2009 August 26

 I have 8 sections of this shelving, enough to reach the far end. I will use the trays at the bottom to further stabilise the structure, by loading boxes of stored items here. Not that it needs it.

The old layout that I am restoring will be used to form the branch line on the top level.

and I will need to construct a support on the end to hold up the narrow curve over the trestle bridge that joins the front station to the back station (Trentham)
Cheers
Rod

2009 September 2

One of my biggest problems is the mess I get in ... for the want of a good local hobby shop :(
There is an old, poetic parable that goes something like this:

For want of a nail the shoe was lost.

For want of a shoe the horse was lost.

For want of a horse the rider was lost.

For want of a rider the battle was lost.

For want of a battle the kingdom was lost.

And all for the want of a horseshoe nail.

you have to marvel at the simplicity of these old tales and how so few words can contain so much wisdom.

The meaning behind this tale is that, "The Devil is in the details." This applies to just about everything I can think of that I have experienced thus far in my life and certainly applies to my model railway projects!
At the moment I have at least 8 mail orders not yet filled. That means I have at least 8 projects that I cannot finish waiting on parts. It seems silly to reassemble an engine, when you can carefully place all the parts in the box and stand it aside on the work bench. However with limited space you soon find yourself unable to start a new project, because of this lack of space.

After spending many hours on the A Class project and arriving almost at the end, in fact I was soldering up the last few wires, after test fitting and finding it it all went back together with the modified lighting and the Loksound unit and speaker fitted.
I noticed that a red marker light was missing, and it was no where I can find. It had broken off as I pressed the markers back into place. My FIRST bit of Damage in the A Class project. I found some fibre optic material that would fit the ole in the nose, retrieved the red paint and tried to melt the lenses in the end of the fibre. The Duratech was not melting the fibre. So I plugged the 15 watt Wella iron in and waited for it to heat up. I bunched the wires together and taped them neatly out of the way in the mech, and ran a final test of the wiring. I then picked up the iron to work on the fibre lenses.
The bloody telephone rang. It was rather late, so rather than turn the iron off as I normally do. I placed it on the work bench and answered the phone. Thinking I could get rid of this unkind person ringing at this time of night, I find it is my brother, and he needs a shoulder to repeat things I have heard before... but I do the right thing. 40 minutes later I hang up, and where was I?
Oh yes the A Class
I swing around and there is the soldering iron, which has travelled a meter across a cluttered bench laying up against the nose of A68 Its stuffed and all the work is down the drain. I turned off the power closed the door, and have not been near a model till tonight, so it has taken 5 days and the arrival of two parcels of parts to get me back in here again.
How unkind is life. Granted my brother needed me, but how bloody unkind is life!
I have sent of a letter to Peter Wilkes , and just maybe he has a faulty mech returned, and I might save full price on a replacement . But I am absolutely gutted.
Cheers
Rod

2009 September 11

Ha Ha!
I am feeling better today
Jaimie from Auscision rang me today and he has found me a new A78 shell to replace the damaged one

Seems that somebody returned it because it was delivered without number plates. I used a sharp knife and removed the number plates off the damaged shell, and now I wait patiently for the replacement.
And publicly I shout from the roof tops.
The boys from  Auscision  are jolly good fellows!!
Cheers
Rod