2016_09_06 Little jobs and big wins

2016_09_06  Track Gangs deployed.

First Job! Mechanical engineer has been pondering the operation of the scharfenberg coupler system in HO because of the immenent arrival of the Sprinters from major supplier On Track.

Because of unreliability problems we have purchased a quantity of  1mm thick, 2mm diam. rare earth magnets. They are small enough to drill out the couplers and fit inside  couplings supplied by On Track. They will create a problem, because North and South poles need to be set to attract and thus hold the coupling together. This will mean that the cars cannot be coupled No 1 end to No 1 end, or 2 to 2.
As it turns out the cars operate this way anyway. V/Line never turn them, they always couple this way, and so will we.

The top coupler will have the magnets fitted to keep the powered cars together.

The 500 magnets sourced from Sydney on EBay.

My camera needs replacing. No longer focusing properly. These things are 2mm by 1mm thick.

Second Job for day (after packing car) was track repair.......

 Lining up the prefabricated points

Clearing away the rubble .

And that's three tracks aligned in , ready for ballast
Final adjustments to connect the Rail Motor dock and the platform road. Then connect up all the power leads and point motors. polarity changes done electronically, and point motors only change points.

Third job was to adjust the Led lighting and add a couple more supports then trim off the zip ties

Taken before adjustments and with flash

Without flash. I am happy with light level. I am not a fan over over lighting my scenes.
So far so good

More soon
Cheers
Rod

2016_08_31 How do you make a better Venetian...eh? blind?

2016_08_31  Making LED light reflectors.

A few years ago I bought 5m lengths of LED strip. And decided on using old recycled venetian blinds as reflectors.  I found some 14 foot blinds in good condition and installed them above Wodonga Coal Sidings.  They were not very successful, unfortunately.
The first thing was that they were too flexible and failed to attach flat to the bearers. As well the self adhesive LED strips did not attach firmly to the slats and after a very short time the buckled slats and detached LED strip had to be removed.
So back to the drawing board.
I tried to reinforce the slats, and as I recovered a hundred or so from the old blinds, decided to laminate two together using overlaps to extend the length.

I tried to join the slats by overlapping, which produced two thickness slats, but it was still too flexible.

So in the finish I had a third layer glued over the top, three thickness dried appeared to be ok.

My son who is a Carpenter swears by anything in a  SIKA bottle, particularly Sikaflex silicon sealer.
So when I saw this one at Bunnings, I thought  Why not? :)  SikaBond TechGrip. Although later on, I found, in the instructions, that it works best when one layer is porous.

 Anyway it was checked this morning, and had a strong bond.

 So  I will try to get a 12.5 m length glued together, today, and will reinforce the LED strip with Sikabond after pealing off the self adhesive cover strip.

Now I need a way to suspend it underneath the top level baseboard. It probably need to hang as I still will need to access point machines and wiring uner that board. The fixed one over the coal sidings is a real pain sometimes. I was thinking about long threaded butterfly clips which would allow me to push the slats aside when necessary? Or perhaps just use picture frame wire or chain?


Cheers Rod
EDIT

Trying not to reinvent the wheel :)  I came up with this whilst pondering the problem :)

 Not sure if I have enough strip I can recover, as I tossed a lot away already. But this is what controlled the slats and held up the blind when it covered a window. So why not use it again?

Glued or stapled in place might fix the slat permanently in position, and allow the reflector to be focused?

If it covers the led's, I believe I might be able to find a similar string design at Spotlight.
Of course, looking at this picture, I am thinking if I measure the slats correctly and mark exactly where the cross pieces are, I could glue the tapes between the slats and they would not then interfere with the LED's :D
Rod

2016_08_29 Sorting it all out (The mess)

2016_08_29.  Moving on. Trying to find a place for everything!

Finally got into Studio for a few hours. Started sorting stuff into areas and clearing down the bench tops.
Aim is to complete existing  track wiring. as well as setting out track in Wodonga yard including turntable area.
Then to lay Albury Yard in place before a running night to be organised in November, with old friends from the Melbourne based Hobson's Bay Group.
So opened the doors up just before lunch and looked at this.....

Need to clear this down, dispose of garbage and store away required items in a place I can find them.
Sometimes I think I am a hoarder. My criteria today, is will I ever use it? Throw It, unless someone else might use it :)

Never got to this corner. I really need to finish the wall. But it is falling back in the order of things.

After sorting out most of the stuff on top of the bench work, I had to find a spot for the two black cases, where I store locomotive boxes that I want to keep. After sorting  through, I actually hung them under the layout, off the floor, and reloaded keepers back into them,

Room to store tool boxes underneath.

So Wodonga side is clear and cleaned off.  Now this reminded me that I had promised Roger that I would get this area finished before he returned. With Liverpool very close now, I need to install the turn table and sheds and lay the missing track, before he turns up.

See how things change around here :(

Its going to be dark under the top level. I already have LED's to install and brighten this area up. So I located them and started to plan out how I would hang them.

I decided to continue on with the Venetian blind method that I was not happy with from using it over Coal sidings. This time I am going to glue the slats in place rather than screw them, which tended to cause them to buckle. As well they drooped between the screws.  To stop it buckling I am going to laminate up to three lengths of slat to make them more solid

These are off cuts. The slats are 7 feet long.

By  gluing the slats together overlapping, I can strengthen the fixture and then glue the strips of LED's down the middle.

I have two types of LED strips. each 5m long one has 300 LED's and other 600 LED's These are 300 strips.

Cant find the glue sticks or the gun, I am going to use to fix it, so will buy some tomorrow so I can complete the job.

Cheers
Rod

2016_08_27 (Continues)

2016_08_27 ok I am mad (as a hatter) :D  Yep I bought another steamer!

And to make it worse, I decided to put sound into it myself :( Not a great idea, I'm afraid)

Anyway here is a pictorial started a month back, and still not finished.

 First thing that I find, is that the builders have filled a bloody big tender with little boxes!!  Why?
I can only guess it makes the thing easier to glue / solder together ??
To cap it off the 8 pin plug is upside down and incorrectly marked (Dot always indicates pin 1 the orange wire!) It appears to have solid bar under the coal load (weight?? why??). The box at front of tender is , or appears to be an empty space.

I wanted to fit a Wow sound with stay alive, but could not find enough room to do so, so have settled for this ESU Loksound V4 installation.

Now this creates a further problem. That is that the tail lights are LEDs in metal containers attached to the circuit board under the 8 pin plug. that has to nestle down in the space right beside the speaker. That means the existing light rods (fibre optics) cannot reach the light boxes.  I will have to glue led's  directly to the lamps on the rear of tender. I can barely get my fingers in there, so job is progressing slowly!   Just noticed a post which shows Eugene has mounted a wow into an A2. Have to ask him a favor :)

You can just see the holes in the rear wall of the tender where the fibre optics poke into the lamp assemblies.

Cheers
Rod

EDIT
Just noticed I had not shown you my new N Class :)

Cheers
Rod

2016_08_27 I guess I am back?

2016_08_27  The weather is changing, and my health is improving.

This weekend I have decided to spring clean and finish off finding a home for all my junk

I guess the barrow shows a ruthless disposal of junk.  And I have already filled a skip many times. It just keeps on going!  :D

The 10 50 liter boxes  are starting to diminish, and yet the room still looks like a war zone :( This is probably contributing to my depression :(   However when its done I think all will be well ;)

I do use the McKenzie patented Locomotive storage bin (Meat clip-it container) I store locomotives waiting parts, such as sound speakers, or just repairs.  As the parts arrive I put them in the bins with the locos and add them to my to do list.  Most of these are to be fitted sound, which is in the bin. A few are damaged for repairs.

Now looking here you would think, I have not done much? However if you think about it, I need to find a place for all the junk. And it needs to be where I can find it again. So it takes a lot of sorting. I guess I cleaned this table down three times (bottom pic) But it just builds up again. But I will get there.

As the bins fill, they are stacked here under the new bench work. Probably need another 10 bins, as I have not even reached the front corner which I need to remove to finish off the last 2.5 m of wall.

empty boxes, and only another 13 to go!

Al decided to help with the stock yards. Thanks Mate Terry and Al have put together a heap of buildings for the layout. All I got to do is install them.
So a start was to add an extension for the cattle and sheep siding. Going to use Casula platform and cut it all in together and cover it in gravel etc etc. Another Walther's yard is coming and will finish it off with two Model Train Buildings yards

Model Trains Buildings

Just noticed these sitting in Wodonga yard. Did I show them before?  They run really well and navigate No6 crossovers well. I am happy with them, although I need to tone them down a tad.

Ok a few hours of (warm) daylight left. I guess I can fill a few more bins
Cheers
Rod Young

2016_07_26 OMG its been too long.

2016_07_26

Watching a lot of TV and keeping warm...  What a waste of time :(
Not been too happy of late, just cannot get too enthused at moment.
Was ill for a while, was too cold for a while too.
Apart from adding a few new purchases, and rewiring some of the layout, nothing much to show.
I got a second hand N Class, which needs sound. Runs very nicely!
I did pick up TrainBuilder X29 today and need to fit sound and test run it. Might take some pictures of that one later. Tony bought it and decided it was too big for his branch line, so muggins here liked it and is broke once more.
Cheers for now
Rod Young

2016_06_16 Bunnings is a destination often visited these days!

2016_06_16  I need to get activated again :)

So Tony had a delivery from the Bendigo Hobby shop and called in on the way to Sydney.

These cast and hand built kits were much appreciated. Thank you to the Shopkeeper at PCB hobbies :)

Really nice job very square and painted better than the original ones were I inspected at Wandong many years ago :)

Very happy with these :)
Cheers
Rod

ps Bunnings? oh yes Bunnings !!  oil based paint to seal the plaster walls procured with a new roller and no stops! Lets paint the walls (again :( ) and stick some back scenes down again :(

2016_06_05 Ixion C32's at Epping?

2016_06_05 A post and some rumors are out there that  Ixions much waited for C32 is about to arrive

On Rail Page this morning....

  standard gauge Station Master

 

 

Looks like there will be some 32s available at Epping including 3265 in maroon

$595.00

This will certainly give Lindsay O'Rielly some cheer and I note it will all have to do with customs as to whether it happens or not.
 It has been a long road with lots of pot holes along the way.  A few caused by me, I'm sure, in my defense of a friend. I sincerely regret this today.

Cheers
Rod Young
Edit possibly a good chance to remind you about what Ixion are presenting?

Ixion on Face Book

2016_06_04 Brass Engine Sale!

2016_06_04 Thanks to friend Michael Holian we have another N Class!

Michael sent this email:-

Hi,

Just wanted to share around that I've got the following for sale, if anyone is interested let me know, I can provide photos if wanted, all models are in good condition and run smoothly, unfortantly they don't come with boxes as the owner thought he wasn't going to sell them in the future, perhaps a reminder to keep the boxes our models come in.

PSM K190 Black, light weathering $1200  Sold pending
PSM D4 247 Black light weathering  $1200  Sold
Alco N 497 Black medium weathering piston extenders fitted oil burner $1200  SOLD
PSM BCE 1 $500
PSM BC 12 $500
PSM E 1 Pressed metal doors $200
Model Company F class F210 $700 original box comes with model

ALL MODELS ARE DC

Please feel free to email this around to any friends you might think are interested, it's some good product that doesn't come up very often, also if you are in a club could you print out a copy of this and put it up at your club rooms or share it with your members

Regards

Michael Holian
0422 739 530
Michael_4472@bigpond.com

If anybody is interested please contact Michael.

Here is my new N Class.

Thank you Michael, for the offer
Cheers
Rod Young