So Monday was a tidy up day. I added a base to my platform shed for Lismore. I also added some legs to the rear of the shed, as it hangs off the platform. The trees were added to the area behind the platform. I drilled 5 holes in the platform to accept the five poles for the platform awning and it was secured to the platform.
I touched up the window frames and platform facing doors in the Lismore platform shed with white paint and when the paint dried the shed was placed on the platform.
I did some experimenting by running a couple of wagons through the Lismore platform and adjusted the distance of the platform back from the track, following all this work. The platform has had some facing added and the platform top itself was recently stained. This area is coming along very well.
On Wednesday I started to turn my attention to the Cassino Station building. This has been sitting in limbo for a while. My main plan is to complete the roof of this very long structure in the next week or two. However, I started by installing some styrene strip 0.100” x 0.100” square along the insides of all the rooms in the station building. Some sections of wall in the station building had started to bend a bit. So hopefully this strip will reinforce the sides, and help them to remain relatively square. The next task was to install some solid wires through the roof structure so I can tap some LEDs into this roof top power bus in the future. I also had a new delivery of eBay 0402 LEDs arrive on Thursday. This power bus will provide power to LEDs under the awnings and allow them to have them controlled by fascia mounted switches. I will also install another pair of copper lines in the roof of the refreshment room building. As this structure too, will have working platform lights. I also painted some other platform light poles a yellow colour. I saw a photo of the platform lights being yellow in the early 90’s. This is the modelling period, so I better get that correct. These will also get wired up to a power supply under the layout in a week or two.
I have done some painting to the various sections of the station building roof. The station building has had 4 pieces of roof painted and glued together. I have painted the next 2 sections of roof, but not yet joined them to the first four. I have also constructed 6 sections of roof for the refreshments room building. These have been painted and assembled into 2 lots of 3. I still need to build the supports to keep these sections of roof at the at correct angle. I plan to work from both ends of the build back towards the middle as this is where the roof shape changes. I think I should be able to have a trial fit of this over the coming week. I have also added some fascia boards to the station building, and will need to be joined to the refreshment rooms section. These items will then be extended to cover the full refreshment rooms area.
This week I will need to fit the last three platform awning supports to the refreshment rooms section and also fit the building fascia which is made from scale 2” x 10” styrene. I also need to fit the three intermediate roof supports between the building and the fascia. I will start at the far end of the refreshment room building and work my back to the breezeway section between the refreshment room and the stations building. This will be done with the structure sitting on the platform itself, as once I join this roof section up, the station building and refreshment rooms will not be able to be moved from the platform. Besides having wires through the platform base for power, the roof supports are so thin they cannot support the whole station building.
On Saturday morning I went over to AMRA clubrooms for their buy and sell. I came away with a few bargains. I parked at PK’s place and we walked to the clubrooms together. As my hands were getting full, I worked back to PK’s to stow my cache and had a coffee and a biscuit. I then went back to the Buy and Sell, caught up with Arthur, and offered him a lift back to where he parked his car on the south side at Sunnybank station. On Saturday evening, we joined the British Region and their regular Brew and Natter. That is two hours I won't get back.
Today was fully spent running the ATLP2022 boxcar around the layout. It left Cassino Yard and made its way to Park Road Siding. The newsprint paper rolls it was carrying were unloaded. It was then picked up by a local shunt train and taken to Acacia Ridge Yard. It was here that it was bogie exchanged to narrow gauge – 12mm – 3’ 6” for a trial by the Queensland Railways. It was sent back to South Brisbane Station and shunted into a siding. It was filled with railmotor parts and sent back to Clapham before it was shunted into Rocklea Siding. From Rocklea Siding it was picked up and via Clapham Yard, was sent to Acacia Ridge Yard and was bogie exchanged back to the standard gauge. It has since been sent to a siding at Acacia Ridge yard to be loaded with Queensland mangoes and is now waiting for the fruit train which is coming from South Brisbane Interstate station, and it will be picked up and taken south to Grafton Yard, before being sent onward to Flemington Markets so the Mexicans can get a great tasking and juicy mango or two in their local fruit shops.
So this coming week I will complete the ATLP2022 moves, continue working on the station roof for Cassino, add a power bus to the refreshment room, add the LED lights, fix a loose wire for track 3 at the northern end of Clapham Yard Panel and find out why there is intermittent power to a section of narrow gauge track between Dutton Park to Park Road. the ATLP Box car is moving on next Saturday.