So on Tuesday I finally rigged my Arduino test platform with some LEDs and downloaded my Kyogle code to the Arduino sitting on my work desk. The LEDs on the test rig, worked, so I was very happy. So I then took that Arduino to the shed and plugged it in. The first 6 LEDs connected all fired up correctly. Two were on the southern end of the Kyogle platform, a third was for the platform that flickered, one for a fettler’s shed just off the platform and two for the Signal box. One is inside and one is outside the signalbox.
I then started looking at how I was going to wire up the Kyogle station building. On Thursday I started soldering the various wires to what will be the fascia mounted switches and spliced in the connections to the above board LEDs to the station building and to the plugs that allow the station building to be removed from the switches via these plugs. I drilled two holes in the baseboard to allow the wires between the plugs to be fed through.
Sometimes I really hate the wine enameled wire on the pre-wired 0402 LEDs, as I just cannot get the wires tinned, to allow them to join to other wires with solder. They just keep disconnecting from the soldered connections. Anyhow perseverance solved that issue. I installed the various LEDs in the station building, and down through the floor of the building. One for the open waiting room, and two for under the platform awning at each end of the building. I attached the plugs (that will feed through the baseboard to the Arduino) to the LEDs on the station building. I then took the station building to the layout and fed the wires through the holes in the baseboard. I then connected these to the Arduino wiring and below layout plugs and turned everything on. Amazingly, it all worked.
Saturday I went to the Bayside Model Railway Exhibition and was quite surprised by the collection of layouts, and the quantity of public attending. I spent close to two hours there talking to various people and inspecting the layouts. I then high-tailed it to the Club for our monthly meeting. I was also very concerned about the raffle drawing. Whenever we buy multiple tickets in the raffle, we are given tickets in each book on the go. Usually five different coloured books. Usually well over 100 tickets are sold each month. First prize went to orange D18. Second prize went to orange D17. Third prize went to orange D20. I went off like a frog in a blender. My ticket was orange D19. It was rigged! It had to be! Everyone present roared with laughter when I loudly and verbally reacted to every prize being around my orange ticket. These tickets were drawn by three different people. All other coloured books missed out. I could not believe my luck or lack of it.
Today I was picked up by Geoff who already had Darren in the car, and we then made our way to Brendan’s place and then up to Toowoomba. We visited Bill and his Tenterfield layout, which now has almost all of his track down, just a couple of passing siding or industry sidings still to be completed. We ran trains for a couple of hours. Very enjoyable. We also imparted our $0.02 of wisdom and then had a very delicious lunch. This was followed by a cross town trip to Ben’s place and an inspection of his layout in his shed. Darren had been there before, but for the rest of us, it was our first viewing. We also got to do a few shake down trips around the layout. A bloody brilliant day, spent with friends and doing some operations on two layouts.
My time next week will be taken up revisiting the measurements needed to make the Cassino station building and refreshment rooms and the interconnecting breezeway. I had scale plans by something is nor working with one of my measurements. I’m actually heading down to Casino next Friday with PK and Barnacle Bob for a trip from Casino to Glenapp and return on Friday. From there we will spend the night and then travel to the NMRA meeting on the Gold Coast on the Saturday. Another action packed weekend of Railway related activities coming up next weekend.
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