Lots of Different Things

On Friday I did what I try to do every Friday and gave myself an early mark from work.  I went down to the Shed at about 3:30pm before the kids came home from school.  I pottered around did a few things.  I need to find some yellow so I can mark where the clearance points are for a number of sidings or passing loops are.  I thought I had marked most of those previously.  Obviously I did not find them all.  I also need to find some white paint so I can mark the rails where the KD uncoupling magnets are hidden in the track.  Since the last running session I have installed three uncoupling magnets at Murwillumbah, so I need to tidy this up.

 

Basically I ran the three trains that were bottlenecked from last week.  My rail train got past the container and terminated at Clapham Yard and the locos ran around their train. The paper train also made its way to Park Road and its locos uncoupled.  I swapped over some non KD's with KD's on my container train.  This train has finally not made it all the way to Grafton Yard, but will very soon.  It will then do a run all the way back to Clapham Yard and back to Grafton Yard.  Then we will see how this train run at the running session. 

 

Saturday morning following Soccer I popped into Shelton’s and dropped off some DVD’s to get some VHS video’s taken by Darren copied.  I also did a swap of a code 75 point for a code 100 point.  We then had some good discussions about the last couple of changes that Shelton has done to the layout since last weekend, and the next few changes planned to be made to Shelton’s layout.  They include swapping one point for another to change the geometry of the track, splice in a point here for the dock and so on.  It was a very constructive discussion but there were no scone this week.  I feel if Shelton completes those changes, the layout will be all the better for it.

 

I did some more pottering around in the shed but cannot remember what I did, so it must have been very constructive.  Later in the arvo I also stopped off at Austral Modelcraft with the tribe in tow on the way to a family party in the next suburb and picked up a 12mm point and a bundle of track.

 

Today I visited Lefty’s place so we could do a point swap - Left hand for a right hand – I guess that is why we call him Lefty!  Thanks Lefty!   I then dropped into Barry’s place to assist with the connection of JMRI on his computer and connecting it via serial cable to his 5 AMP NCE DCC system.  When I got home I spliced the point from Lefty into the trackwork at Fisherman Islands.  The track that I picked up yesterday at Austral was positioned where it will be finally be laid when I pick up another two 12 mm points.  That will be when I save up some more money.  Crickey these 12mm points are getting expensive.

 

Those damn geckos that live in the shed are finally getting to me.  They live up in my shed roof, where I have bracing holding up my roof A frames.  The bracing is open and that is where they sit and another word that rhymes with sit.  So I have decided to enclose the bracing with a sheet of 3mm MDF either side of the bracing forming a triangle in the roof.  This is similar to what Lefty did in his shed.  Last weekend I cut four of these triangles to fit either side of the brace, today I purchased another shed of MDF and cut another 4 triangles.  I then painted these triangles white.  I need to try and find the tin of paint that I painted my shed roof with and see if it is still usable.  I will then give the triangles a coat of that colour and put then up.  They will be liquid nailed and screwed to the brace, and then no more gapped around the A frame and roof.  I think that is a job for tomorrow, along with the washing of the outdoor setting and giving the shed a quick clean.  Tuesday is the fortnightly meeting of our group and it is at my place.

 

Who knows I might be able to do some more jobs as well.