Ops Session Follow Up

This week I was determined to run some trains and go through the various comments made to timetable cards from the last Operations Session.  I fixed a power issue in Rocklea Sidings by re soldering a wire.  I added an uncoupling magnet to the rear dock siding at Murwillumbah used to load the car carriers so an engine can leave the motorail wagon there and do other tasks.  I realised that the wagons in Lismore Yard were actually in the correct tracks.  I thought three open wagons were located where four louvre vans should have been and vice versa.  Well I was wrong!  I relocated a loco South Brisbane Interstate Yard from the loco siding to track 4.  The timetable card said to leave the loco attached to the wagons.  I was checking out a couple of powerline 48 class locos that I was using to move some wagons to the Cassino Meatworks.  The locos was slipping on the slight incline.  So I tried two 48’s after I changed the Powerline traction tyres.  They still could not move the 5 wagons.  I replaced the 48’s with a 44 class loco with sound.   I did look at trying to add some weight to one or both of the 48’s with some lead I have sitting around, to see if this will allow these locos to return to service.  But they are not running well enough by this small include with 5 wagons.  I replaced some wheels on one wagon as it was creating a great deal of drag.  It now has less drag. I also swapped out some couplers on a wagon that was reported to be uncoupling in a location in the last Ops Session.  It had a scale coupler, and I changed it to a KD#5.

I also re-discovered the Activation and Cancelation button on the fascia under the Hotham Street level crossing to allow the automated level crossing lights to work like the button says.  When a train needs to leave the Up Yard at Cassino, the driver can push the activation button and the level crossing lights work as normal.  When a train from the Meatworks needs to go to the Up Yard, the level crossing cancelation button needs to be pressed, after the trains crosses the level crossing and the lights stop flashing.  I have now labelled the button on the fascia and I updated the Operations Manual.  I also labelled the Level Crossing cutout switch near the Cassino Meatworks.  This button allows for the outer sensor that usually activates the Hothan Road Level crossing for trains travelling south, to be cut out, so a shunting movement in the Meatworks Siding does not activate the level crossing.  When the shunting movement is completed, the switch can be returned to the normal position.  The switch and button waere also documented in a revision of the layout Operations Manual. 

I added a Table of Contents to the Operations Manual and the document is now 23 pages long.  This gets emailed to potential new crew before an Operations Session, as it gives them a good overview of the history of the layout and how it operates.  I also updated a couple of timetable cards for typos and re-printed them, and put them back into the mix.

The next Operations Session will occur on the 4^th October and the aim is to allow Geoff to close out his time requirements for the Dispatcher AP.  He will then have to do all the paperwork before submitting this as part of his SOQ (Statement of Qualifications).  Then we will work to get a few other guys to complete their hours for their remaining tasks for the Dispatcher AP.

On Tuesday night I was perusing power supplies online, and I got my son to use his Amazon links to purchase a 18V DC 3 AMP power supply (with free delivery) for use as the power supply for my ESU Switch Pilot.  It turned up on Wednesday afternoon.  I took it down to the shed and wired it in to the Switch Pilot.  I fired it up and gave it a test for the point motors in Park Road Station and the two point motors on the Park Road to Fisherman Islands angle.  Wouldn’t you know that the points both sides of Park Road station/crossing loop were wired in the wrong order.  I swapped the connections over, so teh panel sort of worked.  I then used the control panel and I noticed that the straight and curve outputs were reversed.  So the wires on each of the first two point outputs were wired back to front.  So I swapped the wires over, tested them again and within a minute after adjusting some screws on the point motors, the points were working perfectly.  Next was the point at the Park Road end of the narrow gauge angle.  I could not get it to fire in one direction.  After adjusting the point motor, eventually it was working.  However, when I used the control panel, I could not get it to work.  So I lifted up the control panel and one wire had come off the pushbutton.  So that was soldered back on and that was the third point now working.  The fourth point was on the Fisherman Islands branch and allowed access to the angle towards Park Road.  It took a while of adjusting the point motor screws.  But it was finally working.  So I am sort of happy with the result.

Focus now turns towards working on the narrow gauge timetable and working out what wagons will start where on the layout for the various trains to deliver.  I had a bit of a cleanup around the place on Friday and found some photos, articles and all my planning material for the narrow gauge.  However, I got distracted.  I started looking at the Sunnybank extension.  I cut up some baseboards and now have to work out how to support the baseboards above Acacia Ridge Yard. 

Saturday was NMRA meeting day.  I went to PK’s place and he drove to Ross’s place for the meeting.  We were lucky to have a look at Ross’s Sydney Central Layout in N scale.  This is just magic.  I remember looking at this layout when it appeared at a Modelling the Railways of NSW Convention some years ago in Sydney.  This may have been at Loftus TAFE.  After this meeting PK and I got an invite to visit Laurie's layout just a few kilometers away from Ross's.  Again, another very nice layout.

The clock tower on Sydney Central

The old tram lines outside Sydney Central Station.

A view showing some of the backscene.

Scanning further to the left, showing more backscene.

Another layout module that Ross had in his shed.

I thought that I needed some lengths of threaded rod to assist with supporting the light pelmet above The Risk, Loco Pilly and Clapham Yard.  It had started to sag a little.  On Sunday I went to Bunnings to get some threaded rod and ended up just getting some lengths if 6mm steel rod (no thread) but cheaper.  I have added three braces to the lighting pelmet at The Risk, Loco Pilly and the southern end of Clapham Yard.  It seems to have been a good decision.  While at Bunnings I picked up a length of 5.4m, 42 x 18mm finger jointed white primed pine.  I cut it up in the Bunnings carpark to fit into my car.  The  pine was cut to fit the station platforms at Sunnybank.  I have been roughing laying out the track and the platforms on the baseboard (which is sitting on the floor of the shed).  This allows me to test a few ideas.  I will have to purchase some more 12mm points next weekend at the AMRA Exhibition.  I have packed the items that I am taking to the AMRA Model Train Exhibition next weekend.  I am on a stand with Darren.

The rod supporting the pelmet at The Risk.

The rod at the other end of The Risk near Loco Pilly.

The support for the southern end of Clapham Yard.

Dutton Park Gets Fixed

On Tuesday I went to Jaycar and picked up a couple of rolls of wire to allow me to continue the wiring task to two point motors on the top deck.  That night the Tuesday Nighters all went over to Barnacle’s place and had a great night.  Just looking at his layout is good therapy.  Of course the discussion and stirring is also good for the soul.

On Thursday morning I set about feeding all the wires, from my newly acquired ESU Switch Pilot, to two more points around the Dutton Park angle from Park Road to Fisherman Islands branch on the narrow gauge trackage.  Later in the afternoon I soldered all these wires to the point motors and realised that the first two point at Park Road platform were wired to the incorrect terminals on the Switch Pilot.  So they were swapped over as the two Dutton Park points were wired in as well.  I also had to plug into two NCE Mini Panels with my Procab controller and program them for the new addresses that I configured the points in the ESU Switch Pilot.  To me the limitation on the ESU that you can only set the addresses in groups of 4 to be a archaic limitation.  They then have the hide to say that their gear is modern.  The NCE QSNAP runs rings around the ESU Switch Pilot in this regard.  Get with it guys!

The next task was to swap out the power supply that was not working for the string of LED lights above Glenapp Crossing Loop.  I removed the power supply that was not working, and tested the new power supply.  It would not light the string of LED lights.  Then I realised that I had not plugged the new power supply in to the 240V supply.  Doh!  So I then did that and turned it on, and the string of layout LED lights lit up again.  Another problem solved, although I no longer have any spare power supplies.  So I might have to order a few more, just to keep them on the shelf just in case.

My next job was to test some of the points connected to the ESU Switch pilot.  Basically while the ESU Switch Pilot was issuing a command to throw the Peco point, it could not do anything.  It was just useless.  When I pushed the button, the other LED lights on that whole power district dimmed.  That was another example of bad product design.  No built in capacitor discharge circuit.  So upon reading the manual, it says you should attach a 18V DC 3 AMP Supply to the second set of inputs on the ESU Switch Pilot.  Most other Peco compatible point controllers from other vendors have built in Capacitor Discharge circuits.  So maybe this ESU was cheap for a reason, it left a lot of features out in its design.  So I am not a fan of how it controls Peco point motors.

On Saturday I rigged up two LEDs with a common anode and added 1K resistors to the cathodes.  I then wired this into the ESU Switch Pilot to test the lighting function, which I am using outputs 5 and 6 on the ESU Switch Pilot.  So actuating the turnout address caused the LEDs to toggle on/off and off/on.  That was very nice.  So I then ran 5 wires from my ESU Switch Pilot under the baseboard through to the high up indicator LEDs that shows the setting of the turnouts at Dutton Park.  I started pulling out the old infrastructure that I had to work these lights.  I then tested the standard gauge lights and they were wired the same as my test setup.  Everything was good.  I then tested the narrow gauge turnout indicator lights and one worked and the other didn’t.  It was then that I found that one LED was wired back the front.  So I swapped it over and then it worked well.

On Saturday Night I ventured into my first attempt at remote operations on Aaron’s layout.  We had three drivers located in Brisbane, a Dispatcher located in Tasmania and the owner of the layout in Newcastle, NSW.  He was also driving trains on the layout.  This was apparently the first time Aaron has had three remote operators.  He has a CATs panel displayed on a webpage which is tracking the location of the various trains and there are also 4 cameras showing the various station platforms streaming to the panel, which we can all see.  We all get online in Discord and can talk to the Dispatcher, (and the other drivers) while we watch the webpage get updated.  Apparently we ran 36 trains in about 3 hours 15 minutes.  Most of the services were on-time.  Things went a bit haywire when a freight came through the middle of our electric services.  I don’t believe there were any derailments either.  This is a nice layout to operate on.

It was not until today (Sunday) that I wired in the 4 wires from the ESU Switch Pilot to the 4 pairs of lights on the indicator panel.  I also connected the 5th wire (the power line) up to the LED indicator panel.  I also had to install a 1K ohm resistor in line with each of the four wires from the ESU Switch Pilot.  I gave it a test and again everything is working well.  I removed the old Peco switches that sit on top of a point motor.  The ESU Light feature using two addresses works well.

The ESU Switch Pilot on the fascia.  the first 4 outputs are for points.  The next two are for the Indicator Panel and the last 2 are currently unused.

The Indicator panel showing that the Standard Gauge is set for South Brisbane Interstate and the Narrow Gauge line is set for the direction of Fisherman Islands.

On Friday night we went to my old work rooftop haunt and celebrated my retirement, which commenced 2 weeks back.  A few mates turned up as well as some family members and we drank our way through 185 Coronas.  Our aim was 200, but we had a few no shows for various reasons.  If they all rocked up, we would have sailed past the target. 

It had to start with one.

How it ended!

P.S.  I was functioning on all cylinders on Saturday morning.

 

Post Convention Blues

This week started with continued Convention activities.  I had a few visitors scheduled to arrive for a layout viewing on Monday morning.  They had a tour around and hopefully they had a laugh at some of my layout scenes and they were able to take a learning or two away from their visit.  Tuesday was my day off from home related activities, as I had scheduled to visit other layouts around Brisbane.  I booked into visit two layouts, one on the northside and one on the southside.  The first address was an N scale Australian layout which was running a timetable operations session.  I enjoyed my working in N scale.  This owner also has a 12mm QR layout still being developed.  Second stop was the O scale NSW and QR layouts at Peter Krause’s place.  Both locations were excellent choices to see some trains in scales I do not model in.

Once I got back home on Tuesday afternoon, that was the point that the convention was finally over for me.  We got online on Tuesday night and had a few discussions, and some were about the Convention.  Following that I was all ‘model railwayed’ out and I could not bring myself to do any modelling for the rest of the week.  I still entered the shed on a couple of occasions, as that was where the beer fridge was.

On Saturday I ventured over to the Redland Model Railway Exhibition, which was held at a new location.  I spent many hours there on Saturday morning and I caught up with many friends and viewed a number of layouts.  I actually picked up a rolling road from Model Box at the Exhibition and this was at a very reasonable price.  Mine has been unpacked from its packaging and is ready to be installed next to my mobile NCE test track.  I think I will wire it up so that it can be switched over between my PowerCab setup and a 9V battery to allow me to test all my locomotives.

On the previous weekend at the NMRA Convention I picked up an ESU Switch Pilot from Marty’s Train Shed.  Yesterday I started the install process by screwing the Switch Pilot to the layout fascia.  This afternoon I also made it to the shed and programmed the addresses of 4 point motors and 2 indicator lights.  At this stage I have two unused outputs.  I have completed laying wires to two point motors at Park Road narrow gauge crossing loop, but I have run out of wire.  So it looks like I am off to Jaycar tomorrow to buy two more spools of wire to allow me to complete the wiring of the next two point motors at Park Road and Fisherman Islands so I can activate my narrow gauge ‘Y’.  I can  then wire the indicator lights that will show the position of the points at Dutton Park.  The points at this location are above head height, so the lights allow the locomotive drivers to ensure they are travelling on the correct route.

We head to Barnacles on Tuesday evening, so maybe after viewing his layout, my modelling juices may start to flow again.

2025 NMRA Australasian Convention Done and Dusted - Now Sleep For 3 Days

OMG!  I am stuffed.  Wednesday we had an Operations Session on Cassino where 7 guys turned up.  Thanks for Geoff for assisting with North Coast Control, while the guests ran trains and I assisted.  Friday was layouts viewing sessions from 10:00 until 2:00pm.  That was followed by the Convention Welcome Social at the Calamvale Hotel.  I had a good amount of fun with the included food and drinks.  Friday it got real serious. Early on I registered my 4 model entries and the 90mm cap challenge.  I gave 1 presentation and 3 hands on clinics in a row.  Then I was able to listen to three presenters.  Then we had to scurry home, to then head back out to Anthony Palmer’s place for pizza and an Operations Session along with Darren and Marty and a few others and special guests Dave, Teddy and Pete Abeles.    That went to a reasonable time.  That day was the day that I actually Retired and it was also my birthday on that day.  They sang Happy Birthday at the Convention.  It was great to meet Dave Abeles.

Saturday was the conference on steroids.  I was down for 2 presentations and 3 more hands on clinics and was able to attend two sessions by others.  I had a good talk to Dave Abeles and I was able to share my Layout Rules of Operation with him, from which he obtained immense pleasure.  At the end of the day's sessions it was home, shower and back out to the Conference Dinner at the Calamvale Hotel Rooftop Room.  What a great view!  Nice food and a gain a reasonable long night.  I think I picked up three first prizes, and a second prize from my four models.  I didn’t finish in the top 3 popular in the 90mm cap challenge.  It is easy to come first when you are the only person in that category.

After 5 hours sleep, I was back at the Convention, Picked up one attendee at a bus stop down the road and gave him a lift.  I then gave 2 more presentations, attended two other sessions, picked up a prize of a T-Shirt in the rolling raffle and then listened to the Plenary Session, and then had a select few learned gentlemen (3 x MMRs) back at my place (7 actually) for a tour of the layout.  Then after they left and then with the fridge completely empty, around to the BWS with my son to replenish the fridge.  That has now taken care of my medicinal requirements up to about Christmas.

I might get a few extra hours sleep tonight, before I have some more layout tours guests on Monday morning before I get to be able to go out and visit a couple of other layouts that are open for viewing on Tuesday. 

What a long weekend of activities.  As I said, I’m completely shagged.  I was able to talk to many overseas modellers – New Zealand, Tasmania, Bribie Island, Canada and America.  People there were also from New South Wales, ACT, Victoria, South Australia and Western Australia.  We had people from Cairns and Townsville and many other places in northern and western Queensland.  The overwhelming response from people was, that it was a fantastic Convention and they learned things from it.  I enjoy being able to teach some MMRs new tricks when I tell them how I do certain modelling tasks. 

Convention Countdown - 3 More Sleeps

I cannot remember what I did this week, it just flew through.  I did some printing off of some handouts for one of my presentations at next weekend’s NMRA Convention.  I also added the floor to my QR HO wagon.  I added the various pieces of text to the 'road over rail' bridge.  I started packing my travel boxes for all the stuff I need for my clinics for the convention.  On Friday I cut up the various pieces of styrene for the various Styrene Building Clinics, so the attendees can get a head start of their Clothesline builds.  The pallet build classes are easier as they require full lengths of various sizes of styrene strip.

I do remember that I spent some time doing scatter on my 90mm end cap for the NMRA Conventions 90mm end cap challenge.  I added some detail to it.  You will get a laugh when you see it and turn it on at the convention in the display room.  For those not attending I will add a photo of this entry next Sunday night.  On Saturday I pulled my 90mm end cap project apart and re-installed a length of pipe in which I positioned my controlling motor.  This was again re-positioned in the middle of the pipe.  My previous method of installation made the motor not totally upright and in the centre of the model.  It seems to be working much better now with this new installation.  The motor controls what I have on top of the cap.

On Saturday afternoon, I went over to Paul’s place along with Glenn and Kim and we packed the bags of loot for the NMRA Convention attendees.  I must admit that the contents are pretty good.  I was able to bring my bag home with me, and today I removed all the support infrastructure on an HO scale "QR Lamp Shed with WC".  It is a damn fine model!

Today I also put some finishing touches on my QR 2050 Class railmotor.  Sitting down to dinner tonight, I realised that I forgotten to put the driver inside the railmotor and install the handbrake wheel.  So I will conclude that work tomorrow.  I have packed up most items to take to the clinic they will be put into the car on Wednesday.

I have an Ops Session on Wednesday afternoon which should be great, I also have an open day on the Thursday with a dozen or so visitors coming and then we have 3 days of Convention.  It will be a Blast!

No Time Left

On Monday I was looking at the kitchen table which I had taken over with a couple of my models sitting on it.  One model is a scratch build Road over Rail bridge.  I decided to enter it into the structure category in the upcoming NMRA Convention modelling competition.  So I created a word document, with some text in it, that will be installed on the bridge.  Last painted dates, bent numbers and distance from Sydney Central, etc..  These will be added to the model in the near future.

I found it hard to get motivated into completing the underfloor brake detail on my Australian National AKFX rail carrying wagon.  However, after attending a funeral of a model railway personality on Wednesday morning, in the afternoon I was must have been channelling Eddie, as I installed the air pipes, air cylinders and the various brake actuators on this wagon.  I then gave them a paint.  So I think that wagon is now completed.  I still need to add the floor to the QR HO wagon.  I better do that this coming week.  The last thing I need to do, is add screws to my railmotor up through the floor to retain the roof.  I can them add the relevant wagon numbers and that will also be complete.

Wednesday job was to print out the various forms for my model entries.  I was able to arrange printing of some handouts for my presentations at the Convention on Friday before a work happy hour.  

The weekend was a write-off as I was attending a wedding.  Just a few tidy up tasks to go.

Some Layout Scenery Work Continues

I spent time earlier this week going through all the DCC functions enabled on all of my locos.  I plan to create a loco card for each loco that has all the functions enabled listed for each loco.  I have realised that I have quite a few locos.  I went back each day and did a few more locos and put them into a document that can be printed out on a loco card.  I think I have done all of my locos now except the steam ones.

On Tuesday I did some track alignment activities on the sidings in Lismore Yard.  I use this location to store a number of partially built pieces of rollingstock.  The rollingstock was moved, the track was tacked down and on Wednesday I decided to spread some ballast and glue it all down.  Later on that day, the rail heads were cleaned and the rollingstock moved back into the various sidings.

A rather dark photo of Lismore Yard

The same location taken from the other end.

For quite some time, the area between Burringbah Tunnel and Murwillumbah has laying there dormant.  The scenery was plastered with only an initial layer of plaster on it.  I had wanted to install a traditional farm dam in that area.  I was less than satisfied with how I started out making a water dam.  So it has sat there unfinished for maybe 10 years.  So on Thursday morning I mixed up about 10-12 buckets of plaster and covered the area with more coats of plaster and fixed up the water dam that I had tried to make in that area.  In the afternoon, I painted the plaster and it looks so much better already.  I need to scratch build a small shed to house the pump house for the dam.  I actually found a shed when going through a few boxes today.  When painted the area, I realised that I really needed to do some more maintenance on one end of the original end of the plaster work near Murwillumbah, so on Friday morning I mixed up another batch of plaster and used tissues to be covered in thin plaster to add an extra layer to the baseboard covering.  I then did another round of painting of the plaster in the afternoon.

The newly updated earth dam is in the centre.

I have been very slack lately in completing my models for the NMRA Convention.  I have to add brake piping and underfloor detail to my Australian National Rail carrying wagon to make Laurie happy.  I also need to complete the work to affix the roof to my QR 2050 class railmotor and then add the numbers.  I printed them out last night.  On Saturday I got around to adding the bogie sideframes to this model, which were design by Guy and printed by Luke.

I am also doing small bits of work around the layout.  I added some fencing to a block of land near the Leycester River outside Lismore. 

North of Lismore is this block of land with is being fenced.

I also have been doing some work on various old models I have of CPH railmotors.  I’m not sure if I will just sell this stuff or store it on a siding around the layout, or even put a chip in it and make it run.

South of Cassino is a new dilapidated and abandoned shop has sprung up.

The fettlers at Old Cassino are growing in number

I have also been going through my presentations for the upcoming NMRA convention in Brisbane later this month.  All of them got a few tweaks over the weekend.