I Hate Technology (When it Does Not Work Properly)!

With Wednesday being a public holiday in Brisbane, I got to attend my son’s sports carnival at Runcorn.  He had a ball of a time, and with a thunderstorm approaching in the arvo, we were let off early with two rotations of events left to run.  Anyway, that gave me the opportunity to get down to the shed.  I added some more jumpers to the power bus for the Fisherman Islands district to complete that task.  I then added a few screws into the end of the tracks in Fisherman Islands to prevent trains running off the end.  I would like to add some clear Perspex sides to the baseboard to prevent things falling off that level.

Activity then turned to removing some slide switches from the first area of my layout that I laid - the Rocla Siding and Rappville Loop.  These switches were installed and allowed me to turn of track power in those sections.  I have never used them. I then had to re-wire the two tracks at Rocla Sleeper Siding (main and loop) and the three tracks at Rappville Loop (Main, Loop and Siding).  These tracks are now wired to the power bus but not via separate on-off isolation switches. I needed some slide switches to allow me to isolate the new power district #6 and also power district #6's ammeter.  So two of those switches have now been wired into the main panel. 

I then screwed my DS64 for the entry to Fisherman Islands onto the baseboard. 

On Thursday two packages of push buttons to be used on my two Fisherman Islands control panels showed up.  So on Friday afternoon I installed 14 buttons on my two control panels and soldered them up to the wires running back to my NCE mini panels.  I still have not connected the wires at the NCE mini panels end and I am still yet to code up the new commands in the mini panels.  That is a job for later.

Saturday Morning I went down to the shed in the morning for an hour.  I drilled a few holes and threaded all the wires from my DS64 to the cab bus and from the DS64 to the four point motors it will control in the entry to Fisherman Islands Yard.

That afternoon, I headed over to Anthony’s place for his monthly running session.  On the way over, I stopped in at Austral Modelcraft and picked up a packet of rail joiners.  I would love to work out how many I’ve used on my layout.  The running session at Anthony’s, was attended by Iain, Mark and Keith, as well as of course, myself and the host Anthony.  It was a great session.  I actually got to run trains, we had three single man crews, a shunter and the yard master for Tatiara Downs.  I quite enjoyed running about 8 or 9 trains out of the session.  A couple of times, I forgot to take my train cards with me for the run from staging to Tatiara Downs.  I was severely chastised on both occasions.  It is always good to see other layouts have issues not that these were in way severe.  One S class loco lost its coupler in the middle of the track and we had two sand wagons derail on their exit out of Nankiva heading towards staging.  I think everyone looked at me as I had just set the points and signals, but it was the coupler box working its way down a bit and a low hanging coupler tang which was the cause.  But apart from that the layout ran extremely well and we had great company.  Our post layout running session discussion turned to a photo in the 29th issue of Model Railways in Australia.  There is photo of a train on the Broadford layout (originally built by Keith) but now owned by a Club in Melbourne with a 422 class loco hauling a set of VR E cars on the broad gauge tracks.  Interesting as no 422’s were ever broad gauged.  Oh well I suppose it is either modeller’s license or someone just having no idea what they were doing.

Today I spent over 4 hours at my daughter’s school’s working bee this morning shifting 5 cubic metres of soil and then a few meters of bark.  Upon arriving home, I thought I would just tidy up a few jobs down the shed.  I thought I would solder up the wires from the DS64 at Fisherman Islands to the four point motors.  I then turned the DS64 on and gave it an address of 151 and gave it four point motor addresses - 1511, 1512, 1513 and 1514.  So I then tried to fire off the points at those addresses via my radio Procab-R.  Well none of them threw.  I could see that the DS64 was issuing commands as the light was illuminating as I know it must have accepted the 4 addresses.

This DS64 was one that had previous sent back to the US quite some time ago for fixing as it was getting hot and not working.  I purchased another DS64 to replace that one and when the repaired DS64 turned back up on my doorstep apparently fixed, it was put into a draw until needed.  Well it was needed and now when I try it, it does not work as the DS64 is getting very hot again.  It seems that the b@stards in the US never fixed it, after spending sh!t loads of money to send it back there.  Well that is the last straw!  I will never use one of those pieces of cr@p again.
 

Later tonight I will check out the relatively new NCE equivalent that did not exist when I started using DS64’s.  I might try and pick one up next weekend from Austral Modelcraft.  I think I’ll pen a nice email back to Digitrax about their rotten DS64.

By the way, I seem to have inherited a nice short in power district number 5 - somewhere between Acacia Ridge and South Brisbane Interstate.  I'm not looking forward to working out where this has occurred.

Next weekend is the RMCQ Model Railway Exhibition at the Strathpine Community Centre Hall on Saturday and Sunday.  I will be sitting on the door with a few other guys for most of the weekend, so please say high when you pop in!

Layout Lighting and Trains Temporarily Running at Fisherman Islands

During the week I spend some time thinking about where the next few strings of LED lighting would be installed on the layout.  I wanted another string above Fairy Hill and another stretching around towards Kyogle from Fairy Hill.  I also wanted to install a run of LED above Border Loop (hanging from the roof of the shed) and also investigate installing a set above the Cougal Spiral.  That one will be interesting as it needs to be on a continuous curve.  I'm not sure what I will connect that to.

Darren delivered some wood to me on Wednesday that I will use to hang the Border Loop LED set.  As usual there is still quite a bit of other bits and pieces I need to install these next sets.  But with a bit of luck, I might get around to doing something this week.

While I had a couple of strings about, I decided to take two to the Club on Saturday as it was the Monthly Club meeting.  I ventured over to the Club with Barry as a passenger and on the way to the Club stopped off at Austral Modelcraft and picked up an NCE EB1 for installation in my Power District no.6 at Fisherman Islands on the layout.  Once at the club, I had some lunch and pottered around for most of the day.  At midday I started off with a quick presentation – more a group discussion on building model roads as part of our modelling series that we have been running since late last year.  I covered my techniques for road building and we talked about some things to make the roads look more realistic - like butters, drains and man hole covers.  There were about 4 or so members in attendance and I think we all learnt something.  After that I rolled out two lengths of my LED strings and put them up under the top deck on one of the peninsulars on the layout.  They were installed on the wharf section and looked pretty good once turned on.  They were meant to stimulate the members and give them an understanding as to what we want to eventually install around the whole lower deck of the layout.  I think it worked.

Today I ventured down to the shed after midday and spent some time thinking about what I would do.  First job was to install the EB1, that I purchased yesterday) under the layout and wire it into the power bus.  I still need a few slide switches and a panel metre to fully install this so I can monitor the current in this new section of track.  I have identified where there are two slide switches that I can use, and tonight I ordered a panel meter to go onto the layout facia. 

I then decided to drill the track power dropper holes in the Fisherman Islands baseboard and then soldered 15 pairs of droppers to the rails and then soldered them onto the power bus underneath.  I then decided to quickly add a temporary jumper from the Fisherman Islands power bus to another track bus and when I connected it, I had a short.  Damn!  Upon further investigation I found that one of my narrow gauge points in Fisherman Islands did not have the two insulated joiners installed.  This point had feeders installed on the tracks so it was the culprit.  So that was quickly rectified and Voila, no short!  So I grabbed a loco, put it on the track, gave the track a quick clean, and away we went with a 44 Class running all over the three standard gauge tracks, and the one dual gauge track at Fisherman Islands.  It was towing my ballast set.  I really must put some stop blocks on the ends of the tracks otherwise I might regret running trains in this yard, as it is long way to the ground.

I still have the track from Dutton Park to the entry of the Fisherman Islands Yard to have droppers installed on.  I also have to work out how to wire up my dual gauge point at the far end of Fisherman Islands Yard so that power gets thrown correctly.  I also found a section of track just next to the dual gauge point that was isolated from the track bus.  So I have already drilled dropper holes and installed droppers, but just need to solder the droppers to the track and power bus next week.  Possibly Wednesday as it is a public Holiday in Brisbane.

While I had the soldering iron out I soldered one jumper that I noticed had come adrift in the Grafton to Rocla Sleeper Siding section and, and a jumper in Acacia Ridge Yard that I identified the need for in the last running session.

I also spent some time fine tuning the dual gauge track in the Acacia Ridge Narrow Gauge Yard.  I ran a Eureka Model RSH wagon around the dual gauge track and it ran well, so I was pretty happy as this is the wagon with the smallest wheels.

Hopefully plenty more progress next week.

Running Session and Tidying Up

Yesterday a few of us ventured down to Darren’s place for a Running Session on Wattle Flat.  The call was sent out for a 12:30 pm arrival for crib with a 1:00 pm whistle out.  It was more like 1:30ish pm when we actually did whistle out.  We had three crews allocated to the various tasks.  I was teamed up with Shelton.  I was driver, he was chief photographer.  My first train was a shunt to the second crossing loop on the line – Gollan.  It involved a complicated shunt of the Milling Bros Mill  Siding.  I had to pick up 8 wagons from three sidings, and drop off another 8 wagons to those same three sidings.  But given that the wagons in the siding, three UL’s and three bogie wheaties were in the wrong order compared to the shunting list required for the return trip, I had to re-order the three UL’s and the three bogie wheaties.  I think the traffic controller was a psycho ordering them like that.  We then ran back to the Meatworks and swapped over two empties for two loaded wagons.  We then ran back to Goolma and dropped off the Petrol bomb and a louvre van at the goods shed and pick two of the same wagons from those sidings up.  We ran back to south of North Gulgong and into staging.

We then had to wait for the blind crew to complete their shunt, it was Geoff and Stephen Ottaway.  Following that crew completing their task, we all stopped for some more crib and then resumed.  I was then paired up with Geoff.  We were given the perway special, which had 6 ballast wagons and 4 sleeper wagons, a rail wagon and a ballast plough.  The trains came off the Werris Creek branch and had to reverse at North Gulgong.  That means moving the van from one end to the other, then we could leave North Gulgong and travel to Goolma.  We had to swap the guards van to the other end again and then replace three sleeper wagons and the rail wagon with what was in the perway siding - three sleeper wagons and wagon of rail.  No sooner had we done this and a passenger came through heading towards Wattle Flat.  Straight after we had another train go through, and that was followed by another train heading towards the branch and a steam special come back the other way.  After the steam special had cleared the line, we had permission to travel to the ballast siding at Mebal and swap 6 loaded wagons or 6 empties.  I left the train on the main and did my business there.  Upon return to North Gulgong, we again had to 'end for end' the guards van and then take the branch back towards Werris Creek.

These shunts are not as simple as you think, as the loco cannot enter the sidings at Milling Bros Mill and the Ballast Siding, so you need to take extra wagons to allow the loco to reach the train in the siding.  It was a real brain teaser.  It was a real great day, with lots of friendly banter and great company.  Thanks for the invite Darren.

Today I had a plan for attacking a few jobs in the shed.  The list included tacking up a huge number of wires up under the layout out of sight.  This only has a visual affect and doesn’t make anything run better.   I did this to the wires underneath Clapham Yard (above Glenapp).  I also did this to some wires underneath Border Loop.  A number of power cords for the various LED strings that light the layout where also tacked up out of sight.  It has started to make the layout look a lot more tidier.   

Following this task I did a lot of work back around the Fisherman Islands area.  I ran a 15m run of 4 core alarm core cable from the control panel at entry to Fisherman Islands Yard around to the NCE Mini Panel located at Loco Pilly.  I also drilled the holes in the control panel at this location.  I then identified where the control panel for the other end of Fisherman Islands was to go.  I cut a hole in the facial for it to be located, and drilled the holes in the panel for the push buttons.  I then ran two more runs of 4 core alarm cable from this panel to the NCE Mini Panel located underneath the southern end of Border Loop.  I then ran another run of 4 core cable from the first control panel back the NCE Mini Panel underneath Border Loop.  I have run the ground wire between the two Fisherman Islands control  panels, but I still need to run the ground wire back to the Border Loop Mini Panel.

I then ran the power bus for the Fisherman Islands power district.  I still need to attach the various droppers from the track to the bus and then run the bus back to a new NCE EB1 that is required to power this section of track.  I am thinking of starting to run the first accessory bus for this part of the layout.  At the moment the accessories just get their signal from the power bus - the same as the track.  I know that it is not optimal but have a separate bus actually causes me to run a huge amount of additional wire.  I also did some work between Dutton Park and Park Road tacking the various wires up under the baseboard at this locations as well.

There is still lots of work to get the Fisherman Islands section completely operational.  But maybe it will be ready for running later this month.

Fisherman Islands Progress

On Tuesday afternoon this week I went down to Jaycar and purchased some wire for the track power bus to be used in the Fisherman Islands track section.  That night I went over to Arthur's place for our Tuesday Nighter's meeting and saw some very nice trains running.  Arthur even ran a some special trains (parallel runs) for the Queensland Rails 150 years celebration.

As I try to do almost every Friday, I came home from work early.  I went down to the shed and started work on the electronics for my level crossing detector.  I soldered a few things together.  Then I thought that I must try and find my level crossing flasher unit.  Well I went through all the places that I hide my electronics and you guessed it, I eventually found it.  I gave it a test and it still worked - Amazing - it must be over 20 years old.  I also found some other detector units that I did not know I had.  I also found about 4 relays that I did not know I had as well.  I could have incorporated these into my electronics build instead of buying some from Jaycar.

On Saturday I went back down to the shed and did a bit more on the electronics build.  I could not get my cheap delay relay working, so I gave up working on the electronics.  I then started to work on cutting holes in the baseboard at Fisherman Islands for the points motors at the throat into Fisherman Islands.  I cut out two point motor holes at that end.

I then went down to the other end of the yard and cut four more holes at that end.  So I currently have the three standard gauge tracks all laid.  I think I will have to look closely at one of my dual gauge points, as I think it will cause a short when wired up.  I will have to install some insulated rail joiners at the diverging end.  I think I will also have to cut some isolation slots in some of the rails and install some sort of switch to control the polarity of the frog area.  Once the track was laid, I ran my rake of ballast wagons through all the points and everything seemed to run well.  I also ran two of my narrow gauge stock through the dual gauge points and the narrow gauge points and they seem to be working well too.  It was then that I realised that the dual gauge headshunt did not have any track.  So I soldered up a length of dual gauge track and added that to the point.

Today before a party at our place, I installed the control panel for the Fisherman Islands throat on the layout.  I also ordered some push buttons required for the two control panels for Fisherman Islands.  I am also looking at where I can locate my Digitrax DS64, so I can power four of the five points at this end of the yard.  I will have to purchase an NCE Snap-It for the fifth point.  The point control for the far end of the yard will take quite some time to complete.

I had a look around to find out if I have any spare slots on the nearest NCE Mini Panel so I can hook the Control Panels up to.  I did some design of the control panels at each end of Fisherman Islands.  I need 14 push buttons, hence spare locations on an NCE Mini Panel.  Unfortunately, the nearest NCE Mini Panel has 12 free locations on it.  I could run two switches (and the common wire) to an alternate NCE Mini Panel, but the three wires required will need to run about 35 feet.  I don't think that will be an issue, but it is a fair distance.

This is the view of the far end of Fisherman Islands.  The first three tracks from the left are standard gauge.  The next is dual gauge and the far right is narrow gauge.

This is the entry into the throat at Fisherman Islands.  The narrow gauge and standard gauge split via a Tillig piece of track.

Finally I have uploaded the photos as promised.

Foreign Running Session and Track Laying

Saturday this week a few of us ventured to Anthony’s for the monthly Border District Running Session.  This is a top session.  The layout room was packed with 7 bodies.  Four are from the dark side – Anthony, Mark, Ian and Shelton (Victorian and/or South Australian Modellers).   Brendan has recently gone to the dark side (aka being a Victorian Modeller).  So it was left to Darren and myself to bring some form of resemblance of properness and decorum to the session as we were the only NSW modellers in attendance.


As usual it was a great day.  I was awarded the ‘Train Controller’ job and also had the opportunity to run three trains in the 26 movement roster.  The session is packed with shunting activities.  It did not get off to a good start, as I caused a few issues.  I sent the wrong train out of the staging (even though I did not drive it – I set the points).  I also set the points for the locos for the Overland Passenger to couple up to the wrong end of its consist and it began heading off in the wrong direction until picked up by the host.  At least the rear was still in the staging siding – so we could say that it was just being test run before leaving on its real run.  I only heard of one bogie derail during the session - Hey Geoff (sorry Brendan – you had to be there), and one set of points being run through the wrong way – Hey Darren!  Shelton caused a few shorts – at least his name was the one called out – I know in at least one occasion he was not even driving but he still got the blame.  All this added to the mood of the session.  Someone drove a brass loco (Ian) without looking where it was going ( I distracted him by talking to him across the layout).  The loco was supposed to be heading through Tatiara Downs on the main platform, and the signalman there had incorrectly routed it into the dock (Hey Anthony).  It was only just able to pull up before ploughing into the station stop blocks – and potentially killing hundreds of passengers.  This session is filled with excitement, stress, deep concentration and thought and the comments that occur make it an afternoon to remember full of banter, jest and laughter.  I certainly look forward in attending.  The planning that goes into arranging this running session must be immense and congratulations to Anthony for his preplanning.  It is just immaculate.  For the price of a few beers and nibblies, Anthony even got a piano moved.  A few photos were captured by Shelton and Ian, but they have not yet surfaced on various blogs - What are you guys waiting for!


Today I got down to the shed late in the arvo.  I put the TV on the tennis and the AFL (Lions).  I sat at the workbench and made up two more lengths of dual gauge track.  I then laid them those pieces with a few other pieces of Tillig dual gauge track that I had from Dutton Park Junction and into the throat of Fisherman Islands.  I then ran a string of ballast hoppers through the Standard Gauge point work and everything works well so far.  So I have one more piece of track to buy, a narrow gauge RH point.  Then I can complete the last of my track work on the layout.  I still have to install the point motors of all the points in Fisherman Islands and also install the track bus for this area.  I am currently undecided if I would use a separate power district for this area.  So I think that might be a task for the next few weeks.

I don’t think I will get much done next week with family activities planned on both days.  I might be able to have a day off during the week and get the wiring started.

The Cold is Coming

This weekend it was hard to get motivated.  Maybe it was the cold weather.  On Friday afternoon I made a trip over to Austral Modelcraft to pick up a few more decoders for the Club Shop.  On Saturday I sat down at the kitchen table and installed three plug and play decoders into three American Proto-2000 models for a prospective member at the Club.   The first loco I did produced a puff of smoke when I think the underneath of the decoder touched the loco frame which was connected to one side of the locos pickups.  It seemed to blow the front headlight circuit causing it to be permanently on.  Luckily, I just remapped function 1 to be the front headlight and it now works just like a bought one.  I also replaced the lights with LEDs.  The second loco was slightly easier as someone had previously removed the lighting board from the loco.  That made the loco hard to test run before the install.  I installed the decoder and wired up the LED headlights and gave it a test.  It ran like crap.  I think there are split gears in the loco as the box the loco came in had four gears in the bottom.  No doubt someone has a future job to replacing the existing split gears.  At least it runs better in one direction.  For the third loco, I had no idea how to disassemble it to get access to the lighting board and decoder plug.  But as we all know “Google is your friend” and Mr Google told me about two screws hidden under the bogies.  So I unscrewed these and Bob’s your old man and it came apart.  But it had four light bulbs in it.  I just installed two LEDs to replace the four bulbs.  It seems to work well.  That is one task just completed to return to the loco owner the next time I get back over to the Club.

 

Today I went down to the shed and collected some track to create two new lengths of dual gauge track that are for track 4 in Fisherman Islands.  I soldered these up while watching the V8’s shootout.  I then did some track planning to create two more lengths of dual gauge track to be installed between Dutton Park and the track into the beginning of Fisherman Islands.  Between these two lengths of dual gauge I will insert a Tillig piece of track that takes the third raid from one side to the other – a sort of transition track.  That allows the geometry of the track in Fisherman Islands yard throat to be correct.

 

I have one 12mm RH point to purchase and then I can lay the complete Fisherman Islands Yard.  I will have to cut plenty of holes in the baseboard for the various point motors and then connect them up to a number of DS64 point controllers which will bankrupt me given the price they have gone up to.

 

On Monday I purchased some Light Dependant Resistors from evil bay (but from a NSW location) and they arrived on Friday.  I will use these to make up the test track for the train detection circuit for my level crossing circuit.  I have put a piece of track on a board, and over the next few weeks I will installed the detectors and the other electronics.

Working on Some Electronics

This week I was spending some time trying to get some electronics working.  A couple of weeks ago I came up with a plan to implement a level crossing flasher across the Bruxner Highway, just on the southern side of Cassino (and I suppose another at Hotham Street on northern side of Cassino and a third on West Street on the Eastern side of Cassino).  The plan involves the level crossing flasher circuit being triggered by track detectors (photoresistors in the track), that can detect either an Up or Down train separately.  The circuit will detect a train in the distance and initiate a flash of the crossing lights, but it will turn off the lights as soon as the last carriage is clear of the crossing.  That way the impatient car driving locals on my layout will be able to resume their travels across the track as soon as the train has gone.  But I need to ensure that the opposite direction circuit does not get triggered by the train as it leaves the level crossing. 

 

Most commercial circuits are good for dual track, where you can place the circuit detection just where you want it on each track.  But on single track, I am not aware of any commercial products that works like a real level crossing.  Some people have the circuit detect equidistant on either sides of the crossing.  That is not good enough for me. Well I am making one that works prototypically!  I will submit the final description here on my blog along with circuit plans when it is successfully installed on the layout and also send an article off to AMRM for their consideration for publication if they are interested. 

 

So back to my solution.  Well I thought I had this concept figured out, just how everything was going to work.  Taking this from that circuit, and that from another circuit.  I’ve also enlisted the help of some guru mates to check my logic.  However, I made a small mock-up of one of the circuits components with a relay powered from a 9V battery.  However, it would not work.  I asked my guru mates and they said it should work.  So today I threw the 9V battery away and got out my trusty DC train controller that I test all my DCC decoder installs with, set it to about 12V and hooked that up with my relay circuit.  Success!  The relay now works when I have a capacitor across its terminals.  I get a 3 second delay in this part of the circuit.  I then added a second capacitor and now I get 6 seconds.  It is working as designed.

 

Now while I was scratching my head about getting this circuit to work during the week, I was searching good old ebay.  I found some circuit boards that do what my cheap and nasty circuit does and does it for a variable length of time and at a cheaper price.  Wouldn’t you know it!  So I ordered two of those.  Anyway, I have the first building block of my circuit working.  I just needed to get my components working.  I will cover the alternatives in my future write up.  It will probably take about 3 weeks for the parts to get here from OS.

 

On Friday night this week, a few of us hit the highway and travelled to Grover’s place for a snag sizzle and a modelling night.  I did not do much while there, but I did solder up eight (8) track snubbers for my DCC buses.  However, I still need a few more to be made.  I also need to install those snubbers.  I also revisited the lighting circuits for my Auscision 73 class loco.  One wire has come adrift from one of the light boards, and I was trying to work out where it has to go back on.  So I think I have identified where it needs to go, and I will try to reattach next weekend and cram everything back under the shell. 

 

Yesterday was spent at the Club.  I did plan on working on my troublesome container train but I did not get around to it.  I took it to the Club and just brought it home again.  It is now sitting on the track at Acacia Ridge and will get some more time spent on it next weekend.  My initial plan of adding some more weight in the centre sills of the wagons is not possible as the centre sill is enclosed.

 

Of Friday night, Geoff mentioned about a new Hobby Shop that has opened up down at Browns Plains, 3/45 Grand Plaza Drive.  Its been there about 3 weeks.  It is called Simon Says and covers Hobbies and Games.  I went down to check it out today.  It looks promising.  It is open 9-5 Monday, Tuesday, Friday and Saturday, 9-9 Thursday and 10-4 on Sunday.  It is closed on Wednesdays.  Over time they will increase their range of items for sale. 

 

Go Queensland!