BYLONG

Correcting a Problem

2012-01-14T22:15:00.001+11:00

I recently found out that a number of files that I had links to in previous posts were no longer available so I have corrected the links in the posts to provide these files on what should be a stable site (Google Documents).

Tarping an S Wagon - Not a One Hour Project

A PDF of three HO NSWGR tarpaulins for printing on tissue paper (laser printer).

Missing in action but back again...

DecoderPro files for my NSWGR Austrains C36 class set up as described in the post to drift and also to have the exhaust sound increase and decrease in response to layout grades, etc. Both auto chuff and cam chuff files are available.

Austrains FS/BS Rolling and Weight Problems Solved

Here is a spreadsheet that I use to calculate the weight needed for a HO wagon or passenger car based on a system devised by Terry Flynn and myself years ago. This weighting system is designed to allow relatively prototypical train loads to be handled by our model locomotives as compared to the NMRA weighting formula.

Bylong Operation Night

Various PDF files of the Bylong Timetable Excel spreadsheet and a NSWGR X2010 form.

I apologise to those who tried the links only to find that the file wasn't there.

Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year

2011-12-20T19:59:00.003+11:00

I would just like to express my thanks to those who find my blog of interest. I must say that I quite enjoyed posting in November as the blog and the projects each seemed to drive the output and interest along at a great pace. It couldn't keep up though and I did slow down.
I am taking the break and the first week of January off and hope to accomplish some more. I really should get back to the Cassilis branch terminus and psych myself up to build the last six points (I just checked and I made this promise to myself in a blog post in Christmas 2009 as well!).
I am sure something will eventuate but who knows what? I tend to have a thought about a technique or something interesting to build and away I go, not good at planning and sticking to it.
Anyway, I hope you all have a safe and happy holiday season.

Ray

Back again with another little project

2011-12-13T23:07:00.000+11:00

After my previous months flurry of posts I ran out of steam however I was off again when I heard that the Model Railroad Craftsman had received the first QSI Titan sound decoders. Now, those that know me realise that I like to experiment and try new things so off to Blacktown and $135 later I had a Heavy Steam Titan in my hands.
Now, what to do with it? You would think that I would already have a plan after waiting for it to turn up for so long but no. The Titan comes in several versions with different sound sets that can be changed so the Heavy Steam version wasn't a problem as I had a QSI Programmer and the accompanying software and could change it if necessary.
After due consideration I opened the storage draw under the lower staging yard and decided on my NSWGR D57 class so the Heavy Steam sound set was fine after all.
There is a story about this particular model that I would like to tell.
In 1973 in the first year of Chris' and my marriage we were living in a flat at Cronulla and desperate to get a block of land I approached Neil Cram who I had built a NSWGR 25 class 2-6-0 locomotive for and worked out a deal. He assisted us with money for a deposit on our land at Helensburgh and I would build him the equivalent in locomotives (no actual number was discussed we would work it out along the way). The first loco of the deal was a 57 class that Neil had some brass etchings made up for consisting of the tender, cab and smokebox. Along with the etchings was a 4-10-2 chassis from a brass loco to be used as the basis for the 57. Anyway after a lot of work on a small desk with a Unimat lathe that could be converted to a milling machine the 57 resulted.
About 6 years ago I was in Tom's Hobbies at West Ryde when I noticed something in the second hand display case that was very familiar. Along with it were several other locos I recognised and I guess Neil was cleaning up his collection, a lot of better model locos having been produced down the years. I couldn't afford them all so I bought the 57.
Now to the present, the Titan comes with two speakers as it has stereo output so that you can get sound from the appropriate areas of a loco. The two speakers being 28mm diameter were too large for what I wanted to do so I bought a 18mm and a 13mm speaker and enclosures. The idea was to put the 18mm one down the boiler as far as possible for the chuff and compressor then to put the 13mm one in the cab for whistle, generator, blower, injectors, etc. The QSI CV Manager software has sliders for each sound so that any sound can be directed to either speaker or balanced somewhere between. The speakers placement was accomplished relatively quickly but I had to put the Titan above the motor and sticking into the cab a bit, thanks goodness for the large boiler made from rolled brass (that was fun to make way back when). I couldn't put the decoder in the tender as I has soldered it all up, no way in and the floor was milled from a piece of brass.
Using the QSI Programmer and the accompanying CV Manager software I proceeded to choose from the available sounds to produce what I felt a 57 sounded like based on a DVD I have with 5711 chuffing away. The Titan has a number of different chuffs, many whistles including the Eureka 38, 60 and Austrains 35, different compressors and generators to choose from. The whole sound scheme can have the overall pitch adjusted (bass to treble range) and the chuff has another pitch adjustment as well. Of course with small speakers some of the bass is not really available. I would love to hear the Titan on some larger speakers. I was also able to nominate 6 chuffs per wheel revolution. There are many other adjustments available that I won't go into but do investigate. I should mention that it allows a 'User sound' to be loaded in and this sound can be looped if necessary, I am not sure what you can do with that though, perhaps a more suitable compressor as it is a simpler sound than a whistle for instance. A whistle could be done but it would always have the same length and couldn't be looped as a whistle has a start, a middle and an end that have to dealt with separately to extend the whistle sound.
Anyway, enough talk, here is another rough video of the 57 in action on Bylong.

A bit more on tarp colour

2011-11-29T22:00:00.000+11:00

I had an idea tonight (dangerous I know) about how to colour the tarps. Basically I turned the tissue paper over and taped it to a scrap of cardboard then air brushed the back with Tamiya XF-57 Buff. One 'advantage' was that the tissue wrinkled so that might assist in making it look more like an old tarp.
I think that it might do for a start and as tarps end up all sorts of colours from black to browns to the off-white original then different base colours could be used.
The advantage of course is that the NSWGR stenciling and the locations of the tie down points are still clearly visible.

Some weathering of the tarp can be done later after it has been installed on a wagon.
Now, how can I make the attachment of the ropes less boring and quicker?
Somehow I don't think that there is an answer to that one.

Tarping an S Wagon - Not a One Hour Project

2011-11-26T23:26:00.001+11:00

As a result of Colin Hussey leaving a comment on my last post with the size of a NSWGR tarpaulin (24' x 16') I decided to have a go at tarping a S wagon. A search led me to the following three photos from the Weston Langford collection. Note the brand new tarp on the S wagon and the stencilling of NSWGR with 4 characters, the last two being 44. You can also see the end of a tarped K wagon in the lower left corner which only has the NSWGR so I don't know what the other 4 characters were for.

With the clean tarp picture I was able to estimate where the tie down points were on a tarp and as Colin pointed out in his follow up comments there are some about 4' in from the edge as well as around the perimeter. I drew up a tarp to HO and made a PDF file with three tarps (click on the link to download the PDF). I then then taped some white tissue paper to an A4 sheet of paper, crossed my fingers and printed three tarps on my laser printer. This worked well as can be seen in the following photo.

After cutting a tarp from the tissue paper I used a pin in a pin vise to put small holes at the black dots printed on the tarp. I then threaded some EZ Line through the holes and put a small drop of ACC (Super Glue) on the underside to hold the 'rope'. Twenty ropes later I was ready to give it all up!!!

I then used a number 76 drill and drilled through the sides of the S wagon to the underneath of the floor .

A piece of balsa wood was glued to the floor of the S wagon to replicate the load under the brand new tarp in the Weston Langford photo. The balsa was rounded slightly on the top edge.

I missed a photo here, but the next step was to thread the 'ropes' on one side of the tarp through the bottom holes in the wagon until it was shorter than needed (so it could be stretched later) and glued it to the underside of the floor. I used accelerator for all glueing and I can't emphasise enough how this speeds construction. It is tricky to get two ropes through the same hole but it can be done, the second rope coming from the higher up tie downs. I continued slipping the ropes through the holes, pulling them tight then glueing them to the floor and folding the tarp around the ends of the wagon. This is hard to explain so if you give it a go you will have to work out the best way to do this. I think that each wagon type will have a different challenge.

Once the ropes were all attached with the tarp folded around the S wagon I carefully coated the tissue with watered down PVA and allowed it to harden.

The last step was to carefully paint the tarp without painting over the NSWGR stencils. I used a light grey and followed it with powdered pastel colours. I am not too happy about the result but it is the first time I have tried to replicate the colour of a tarp.

If you look carefully at the top view of the S wagon you will just see the NSWGR stencils.

ADDENDUM TO PREVIOUS POST

It appears that I am in trouble with the detail police as James McInerney sent an email saying that I had the timber in the wagons pointing the wrong way for the direction of travel (see the video in the last post). It seems that the single central stack should be pointed towards the locomotive to lessen the chance that either of the two outer stacks would strike something, makes sense to me, thanks James.

Here is a photo from Colin Hussey showing timber carried this way.

Tracking of K and S 4 wheel wagons with cantilevered timber loads

2011-11-24T22:12:00.002+11:00

As a result of the my success recorded in my blog post of 13/11/2011 I managed to do two S wagons with the cantilevered loads and another K wagon with a load enclosed within its sides.
The timber castings for the loads came from two different sources to the load in the earlier post namely, In Front Models and some polyurethane timber stacks I found in a plain plastic bag a few years ago (in Toms Hobbies I think).

The end result is that I now have three cantilevered loads each with different timber stacks in one K wagon and two S wagons plus the normal load in the other K wagon.

Of course the next step was to see if the timber stacks extending out of the ends of the wagons would interfere with each other on curves. I placed the wagon with the wide central load projection next to a S wagon without timber then the others were coupled so that each central stack went between the two outer stacks on the next wagon.

Here is a video showing that there was no interference on my 762mm (30") curves.

The next obvious step is to tie down the tractors in the following S wagons. I will have to paint them and then tie and brace them as shown in an AMRM article by Graeme Brown some years ago (AMRM Issue 229 August 2001). I am sure that the VR way of tying down a tractor in a 4 wheel wagon would be much the same as it was done on the NSWGR.

I also want to try my hand at tarping a few wagons using the EZ Line to stretch the tarps 'tight' but I have loaned my Day of the Goods Train book which has the dimensions of the tarps in it to another modeller. I think a phone call might be in order soon.

Another Small Project

2011-11-19T13:13:00.000+11:00

While going through that box of bits last week that resulted in the timber K wagon load, I also found a Bergs Hobbies CV wagon kit that I was given many years ago by my cousin Garry Waugh. Garry is no longer with us and may be remembered by some who have been in the hobby for many years.

I hadn't used the CV as I have several Protype CVs on BYLONG which are superb models, the masters being made by Michael McCormac, the well known modeller who has just released his NSWGR 'dogbox' kits.

Now, Wollar loco depot has a short radial track from the turntable that is very close to the edge of the layout with a 1420mm drop to the concrete floor, not a good situation. This track is to be used by the Cassilis branch railmotor so the answer was to build a shed for storage of parts and light running repairs. Down the decades the NSWGR had used old wagons stripped of their undergear and placed on supports for this and other purposes, a SRC was used at Sutherland for the CPH railmotors and trailers that were used on the Sutherland to Helensburgh services.

I won't go into the details of construction as they will be self evident from the photo but will say that the wagon doesn't have to be supported by rail and a retained embankment or even stacked old sleepers could do the job.

I have to find more bits and pieces to detail the shed and surrounds along with some nice black oil spillage soaking into the ground, then I really should start (and finish) the Stephen Johnson 400 Class Railmotor kit I have had since the 1980's. Now how did a 400 Class sound and what sound decoder will I need?

A One Hour Project

2011-11-13T17:50:00.001+11:00

Last evening I came across a Sydney Hobbies timber load for a K wagon while searching through my 'treasure chest' of detail parts for another project. I didn't have any luck with what I was looking for so decided it was about time to do something with the wagon load kit as I had bought it a few years ago.

I thought I would document this as a blog post as I tried something that I had not done before and thought that it might be of use to others.

I placed the three stacks of timber into an Austrains K wagon which was laying on its side, two stacks one way and the third one in the centre the other way as shown in the photo accompanying the kit, applying a drop of ACC (Super Glue) at the cross point between the stacks.

I then slipped a piece of timber (supplied strip polystyrene) vertically either side of the stacks as shown in the photo aligning them with the hinges of the K wagon doors glueing them to the stacks but not the K wagon body.

At this point I removed the stacks from the K wagon and proceeded to paint the timbers.

I used Tamiya XF-59 Desert Yellow for the fresh sawn timber and Tamiya XF-57 Buff for the vertical scrap pieces of timber that are tied in place to hold the stacks. I feel that the Desert Yellow does a great job of giving that fresh cut timber look while the Buff gives a slightly weathered colour as could be expected for the scrap bracing timbers.

While the paint was drying I removed the K wagon chassis and drilled No. 78 holes in the tie down rings low down the side of the K wagon (see photo of finished model).

After the paint had dried I placed the load back into the K wagon and proceeded to use copper coloured Berkshire Junction Model Railroad Supplies EZ-Line (from The Model Railroad Craftsman at Blacktown NSW) to tie down the load as per the supplied photo.

I chose the copper colour for two reasons, one is that the line comes in black, copper and green and we don't usually see black or green rope at least not in 1965 and the second reason was simple, I had the copper line already.

The trick is to ACC glue one end of the line to the inside of the K wagon body after passing the line through the hole in the ring. After this it is simple to stretch the line up and around the various timbers glueing occasionally as you go. I use a piece of tissue paper to blot up any excess ACC glue straight away and the use of an ACC glue accelerator solution really assists this work to move at a fast pace (I got my Flashtac Accelerator from Tom's Hobbies).

Where the rope is tied around the ends of the stacks I started by glueing the line end on the bottom of the stack end then wrapping it around as required. I left a few short ends of line hanging loose to indicate knots.
I didn't attempt to tie knots as the stretchy line is interesting to tie knots with, not impossible just interesting. I also couldn't work out how to model the knots on the rings, maybe someone else can work that one out.

So the new technique was the use of the EZ-Line for tying down loads, nice and thin, more or less the right colour and it looks tight as it should.

Making an Exhaust Chuff Cam

2011-11-08T21:20:00.000+11:00

In my last post I mentioned that I would explain how I make exhaust chuff cams for my locomotives so here is a technique that anyone can do.
1. Place the loco upside down in a cradle.
2. Connect power to the loco and clean the rear of the rim of the most likely candidate driving wheel, this is usually the rear wheel on the left, looking towards the front and with the loco upside down.
3. Apply power to the loco while it is upside down in a cradle and bring the side rod crank of the wheel uppermost (where it would normally contact the rail).
4. Make two marks on the rear of the rim wheel three spokes apart (the crank is usually aligned with a spoke) with a very fine marker (0.5mm line width).
5. Move the wheel to the next quarter position by counting the wheel spokes and make the next three spoke set of marks and follow through with the last two sets.
6. Using a sharpened toothpick carefully apply ACC glue (Super Glue) between the three spoke marks at each quarter location and allow to set for a couple of days.
7. Mount a piece of printed circuit board (PCB) to the under side of the chassis either with a suitably located chassis screw or with glue, if glueing the PCB, clean any oil from the chassis thoroughly.
8. Solder the cam wire from the sound decoder to the printed circuit board.
9. If using a chassis screw to mount the PCB ensure that the copper of the PCB where the wire is soldered on is not in contact with the screw head or chassis by removing copper between the screw and the decoder cam wire.
10. Solder a piece of phosphor bronze wire or strip to the PCB near the decoder cam wire such that one end bears against the rear of the rim of the wheel with the ACC insulated segments. I used Slaters 0.12mm (0.006") phosphor bronze strip on the Austrains C36 but I have also used phosphor bronze wire.
11. With power applied to the loco rub the point of a 8B graphite (lead) pencil to the rear of the rim, this smooths the tracking of the wire/strip.
12. Place the loco on the programming track or main and set the sound decoder to use the cam, this is easily achieved using JMRI Decoder Pro.
14. Adjust the strip/wire to lightly touch the rim until a good clean chuffing sound results.

Here are some photos showing the C36 installation.

If you have followed the above you should now have a loco that chuffs four times for each wheel revolution.
If you have a slightly uneven beat then one or more of the ACC glue segments is a different length but this is not an issue a locos may have a slightly different beat with one chuff being slightly longer/louder than the others. Of course if the chuff sound is really out of balance then you will have to scrap the ACC glue off and redo it.

Missing in action but back again...

2011-10-10T21:50:00.003+11:00

Things have been quiet on the blog for the past month as I have been off work looking after my wife Chris as she had a hip joint replacement, makes you suddenly feel old. She had been having increasing leg pain over the previous year and we put it down to sciatica as she has a bad back. Eventually we got her to see about it and after the usual weeks waiting to see the specialist he went through the roof and scheduled her for the operation on 6 October. Now that obviously didn't happen as he rang us two days after that first visit to ask if she could be in hospital the next day, it was that bad.
All is well now, she can manage quite well and I returned to work today but she won't be back to work for another month or two.
Although I was the apprentice chief cook and bottle washer I soon got things under control and managed to get into the garage now and again. My previous GSV sheep van chassis post was done during one of these moments.
What have I been up to since?
Well, I have been playing with Decoder Pro and the Soundtraxx Tsunamis in my steam locos trying to extract more of the good stuff from them. I now have several locos that will chuff heavily as they move away and then the chuff will almost disappear as they start to cruise along. Also if they come to a grade they will start to chuff heavily again as the Tsunami senses the load coming on. Similarly if the chuff will drop away as they drift down a grade. All very satisfying and I want to point out that when the chuff drops to a drift and increases again I am not changing the throttle unless of course I was starting or stopping.
Here is a quick and rough video of the effects.
I had been trying to achieve this effect for some time and finally worked it out.
First up you need to put some momentum into the loco and as I use the NCE ProCab I used 6 in the 0 - 9 range accessible from the momentum button. I should also mention that the NCE command station can be set up to have half the momentum acceleration setting when decelerating or a one to one relationship, I use the one to one so acceleration and deceleration settings are the same if using the ProCab momentum button. Note that the use of the momentum button on the cab will overwrite any CV 3 and CV 4 momentum settings in the locomotive but I use the button to try to replicate the load that is behind the locomotive, I use a low setting of 2 or 3 for just the locomotive when running 'light'.
The difference this time around is that one of the BEMF CVs has to be set to 0, this is CV 212 which is the Motor Control Intensity CV on the Advanced tab, then CV 188 on the DDE tab (Dynamic Digital Exhaust) has to be adjusted until you get the right responses, this might come down to adjusting CV188 by as little as only one or two once you are in the 'ballpark' area.
It seems that CV 212 turns off BEMF to the motor as the response returns to being like a no BEMF loco but some sort of sensing of the motor load is going on so maybe it is only half turned off, who knows?
It really comes down to adjust CV188, test and listen, then do it again and again until you zero in on the right value. I found that around 60 was a good starting point.
Other DDE sound CVs also need to be adjusted and there is no easy way to explain this, just try it out.
Here is a link to my Decoder Pro file for my Austrains C36 set up for auto chuffing.
The down side of the auto chuff is that without the BEMF it doesn't keep in time too well and I installed a can chuff arrangement which is much more realistic.
And here is a link for the same C36 set up for a cam operated chuff (perhaps a subject for another blog).
It appears that as each model loco is a bit different that you may have to play with the CVs for your own Austrains C36 but have a go you might like it.
If you don't like it then just use Decoder Pro to reinstate your own settings (assuming the you saved them in Decoder Pro first.
Other locos I have done by copying and modifying the C36 file are 2 Trainorama C32s, and 2 brass D50s so it will be interesting watching at the next Bylong operating session when the boys start to run them.

A not so new GSV sheep van

2011-09-13T11:59:00.002+10:00

I recently noticed that Casula Hobbies had released four axle packs of 10.5mm disc wheels in 23.8, 25.0 and 26.0mm axle lengths which gave me an idea. Spoked 26mm axles are also available and I heard a whisper that spoked 23.8mm axles may be available in the future which would be great for this project and others.
Some years ago I purchased a number of Austrains S trucks so that I could use their removable chassis on my Protype four wheel wagons. In my usual fashion I converted a CV van and stopped there.
Now though I had an idea and bought some 23.8mm axles from Casula Hobbies.
My idea was to try them out under a Camco NSWGR GSV sheep van as the original chassis was made very wide to suit the axle lengths available when first produced.
Now the S truck chassis is wider of course but as it is removable I used a motor tool with a wide (approx. 1mm) stone cutting disc to cut it down its long length through the centre of the chassis. I also filed the edges of the steel weight to fit within the new narrrow chassis.
The two longitudinal ridges on the underside of the GSV floor that represent the inner chassis members of the GSV were clipped off with small transistor side cutters and then filed flat to the rear of the coupler mounts, the mounts were left as is.
The 23.8mm axles were held in place between the S truck chassis pieces and marks were made on the under side of the GSV floor in the four holes at each corner of the S truck chassis. I attached the S truck chassis to the floor using a small self tapping screw through each of the four holes at each corner of the chassis. The rest of the van was assembled as per the instructions and painted dark grey.
After painting I applied some clear gloss to the number boards and chassis areas where the van numbers were to go. I found that the decals needed a coat of Microscale Liquid Decal Film, a clear liquid that gives an extra coating to hold old or suspect decals together.
I fitted Kadee scale head whisker couplings and followed this with some pastel dry colour weathering and here is the result compared to a GSV built as supplied.

Yes, I know, I will fix the brake handle now that the GSV looks so good.

Amazing what you find on the net

2011-08-30T22:40:00.000+10:00

While cruising the net this evening I stumbled across these two videos on YouTube.

Video 1 Video 2

Although I have driven through the Bylong area about 15 years ago and have some video I didn't notice the reddish colour of some of the soil so I will have to add a little here and there to correct this on the layout.

I also note the large number of small trees and bushes close to the track, I might add a few more to the layout but since 1965 was in drought I think that most of my scenery will be fine, although my backscenes are too green apparently (not that I knew about the drought when I painted them).

That's about it for the moment.

Austrains FS/BS Rolling and Weight Problems Solved

2011-08-09T18:36:00.003+10:00

Rolling
I have been working on my Austrains FS and BS carriages to reduce their weight and to improve their rolling capability.
The following is a simple and quick method to achieve this.
Begin by disassembling the coach, a little bit of leverage on the bottom edge of the body will release it from the retaining clips. Remove the two screws that hold the lighting board on then do the same with the three very small screws that attach the interior partitions to the chassis.
At this stage you will see two long steel weights that also act as part of the pick up circuit for the lighting.
Unsolder the two fine wires, you will need a hot soldering iron or alternatively snip them at the solder joint with the steel.

Next cut four small pieces of shim brass (clean and polished) about 25mm long and wide enough to sit in the floor groove (see photo below).
Super glue the shims over the holes where the small pickup springs come through the floor, you will need some weights to hold the shim against the floor while it sets.
Solder some wire between the two brass shims on each side. I used straight brass wire that I made by stretching some picture hanging wire between a vice and a pair of pliers. Finally solder on the wires from the switch.

I took the opportunity while the coach was apart to paint the interior a mid-brown wood colour with maroon seats for the FS and dark green seats for the BS.
Reassemble the coach.
Now to improve the rolling, turn the coach upside down and using a small jewellers screwdriver lever the inner brake shoe casting up and out from the two retaining clips.
Chamfer the inner rear edge of each brake shoe (closest to the wheel flange) as it appears that this is where the brakes are touching the flange and where the resulting squeaking comes from.

Clip the castings back into the bogie and you are ready to see it roll.
The casting can be tricky to get back into the retaining clips and the small screwdriver can assist in pushing it gently until it clips into place. It has a tendency to want to lay over but perservere and you will get the trick of it.

Weight
The coach originally weighed 155 grams but now only weighs 105 grams.
Now as it comes the mass of this coach is to the HO NMRA Recommended Practice RP-20.1 which is 1 ounce of weight plus another half ounce for each real 1 inch in model length.
The FS and BS are 9 inches long so that is 5 1/2 ounces which is 155 grams, spot on.
However, as we have found, this is too heavy for our HO NSWGR steam locomotives even without the built in braking.
I use wagon and coach mass formulas that are the result of experiments carried out with Terry Flynn back in the 1980's on my BYLONG layout with 4 wheel wagons at the front of very long trains on 1 in 40 falling and climbing grades.
The formulas were developed to try to get realistic train lengths with model NSWGR steam locomotives as the NMRA weighting formula does not work for our small steamers and also doesn't work for 4 wheel wagons and is overall, too heavy .
For passenger coaches I use a weighting formula of 1.8 grams per foot of body length +/- 10% so the FS and BS just pass the minimum mass of 105 grams, a little more mass could be added with some HO scale passengers.
I also use a goods wagon weighting formula that is 2 grams per foot of body length +/- 10%.
Terry has similar formulas on his web site here (just close the pop up windows that are a part of his free web site).
As trains on my BYLONG layout are banked from the rear over much of the mainline length on grades of 1 in 40, I feel that this is a formula that works.
One proviso - Get as much weight as you can into 4 wheel wagons as an empty wagon can be a challenge to even get to the minimum of my range let alone the NMRA RP-20.1.

Operation
I tested these FS and BS coaches in a passenger train with an Austrains NSWGR C36 class and found that I could not get 1 Austrains FS, 1 Lima MBE, 1 Powerline FS and a Powerline MHO up my final ruling 1 in 40 grade. This grade start out as 1 in 40 but has a curve near the top which challenges the locos.
After the above modifications the C36 could pull the Lima MBE, Powerline FS, 2 Austrains FS, 1 Austrains BS and the Powerline MHO, quite a change.
I should note that the C36 had the front bogie spring removed and some sheet lead in the cab roof for both tests.

Here is an Excel spreadsheet that calculates the formulas for a range of existing passenger coaches and wagons.

I leave the above weighting formula for you to ponder on.

More Roundhouse Information

2011-07-11T21:33:00.000+10:00

Well, "ask and ye shall receive", James Black has come to my/our rescue with two plans of this type of roundhouse and a series of photos of the Cowra loco shed taken in 2005 that show the lights between the last track and the side wall!
Thank you James, this information is very much appreciated and I am sure that there will be others out there who will be able to make great use of it.
Here are links to the two plans, click on the magnifying glass between the rotate icons to get a high resolution plan and then right click and click on Save Picture As to save to your own PC.
Plan 1
Plan 2
And here is the link to the photos of Cowra roundhouse in 2005.
Photos Untitled24 and Untitled25 show the side lights suspended from a beam that is between the wall truss and the next truss towards the track in the shed.
Another detail I notice is that the timbers aren't black as I would expect but more a dark reddish colour with an 'overspray' of black, just in time for my spraying.
Now James has caused me another problem! A couple of photos show the belt drive for lathes, etc. mounted on one end wall. I think I might draw the line now or I will never finish the shed (this wall will not be easily visible on the layout).
Thanks again James.

Wollar Loco Shed - The next stage

2011-07-10T22:14:00.000+10:00

While working on ideas for the lighting of the loco shed I had been pondering the construction of the smoke flues that sit above the end of the tracks to direct the smoke from the locos up and out of the shed.
I spent a few hours over the weekend building the smoke flues from Evergreen strip and scribed styrene.
The flues turned out to only be a small challenge and not as bad as I had been dreading.
Mounting them in the rafters was tricky however as the plan in Byways 7 shows the flues suspended between two trusses at around 6' apart but the kit rafters are 8' 6" apart. Without a full plan it is hard to know if the kit has the right number of rafters or if the Broken Hill shed in Byways 7 is simply a variation to the shed modelled in the kit.
Here are two views of the flues, one from the front and another through the rear windows.

Being white and close with a lot of other framing running in all directions they were difficult to get the camera to focus on but I think you get the idea.
I needed to do the flues before the suspended lights as the lights will be very prone to damage and if bent will probably short out the LEDs due to conductive silver paint method I will use as per my previous post for the street lamp.
As can be seen from both photos I have yet to extend the tracks in the shed, I will probably leave this until the shed is finished as I also have to work out a plug and socket method of getting power to the shed LED lighting as the shed will be removable.
The kit as supplied has the floor and track bed built as a solid part of the shed which is good for track alignment with the turntable but it also means that a method has to be worked out if you want to get access into the shed. I think it would be best not to glue the floor to the walls which would make it very tricky when first starting to build the shed until the frame gets sufficiently cross braced to gain some strength. Tell me how I know this ;-)
The next step will be to spray all the trusses, frames smoke flues, etc. prior to fixing the lights.

Yes, I got distracted

2011-07-06T23:18:00.001+10:00

Well, I ended the last post with a mention of the hanging lights in the pictures of Lithgow shed. Investigations revealed that these were standard of course however I have been unable to find photos of the lights between the side of the shed and the first track. The lights in the Lithgow shed photo are on a main truss between each track and they only show at Lithgow because at least one bay has been removed opening up the inside to daylight. If anyone has a photo showing the lights towards the side walls I would be interested in seeing it.
While researching the lights I started to work out how I was going to light these shades when they are suspended on a thin piece of electrical conduit.
As an experiment I have produced the following.
The first photo shows the new Wollar level crossing with a power pole and street light.

The second photo is a night scene.

How did I do it?
I used a surface mount 603 warm white LED with a Tichy lamp shade, some brass wire and some conductive silver paint to get the power to the LED.
It involves conductive silver paint from one contact on the LED out, up and over the shade to the wire conduit and then down the pole to a 1K Ohm resistor and power wire. The brass wire conduit is then coated with super glue and allowed to harden for a day after which the conductive silver paint is painted from the other LED contact out and up over the lamp shade, over the coated wire and down the other side of the pole to power wires under the pole. The power source is 12v DC.
Pretty cool!
I always was going to light the layout for night operation and this is my second light, the first being the Wollar loco depot yard light. I will slowly add lights around the layout. The more that you think about it the more places you realise that you needs lights for.
The loco shed will be next but I also have to make three smoke flues that aren't included in the kit. luckily there is a plan in the article on Broken Hill Loco Depot in Byways of Steam 7.
Here is a photo of a smoke flue I received from Alex Nadalini. The actual chimney part has been removed as this shed is being torn down (~~Orange I believe~~ - Cowra actually, see comment below from James Black).

An Interesting Challenge

2011-06-16T21:41:00.001+10:00

Well, I didn't have much time last Saturday for a quick trip to the Epping Exhibition but managed to sneek in almost 2 hours between 11:00am and 1:00pm. I had a big weekend ahead of me with family flying in from Townsville for a BBQ on Saturday afternoon and into the evening and a christening on the Sunday. I really wanted to get there to pick up the latest Australian Journal of Railway Modelling, check out the Austrains 4 wheel oil tankers and Anton's OZ KIT 3 stall NSWGR roundhouse kit (and the layouts of course).

I thought that Geoff Knott's scenery clinic was sensational and teaching the kids and others how to do it was a great idea. Bowen Creek was back and what a great layout. I wanted to catch up with Andrew Campbell and Ian Millard but they didn't seem to be around each time I passed, sorry fellas, next time. There were a number of other interesting layouts as well but others have covered the exhibition well so I will leave it alone.

First AJRM was a delight, especially so when I found reference to my Bylong layout and this blog. I think Brad may have a rather inflated view of operations on Bylong. We do operate and I try to build in as many aspects of the NSWGR as I can without getting to the difficult bits. I think a balance needs to found between the 100% prototypically correct operations and enjoying yourself. Of course there will always be those who strive for the ultimate in any endeavour, me I'm an 80% plus man.

I checked out the Austrains 4 wheel tank cars but was disappointed to see that the Shell version was not available due to difficulties with obtaining permission from Shell. I was also concerned about the poor detail on the chassis, particularly the axle boxes. Now I know that these are the Austrains Basix range but it isn't any harder to get the axle box looking correct, the cost of the die doesn't change with extra detail. I have since found out that the tanker is about 86grams in weight which is way too much and would potentially have caused me problems when banking trains from the rear up the grades on Bylong. I can't afford to have the wagons jakknife and derail as at one point there is a 1200mm drop to a concrete floor for about 2400mm on a 100mm wide roadbed inside a tunnel. It could be difficult to reduce the mass as it will be inside the tank I guess and opening it up without damage could be problematical. When banking it is best that all wagons are of a similar mass in ratio to their length and I use the 2 grams/foot of body length formula which works well to give suitable prototypical train lengths for our model NSWGR steam locomotives. On this basis the wagon would be about 20 ft so 40 grams is the mass I would be after. It can be difficult to get this amount of weight into an open wagon like an S truck. I am currently doing a survey of models that are or have been available and will publish when I have it together.

I also checked out Anton's engine shed and decided that it should work nicely with the 75ft turntable of his that I have installed at Wollar. So $285 later I headed for home. I did take a few photos but will not post any as they just didn't work, exhibitions are not the place to take good photos.

Now, the challenge.

I opened the kit on Sunday night and spread out the parts, very impressive bit of casting in polyurethane. After a little while the penny dropped! This kit was made for the turntable alright but with the track arrangement as per the prototype which is 60 ft from the edge of the turntable pit to the front of the shed and my tracks were shorter due to a lack of space!

I pondered this for a couple of hours and came to the conclusion that I could extend the existing tracks about 50mm off the rear and could get the shed front 50ft from the pit. OK, so far so good, this kept the back walls the correct width (which would be impossile to change anyway) but the front post spacing would have to be thinner due to the closer placement. I worked out that I could thin down the openings between the front posts and still manage to make it look OK.

Monday morning came all rainy and wet so with nothing to do I sat down and started. The instructions need some work requiring a bit of careful interpretation and the supplied proof sheets of photos weren't much better as they were a bit muddy and needed to be bigger (maybe when Anton gets his web site working again he could make the photos available for downloading). After a careful read and study I began and followed the instructions as best I could keeping in mind that I was changing things. I couldn't use the floor pieces or the supplied inspection pits and these are used as a base to build off!

I carefully worked out the placement of the lower wall pieces on the layout and Super glued them together with a piece of balsa across the front opening. I now had a semi-rigid 'base' to work from.

I followed the instructions after this and everything proceeded very well. After about 10 hours work I had the frame as in this photo.

I managed to find a few photos of this shed style and the Lithgow shed photos below were a bonus as the end wall and some stalls had been removed and there are pictures of the inside (EDIT: The pictures are from Graham H's flickr site, I hope you don't mind Graham - Thanks Darren for the link). I also found some inside shots of the Cowra shed on the Intranet.

When I studied the Lithgow ones I saw the suspended lighting, now here is a challenge I thought. Needless to say the shed construction has paused while I work out the lighting, nothing would look better than to have the inside lit with the dropped lights as per the prototype. So this is where I am at in the build so far.

Arrival and Departures at Wollar

2011-05-28T22:30:00.000+10:00

A comment by Ian Phemister on my last post about the Austrains FS and BS coaches and requesting a video of same led me to quickly do this video tonight.

Operationally we see 3390 bringing a Cassilis branch goods into the small Wollar exchange sidings as 5085 shunts the goods siding on the other side of the yard.
Shortly after 4908 on a passenger working pulls out of the Wollar main platform heading towards Gulgong.
On the way out of the yard 4908 passes the last limit of the town at the level crossing and then passes the flour mill before heading towards the 1 in 40 grade.
As you will notice on a relatively narrow two level layout taking a video without seeing the edge of the layout or the top of the backscene is a challenge, this is why I am working to raise the height of the backscenes to 600mm and yes, in my usual manner I have stalled.
It seems lately that the house requires a bit of maintenance so it is going to have to come first, I'm replacing a second downpipe tomorrow.

Austrains FS and BS Arrive

2011-05-17T22:59:00.000+10:00

There was an interesting package waiting for me when I got home from work tonight, yes they seem to be here although no announcement has been made as yet. I must be one of the lucky first mailings.
I have taken a few quick photos, not the best but I think they will show the detail, etc.
One thing to note is that if the lights flicker then the power pick up springs on the bogies (see pic below) might be squashed or bent. These springs are made from soft wire so care will be needed to re-shape them. I think they might be able to be replaced with Kadee knucle coupler jaw springs, I will have to check.
I like the actual light colour and lack of intensity, just as I remember. The real carriage lighting could be a challenge to read by.
The colour rendition of the interior walls in the photo is not correct.
It was also difficult to get a good night time shot.
The slight curvature of the carriages in the photos is not the model, just the photo.

Level Crossing and a Backyard

2011-05-12T21:12:00.000+10:00

Lately there has been a bit of discussion on the Yahoo Aus Model Rail Newsgroup about interest in laser cut buildings which led to some talk of backyards so I present a backyard I have been working on.

The yard is question is at the back of a shop at a level crossing at the west end of Wollar yard.

I had been pondering on how to treat a 'drawbridge' section of my layout at the door into the garage for some time and had decided that I wanted a level crossing and some buildings. The buildings were to represent the other end of the Wollar township, the eastern end being near the locomotive depot and previously pictured with the dirt street and shops. The main part of the town being in the operating aisle in front of the Wollar yard.

Over my Christmas/January three week holiday I attacked it with some vigour and managed to almost complete six buildings on the 1160mm x 330mm area.
I have been wanting to document this new area on my blog for some time but wanted to surprise the Ramblers which I managed to do a couple of weeks ago.
I am quite happy with it but still have a few things to do like the level crossing gates, fences, signs for the Farmers Co-op and to complete the rural mechanics building, so here are a few pictures of the area.

An Impromptu Operating Session

2011-04-23T18:26:00.004+10:00

As our normal night at Werris Creek clashed with Ron (Eureka Models) going to Hobson's Bay exhibition I had the rest of the Ramblers over to Bylong for a bit of a run.

Not an operating session as such with timetable and all but I did set up the Up and Down Pickups and the Cassilis Branch Mixed.

Gary Laker had the Down Pickup, Marcus Amman had the Up Pickup and Bob Lynch had the Cassilis Mixed. Now of course in the way of things they all managed to end up in Wollar shunting at the same time!

Towards the end of the chaos I realised that I should have taken some video so I grabbed my camera. By this time Bob Lynch had completed shunting the Cassilis Mixed and had put 3390 to bed in Wollar loco depot after dropping the ash, re-coaling and watering.

I managed to get a shot of a through goods driven by Layne Hardie and Marcus left Wollar and proceeded to Bylong in the early part of the video. This left Gary with the Down Pickup alone in Wollar and the rest of the video shows 4908 shunting and then leaving Wollar.

Everyone else ran trains with the usual interesting meets occasionally, there being no dispatcher.

If you pay attention you will notice a new scene, more on this later.

Enjoy.

Just a little resistance

2011-04-12T22:53:00.000+10:00

For decades (since the 1980's) I have been interested in the possibilities of some sort of computer based control of my trains. With the advent of DCC this has moved much closer in recent years.
My idea is to be able to drive a pickup goods while the computer sends trains along the main line from staging yard to staging yard. This of course is just for me to operate alone. Now, that is not to say that I want to always operate alone but it is more the challenge of doing it in the first place.
I am one of those people who like to try things out and am quite happy to build say one BWH wheat hopper but don't ask me to make the rest of the kits I have stashed away (thankyou Trainorama for rescuing me from that dilema).
A couple of weeks ago I found some SMD (Surface Mount Device) 5.1K ohm 1/8 watt resistors at the Model Railroad Craftsman at Blackown NSW. The brand was Ngineering and there were 20 for $2.50 in the pack. I bought the only two packs that Gary had and then the fun began.
What are the resistors for? They are used across wheels in a wagon to trigger a track detector (NCE BD20) so that a computer or other circuit can know that a train is in a block (or section).
Since Bylong is set in 1965 the wagon of choice is the guards van or passenger brake van, the locomotive is already capable of being detected due to the resistance of the motor, DCC dceoder or other circuitry.
If I was modelling the later no guards van period then I would have to consider adding a resistor to at least two axles on every wagon.
The idea is to connect the resistor between the two metal wheels on an axle. My first attempt at using the resistors involved coating the metal axle with super glue as the resistors have solderable contacts at each end but also on the top and bottom so insulation from the axle is the first priority.
Next the resistor is picked up with fine pointed tweezers and super glued to the now hardened glue. The last step is to use some solver conductive paint to make a connection from each metal wheel to each end of the resistor. I used a pointed toothpick to apply the paint and as can be seen from the picture below I ran the paint up the spokes to the rim to ensure good contact. I will of course spray paint the axles later.

Here is a photo of a Trainorama PHG with a couple of different ways to mount the resistors, on the left are the axles with the coating of super glue while on the right are two different size resistors mounted at an angle from the axle to the insulated bush on the other wheel, this is the easiest method but you need to watch out for the runny paint (see below). The small resistor comes from an alternate source but is extremely fiddly. The source was Altronics, an electronics supplier who had them in different sizes at 10 for 85c or $21 for a reel of 5000, I bought the reel figuring that some of the other Ramblers will want to do the same.
I checked each wheel set with a meter set to resistance. Easy enough? Not as simple as I found out. I kept ending up with short circuits as the silver paint ran around the resistor by capillary action and joined the other end (yes they are that small). Or, as I found out, the solvent in the silver paint was strong enough to eat into the super glue and get enough silver paint through to the axle. Now, the reason for this I think was that I was impatient and if the glue had been allowed to go off for say 24 hours then it probably would have been OK.
Why not use water based glue or paint so that this doesn't happen? Easy, water based glues and acrylic paints are of course going to be conductive until they are very dry, yes, I tried it also, same result, a short circuit.
Is it all too hard? No, I soon got the technique sorted and the success rate climbed but you can usually save the situation if it does happen by scraping away the silver paint and trying again.
I ran a series of tests on the layout while I was doing this, I tried one axle, no go, intermitent, two axles, yes if the wheels were spotless but intermittent even if not too dirty, so four axles which worked well.
The easiest axles to do were some Walthers Proto 2000 36" wheel sets that have plastic axles, dead simple.
Well, I have done 9 guards vans so far and have 18 guard vans and brake vans to do in total so I am going to have to get over my resistance to just completing one thing before moving on to something else (I still haven't finished the hand built points for the Cassilis branch terminus yard).
For those who are interested, I am using JMRI and Panel Pro on my computer which is interfaced with my NCE DCC system. I can see trains in the Bylong yard and on the main to either end and I also have a signal acting as a starter for the top staging yard that indicates if a train is in the block outside of the yard as it is about 24' long, that's all for the moment though.
Don't wait for the next installment it could be a while.

Main Western Line Video

2011-03-14T17:37:00.003+11:00

A few weeks ago Chris and I visited John Brown, who is the builder extraordinaire of the Main Western Line layout that models the NSWGR Main Western from Tarana to Bathurst with the branch to Oberon.
I was invited up to take some pictures and video of this huge layout. I keep forgeting the exact dimensions but it is I think 70' x 33' in a room that is something like 80' x 45'. Apologies for the lack of metric dimensions but the old measure just seems to give a better idea of the size.
The layout is a U shape with two teardrops at each end of the U and the staging yard at the base.
I only managed to video two trains, one each way in the 4 hours that we were there.

Here is a short video of a western line goods passing through Locksley and then through the well known three arch road bridge.
Unfortunately, John was asked to build short backscenes so that the owner's wife could see out the large picture window at one end of the railway room (a hall really) and this makes shooting a video less than ideal. Still pictures can of course be edited to make the walls, windows, etc. disappear and while it is possible if the video camera doesn't move it is no where near as easy.
Chris and I drove via the road from Tarana that follows the railway which was very interesting, at one stage as we were leaving Tarana we crossed a bumpy bit of road with two cracks across the roadway and realised it was all that was left of the beginning of the Oberon branch, very sad.
The road is very narrow and I was glad that we didn't meet any cars coming the other way as I was too busy with one eye on the railway line.
At one stage we passed a large brick retaining wall that seemed strangely out of place at the time as the railway was out of site well above us.
We hope to visit again and with a bit of planning to get a better video view of the layout.

An Addition to the Roster?

2011-02-21T22:53:00.000+11:00

On a recent Saturday morning I had to mind my 4 year old grandson and Chris suggested that I take him to Casula Hobbies for his first outing to a hobby shop.
OK I thought this could be fun.
We set off to Joe's shop at Liverpool with Cameron asking the odd question that showed he wasn't sure what the trip was about.
When we arrived, Joe in his usual friendly manner introduced himself to Cameron and I then introduced him to Therese, Laurie and Kerroby Bob. Well his eyes popped out as he made his way around the store, straight to the cars first; as he explained it to me a couple of months ago "You like trains and I like cars". Cameron is often with me in the train room and likes me to run the trains while he plays with the HO cars on the layout, I find them in all sorts of places later.
He then started asking a lot of questions about many of the things he saw in the shop as is the habit of 4 year olds.
At one stage Laurie showed him a chocolate and asked him what he wanted, his answer? "A train"!
Laurie was so stunned that he had to come and tell Joe and I about this 4 year old who turned down a chocolate for a train.
Well I was planning on buying him a small car for his collection and thought I might ask him if he would like a car later before we left.
I did and he took me to the Thomas range and pointed at James!
I thought OK but you need a carriage to go behind it, so I included a small 6 wheel green passenger car.
So now I present you with a video of Cameron having his first drive of his first locomotive. I should point out that this is the first time he has driven any train on Bylong or used an NCE Procab.
After about 10 minutes he was driving slowly with only a couple of promptings from me and stopping the train in the station and all, I was impressed at the concentration and care he took but then I am his grandad.
I should also let you know that James being in OO and not being an actual model of a real locomotive had a couple of clearance problems as it progressed around the layout. The cab roof hit a tunnel entrance which was removed (not yet glued in place) and then it hit the bottom of the secondary branch post on the bracket signal at the branch junction (it projects out over the track at the correct height). So it will be restricted in its running rights.
I had a look at it to see if I could lower the cab roof but it isn't really a candidate unfortunately.
I don't know if this interest will last but we will see.

A question about the 44 video

2011-02-01T20:28:00.000+11:00

Iain S asked why the 44 seemed to jump away as it started to move in the first video of my last post.

The 44 is not mine and was one I had just finished installing the Tsunami decoder in and giving it a weathering job. I suspect the lurch was caused by paint on the wheels and then the power breaking through suddenly. I gave it a wheel spin in some CRC 2-26 later on when it stopped occasionally as it went around the layout which solved it. My44s do not have this issue.

Perhaps I should have redone the video after cleaning the wheels.

If you have a problem locomotive the Tsunami does allow adjustment of the BEMF CVs but this is best done using DecoderPro after you have saved the settings in your loco as the BEMF can get a bit confusing and needs to be adjusted carefully. Download the Tsunami technical documentation and manual, read it and well done if you can understand the BEMF instructions. A case of someone who knows what they are talking about not being able to come down to the level of most users when trying to explain things.

Now for a little noise and movement

2011-01-31T22:25:00.000+11:00

4429 outside McCauleys Hide Merchants at BYLONG

I have been working for a while on trying to come up with a suitable set of parameters for DCC operation of diesels, to, as much as is possible within the constraints of the various decoder specific features and CVs, give us realistic operation.

I am reasonably close now and have decided to share my findings.

This video shows a Trainorama NSWGR 44 class (4429) fitted with a SoundTraxx Tsunami TSU-AT1000 Atlas form factor (board shape) Alco v12 251 sound decoder that has been adjusted to show the current state of my investigations. For those that are interested I retained the front Trainorama speaker but used an enclosure sold by Gary at the Model Railroad Craftsman at Blacktown NSW.

I use JMRI DecoderPro to adjust the CVs and have saved various set ups as templates to enable me to download them into a new diesel in seconds.

The NSWGR used to state the continuous tractive effort of each of their diesel classes the the maximum load and speed attained on a 1 in 40 grade.

Here is the data for the main NSWGR diesel classes:

Class    Maximum Load and Speed
40        400 tons at 15 mph
42        720 tons at 9 mph
421      630 tons at 11.25 mph
422      630 tons at 11.25 mph
43        510 tons at 12 mph
44        600 tons at 11.75 mph
442      600 tons at 11.75 mph
45        640 tons at 11 mph
47        490 tons at 8 mph
48        450 tons at 8 mph
49        470 tons at 7 mph

Note: mph is miles per hour for the young ones ;-)Now I know there are people out there who have driven diesels but I am trying to keep this relatively simple as the current state of decoder development doesn’t allow us to drive our models realistically.

A diesel achieves its maximum power when the diesel engine is in notch eight, the control of the engine having eight notches.

I initially set up one of my 44 class diesels to give 10mph in notch eight to replicate an average of the above conditions for a heavy goods load.

The Tsunami has two different ways of controlling notching:

It can be set up so that the engine notching noise can be changed separately to the speed of the locomotive (as in real life), the speed of the locomotive being controlled by the electric traction motors.

Or, it can be set up so that notching increases will occur at a set number of speed steps, e.g. every 10 steps, but the train can increase speed between these steps of course as it is the diesel engine notching up separately to the electric traction motors.

I initially tried the first method but quickly found that I would have the locomotive doing one thing while the engine sounds were doing another, mainly due to my distraction by other things happening on the layout.

As a result I chose the less realistic second method (the real drivers and purists will probably choose the first method).

Now I use the NCE DCC system and have standardised on the ProCab with its many options. One option is the use of buttons to control the locomotive speed and the ProCab has to sets of buttons, one set for small increments (1 step per press) and the another set for large increases and decreases (4 steps in 28 step mode and 10 steps in 128 step mode).

I use the 128 step mode and as such each press of the large buttons will notch up the diesel engine but will also display 10, 20, 30, etc. which tells you what notch you are in.

In combination with the notching I have set the maximum speed at 56 mph which can be reached by continuing past speed step 80 until speed step 126 (max. step on NCE) is reached.

Now we move to a really useful feature of most NCE cabs and that is that they have a momentum button that allows you to adjust the momentum of a train very easily. It is best to do this when it is stopped of course, like when you first couple up to your train. The momentum button will accept a number between 0 and 9, 0 being no momentum and 9 being the maximum.

A further aspect is the ability to use speed curves that can be programmed into a decoder and the Tsunami is set up with a special speed curve that I have devised.

The end result of all this is that you can start the diesel with a press on the small increment button and hear the diesel engine start to crank over and then fire. I then press down 1 speed step back to 0 to idle.

Next set the momentum for your train, I have been working on counting 2 - 3 bogie wagons in the train per increase in momentum number. I use a base of momentum 2 to represent the inertia on the diesel locomotive itself (light engine). The determination of the number of bogie wagons per momentum number is really a function of your layout, mainly its size and hence the length of the trains that you run.

Now, number boards on, headlight on as appropriate then hit the horn and start to notch up. If you have a momentum above 6 then you can notch up the engine to notch 8 if you wish and wait for the train to slowly move away as it takes the load.

One night when the Ramblers were at my place I had set up three locomotives one at 10mph notch 8, one at 15mph notch 8 and another at 20mph notch 8 and I asked them to drive each and we would decide on a suitable version. The decision wasn’t unanimous with most liking the 15mph and a couple the 20mph, it was decided that the 10mph was too slow at east for my size of layout (possibly good on a small layout for a slower run).

I have since driven at the 15mph notch 8 and feel that maybe the 20mph might be better, less realistic perhaps but more suited to a locomotive that is used on both goods and passenger trains.

The final bit of realism is supplied by the Tsunami decoder itself as it can actually brake a train. The decoder has a brake on Function 11 that will slow the train without reducing the throttle, just like the real thing. This braking effect is adjustable through a CV and needs to be set through trial and error after the above aspects are set up.

Function 11 on the NCE ProCab though is awkward to use so I re-mapped the brake to Function 7 where strangely enough there is a brake/wheel squeal noise, so now I can hit the brake and get the brakes squealing as the train pulls to a slow stop even with the throttle still on. Once the train is stopped I can release the brake and if the throttle is still open the train will slowly regain speed.

Another feature of the Tsunami is that by pressing Function 4 you can turn on dynamic braking when on a grade. The Tsunami can be set to drop the engine to either notch 1 or notch 4 while the dynamics are operating. As NSWGR diesels use notch 4 this is what I set it for.

Watch this video and listen right at the start for the engine to drop to notch 4 then the dynamics come in, you can of course combine this with actual braking, brake squeal and all.

So there you have it, not perfect yet but very driveable and great fun as well.

How's that for Prototypically Straight Track?

2010-12-20T22:48:00.000+11:00

I am of course referring to my latest Desktop picture to the right.

I should apologise for my recent blog post where I led with a photo that I used on my last blog 5 weeks before!

Goes to show something, getting old? No don't answer that.

In the previous blog I also showed a picture of an overgrown siding and as can be seen by my desktop photo at right I have been a bit busy this weekend.
Here are a few more photos that I took to see how it was going, some areas still need some more work and clean up (grass laying all over the station parking area), etc.
Basically I have given the BYLONG station yard a going over scenically including the trees and I have finally finished the dam that supplies water for the livestock at the abbatoir, well nearly.

Lastly, I would like to wish you all a Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year and leave you with this 'Christmas card', my first attempt at adding smoke and steam.

Ray P

A Long Time Since....

2010-12-16T23:56:00.000+11:00

Yes, it is a long time since I posted on the blog, not since 30 October to be exact.
It has been a time of small changes to the layout and I mean small.
However, I was motivated tonight to post when I received this link of a 1964 film on Australian Railways in an email from Blair Kooistra of North of Narrabri only to discover that Blair had finally posted again when I went to copy his blog link for this post, I will leave you to check his blog but I will say that his is a very similar story except that mine was Triang in 1960 and polished Masonite.
What have I been doing?
Here is a photo of the new scenery around the Wollar flour mill with 3390 passing the Cassilis branch junction bracket signal and yes, it does work.

Another addition is this fine small shop built by Phil Gibson of Trainorama that I picked up a month or so ago at Toms Hobbies, Phil does very nice work and he makes these up every so often; I also have a large shop version of his that I bought a couple of years ago.

I was using my 3 year old $1400+ digital video camera at my Grandson's first birthday a couple of weeks ago and turned it off only to discover that it wouldn't turn on again. After dropping it into the approved repairer and waiting a week I was informed that the main board was dead and a replacement would be $700, it cost me $77 to find this out.
After several days of pondering over repairing or buying a new one I decided on the latter as I couldn't overcome my concern that if the main board could die so quickly once what was to stop a replacement from doing the same again.
I bought a JVC GZ-HD620 full high definition digital video camera, normal retail $999 for $799, that came with a free 8GB SD card and a promotion to get a free 500GB portable hard drive by following some simple steps and mailing in the required proof including the bar code from the box - BARGAIN!
I have been spending the last week experimenting with it and shooting some BYLONG videos, nothing to post yet but soon maybe.
Although it has full high definition of 1920 x 1080 it is difficult to produce a YouTube video that shows the clarity as uploaded videos seem to loose something along the way. I have also worked out that I need more light to acheive a higher f stop for a better depth of field. Now the thing with digital video cameras or at least the ones I can afford is that the highest f stop is usually only f3.0 but the GZ-HD620 had f4.7. My dead video camera had f8 but when I tried to use it everything was too dark, back to the lighting issue.
OK, here is a trial video as I couldn't help myself, 6037 climbing towards BYLONG on a coal train, yes I know that the coal is going in the wrong direction.

I picked up some new scenery materials recently from the Model Railroad Craftsman at Blacktown NSW. Gary and Maria have what I would say amounts to the largest range of scenery products around. The items of interest were new static grasses in dead grass colours (and greens) from MiniNatur at $13.50 per 50g pack. I have previously used Heki Winterboden which is a good dead grass colour but it is only about 2 - 3mm long, this MiniNatur grass is 6.5mm long, just the thing for that thigh high dead grass so common in Australia. I got a Beige, Golden Beige (yellower) and a slightly green but almost dead grass colour called Late Fall.
Here is a photo I took of an oil siding on BYLONG that is overgrown and little used. I know that oil sidings would probably have been kept clear of grass due to the fire hazard but I couldn't resist having a go with the new grasses.

I used Pascoes Self Shining Long Life Floor Polish (really a waterbased clear coating) as mentioned on Julian Watson's VR Days blog as an experiment to glue the grass and it worked well, it can be found at Bunnings and Woolworths for about $5 for 500ml and at Bunnings in 5 litres for $35, I am going to get this size soon. Like Julian I also tried it with ballast and will shortly try it with soils. It doesn't dry as hard as say PVA so could be useful if you need to take up some track later.
Well, that's about it for now, it's 11:33pm and I had better head for the shower and bed.

What's Been Happening?

2010-10-30T10:40:00.000+11:00

Another drought of posts from Bylong it seems but what has been happening?

Well, a few things that I didn't seem to think were worth talking about but maybe if I put them all together?

I just finished another hand held video of a train moving over the main line as an experiment in working out good angles, etc. I like it but the sound coming from the locos does get a bit boring but then I suppose it would be if you were driving them. There is a cycling noise coming from 4434 which has an Alco v251 12 cylinder Soundtraxx Tsunami but not from 4530 which has an older Alco Soundtraxx DSD decoder. The 45 also sounds more 'rounded' even though it has the 8 bit decoder compared with the 16 bit Tsunami. I put this down to the use of a good quality oval speaker in the fuel tank of the 45 as against the supplied Trainorama speaker in the 44. I think that the cycling sound is because I had been playing with the reverb settings, I must check. Also the horn that can be heard as they start out of Wollar has a vibration which is a wire running across the speaker front. I have to open up the 44 to fix this and we all know what an interesting job that is.

Two weeks ago I bit the bullet and decided to do the scenery around the flour mill at Wollar that is situated between Wollar and the branch junction. I think I managed a reasonable transition to the backscene although the general impression is too much green (it is supposed to be set in the spring of 1965 so it's probably not that bad).

I now have a 3 foot section (sorry, no metric this is 1965 remember) between the flour mill and Wollar station which is a drawbridge section used to enter the layout from the house. Part of one of the hinges can be seen in the lower right of the above photo. There are two hinges and they will be an interesting challenge to scenic and keep operating as they stick up above the baseboard by about 1 1/2 inches. Anyway, the Wollar loop ends on this section of the layout about half way across and I have decided to add a level crossing after the point with some shops and small industries on either side of the road and crossing. I dug into my collection of kits last night and think I have come up with some interesting possibilities but you will have to wait, don't hold your breath.

I went to a 90th birthday party last Sunday for my great aunt who is the last of five sisters and three brothers who came to Sydney from Werris Creek in the late 1930's. Needless to say there was some railway connection.

My wife Chris has been doing family history for the last 25 years or so and a few years back we called into Werris Creek station museum before it was done up and in the books and various documents on display were some records showing details of the workers including family members. To my astonishment she has since found something like 10 or so that have worked for the NSWGR down the years.

I had a great-great grandmother Gatekeeper at Turanville a few miles south of Scone in 1884.

Turanville Level Crossing 2005

Another female Gatekeeper at Limbri north of Tamworth in the 1890's.

Site of Limbri Station 2005

My great grandfather worked in the yards at Werris Creek and my grandmother was a RRR girl in Sydney until she retired. There was also a ganger and earlier generations lived and worked at West Tamworth.

Werris Creek Station 2005

I have memories of watching trains from the verandah of my great grandfather's house at Wiley Park, a nice old federation home (the reason that our present home is a modern federation interpretation). Incidently, the family house is still in Dewhurst St Werris Creek in really good condition.

Cartwright house (1920/30's) - Dewhurst St Werris Creek 2005

Chris could certainly tell me about all the others but I won't bore you here. I guess I was wondering if there is a genetic effect, no not really, it was those trains from the verandah and my great grandfather taking me down to the tracks to watch the trains.

It all makes it all the more interesting when I work on and operate on Ron C's Werris Creek layout, I feel a very strong connection.

What's next?

Yesterday I picked up copies of Train Hobbies Steam Locomotive Depots - NSW Part 2 and Country Branch Lines - NSW Part 3 for Cooma, Bombala, Canberra and Captain's Flat at Berg's and a nice quiet read with a coffee will go down well.

Liverpool Exhibition

2010-10-06T22:32:00.000+11:00

The Liverpool exhibition has came and gone again and I found it to be very inspiring. I normally go twice but this time we had to go to a wedding at Robertson on the Sunday and my daughter's birthday on the Monday, however the one visit still gave me a boost.

I arrived at about 1:45pm and left at 5:00pm having only made about one complete trip around all the exhibits due to stopping and chatting.

I also managed to take a few photos, something I usually give a miss as exhibitions are not the best for trying to take photos ( for some reason the trains keep moving). I also hate the use of perspex as it makes photographing very difficult. I had some nice shots of Time and Patience and Central that I can't use because of the reflections of flourescents lights over the models beyond the perspex, grrrr!!!!

Here are a few shots that I like.

Ross Balderson's Central Station 1958.

Museum Station

Wallerawang

Time and Patience

Waterfall

I damaged the bank account with some book purchases but had to leave a lot of other interesting stuff behind.

All in all, a good exhibition.

Ray's 'Patented' KD Uncoupler

2010-09-14T23:16:00.000+10:00

I have for many years been looking for a manual uncoupler for Kadees that works. I bought the Kadee version but it hardly works at all except it is better with the new scale head couplers. Another, the Rix Products version uses two magnets that are placed between the wagons either side of the couplers, unfortunately, since I am modelling NSWGR in 1965 many wagons have buffers so this uncoupler can't be used.
My first attempt at making one many years ago (20+) worked well but it was always difficult to see between the wagons.
While doing the grocery shopping a week ago I noticed a clip on LED book light and the penny dropped and here is the result.
This uncoupler really works very well, the video shows the uncoupling of various types of KD and KD clones in various combinations, The only slightly issue is with the plastic KD clones as the uncoupler occasionally catches slightly but as I intend to replace these it won't be an issue.
Incidently, the new scale head whisker variety of KDs are very good, much better than the old standard KD No.5.

Backscene 1 - Signals 0

2010-08-22T23:41:00.000+10:00

In my last post I was about to install the new signals that Dale Richards made for me and I thought that this was the next logical step, wrong!
I realised that I neeeded to paint the backscenes along the garage doors before I could safely install the signals at the branch junction as I would have to remove the backscene panels for painting as it was too far to lean across the Bylong station section below.
Oh well, we can't always do what we want when we want to can we?
I had investigated the paints I needed to use a little while ago and these were made by Jo Sonja and could be found in craft stores (of the female persuasion) but also at Bunnings. Jo Sonja makes a range of paints called 'Background Colours' and from these I used the following, Sky Blue for distant blue hills, a mix of Sky Blue and Forest Green for shading the blue hills, Oak Moss and Forest Green for distant wooded hills, Oak Moss for distant grassy hills, then Vellum and Willow mixtures, some with a little Forest Green for closer fields.
I used my digital projector to project a suitable long panorama scene I had taken in the NSW countryside onto the backscene and then sketched in the horizon, mountains, hill lines and foreground features, etc with a 6B pencil.
After trying out my painting techniques on a small piece of previously sky painted backscene I held my breath and started earlier this week.
Here are some pictures of the result.

Now I worked out the horizon by looking at the projected picture as roughly my eye height which seems to work pretty well in the above photos but here is a 3/4 view of a train on the grade to the upper staging and it certainly doesn't work from this view, looks like you can't have it both ways which is one of life's little rules.

Also note the way that the foreshortened view causes the hills and mountains to become peaked. The only way to reduce this is to paint your hills and mountains very long horizontally if you understand what I mean.

A comparison with older photos will show that I have matched the colours of the old backscene reasonably well but without the misty effect I achieved with a can of grey primer sometime back.

Working Lower Quadrant Signals

2010-08-04T22:44:00.000+10:00

I have been asked in a comment on my last post if the signals are made to work and if so, do I intend making them work, the answer is yes on both counts.

I have had two signals working for about 6 years now and thought it was about time I pushed the signalling along.
I received the two brackets and two home signals last Friday night and have just started to work out their exact locations on the layout, hence the picture in the last post.
To make them operate I use cheap relays with a fine phosphor bronze wire soldered onto the 'clapper'? (the moving piece) the other end of wire is threaded into a hole in the bell crank arrangement to operate the signal. I also use a small weight on the crank to make the signal fail safe, i.e. a loss of power brings the signal to stop.
Now, you can use bell cranks available from model aricraft hobby shops that are quite cheap but I use the Circuitron Actuator (Part 800-8101) that is actually made to do just this job, although when I first bought them about 6 years ago I didn't realise that is what they were for.
I get them from the Model Railroad Craftsman at Blacktown and here is a picture from the Circuitron product catalog:

The actuator comes with 450mm (18") of wire in tube as shown above that would help with placement of the Tortoise motor if you are rich enough to use them for this.
The bell crank has limits placed on it's movement (adjustable with the two small screws) so that the stress is taken by the bell crank and not by the signal mechanism.
I will be mounting the signals on a piece of 3mm MDF and will set up the bell crank and signal connecting rod on it as well. I will lower the bell crank part through a suitably sized hole cut in the board and fit the relay underneath after. The relay positioning is easy as the phosphor bronze wire is about 100mm (4") long and has a lot of flexibility, it also takes up the excess movement at the bell crank.
I have previously installed the board under the layout by putting the signal up through a hole in the layout baseboard as this allows the signal, bell crank and relay to be set up and working but at the expense of having to fill the hole through the baseboard and around the signal. Does that make sense?

Simple enough really.

Back Again

2010-08-03T23:26:00.002+10:00

I have just spent an inordinate amount of time removing a thin layer of 'plaster' and ballast next to the main near the Ulan Colliery branch junction. Now this may not seem much but it took me about 10 minutes to remove about a 1" square section to provide a flat area to mount a new bracket signal that Dale Richards made for me. Now this piece of layout was sceniced in about 1982 with plaster and ballasted using PVA (I think; it has been a long time). I have struck this same problem before with scenery around the Bylong station area which was originally done in 1979.
I don't have any answer to this riddle it just had me amazed at the difficulty.
I took this photo to check how the signal looks and am very happy with it.

I will soon be removing some of the plaster on the small bank in front of the white railway gate so that I can install a small sleeper built retained area for the signal box that will control the junction and the Sydney end of Wollar yard. Given the difficulty experienced so far this could be an interesting exercise.
I also contracted Dale to build another bracket signal and two home signals for the branch junction on the main beyond the Gulgong end of Wollar yard. just past the flour mill.
I decided that it was time I did something about signalling the layout and finally decided on the 'style' of signalling.
I went for homes signals outside of stations and loops, the two junction brackets and a couple of distants where there is room.
The next step upwards in signalling gets very complicated with brackets inside yards to indicate main or loop, starting signals, etc.
I have decided that the trains will be started by the signalman or stationmaster using a green flag (as they did) and yes, Bylong is operated with signalmen and stationmasters as we can only run about 4 - 5 trains at any one time and there are about 10 of us when we operate.
The 'green flags' in my case though will be green LEDs on the fascia of the layout opposite the ends of the loops or on the main. These will be operated by the stationmaster/signalman using a momentary contact push button. The button will be pressed for a few seconds and the train driver will respond by blowing the whistle before proceeding out of the station. It will be a momentary push button as I am sure that the real stationmaster would not hold his arm up forever (no there won't be any silver whistles issued either).
The purists will say this is all wrong but I am looking for something that appears to be more or less correct without all the complications that would tie up the operations too tightly.
Now, if I follow my usual work regime, it will probably take me another two years to finish this little exercise.

Hey, I'm back

2010-07-13T22:55:00.000+10:00

I didn't go anywhere, I've just been doing lttle fiddly stuff that I didn't think was worth writing about.
One thing I have been trying though is to come up to Bob Stack's standard of Illawarra / Blue Mountains type scenery for the Coxs Gap area of my layout.
Just so you can compare and realise that I still have not made it, here is a video Bob has just put on YouTube from his South Coast Rail blog.
Having checked his scenery out you can now see my efforts.

What I see I need is more bushes, more shrubs, more weeds and to tone down some of the greens with my airbrush. Of course the tiny air bubbles in the rock castings are going to have to stay, I'm not the focussed.
Here is an unusual 'helicopter' shot of the area I call the tear drop as the line climbs from Coxs Gap to Wollar. The junction is to the Ulan No. 1 coal mine towards the back on the left behind the outcrop at the end of Coxs Gap loop.

Chris and I took our grandson Cameron to RTM at Thirlmere for his first trip to see the real thing recently, he loved it, so we will see if he keeps the interest over the years. No, I haven't been encouraging him to like trains, that would be Chris.

That's about it for now and I am going to be off the air next week as we go on a short vacation, no trains, no internet, horror! Well they tell me there is other stuff you can do to while away the hours pleasantly.

A Great Weekend

2010-06-14T23:11:00.000+10:00

As you have probably noticed things have been a little slow on this blog of late. I think it has something to do with winter and that it can get cold in the garage. Now, that's not the whole truth as I can turn on the air conditioner to fix that. I some how manage to fall into a creative hole occasionally and this has been one of those times.
Saturday Night
About two weeks ago I got an email from Andrew Campbell of Bowen Creek fame asking if he and Ian Millard (Liverpool Range) could drop by on the Saturday night of the Epping Exhibition weekend to see Bylong. Note that I related the weekend to a model railway exhibition and not the Queen's Birthday, must say something about me I think?
Anyway I agreed and they turned up at 7:30pm on Saturday night having spent the day at the exhibition. I had only met Andrew for a few minutes at last year's Epping exhibition when he and Ian exhibited Bowen Creek and had not met Ian at all.
After the introductions to Chris and my 3 year old grandson Cameron we moved into the garage (yes, I did have the air con on). I then talked them through the railway from the lower Muswellbrook staging through the first tunnel to Kerrabee loop and station then across the Goulburn River into the second tunnel, up the 1 in 40 grade to Bylong then the third tunnel to the 1 in 80 of Cox's Gap loop, then more1 in 40 around the tear drop, past the junction to the coal mine, across the Wollar level crossing, through Wollar, past the Cassilis Branch junction then up the final 1 in 40 to the upper staging at Gulgong.
After this introduction I suggested that they should take a goods from Muswellbrook to Gulgong and of course in keeping with one of the main operational reasons for the layout, the train needed to be banked from the rear. Andrew volunteered to drive the banker with Ian on the head.
After a quick introduction to the NCE radio Pro Cab throttles Andrew took 5085 from Wollar loco and descended all the way down grade to Kerrabee where he moved to a short siding off the Muswellbrook end of the loop. Ian then selected 3532 on the goods in Muswellbrook staging and slowly proceeded to the Kerrabee loop. Andrew moved 5085 up to the MHG and gave a long, short and another long whistle which Ian responded to with a long whistle and the throttles were carefully opened up as the train began it's journey.
After crossing the Goulburn River bridge and passing through the tunnel, the 1 in 40 grade began with an easy climb to Bylong. They drove on slowly through the Bylong tunnel and through Cox's Gap loop until they were about 3/4 of the way around the tear drop when they slipped to a stop. It seemed that the extra two wagons I added to the train that afternoon were too much (one was a Protype white metal CV!). I suggested that they back down to Cox's Gap loop and then make a faster run at the grade. This was tricky as they didn't have a very long run before the 1 in 40 'S' curve at the start of the tear drop, however with a little bit of wheel slipping they managed to top the grade, whistling for the level crossing at Wollar as they moved into the station.
Realising that they would not make the final grade to the Gulgong staging I suggested that we cut in a C32 which I would drive. Once the 3390 was in train, whistles were exchanged and three separately driven locos took the train up the grade and into the staging. As the train crested the grade Andrew driving 5085 dropped away from the train and coasted to a stop then drifted back into Wollar. He then put 5085 away in the loco depot after dropping the ash, coaling and taking water.
This was the first time that three locos had been used this way on Bylong and I enjoyed taking part, it felt like the real thing as we battled to lift the train up the grade and the feeling of accomplishment when we crested the hill was very real.

In this picture I recreated the last climb this morning by backing the train down from the staging so that you can 'see' the action. I have calculated that the train would have been 590 tons with the RUs and BWH being empty and all other wagons loaded. The load allowed for a C35 + C32 on 1 in 40 grades is 480 tons and a D50 can haul 295 tons on a 1 in 40 grade giving a total capability of 775 tons so this load was certainly prototypically correct. Please note that I weight my wagons to 2 grams / foot which gives these prototypical hauling capabilities (not counitng the Protype CVs of course).
I can only say that we had a very enjoyable time running the layout and discussing all those current topics doing the rounds of the hobby at the moment. After a top night I feel that my circle of hobby friends has just expanded and the offers of visits to Port Macquarie that were extended to Chris and myself were truly appreciated.
Sunday Morning at the Brickpit - Epping Exhibition
I went to the exhibition on the Sunday morning for a couple of hours and found a well lit spacious exhibition with a nice range of layouts and commercial stands. I won't say too much more as a number of attendees have already done so on the web with their reports but I will add a few photos.
Those who know me must have been more than a bit surprised when I proceeded to photograph various scenes on the layouts using my mobile phone. I find that exhibitions are not very good for model photography ( the trains are moving) so I had left my camera in the car. I started to go back for it when I saw Geoff Knott's latest On3 timber layout but decided to see what my phone could do.
Here are a few pics, sorry, no trains.

Geoff Knott's Charging Moose Mining & Lumber Co.

A-tractiv Effort Newcastle suburban layout

A Bavarian layout - nice scenery

Sunday Afternoon
I left the exhibition at 1:15pm and drove to Bob Stack's place for my first look at his South Coast Rail layout. I have been looking forward to this as I believe Bob is one of our finest scenery experts specialising in Illawarra escarpement / Blue Mountains style of scenery. Bob uses many different products both commercial and natural to produce the vegetation that grows profusely over the cliffs and hills of his layout.

Bob's brilliant rock work and vegetation (note the wet rock)

Bob's gorge (see his blog for a more complete photo)

Bob explained to me how he does his sandstone rocks and cliffs and I don't think I have seen his method in any magazine in all the time I have been in the hobby (since 1966).
Bob uses an almost dry plaster mixture (I am thinking pie pastry before cooking - ask your wife, girlfriend or mum) over a chicken wire former and he includes pieces of white expanded polystyrene foam which he covers with the mixture for outcropings. He then puts a basic wash of brown oxide over the rocks and I am sure he does some carving, texturing and shaping as well. When dry he then uses matt hobby paints and dry colours to add the myriad colours that are present in a sandstone cliff face (just have a close look next time you are in the bush).
Bob was very free with his information but I am not sure that I could reproduce the quality of his work. Those who are attending the Modelling the Railways of NSW Convention in July will have the chance to see Bob talk about his scenery methods.
I left late in the afternoon heading south across Sydney thinking what a real gentleman Bob is.
All in all, a great weekend, batteries charged, now to get back into the garage.

4206 arrives at Bylong

2010-05-10T22:44:00.000+10:00

In case you were wondering if the Trainorama 42s have arrived, the answer is:

A Video of the Bylong Main Line

2010-05-10T07:30:00.005+10:00

Here is No 83 conditional empty wheat train as it traverses almost the full length of the main line on my Bylong layout. The first 20' of line through Kerrabee wasn't good enough to post (in and out of focus, I got too close).

This gadget seems to only be 4 x 3 format so here it is on YouTube:
16 x 9 video.
The video was taken in one go as the train climbed from the lower staging yard at Muswellbrook to the upper staging at Gulgong.
Some sections have been cut out due to too much camera movement as I tried to keep up with the train. Almost all of the main line is shown except for the Cox's Gap loop and signal box, way too much movement.
If I ever build another layout then I will be aiming to have a lot more vertical space between the decks as it is difficult to take photos and videos in the current 10" or so (250mm).
One thing I have learnt is that using a video camera is an interesting challenge and good lighting is essential. To this end, I added four more low wattage flourescent lights to the lower deck under Wollar on the climb up into Bylong.
After installing the lights my HD digital video camera decided it didn't want to turn on last weekend and is in being repaired at the moment, well I am waiting for a quote anyway. It will have to be repaired as it is only 26 months old and it cost about $1400, of course it is out of warranty.
This video was taken with a small hand held Sanyo HD digital video camera shaped like a pistol so I couldn't put it down on the layout. This camera is my daughters and I did this video to try out the camera and the lighting.

Bylong Operating Night

2010-04-24T22:55:00.000+10:00

We held another operating session last night and all concerned felt that it went very well and that the layout operated very well which was a relief.

The layout is run to a 12 hour timetable that starts at 6:00am and concludes of course at 6:00pm. The timetable is run at a fast time rate of 6 to 1 so that 1 hour on the fast clock is 10 real minutes. This was made easy by the use of the clock facility in the NCE DCC system where the fast time is displayed on the Pro Cab throttles. Marcus Amman was also kind enough to bring along two fast clocks that plug into the cab bus and display the fast time in large red LED numbers. One clock was placed at Bylong and the other at Wollar for the Station Masters.

We ran again using NCE radio throttles as since the previous operating night a number of the Ramblers had their Pro Cabs converted to radio. There more than enough radio throttles to run the layout. The radio throttles performed flawlessly with no one complaining about delayed response or missed keystrokes.

We ran 25 trains during the session and finished the night at 6:00pm fast time one train movement behind the timetable which all agreed was pretty good, better than last time.

We didn't have a dedicated Station Master / Signalman at Bylong this time. That was my fault as I didn't ask for volunteers and we did have one instance of two trains in the section between Bylong and Cox's Gap Loop but not a cornfield meet due to that lack of control. There was one other instance when I was shunting the branch mixed in Wollar and I gave permission for a passenger train driven by Dave "Rowdy" Allen to leave Wollar down the grade to Bylong as a coal train was climbing the grade. This of course was very wrong of me as I had usurped the power of the Wollar Station Master, Layne Hardy. Layne has been the SM for the last two sessions and has done a really good job although he did say that next time he would like to run a train or two.

I will leave you with this YouTube video of 3532 on 81 Goods banked by 5085 as it passes through Bylong in preparation for the climb to Cox's Gap and Wollar. Apologies for the quality of the video but I quickly grabbed the camera and took the video without having the chance to set it up so that the focus was better. It is however interesting to listen to the discussion going on .

Decision Made - Action Taken

2010-04-04T23:19:00.000+10:00

Some time ago I discussed the height of my backscenes, now this was from the perspective of taking photos without having buildings or trees, etc. ending up with the garage wall behind them. Getting rid of those bricks and cutting around the trees can be an effort in Photoshop.
I was trying to make the decision about making the backscenes higher and was tossing up just how high.
I originally made the backscenes 14" (400mm) high which gave three strips out of an 8' x 4' (2400 x 1200mm) sheet of masonite allowing 2" (50mm) to be bolted onto the layout frame. I did this as I had some backscenes from Bylong in it's previous abode and in an effort to save money as we were in a new house and there were other things to spend the dollar on.
Well, I bit the bullet and over the last three days I have installed and painted the sky on 24" high (610mm) backscenes across the front of the garage part of the layout above Bylong station.
I have not blended the joins between the sheets as I had to make the backscenes removable for layout maintenance, up with the roller doors and off with the backscenes.
Here are a few quick photos showing the effect, a much greater sense of immersion as the top of the backscene is about 7' (2100mm).

The third photo dramatically illustrates the difference in height of the old and new backscenes.
The second last photo shows that I have got to do some work on the hill scenery leaving Bylong so that the 'lower' sky doesn't intrude into the hill. I will bring the hill forward along the backscene towards Bylong with the trees 'walking' up the new part of the hill and blending into the upper level tree line better. This will also allow me to improve the last photo by hiding the top edge of the lower backscene in this picture.
Multi-level layouts certainly give a nice long run but at the expense of some interesting challenges.
Of course I now have to replace the existing backscenes with the new high version and my hills that I painted have got to go, which leads to another painting stage, nothing like repeating your work.

Solving a sometimes problem

2010-03-22T23:12:00.000+11:00

When we are banking goods trains up the grades on Bylong the bank loco is usually a D50 with sprung buffers and no front coupler, so the load is taken on the buffers which is to allow the D50 to slowly drop away from the goods train when it has crested the grade, very prototypical.
However we occasionally have a problem when the loco buffers slip off and past the buffers on the guards van when on a curve. This of course causes no end of grief, bringing the train to a stop.
I have had an idea on how to fix this for several years now; no need to rush into things ;-)
I should mention that when the train leaves Bylong it enters a tunnel that is about 3 metres long and the track runs on a 100mm wide road bed with a 1200mm drop to the concrete floor so it is a little bit important. We have never had anything hit the floor yet, amazing how it focuses the minds of the two drivers.
I worked out that part of the reason for the buffer was problem was that I was using a Stephen Johnson LHG and although it has reasonably large turned brass passenger car buffer heads, I realised that when on a curve the longer the van the more the van end projects away from the track centre and hence the buffers on the loco.
I decided to use a shorter guards van to reduce the overhang effect and settled on three old Trax MHG vans that I had.
I cut the buffer heads off and replaced them with large cast brass passenger car bufffers from L&C. Now I know you will say "but you can't get these anymore" and I will agree however I had enough to do the three vans which should be sufficient for any operating session.
Ian Lindsay Models also used to make some with a slightly smaller head but they aren't on his web site now.
I guess this doesn't help anyone trying to do something similar but maybe Ian Lindsay Models or Ozzy (available at Casula Hobbies) could be convinced to run them again.
Anyway are here some pictures to show what I did.

First I marked the centre of each buffer head and drilled a hole with a no. 59 drill, I then cut off the head flush with the back and drilled a slightl recess with a no. 52 drill to take the thick shank of the passenger buffer. I then glued the heads in place with super glue.
A quick test revealed that it was successful and I then did the other two vans.

The buffer heads do look a little large but as they are now painted black they are not very noticeable.
The next operating session will be the acid test.

A Bit of Video Fun

2010-03-15T00:17:00.000+11:00

When I posted the videos of our recent operating session I had used the video option on my still camera so I decided that I should have a go with my actual HD video camera.
I give you this picture to ponder before you download the YouTube video of 6037 passing the colliery junction.

Just a short post tonight so here is the video, not pefect, I need to improve the clarity but that needs more light so that I can get the f stop to f8 and there is another small issue that could have been better:
6037 passing colliery junction.
I really have to get back to some modelling, life has many interesting distractions.

Operating Night at BYLONG

2010-03-01T22:37:00.001+11:00

Well, I have been a bit quiet lately as I had been preparing for an operating night; now how long did it take?

I started about four weeks ago by wracking my brains about what went wrong last time. We always think we will remember or at least write down those little and not so little issues don’t we?

I remembered a point at the throat into Wollar that had sprung the straight rail during the recent summer but I had already ‘fixed’ that with track spikes and superglue (I hoped). So the next thought was to rolling stock some of which had been responsible for a few derailments. I should mention that my rolling stock is a mixture of the very old and the very new so a full review was in order.

After about $100 in metal wheels and new bogies I was reasonably confident that they would not embarrass me. I took the opportunity to replace the plastic 33” wheels in a number of goods bogies with 36” ones and also found some nice 2BR Andrews bogies made by AccuRail (0103) from The Model Railroad Craftsman at Blacktown NSW. Be aware though that I cleaned Gary out but he said he would be ordering some more, ring before going there if you want some. Also realise that they come with plastic 33” wheels that need to be replaced with 36” ones (I used Walthers 36” wheels as they have plastic axles and aren’t magnetic of course).

Here is a photo of the 2BR under an On Track LLV that I will be back dating to 1965, not much to do, just adding some hand rails on the ends really.

After the re-wheeling came locomotive and layout testing and I forgot, cleaning the ‘crud’ off the rolling stock wheels, a slow process.

Two days before the big night I thought it might be a good idea to put up a ‘fence’ on the aisle side of the upper staging yard as the outside track was right next to a big drop to the concrete. So a quick trip to Bunnings procured a length of cover strip with rounded edges which was nailed to the edge and painted black to match the rest of the staging yard. The top edge comes to the floor level of the rolling stock which I felt would stop any problems.

I also set up an old video monitor with a small (tiny) video camera which I temporarily mounted at the throat of the yard so that the shorter members of the Ramblers could see which track was empty etc.

Here are a few quick and dirty videos I took during the proceedings using my digital still camera, my HD video camera having a flat battery which was inconsiderate of it!

Bylong Operating Night 2009-02-26

AD60 on 87 Goods leaving Bylong

UP Pickup arriving Bylong

UP Pickup shunting Bylong 1

UP Pickup shunting Bylong 2

Cassilis Branch Mixed arriving Wollar

I will really have to try making some videos of the layout but it is not as easy as the still shots as you can’t remove the brick wall, garage doors, etc. in the background. Bob Stack has done some very nice ones on his South Coast Rail blog that I will use for inspiration.

The layout was run to a timetable that I have been slowly developing with an NCE DCC control system. Since the NCE radio throttles have had the issues with slow button presses, etc. solved I decided that this would be a full radio throttle night and with all sound locomotives. Now I only own two radio throttles but Marcus Ammann (6 throttles) and Ron Cunningham (2 throttles) came to the rescue. In case you get the wrong idea the layout only needs about six throttles at best it just shows how helpful friends can be. I also didn’t have enough sound equipped locomotives but that was much easier with several friends bringing along theirs to complement the roster.

James McInerney brought along a D50 equipped with a Tsunami suitably adjusted for drifting, with momentum and deep throated chuffs on starting and a 49 class with a LokSound decoder also set up with momentum. These two locomotives were quickly allocated to the two pickups, one Up and one DOWN, James taking the D50 and Terry Flynn the 49, very interesting to shunt with.

Well the night went reasonably well, we did manage to finish without too many errors, only one train missed its time slot but it was the branch mixed and they always ran late. I did notice though that there was an extra light engine movement back down the grade to bank the next goods train that required it (none) and an empty express meat back to the country that wasn’t timetabled!

Regarding the layout, I only saw one derailment and the offending wagons are being checked, I suspect a too tight bogie. There may have been others but I will ask for a post mortem at our next meeting.

The best part was standing back interpreting the timetable and watching my friends enjoy themselves, all in all a great night which finished a bit before 1am.

A Few Useful Bits

2010-02-04T22:03:00.000+11:00

Recently I was asked by Joe Calipari to review a newly introduced range of detail parts sourced from the Rail Central Pc3 building kit. The review should be in the next AMRM but this post is to let people know that these parts exist and that they are available now.

The parts are of course suited to modelling NSWGR concrete pre-fabricated infrastructure and will be a real boon for those who are modifying the existing station buildings into the various iterations that were scattered around the state.

In my instance I have already done a double sided island platform version similar but shorter to Cumnock and Yeoval for Wollar on my layout. Pictures of Cumnock and Yeoval can be found on James McInerney’s Fotopic site.

Several of the parts are more than suitable for scratch building other Australian structures such as houses, shops, sheds, etc..

I figure that the double hung windows for would work well in a 1950’s ‘fibro’ (asbestos cement) house, the four panel doors could be hung either way up and the metal chimney can be used for a stove or a sewer breather pipe. I think that two windows or even three could be joined to form the classic front windows seen on those 50’s houses.

The goods shed sliding doors can be used for sheds, garages, rear shop doors and industrial buildings

Joe said that he would probably also release the diagonal station awning supports and he was kind enough to supply me with the extra supports I needed to complete the Wollar building.

Let there be light, well a little bit

2010-01-10T22:08:00.002+11:00

While pondering if I should light the Wollar station (the answer being , yes) I resolved to finish a yard light kit that I had bought from Casula Hobbies at the October Exhibition last year.

This yard light is cast in brass and looks very nice when painted.

I started it last year and fitted it with a small Golden White LED (GV32) that I had reviewed in AMRM recently for Gwyder Valley Hobbies but like a lot of my modelling it had languished after I ran into a small hold up (how to mount it in the layout so that it was removable - for access to track behind it).

Anyway, I finished it off and mounted it with a mono 3mm plug and socket, the plug being soldered to the base of the post.

The LED is supplied with very fine enamel coated wires which I used to represent the lamp raising/lowering rope, one wire being soldered to the post at the middle of the post at the cross piece (see desktop pic on the sidebar) and the other was soldered to a fine DCC wire from TCS which ran in a groove cast into the rear of the pole. I am sorry if that is confusing but I didn't take any photos.

I have just noticed that I still haven't put the two 'power' wires that run from the top spreader above the lamp to the middle cross piece, just as well that it is removeable.

Here it is in the depths of night.

Wollar Station Building Update

2010-01-02T19:18:00.007+11:00

Here is a small update on progress on the Wollar station building. Wollar has an island platform for main and branch, the branch platform side being the closest to the edge of the layout. This of course puts the 'rear' of the Pc3 building in full view.

I decided that the rear was a bit plain and would require at least one door and one or more windows to be added.

A quick study of the window styles showed the lack of suitable windows in my box of structure parts (Grandt line, etc.) and left me with the conclusion that I could add one extra window by changing one of the windows into the required door. The door came from the box of bits and while not quite the same was close enough.

I also had to add a small window over the new door and make the corbels (is that the right name) that hold the bottom of the awning supports.

After this I had to reduce the width of the corrugated iron awnings to suit the platform width and move them inwards under the slate gable roof sections.

Where did he get the second corrugated awning from you ask?

Well, Joe Calipari came to my rescue when I first bought the kit and happened to mention that I wanted to make it into an island platform version. Now Joe doesn't have these as spare parts but did have a damaged kit that he took the awning from. Thank you Joe, you are one of nature's gentlemen.

If anyone wanted to make a similar building then it would very easy to scratchbuild an awning to suit.

Here is a view of the almost completed model, just the awning supports and the downpipes to go.

I have run into a small problem with the awning supports as I have to make another eight and it should be easy, but the ones in the kit are about 3" x 3" in cross section but this size is not available in Evergreen polystyrene strip or in timber. I suspect that they would be 2" x 4" in real life so it looks like I will have to make sixteen from 2" x 4" Evergreen strip.

Now regarding the downpipes etc. from the roof, I feel that a station of this size would have town water (or at least water from the loco supply) and drainage for the downpipes, so I will be eliminating the water tanks and filter system. The lack of water tanks leaves the ends of the building looking a bit bare so I will probably add some advertisements.

I am not moving as fast as I thought but it is the festive season after all.

Merry Christmas

2009-12-20T22:30:00.005+11:00

I will be having some time off at Christmas (back to work 11 January) and hope to get a bit of modelling done. I might even get back to the remaining points for Cassilis, who knows.

My first efforts though will be directed at making a station building for Wollar; that platform has been bare for too long.

The building will be an island platform version of the Rail Central Pc3.

A picture of Cumnock station, one of the two such buildings can be found at the Rail Central site here, just scroll down.

The other building was at Yeoval but was different as near as I can tell from the few photos I have seen. Note that neither was actually a Pc3, they appear to have been built to suit local requirements.

I hope you all can find a bit of time for modelling after the family time and festivities so to everyone, please have a merry and safe Christmas.

Ray

Inspiration

2009-12-14T23:00:00.006+11:00

I write this post with no more progress on the layout, still in the doldrums.

However, I have been busy wasting my time by trawling the web.

Digressing slightly, Chris and I went away for a few days late last week and as we were leaving we dropped into the local newsagency to pick up something to read. I couldn't find anything so I bought an English model railway magazine remembering that I had picked one up a few months ago and had been refreshed by it. I hadn't investigated the british scene for many years.

This event caused me to have a better look.

I present to you now some web sites that should inspire and hopefully not bring on feelings of inadequacy. We can all learn from others and these few sites are just fantastic!

Here is the first a look at Irish Railways (5'3" gauge) in P4.

Now some thing from Scotland.

And a site by Chris Nevard with some small layouts in the british style with a lot of incredible model photos, note the real cat in this photo.

I came to these sites through a site with a huge number of links on all sorts of model railway subjects. A small number of the links are dead as you would expect with so many to keep up to date but Bob Heath the owner has done an amazing job of bringing them together in the one spot.
I hope you enjoy cruising through these sites and I apologise for dragging you away from your modelling.

Plenty of inspiration, now to some modelling again.

I have been taking a few photos though, so something is happening.

Early morning in Wollar, no Photoshoping just the light through the garage window without the lights on.

Feeling Guilty about my Lack of Posts

2009-11-29T22:50:00.007+11:00

I have had a very quiet time of late with my modelling, I don't know why but this state of affairs comes and goes.

I have done only one more point for Cassilis but could lay track almost right through the yard if I wished, I just haven't.

Anyway, here is a little scenery project I did a few years ago.

Take a sprig from the end of a Cootamundra Wattle branch (Acacia Baileyana '"Purperia' variety). See http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cootamundra_wattle

Trim the fine branchlets as per the picture.

Dye a cotton pipe cleaner a light to mid-brown with a little orange in it (if you can find them), I used a little artists acrylic paint.

Cut the dried pipe cleaner into pieces about 20 - 25mm long.

I made a jig with a piece of timber drilled to take the short length of pipe cleaner with timber surrounding the hole to support the branches (sorry, no picture but just think about it).

Glue the ends of the branchlets to the top of the pipe cleaner , at least two layers looks best, put the small branchlets on top and there you have it!

Easy!

Yes, I know the branches are upside down!

Why do you think I haven't published this before?

;-)

Pleased with myself and other short stories

2009-11-01T21:39:00.005+11:00

I had a whole day to myself today, something that I theoretically have each Sunday as Chris, my wife, works Sundays. But of course we all know that life often gets in the way.

Normally I visit my mum and dad on Sunday mornings and this can run into the early afternoon as I am building a layout with dad. I have done this once already for about 4 years then 18 months ago mum and dad moved and well, we start again.

The layout is coming along nicely this time as it has been planned carefully instead of just growing like the old one (usually between my visits ;-) ). I have been building the new one for the last 6 months or so. I will post some photos at a later date.

The point being though that they are away visiting my brother at Townsville.

Now this leads me to another story.

Last Sunday I joined a few hundred other people who were lucky enough to visit what may be known as the Main Western Line layout. The layout was opened to the public in aid of a charity and at $10, entry it was worth it.

The layout was on a property at Brewongle near Bathurst and was built for it's owner Paul Hennessay by John Brown a well known modeller. John told me he had taken 19 months at 40 -50 hours per week to get it to this stage. Well John, you can be proud of your achievement. John had some assistance from another modeller whose name unfortunately escapes me.

Some may have heard of it but you have to see it to believe it. It is housed in a 100' x 45' purpose built building, notice I didn't say shed. The layout is in a U shape with a large staging yard at the base of the U and two long peninsulars. It is a takes up a space about 80' x 30' leaving enough room for a few lounge chairs and wood burning fire.

The layout represents a section of mainline from Tarana to Bathurst and it includes a short Oberon branchline.

I took quite a few photos and also video but will only post these few photos below.

This photo was taken 2/3 of the way down one peninsular.

And this photo was taken when I turned around and took the last 1/3, long enough?

Some more photos can be found at:

http://www.nmra.org.au/Layout_Tours/Western%20Line/index.html

Now back to the original subject of this blog.

Having all day to myself I decided to build two points for Cassilis but I did have to mow the grass, not my most favourite past time but the lans are small and it only takes 20 minutes or so. I learnt from my first home where it would take about 2 hours!

Any way I went to the back lawn to removed the land mines and noticed that a tree was overhanging the path. OK, I can trim that, next I knew I was out the front trimming a very tall hedge and another tree as well.

After a shower and some lunch, yes, half the day gone, I headed for the layout room (not nearly so splendid as Paul's).

I side tracked myself with fixing a vibration in the sound from my dad's new Eureka C38. If you have the same problem then the fix is simplicity itself.

The tender body is held on with two screws underneath near the rear coupler and two tabs at the front. Unscrew and remove the body.

Now, you will notice that the inside surface of the tender sides have a very slight recess starting near the front and going about 3/4 of the way to the back. Why? I don't know but it allows the sides to vibrate against the tender floor.

Now for the fix, as per the photo, put some sticky tape (Cellotape) into the recess on each side. Allow the tape to extend out the bottom and trim with a sharp hobby knife.

I also taped down some of the wires that might have been touching the tender sides causing the vibration noise.

Re-assemble and it should be fixed, don't forget to turn down the volume to about half.

As with all QSI sound locos, if using DCC then you will need to put a zero into CV62 to turn off the talk back feature as it can interfere with programming by talking while the command station is sending the second of any two part CV adjustments such as the address.

OK, now to what I am happy about.

I only got one point built but it was my first curved point and it went together without any further adjustment, my test 4 wheel S truck just glides through without any discernable click or wheel drop at the frog.

I was over the moon and took it in to show off to Chris!

Now that was the fourth point built, only seven to go ;-(.

I say ;-( because I am a person who doesn't like repeating things, I love to work out how to do something and then do it, just don't ask me to repeat it. Yes, I have many unfinished kits but I do have one complete of each ;-)

That's it for now, a bit of a ramble, no pun intended.

A Suggestion Comes Home to Roost

2009-10-12T22:13:00.005+11:00

At the Modelling the Railways of NSW Convention in July I was having lunch in the sun outside the canteen at Loftus TAFE when John Dersch sat down at the table. Now John is the man behind the Uneek range of details. During a pleasant discussion about the convention and his latest model of a soldier atop a WW1 momument, I ventured that a good item to make would be the platform fencing in use on NSW stations as it has one or two 2" x 3" cross beams in each post and is capped with a 4" x 4" top rail. This rail is however placed in a diamond configuration. The problem for the modeller was firstly to notch the post for the middle rail(s) and then put a "V" in the top of the post to take the 4" x 4" top rail and then to repeat this process accurately for all posts. Not a prospect I would look forward to.

Well, John listened politely and with a bit of interest.

At the recent AMRA October Exhibition at Liverpool John saw me as I passed Anton's stand and came out and shook my hand saying he had something for me and thanking me for the good idea. Of course it was a small bag of fence posts cast in white metal. John had just run the first castings on Friday night so they were not for sale yet.

Here are the castings:

I used Evergreen Item No. 142 0.40" x 0.40" (1.0mm x 1.0mm) for the top rail and Item No. 8203 HO Scale 2" x 3" strip styrene for the middle rail. I found it easiest to make up a small jig to space the posts at 8'9" as per a DATA SHEETS plan I had for platforms and to hold the middle rail in place.

It will be noted that this is a single mid-rail fence and the DATA SHEETS fence has two mid-rails. A quick check of photographs will show that both existed. Perhaps John may consider the two rail version as well.

Here is the result, not glued as yet and a little up and down.

Time for an Update

2009-09-15T22:32:00.003+10:00

I can't believe that it has been about five weeks since I last made a post.

Well, let's see, the spray booth is finished and working. It appears that the fan should be at the exit end of the ducting as it certainly sucks better than it blows. It could be better but provided I keep the sliding perspex 'doors' open about 300mm it works well enough so that I can't smell solvent when my nose is about 150mm from the opening, not very scientific but hey it works.

Next, I now have nine of the eleven undertrack Kadee uncoupling magnets but the point work has gone no where, real life sometimes intrudes.

Now here is something I have been pondering for a number of years.

Since I bought my digital camera and began taking model photos I have been painfully aware of the lack of height of my backscenes. I have difficulty framing my shots as trees and some taller buildings stick up above the top edge of the backscene. This puts them in front of the brick wall and removing the bricks in Photoshop to place a real background into the picture is a real pain.

When I built the layout I had to decide on the height of course and I foolishly went with the decision to cut 2400 x 1200mm masonite into three 400mm high boards in an attempt to save money. The 400mm high board only allows a 350mm high backscene by the time it is screwed to the layout frame.

Here is what the backscenes look like.

And here is what it would look like with about a 1200mm high backscene.

No contest!

The problem I have been wrestling with is how do I retrofit higher backscenes?

I can't see them being 1200mm high but I think 600mm (cost again) would work reasonably well as the top level of the layout is at 1400mm so another 600mm would put the top well above head level.

Hmmm, 1200mm would be really nice.....

Final Cassilis Track Layout v2

2009-08-10T22:20:00.005+10:00

Is anything ever final on a model railway?

At the moment here is the track layout on the baseboards. I have gone for a slightly unconventional terminal track end whereby the main line passes through the platform (see plan in previous post) but doesn't stay straight as it swings through the crossover and ends as the second track from the right at the bottom of the photo. I hope that makes sense?

The reason was to allow me to fit in a loco stabling/railmotor servicing track next to the turntable. There was no other way that I could swing a track into place but I think it's important to the temrinus, to me at least.

Also in my efforts to get that typical set of crossovers into the goods yard from the loop I have a shorter goods siding to live with but hey, I like the flexibility for shunting the goods and stock sidings.

I have also had to use a curved point at the throat of the yard to get the correct swing off the incoming curve.

The observant will notice that the branch crosses over the Coxs Gap Loop which is not prototypical for NSW by any means. This is a compromise I have had to live with to enable me to get a branch terminus, the space above the lower staging yard being the only possible location. It's also the way the main got to the upper staging yard before it's leap across the room to the left.

The secret is that the track is going to cross a brick road bridge over Cox's Gap Loop so that unless you really look you will not know that a rail line is crossing it unless a train does so.

The next stage will take a while as I am investigating the use of Kadee under track magnets which will be hinged below the baseboard to be raised into position when required. I will probably do a small mock up of the base board and do some trial fitouts. I have worked it all out in theory but you know how it goes, there is always something you haven't thought of. The other reason is that I need about ten and I only have two at the moment.

While I collect the magnets I will start to scratchbuild the points.

'Final' Version of Cassilis

2009-07-18T22:19:00.007+10:00

Firstly, my spray booth efforts have gone nowhere so far except to find out that air is not like water, you can't put it through a smaller pipe and get a greater pressure, just the opposite. It seems that you should have ducting of the same size as the fan (300mm) so I am trying to work out how to make larger ducting and to get it to the exit vent without destroying the storage I currently have.

Now, back to Cassilis.

I have built the baseboards (2 - see plan) and they are now in place above the lower staging yard. I have probably tried too hard to fit in too many goods options but the above plan is it. I have decided to keep the sidings straight to ease shunting with Kadees but did manage to angle the yard across the board area for a better effect. I have also managed to fit a loco siding for the branch loco and possibly for the CPH railmotor passenger service.

I am going to scratch build the points and try to put as much of my modelling into this station area as I can. Building a largish layout causes you to assess what you can achieve in a reasonable time and this leads you to realise that highly detailed work can't really be done all over. Some can do it but I decided years ago to build for overall effect with focussed highly detailed scenes (not too many of those as yet).

I have split the baseboards into two pieces as the lower staging yard is also able to be split into two. You never know if you may have to move in the future and I didn't want to put a lot into this station to have to scrap it later.

A couple of weeks ago Chris and I went for a cruise down to Crookwell and Boorowa to photograph some suitable infrastructure for Cassilis. I new there was a fair bit of infrastructure at Crookwell and I had found the silo at Boorowa when doing a Google Maps Streetview search.

I have previously seen a photo of Crookwell in snow and I can now believe it, no snow but Chris wouldn't get out of the car!

I needed the turntable pics as I recently bought Anton's 60' Sellers turntable which is very nice although it doesn't have the characteristic curve of the bottom of the frames. This is a bit annoying but given how nice the unit is otherwise I can live with it, particularly if there is a lot of static grass growing in the pit.

I am also planning to get one of Keiran Ryan's silo kits soon and needed detail photos of the silo, especially the corrugated iron unloading shed, the only part of the structure that Keiran doesn't supply.

On our way back we checked out Harden and I found a 5 ton yard crane on a square brick base. The interest here is that I have bought a Uneek 5 ton Crane kit and a Peter Boormans Workshop 5 Ton Crane kit. Both are the same version of crane and have cast and etched parts but the Uneek one has an octagonal concrete base and the Peter Boormans one does not come with a base. The point here is that it is going to be easier to build a square brick base than the octagonal version. It also adds a bit more interest.

As we were leaving Harden I turned around and was presented with this shot which I will use to close this post.

The old and the new - Harden South Box July 2009

The Continuing Saga of the Small Job

2009-06-24T22:05:00.002+10:00

Following on from my previous post I spent the next two weeks locating the spray booth, the exhaust fan and constructing the connecting ducting.

I screwed a plastic gutter downpipe collecting box to the wall over the vent that I was going to use as the outlet and sealed it with acrylic flexible sealer. I used 90mm PVC pipe from the spray booth to the exhaust fan that I had mounted on an interior dividing wall in a timber box. The air exiting the fan was channelled into a plastic plant container that tapered down to about 200mm and a 90mm fitting was mounted in the base of the container. Silver foil covered spring wire ducting available for clothes driers was then sealed to the 90mm outlet of the fan and run to the vent in the brick wall. A lot of time was taken in waiting for sealant to dry sufficiently to move on to the next stage.

Before making the final ducting connection to the wall vent outlet I turned on the fan.

Well, hardly any air came out!

I removed the ducting at the fan enclosure and got a reasonable air flow.

The problem seems to be that the spiral spring ducting is not smooth inside and the ridges of the spring is sufficient to impede the air flow.

I now have to re-think the whole project.

I am going to put a new smaller spray booth as close as possible to the wall vent and cross my fingers, unfortunately I don't have a lot of room for the fan enclosure.

The spray booth and fan enclosure had previously done years of service at my old home but it was ducted with smooth bore 90mm PVC pipe.

There's a lesson there me thinks.

Beware the Small Job

2009-06-09T22:13:00.004+10:00

A couple of weeks ago I decided that the foliage of the tree in the photo of 1307 was too green so I proceeded to spray paint it with a lighter olive green. To keep the different shades of the existing foliage I thinned the enamel matt paint more than normal and made up about a thimble full of the paint and started spraying.

Now here is the rub, I was doing it in the garage without any sort of spray booth, just a cardboard box. The theory was that I would do it quickly and exit the garage.

Well, too late, a voice came from the doorway, "What are you doing? I can smell that in the study!"

Sprung!!!

Chris my wife had arrived.

I should explain something here, it is of course not a very good idea health wise and I of all people should know as about 8 years ago I had Lymphoma a form of cancer that was caused by exposure to benzene solvent at work 30 years before.

So, I quickly assured Chris that I would set up my spray booth that had sat in the corner of garage under the layout since we moved into our new house in 1995.

I had not been doing much spraying because of the difficulty in extractng the booth from under all the spare timber that had 'grown' around it.

Now this meant moving a lot of saved treasure (read junk) and the first picture is the result. About half of the timber went to the tip on Monday at a cost of $25 not counting the value of the timber itself.

The tree, the cause of all the trouble is sitting on top of the lower staging yard on the site of the Cassilis branch terminus station.

The second picture shows the booth on the left and the brick wall where the wall vent is located that will be the exit point for the ducting.

That was last Saturday and since then I have assembled most of the ducting and tonight I was about to connect the ducting to the wall vent exit when I found that the bricks were saturated. Fearing real rising damp problems I investigated but the wetness was only a small area at the vent. It turned out to be a coiled hose on a bracket outside that was just dripping onto the wall, what a relief.

Now of course I have to wait for the bricks to dry out before I can apply any gap filling sealant, probably at least a week, I hope we don't get any rain for a while.

I started all this before I went to the Epping Model Railway Club exhibition last Saturday where I came home really enthused by Bowen Creek and the incredible scenery of Muskrat Ramble.

I also picked up a 60' Sellars turntable from Anton (very nice) for my Cassilis station and was looking forward to starting the benchwork and getting on with it.

Bowen Creek was such an incredible piece of work and I wanted to get right to work.

All I can say is GRRRRR!!!!!

Curved Stations

2009-05-30T11:08:00.002+10:00

James McInerney posted a comment to my previous post about curving the station to get away from the parallel to the baseboard look.

I love the look of a curved station but have always shied away from it because of concerns about the reliability of uncoupling KDs. Uncoupling KDs is a question in itself, permanent magnets, electro-magnets, by hand, etc. that I still don't have an answer for.

I have found that the new whisker and scale head KDs are far superior in performance to the old No. 5s, however because they are so good, with 4 wheeled stock they can false uncouple when moving slowly over permanent magnet uncouplers. This is a big issue with steel axles on light 4 wheeled stock.

I only put permanent uncouplers on stub ended sidings so it's not that big an issue and can be overcome somewhat by adding weight to the wagons. This suits me as I like my loads to be heavy to give the challenge of getting up the grades with bank locos.

I am hoping to build Cassilis station yard with handlaid points as per Bylong station so curving might be the way to go, perhaps a nice broad curve will still allow the KDs to couple and uncouple, I must do some trials.

Cassilis Version 4

2009-05-28T22:20:00.003+10:00

Here is another version of Cassilis, this one is in response to a comment from James McInerney on my first version (see first Cassilis post below) regarding the placement of the silo and the stock yards. I knew that they should have been swapped to be more prototypical but was pushed for room for the silo.

Well, once you have the detail police on your tail you may as well give up so here is a better version.

I had another version that was prompted by 'Tom' from another comment about tracks being parallel to the baseboard edge and the need for a coaling stage track. I did a version to suit but have had to put the tracks back parallel again to fit the silo.

I am open to any suggestions but the available space is 3600mm x 600mm (12' x 2') as it will sit above the lower staging yard where the upper staging yard was until it's recent move.

Cows and Grass

2009-05-25T19:00:00.004+10:00

I had a comment from IainS on my last post about how good the cows looked in the grass and how I got the effect.

Well, those two cows are Bylong layout veterans having first been used when Bylong was exhibited at the AMRA Sydney October Exhibition in 1979. Those who have the July/August 1981 AMRM will see them in one of the Bylong article photos.

Unfortunately they are somewhat crippled as I cut them off at the knees back in 1979 when the stood in the 'grass' I used then, coloured sawdust.

These days the 'grass' they are standing in that is tickling their bellies is made of a layer of fine grass flocks of various colours to give a dry look which then has green and brown static grass applied over it.

A Quiet Night

2009-05-23T10:48:00.005+10:00

One recent Friday I got a call during the day from Gary Laker, one of the Ramblers who was desperate to do something. Gary works to a roster and was out of sync with our meetings so I invited him over that night.

I also rang 'Rowdy' David Allen another quiet Rambler.

Well we had a most enjoyable evening running trains and adjusting the CVs on a Tsunami Alco 251 V12 decoder I had just installled in a Trainorama NSWGR 44 class. Gary had been a driver for 15 years and Rowdy had been a fireman for several so they were invaluable in determining which of the 15 diesel horns in the decoder was the closest to a 1960s 44 with dual horns. After much tooting of horns it was down to two, numbers 4 and 13. I am using the number 13 horn at the moment and it will be put to the test the next time all the Ramblers drop by.

Next we moved on to dynamic braking, the Tsunami allows the dynamix brake to be turned on with function 4 but you can also have the throttle respond accordingly by adjusting the CVs. By default the Tsunami will drop the diesel sound to idle when the dynamic brake is used but the real 44 class would go to notch 4, so notch 4 it was. This doesn't give as much change in engine noise as the default as you may only be around notch 4 when descending a grade but it's nice to know that it is happening.

In conjunction with the dynamic braking I had set the automatic notching in the Tsunami to change every 10 throttle steps, so when set in 128 mode and with a speed curve active that tops out at the 80 step mark this gives you eight notches as per the prototype. The Tsunami can also be set up for manual notching where the diesel engine sound is disconnected from the throttle and most be notched up and down by the driver, I haven't tried this yet.

The 44 was given a heavy momentum for both accelerating and decellerating for more realism.

The Tsunami allows function 11 to activate a brake that will slow down the loco, the braking effect being fully adjustable by CV for effect.

Now, I use NCE and function 11 is an awkward two handed button press and function 7 operates the brake squeal noise so I used JMRI Decoder Pro to make function 7 sound the brake squeal as well as activate the braking effect. Function 7 is also the brake squeal on locos fitted with QSI sound decoders such as Eureka and Austrains C35 so this is a good match, nothing more confusing than trying to remember which function does what and which decoder is in which loco. The JMRI DecoderPro freeware program is just the thing for setting these function button assignments easily.

With the momentum and the above adjustments the 44 took on a whole new dimension.

There may be more adjustments to make for fine tuning but I am more than happy with the way this 44 operates, two more to go.

A word of warning, the standard shrink wrapped Tsunami barely fits and one speaker must be removed to make room. For my second 44 I have bought the Atlas variant of the Tsunami, this being a flat long decoder that should replace the existing lighting board although it isn't the same shape. Maybe one day Trainorama and other manufacturers will ensure that the lighting boards in their diesels are made to the Atlas 'form factor' for ease of decoder installs, or at least for this decoder. Unfortunately this is not the case with the upcoming GMs.

One last point, I fitted a speaker enclosure for the 44 that is available from the Model Railroad Craftsman at Blacktown, NSW. This speaker enclosure need a little bit of chamfering on the inside edge to fit the existing 44 class speaker. You must have an enclosure sealing the back of the speaker as you will get little sound the way the speakers come in the 44 class without it. The speaker needs to work against entrapped air to produce the sound.

Gary Spencer-Salt, the proprietor has produced this speaker enclosure to go with his Loksound sound decoder kit specifically set up with 44 class sounds. Having seen and heard this operate in James McInerney's 44 class I can thoroughly recommend the Loksound as a far easier install than the Tsunami.

Finally, towards the end of the night Gary Laker asked if he could take a photo of his 13 class and passenger cars that has been working their way around the layout that night.

I gave him my camera that is permanently set up for model photos and a tripod. The desktop photo above is the result of his photo and a bit of enhancement by me by dropping a real background into the photo instead of the light blue background that exists right behind the train (see below).

As you can see Gary is a fine modeller with a good eye for weathering.

BYLONG Operation Night

2009-05-05T22:37:00.011+10:00

NOTE: Links to timetable files are to be found at the bottom of this post.

Two nights before they returned home to Texas, Blair Kooistra and Lance Lassen attended an operating night at Bylong.

Others attending were, left to right, sort of:
Bob Merchant (Senior Bob), BobLynch (Junior Bob), Blair Kooistra (at rear), Ron Cunningham (front), James McInerney (centre), Lance Lassen (at rear in orange shirt), Terry Flynn (centre), myself (front in white shirt), Layne Hardy (centre), Des McDonell (towards rear) and Gary Laker (front right). Keiran Ryan turned up later from work after the photo was taken.

Blair has been posting a day by day diary of their train chasing exploits around NSW on his Under the Weather blog (http://undertheweatherblog.blogspot.com/) since he arrived back home and I feel slack about not updating my own blog.

We had a fun night operating Bylong to timetable for the first time since it's recent changes. Everyone was given copies of the timetable and signalmen were allocated to the staging yards and each station with a 'station timetable' to control the passage of trains through their section. We did not operate with a dispatcher although I was available for advice and to troubleshoot as the night went on.

The timetable was run to a 6:1 fast clock and we started well but slowly dropped behind until we were running about a fast hour behind at one stage. I had allowed for this and the middle of the 'day' was quieter and we managed to catch up a bit of time. It later became busy but we finally ended up a bit late.

There were an Up and a Down Pickup Goods as well as an Up and Down Branch Mixed that had to shunt. Blair volunteered to be driver with James McInerney as guard, he must be a masochist!

He did say he had a great time though as he shunted with James' Trainorama 49 class fitted with a Loksound sound decoder from The Model Railroad Craftsman at Blacktown NSW. James had done a lot of adjusting of the CVs and the loco had been programmed with momentum so it was interesting to shunt with.

James also brought along a Trainorama 44 class similarly fitted and adjusted like the 49 and also an Austrains C36 with a Tsunami sound decoder that was so well programmed that it would fall almost silent and drift downhill with only the clank of the side rods to be heard. I really have to ask James exactly what CVs and values he used as my Austrains C36 is also fitted with a Tsunami.

Lance chose to drive a couple of the mainline trains during the session and said he enjoyed himself.

We had two goods trains that needed banking from Kerrabee to the Gulgong staging along with the attendent light engine workings of course.

All in all, things didn't go too badly but I certainly have a couple of things to fix before the next session.

Blair kindly offered to attend the next session..... ;-)

Here are the timetables, train control graph and forms used.

The full timetable.

Individual station timetables.

Train control graph

Modified NSWGR X2010 form used for pick ups consists including shunting instructions.

When you click on one of the above links you will get a preview on a Google Documents site, go to the File drop down and click on Download Original.

See if you can find the error in the timetable and train graph, there is a move that wasn't actually possible on the night, I stuffed up.

A Welcome to Oz

2009-04-12T13:01:00.006+10:00

Those that follow these blogs would of course be aware that Blair Koistra (North of Narrabri - http://northofnarrabri.blogspot.com/) and his friend Lance Lassen arrived in Sydney yesterday.

Gary Laker and I met them at Central Station and so began a day of hobby purchases as we drove around Sydney.

We ended up at my place for a welcoming BBQ with a number of friends, Bob Merchant, Bob Stack, Bob Lynch, Graham Saint, Marcus Amman, Terry Flynn and David Allen.

Other friends that couldn't be there as they were away either holidaying or at the Hobsons Bay Exhibition in Victoria were (Ron Cunningham, Ian Dunn and James McInerney).

Some time was spent talking and running a couple of trains, eating and generally having a great time.

Blair and Lance left this morning on a punishing road trip around NSW to photograph various trains being as I understand it, assisted at various times by a number of other contacts here, who I am afraid I do not know.

I am sure that Blair will give a much more detailed report on his blog when he arrives back home and recovers.

Blair and Lance, "Welcome to Australia".

Proposed Branchline Terminus

2009-03-25T23:20:00.004+11:00

At the instigation of Dr Iain Stuart this post is being composed in Windows Live Writer and to give a small update on directions at Bylong.

In my last post I posted a photo of the layout with the new branchline and scenery. The branchline makes it's way around the room until it arrives at the previous position of the upper staging yard (above the lower staging yard).

At this point it enters the terminus of Cassilis.

Cassilis of course didn’t have a railway line but that just gives me a free hand to design the station yard.

Here is the proposed station yard as it stands at the moment.

I hope to start work on the terminus sometime in the next couple of months.

Yes Keiran, that’s where your silo will be going, the one I have been promising to buy for a while now.

Postscript: Live Writer was very easy to use and the plan could be placed right where I wanted it, although you have to have a Google Picasa Web Album account as a requirement, not a great impost.

Layout update

2009-03-10T23:26:00.005+11:00

Just to show that I haven't been bludging here is a quick and dirty photo to show progress on the new upper level trackwork and scenery.

The main line climbs up and around behind the tree line to the upper level Gulgong storage.

That's 5085 creeping around the curve on the branch coming from the non-existant terminus.

The terminus will be above the lower staging which can be seen in a panoramic layout view in one of my early posts.

I think that the lower level backscene needs to be repainted to make the mountains rise up higher near the tunnel to better blend with the new upper level scenery.

What I am trying to achieve with the new scenery above the tunnel is the effect of a distant tree lined hill from afar but smaller trees and shrubs when up close looking at just the branch and main line.

I think it works reasonably well.

Desktop Picture Change

2009-01-18T21:26:00.002+11:00

Yesterday I bought a 21.5" Full HD wide screen LCD monitor for my PC and realised that my desktop pictures being 4 x 3 proportions get distorted badly on a wide screen.

So I have reverted to a previous desktop picture but have added a wide screen 16 x 9 version.

Programs that show pictures seem to handle the different proportions OK but the Windows desktop does not have an option to show different proportion pictures properly.

I will do the same on the Eureka Models Blog desktop pictures that I do for Ron Cunningham.

I hope that this is of some use to you.

Back to Work

2009-01-14T21:50:00.012+11:00

Well, I went back to work this week, what a joy!

I did however enjoy myself over the break, kit bashing my flour mill. It started as a Walthers kit for a steel merchants, I can't remember the name but you should recognise it. Anyway I had started it many years ago before the Walthers sugar mill was around, it was the most likely candidate. I had realised later that most flour mills had three or even four floors so two wouldn't do and the project stalled, I'm good at that, 3/4 finished models are my specialty.

After pondering over the problem after Christmas I realised that with a few bits of spare brick material and part of the rear wall (out of sight) I could give the mill a third floor.

I still have to build the rail unloading shed and vertical conveyor tower to the two silos but I thought I would share what I had done with you, after all, I am now 3/4's of the way through the total project.

So here it is, I'm pretty happy with it.

It has a mixture of features from several mills, double multi-pane windows, external fire escape stairs, expolsion wall, bricked up windows, etc., see below.

Photo from http://www.filmcentralnsw.com/film_tv_nsw_home.shtml

Photo from http://www.filmcentralnsw.com/film_tv_nsw_home.shtml

Photo by Ray P

I cut a point into the main just west of Wollar in the area of the panorama photos of the layout that you can't see, just to the left of the camera (see earlier posts). The point is controlled by a push-pull rod to a Blue Point mechanism so this should make shunting interesting, most other points being electrically controlled.

I will post a photo of the completed mill with silos when I get it done but don't hold your breath.

An Unexpected Gift

2008-12-27T23:35:00.005+11:00

To: District Superintendent

From: District Engineer - Signals

Subject: Brakes Landmark

General Appendix Part II p.42, Signalling, Sec. 9 Miscellaneous
Signals (d).

"Provided to indicate the place at which goods trains are to stop,
in accordance with regulations, for the purpose of applying or
releasing brakes.

The brakes landmark takes the form of a black disc with the word
"BRAKES" cut out of the face of the disc, or a black disc with the
word "BRAKES" inscribed with white lettering thereon. Both affixed
on a post.

During darkness, the indication is given by an illuminated "B" in
the centre of the disc."

So began a note in a Christmas present from a fellow Rambler, Gary
Laker.

A description of the construction on the enclosed Uneek model
Brakes Landmark was included along with the words:

"Built in appreciation of your passion and commitment to the
greatest hobby of all and your help and friendship along the way."

Well, I was blown away.

I think this shows the friendship that this hobby generates and it
caused me to think of a few other gifts over the years.

The first from James McInerney many years ago was the Cox's Gap
signal box, the goods loading bank and station platform at Wollar.

This was followed by a Central Valley girder bridge built along
NSWGR lines from Ian Dunn, which currently crosses the river at
Kerrabee.

And finally a trestle bridge from Ron Cunningham that is on the
grade from Bylong to Cox's Gap Loop.

Down the years I have received the assistance of the other Ramblers
when I have called for help with some aspect of the layout. They
even helped me move the layout and contents of the layout room to a
new purpose built garage many years ago.

I think Gary says it well, it truly is a great hobby and it is a hobby that engenders long term friendships.

Thank you Gary.

The Brakes Landmark in place at the Wollar loop at the top of the 1 in 40 grade to Bylong.

P.S. Gary (ex. NSW train driver) has been officially appointed
District Engineer - Signals.

Christmas

2008-12-21T22:33:00.004+11:00

I would like to wish you all the best of the season, have a safe , enjoyable and relaxing time.

Ray

PC Desktop Picture Change

2008-12-16T23:27:00.003+11:00

I have just changed the Desktop picture to a variation of the previous one. I will change these every now and again.

You can click on the small picture to get the larger version and then right click on the picture and select Save Target As to save the picture to your computer.

A Major Change to BYLONG

2008-11-25T22:21:00.007+11:00

For those who have been wondering about the hint I made a few weeks ago ("There was movement at the station"), I have changed the layout, the upper staging yard has been picked up, rotated through 180 degrees and is now located over the Bylong tunnel and Cox's Gap cliffs.

A 1 in 40 grade now starts just west of Wollar, near the bottom left of the photo, crosses the garage doors above Bylong and climbs to the top staging yard.

More banking and double heading out of Wollar loco depot!!!

At the start of the 1 in 40 grade there is a junction of the new 40' (12 metre) branch line which proceeds across the roller doors and then under the upper staging to then swing through a 180 degree curve to the branch terminus (where the upper staging was). Only about 3 feet (1 metre) of the branch line is hidden trackage.

If you look carefully you will notice that the branch has a roller coaster in it. I decided to add this feature as I have seen lines that follow the country side rather than just cut through it. The small 'hill' is approximately 435 feet long and is only about 4'6" high, about 1 in 60 each way to the crest. I will be interested to see how this looks once the scenery is done as it looks odd at the moment.

The branch terminus will be 12' x 2' and at the moment I haven't decided on the track layout but it will have a turntable, wheat silo and the usual goods shed, loading ramp, etc. I have about eight prototype station plans to choose from currently and most seem to have seven points.

Although you can't see it in the photo because of the lights, the area above the cliffs where the branch line runs will be sceniced as well even though only about 4" high.

This branch line is the culmination of several years thought trying to work out how to fit a branch in. Of course the idea finally came and it was all worked out in about 10 minutes of measuring, although it took me about another month of pondering before I started.

The tree upper level support (as mentioned on my blog a few weeks ago) can be seen in the photo and the branch line is running just behind it and in front of the printed backscene. The upper level staging is supported at each end and in the middle, by the tree.

Second Set of Scalpel Saw Blades

2008-11-09T23:01:00.002+11:00

Here is a second set of saw blades, this time there are two longer blades.

The packet states that they are 0.12mm thick but they are actually 0.24 mm thick, the same as the other set.

The price for the blades by themselves is $20.30.

I Found a New Tool

2008-11-05T22:53:00.003+11:00

I am a person who really is a collector of small modelling tools, show me some small obscure tool and I am likely to buy it just in case.

I found this new tool, a scalpel saw at the Auburn Bunnings hardware store here in Sydney. This line of hobby tools had been mentioned a couple of times on the Aus_Model_Rail Yahoo group so I decided on Monday to go and see what was on offer.

As you can see in the photo above the tool is a scalpel handle that takes very fine saw blades. The blades are etched in stainless steel and are 0.24mm thick. There were several sets available; one with saw blades about twice the length of those shown here.

I decided on the short version as I wasn't sure how strong they would be. Well, I was pleasantly surprised, as you can see I have cut the doors from a Trax MHG. This took seven minutes to do and the blade removed the door without taking any part of the doors with it. That is the saw was the width of the moulded crack between the doors.

The blades are etched into a sheet and they must be cut from the etch.

Do not use tin snips as you will wreck the blade edges, the stainless is very hard. I used a thin stone cut off disc in a motor tool but be very careful and go at it slowly at the slowest speed possible, you don't want to bend the blades and do use safety glasses or goggles.

Now for the price .... $30.70, a bit of an ouch and I had my fingers crossed but I am very happy with the purchase.

Shorter Trainorama C32 Couplers

2008-10-31T18:18:00.012+11:00

For those who have larger radius curves the supplied Trainorama C32 class couplers are too long leaving a large gap between the locomotive and the first carriage.

The supplied coupler is a work of art but there is no way it can be shortened so here is how I managed to do it.

Step 1

I found that there was just enough 'meat' ahead of the pivot hole in a long shank KD 156 coupler to drill a No.50 hole for the C32 coupler pivot screw and file the rear and two sides to match the supplied C32 Trainorama coupler.

To drill the hole I first used a scriber to make a centre mark for the drilling. You will have to mark this by eye as it is too small to try to measure and mark it.

Next I used a No.57 drill in a pin vice to drill the first hole then made it progressively larger with a No.55, No.53, No.52, No.51 and finally No.50 drill. It is best to do it this way as the drill can easily bite into the die cast metal and jam.

Step 2

The next step is to carefully cut the rear hole section of the coupler away. I used a jewellers saw to make the first cut into the hole, this then allowed me to use a pair of sharp transistor wire cutters to snip away the rest. The first cut will allow the metal to be cut away without stressing the drilled area.

Finally I used a fine jewelers file to file the remaining curved section of the original pivot hole at the rear of the new hole away until it just disappeared, this formed the rear face of the coupler.

I then filed the two sides to the same slight angle as the sides of the C32 coupler end, also filing the corners with the same slight curve.

Step 3

I now mounted the coupler.

I managed to lose one of the two small coupler mounting screws and guess which screw isn't in the bag of spares!

I think I may just align it and put a tiny spot of glue on the screw hole if Trainorama can't supply a replacement, hopefully they can.

As you can see by the photo above I still hadn't adjusted the droop of the coupler

I found that I had filed the back just a little too much and as a result the coupler doesn't stay centred but will swing back when pushed sideways, so I suggest you go slowly and try a couple of trial fits until you are happy.

Layout Trials

I have successfully pushed and pulled some 72'6" passenger cars around 30" radius curves, up and down 1 in 40 grades. On the inner side of the curve there was about 1mm between the buffer heads.

Now, to do another for the tender and perhaps have another go at the front one.

Well, that's about it, so have a go, it isn't hard at all.

There was movement at the station ......

2008-10-19T22:56:00.005+11:00

For those who have been following this blog I give you something to ponder.

The first picture is of an upper layout level support made from a piece of 1/4" threaded rod. The branches are Woodland Scenics and are glued to the trunk with hot glue. I was going to use 'No More Gaps' a water based flexible crack filler but when I was gluing the branches on I just kept going. It worked fairly well. The tree is part painted with water based house paint from those little sample pots, very useful.

The final photo shows the finished support. The trunk has extra colours added using pastels and the foliage is light green Woodland Scenics foliage.

I will post some more when I move this little project along a bit further.

What I can say is that it will add a another level of operation to the layout, sorry for the pun.

The Area I Am Modelling

2008-10-04T23:31:00.004+10:00

The type of landscape I am trying to create, rolling hills to tree covered sandstone mountains.

The 48 class diesels are from a later period than I am modelling.

Photo by Chris Nelson - with thanks (see comments).

http://chris-nelson.fotopic.net/p47544310.html

Water tank with tap and downpipe

2008-10-03T20:49:00.001+10:00

PHOTOGRAPHY AND THE SEARCH FOR REALISM IN MODELLING

2008-10-01T22:38:00.010+10:00

This is the text from a talk I gave at the 2007 Modelling the Railways of NSW Convention. I present it here to aid those who like me would like take good model photographs and to improve their modelling.

The talk included discussion of camera settings, framing the shot, editing, adding backgrounds and a final adjustments.

A Camera

This discussion will not involve the use of film cameras although the basic principles are the same and they can certainly give equally good results in the right hands. The advantage of the digital camera is of course the ability to review the shot immediately and correct anything required.

I use a Nikon 8700 which is an 8MP digital camera (no longer available), it is about as big and complicated that you can get from Nikon before moving to a DSLR (Digital Single Lens Reflex). It has a fixed lens which goes down to an aperture of f8.0 and has a screen that can be moved in all sorts of directions. The screen allows me to put the camera on/in the layout and see what I want to take to frame the shot.

I bought the Nikon 8700 primarily for the features that allow me to take these model pictures. I always shoot in macro but it just depends how close a lens can focus and a high f stop is best for a bigger depth of field, eg. f22 or greater would be terrific. The Nikon 8700 also has ISO 50 for 'film' speed - I read this as fineness as in grain size of film ???? All I know is that the lower the ISO number the better. This camera also has Noise Reduction which processes the picture to remove the odd pixels that appear as noise. I shoot time exposures with normal room lighting, never with flash. Some pictures are up to 8 second exposure at f8. White balance is important also to get the right colour balance although if shooting in RAW or TIFF modes this can be corrected later in Photoshop or the like - it is better to get it right first time if possible. I often shoot in auto white balance which works well on my Nikon. You will really have to look deep into the specifications and capabilities of each prospective camera.

Digital Single Lens Reflex Cameras

A DSLR would give a much better f stop because you can change the lens to suit to get a better depth of field. The larger the f stop number the deeper depth of field you will have to play with.The disadvantage of a DSLR is that the screen can't be used to take a shot. DSLRs are restricted to using the viewfinder to frame the shot, because of the mirror system housed within the camera. This means that there is an inability to frame the shot and focus from low on the layout or awkward angle shots. All of the DSLR screens I have seen so far are fixed.

If you can find a DSLR with a moveable rear screen then you will be lucky.

I believe that the 7.5MP Olympus E330 has what they call a 'live screen' that allows a more restricted range of movement. The screen would probably be useable but not as flexible as the Nikon 8700 but then I can't change lenses.

I think though a DSLR would be of greater use as it is a better camera overall, more flexible. So it is a toss up as to what to get.

Several new DSLR cameras have what is called 'Live View' which means that you can see on the LCD screen what you are trying to take.

Late Breaking News

There is a new accessory for the DLSR allows viewing through the lens while framing and focusing the shot, it as called the Zigview S2. The manufacturer's web site is : http://www.argraph.com/Zigview/page1/Zigview_page1.htm
but the following web site has the most information I could find : http://www.climaxdigital.com/zigview/zigview_s2.html.
It is not cheap and would be at least $A500.

And

There is a compact digital camera that has virtually all the features of my camera, it is the Canon PowerShot A650 IS, a 12MP camera. I bought one recently for work and I have used it successfully. It has been around for 6 months or so but is still available, do a search on the net and check it out.

Framing the Shot

The movable screen on my Nikon 8700 allows me to place the camera in all sorts of positions on the layout and still be able to see what the camera is seeing and focus accordingly. The lens on my camera is at the bottom of the camera so the centre of the lens is probably about the height of the average HO person.

I try to achieve a photo that you could imagine finding in a book on the prototype.

I always try to shoot looking up to or at a train from ground level, I rarely shoot downwards unless there is some indicator in the foreground showing that you may be standing on something 'real' in the scene. I do not like the classic model train helicopter shot that certainly shows the layout but screams model.

I am always searching for that interesting view, even in scenes that I have shot many times.

Digital Manipulation

I find that you will rarely manage to take that perfect shot straight from the camera, while this may be possible in the real world in modelling there is always something in the background or foreground spoiling the effect.

I use Photoshop to adjust the picture to obtain the maximum realism.

I only use a few of the tools as I believe that you should retain as much of the original shot as possible.

I do often use another layer to place a real background and sky behind the modelling to remove that unsightly brick wall, etc.

I use the 'Magic Wand' tool to collect together all the parts of the background that I don't want. This is done by clicking on the areas you want to remove while holding the Shift key down. All the areas are joined together and are outlined with a dotted line.

When you have collected them all you go to the Select menu and choose Invert, you now have all the picture that you want to retain. Copy this to the clipboard, open a new layer and paste the picture.

Now choose an appropriate background picture and select all and copy it.

Open another new layer and paste the background picture into the layer.

Now order the layers so that the model picture layer is over the real background/sky.

If the background does not work with the model picture either through being the wrong angle, too close, too far or the wrong colouration then try another.

Once you are happy with the combination it is time to do a small bit of work to blend them better.

I usually only use Brightness and Contrast to bring the two pictures to look all part of the one scene.

I will occasionally adjust the colour balance of either or perhaps both layers to better match one to the other.

The best way to deal with the model foreground and real background is to have a range of landscape pictures in varying light conditions.

It really comes down to choosing the right background.

I take landscape pictures whenever I have the opportunity and have them with blue skies through to grey and overcast.

To remove the front edge of the layout if it has appeared in the picture I use the Rubber Stamp tool which allows you to copy a small area of the exiting picture and paint with it.

There are a number of suitabe paint grograms that have these simple tools including some that may have come with your digital camera and freeware ones.

An example of a freeware paint program is GIMP, which I assume stands for Graphic Image Manipulation Program. If you search the Internet you will find this easily. I have not tried it much as yet but it is like all things we need to learn, just give it a go and experiment.

Improving Your Modelling

By now you may have noticed that as the picture of the layout is static it can quickly show those areas that need work or that are lacking in suitable detail.

Unfortunately this can also mean that the wagon that we built some years back is now showing it's age, particularly against the recent influx of incredible models from China.

Improving your modelling is about studying your model pictures, learning from them and fixing those glaring and not so glaring bits.

Examples of potential modelling improvements that can become painfully obvious are as follows:

Incomplete models become very apparent;

no numbers on locomotives or carriages;

no point rodding and/or catchpoints and catchpoint indicators;

buildings not bedded into the scenery, that is show a crack under the building;

station corrugated iron water tanks without a tap (this one forced me to add a tap and downpipe to the water tank at the BYLONG station building - see the pic of 622 and 6037 in my first post versus the one below this post);

coarse detail;

overly bright painted backscene;

steam locomotives in particular having no crew;

a lack of ballasted track;

and of course many other similar issues.

If these issues are corrected then it becomes likely that your modelling will improve, until of course you take that next photograph... ;-)

BYLONG Blog - A beginning....

2008-09-16T23:00:00.009+10:00

This blog like all things new is a work in progress so please forgive the amateurish attempt.

BYLONG is the name of my HO scale model railway, it is based on a once proposed railway line in the upper Hunter Valley region of New South Wales, Australia. I say 'once proposed' as it was finally built in the early 1980's as a means of extracting coal. The original proposal began life in about 1911 and the railway proceeded in fits and starts until abandoned after the Second World War with almost all but the track in place. There were several tunnels and bridges constructed by the time it was abandoned.

My interpretation has the line being built about the time of the first proposal, this was so I could model timber station buildings, brick tunnel mouths and bridge piers. The infrastructure used in the actual construction of the original abandoned line was built of concrete.... boring.

My warped history of the line has it being used as an alternative crossing of the Great Dividing Range, part of which are the Blue Mountains just west of Sydney. As such it was upgraded to major cross country line status allowing the larger locomotive classes to use the line.

The layout is point to point and it is in a 20' x 20' garage, around the walls with a peninsular and central staging/fiddle yards. It appears to be two levels but is simply one level that ends up on top of itself with an almost continuus grade, stations being level. The following two photos show the layout, the BYLONG station is to the left of the panorama, I couldn't stitch it together without too much distortion. As you can see by the mess under and around the layout, it's a work in progress as well. There's nothing like modelling on a few square inches of space and you will notice two work benches, when one fills up, well just move to the other until you can't work there either then clean one up ... ;-)

Layout panorama

BYLONG from above

Diesel railcar 622/722 idles at BYLONG platform as AD60 class Beyer Garratt 6037 drifts by on a wheat train

The ruling grade is 1 in 40 and the Cox's Gap crossing loop is on a 1 in 80 grade.

5085 crosses 6037 at COX'S GAP loop

The long grades mean, that like a number of places on the NSWR, the trains must be assisted. Since I use DCC (NCE) and I like the operating interest and challenge, the longer trains are banked (pushed from the rear). Double heading and consisting is too easy.

Bank locomotive 5085 drops away from a goods train

3142 passes a level crossing approaching WOLLAR

Although the layout is named after BYLONG the largest station is WOLLAR which has a small locomotive depot from which the bank locomotives operate.

I will post a plan once I draw one, until then this description will have to suffice.

Well, that's it for now.