Running the Trains

As mentioned, I'm in a dreaded transitional phase of the train project; moving from one room to an unknown room.  This is where, I think, its easy to lose your momentum and call the whole thing off and be done with it.  While this would be easy, I'd always be nagged internally with my train bug.  What I'm trying to say is - I have to keep my interest levels up while its determined where my trains will reside next in the house.

I'm running trains.  Got some new stuff in the mail, a box of goodies! I've started going into the inter modal scene, since let's face it, that's the way of trains now.  That and my new design calls for a harbour full of fun inter modal cranes and ships.  Oh, and a couple KATO AC4400 Beaver logo locomotives. 

 If you look at the picture to the left you'll probably think I like 7up.  I don't.  For the nosy - yes, that is my work cube and my shoes.

Naturally I tried to install the decoders into the loco's that night.  So a couple things...  apparently Digitrax changed the decoder type that's recommended for this KATO unit.  Although it says clearly in their documentation (web, instructions etc etc ) that it doesn't need a shell modification to fit, IT DOES.  Digitrax mentioned that - after when I asked them.  Great service response time though!  anyway, they were helpful with a suggestion - file down the back LED or mod the case.  I chose the filing method.  Worked great.  FOR THE FIRST ONE !!!  Of course it couldn't be easy after that.  no, that's not how life works.  The second decoder only ran in 1 direction.  Lights worked great.  ran great backwards.  nada forwards.  *sigh*

Of course Digitrax says send it back - its Friday, and I'm leaving for a course in Denver the next day so everything has to wait until I get back.  Realistically it's been a week and the decoder is still sitting on my desk waiting.

Aside from that, got my two FVM GEVO's speed sync'ed.  Or at least I thought I did.  A couple tweaks are still needed, as they're out to lunch with each other on the low speeds.  Cool feature in JMRI is their speedometer, which tells scale speeds based on my detectors.  Set the high speed to 90 mph and then worked down.

Local hobby store (http://www.cvrco.com/) had a sale this weekend, and last time I was there noticed that they've got the scarce BLMA 53' spine cars.  At full price, 89.99 its a bit much, but they had a great sale (21% off), so I got their last one.  oh yeah! 

So I ran my new KATO, my consisted GEVO's with 9 inter modal cars and associated random containers.  Sweetness. 

The nice thing about running trains is I've learned things for the next layout.  Like the importance of perfect trackwork and switches in the yard.  The BLMA's had a tendency to walk over some of the switches, thought I'd fixed 'em all perfect but apparently these cars are a bit fussier.

Had fun anyway.

More grass Man, more grass

Okay so the title is bit misleading - this isn't actually about the effects of marijuana. Maybe though, it gets me some cheap web hits ... if that's the case, sorry but thanks for visiting.  This is actually a continuation of the use of the new Grassinator on my N scale model train.  Dude - don't judge, you're looking up web references for marijuana !!   Anyway, I also tried my hand at building a rural road. Mixed results. Definitely mixed results, by that I mean the road stinks, the grass is pretty good.  Again, no weed ref intended.

The road was made with plaster of Paris tinted with grey. Mistakes

 1. should have used black not grey.
 2. was the plaster of Paris itself not runny enough I think.  
 3.Lines were painted - too thick a brush and I shake.  Tried, halfheartedly, to make a stencil but that failed too.

Grassassinator and the wonders of static electricity

My efforts for getting the short escarpment area continue... slowly.  I'm a bit mixed in thoughts on if I should finish or not.  The Zoning controller has deemed the train room to be re-zoned back to residential use.  In English that means my Wife has decided that I should clean out the garage and move into that so she can have the spare room back.

This presents some great opportunities for me to re-design, and re-build a BETTER, STRONGER, FASTER layout.  but all the work done thus far on the current layout would be trashed.  The cliffs have turned out great so it will hurt somewhat to tear them down, but I'm confident I can redo them again and make them better.  Lessons are being learned !  and in that viewpoint, I'm going to proceed a bit and finish this small section.  But the new train room is beckoning..

So my father built me a fantastic static grass applicator using a $5 dollar ionizer thingy from the internet.  The most expensive part of the build was actually a transformer to make it safe if it didn't ground properly - its electronic talk that went over my head, but amounted to if someone bypassed the grounding pin when plugging it into the wall (or extension cord) it could fry a whole lot of electronics in the house.  So that was $17 well spent I think.  Certainly a far cry from the 200 dollars the Germans want for theirs.  Although, lets face it, theirs is probably pretty cool too.  Not sure if its more powerful though.

Anyway, we tried it out at my nephews birthday party.  Very cool stuff watching the grass stand up.  Feels like fur when the glue dries.   Anyway, here's some shots from my new iPhone 4. The first two shots are kinda artsy and look great, the first with shadows from surrounding things or clouds but then again I'm biased.  The other shots show more of the grass.  The hill is covered in 'vegetation" not grass. It will have trees all over it when its complete, so that will be the forest floor.  I'm going more for a bit of different colour and texture.  I'm going to do some more passes with different coloured grasses to make it thicker and more like a field between the tracks.

My weakness seems to be ballast.  Sure the line that's done is an old line, that's supposed to look kind of crappy and used (with the grass growing in it) but it looks really bad. Maybe it will dry better and I'll be happy.  Or I'll just fix it up as best as I can.  Of course, there's the fact that it will all be destroyed with the new train room move !

The hills go on and on

I continue to work on the escarpment and as I go I'm trying different techniques and such.  The downside is that the first section is looking drab I think.

This first shot  shows all the sections that are (almost) complete.  The bit in the middle is the first, the far right was done after that and the bit left (not far left that's not done) is the new batch.  The blacks are stronger, there is more variation and looks better.  I think.  The next shot shows the two areas side by side (latest and first).  The first is a bit washed out.  The escarpment, though, has sections like that. Bleached and then it has the darker, earthier sections. So it should work out as I continue to scenic it with trees, dirt, bushes and wild life.

I couldn't resist taking some shots of my latest FVM loco in the new rocks -

The Hills are alive with the sound of music

Well that's not entirely true.  But my Ipod Touch does play music to keep me company (gen 4 for the nosy, and no I'm definitely not an Apple Fanboy, I can't stand Apple the company - decent product though).  Got the Touch so I could run trains wirelessly with JMRI and this App.  Its pretty cool.  But I digress...

I spent the weekend working on the hills - at night and nap time as the twins demand (!)  my attention during their waking hours  of course I don't mind.

Painted the next section.  Thought the first (the bit to the left in the picture) was a little too light grey, so I tried something different.  Started with two intensities of black wash, then moved to a dark gray heavy wash, lightened that up then washed it out.  Went to the umbers (raw and burnt) washes, added a bit of yellow to some areas, then went gray, light gray and a bit of white.  I think it might be better than the first section.  Also built my first scratch structure - a retaining wall but its a start.  Came out looking sharp!  Mostly this is thanks to my new chopper and a metal gluing box 

 I also built a tunnel box for the portal I purchased from the LHS (Local Hobby Store).

For the over observant, yes that is a toilet roll tube.  I painted the inside black and stuck on some cardboard sides (also painted black) with a glue gun.  I got this idea from a good book, Jeff Wilson's Bridges, Trestles and tunnels.  The idea is to make it more a tunnel than a hole into the backdrop / scenic shell.  You can, of course, take this to another level by added more details - like the brick pattern, or drill marks etc on the walls but I went minimal.  I might regret this later if I every get a camera on a train.

Back to the hills for me...

Servo update

More about servo's you ask? yes.  I wanted to finish off a couple things - tweaks, re-designs, things like that.  

I had a flash of insight the other day to make things even easier for the servo / switch movement.  If you recall the motion is different between the switch and the servo - circular versus linear.  I solved that with some bends and such to the wire... BUT... I've gone and changed it up again.  This time I mounted the servo up and down, versus upside down.  picture to come later.  This allows the arm to swing like a pendulum (a controlled one but none the less) and moves the switch arm in a perfect linear fashion.  The tweaks aren't needed and installations are a bit easier (ok a lot).

Facing the servo.  Up and down like a tortoise.  I didn't bend the wire around the arm too much and its still ok

From the side.  Notice the horrible job I did on the bending.

Seriously bad bending job.

Here's another one that I bent better.  Oh and used a lot of glue !

Here's a better shot.  The wire is piano wire and very stiff.

The switch and the servo wire poking out.  I usually put a bit of clear plastic around the hole.

I've gone and converted 4 previously installed servo's and two net new to this new methodology and am very happy with the results. 

Besides that, I haven't done much.  Entered some info into JMRI so I can start the automation, tweaked a couple of the loco's, still haven't speed matched my damn C-630's.

Working the Engine

Procrastination is a great thing.  Someday I'll get around to writing about it, but that certainly isn't today. However, I did finally get around to fixing up my GP-38 (Atlas with built in Lenz decoder).

It was running really poorly - jerking and stopping every couple inches.  So I took it apart, made sure the connections looked ok from the motor to the DCC board.  It was worse than before when I put it back on the track.  Of course.  This hobby can be killer for the ego, I'm telling you.  But I never let technology win, so I took it apart and put a big ol' blob of solder on the DCC board motor connector that I thought wasn't getting a good connection.  Put it back on the tracks and it ran like a champ.  I won this one. Hurray.   I can't claim the all the credit for this victory, I have to thank the Internet for a lot of the thought power behind the simple fix.


Next on the list is getting my C-630's to speed match so I can put them into a consist.  I've spent hours trying things but they refuse to match speeds despite being identical.  

Frustration has a new name and its Model Trains.

Servo's and more Servo's

As much as I want my layout complete, its quite fun building it.  But sometimes, just sometimes I just wish the damn thing was done already !  I have most of the track work complete for the up and down tracks - by that I mean two ways up or down to the main loop.  Final end to end connectivity requires two bridges to be put into place.  Once that's done then I can start running trains and watching them go 'round and 'round without human intervention.  I can also focus on using JMRI  to get the trains running automatically, and someday, intelligently with route decision making etc.

Anyway back to the work for the last week or two.  I think I've mastered Servo installations and my personal technique to get the servo to throw the switch.  The problem is kind of related to the type of movement the servo is designed for - radial (not sure if this is the accurate word, but its a circular motion) while the throw on the switch is linear (back and forth).  Getting the radial movement to translate into the linear is the heart of the problem with servo's, or at least it is for me.  The solution is dirt simple, and there a couple ways to actually do it.  BUT  there are new servo's that are linear geared, and would be perfect for this.  Unfortunately I've already purchased my 50 odd servo's (each is a whopping $2.49), the new ones are 4.29 or so. Anyway, back to the technique.  I use a wire all bent up to reduce the radial movement into as small as possible so it mimics a linear movement.   I'll try to use Google sketchup to do up what the hell I'm talking about.
 

Suffice it to say that my technique works pretty well.  Of course there's always a joker in the crowd so my installations aren't yet flawless.  I've done 14 installations with this new technique and managed 12 of them without any muss or fuss.  2 of them need tweaking which I'll get to when I have some patience to work on it

I've also been installing the Tam Valley QuadPics that control the servo's on the front of my benchwork.  A track plan will cover them with the push buttons controlling the turnouts in that.  Fascia will go above and underneath.  Or so the master plan dictates.

I got really clever in my installation and used old computer motherboard spacers (brass thing in picture below) that screw into the benchwork, and then a screw goes into that to afix the Quad-Pic.

I've got 5 fixed in place currently, another couple are slated to be done this weekend.

I've also begun painting my Atlas bridges.  Finished two of them, working on the third.  They're a snap (haha, literally they snap together with four screws to hold the track and bottom pieces together).  I primed them up and then painted them black.  Added some rust colour and they came out ok I think.

Another Digitrax installation

Well, tried another decoder install. Had to research the case removal again. The Kato P42 Genesis was on sale at the LHS at a price I just couldn't pass up. Unfortunately there aren't any matching LRC Via Rail cars so I had to settle for other Via Rail cars but there is precedent in the real world to support this.

The KATO P-42 "Genesis" VIA RAIL

So with the help of Reality Reduced I found out all the needed tricks to pull off this decoder installation without any issues. He used a sound decoder, but I went basic with the Digitrax DN163K0A.  It was a breeze - well, mostly. The biggest issue turned out to be getting my damn fingernail beneath the kapton tape end to get it off the decoder!! Finding the end of the tape wasn't pretty either. All things considered, though it worked out really well. Then I threw it on the track and watched her run.  Worked great !  I've got some factory installed decoders in my other Atlas locomotives, all from Lenz and I have to say, I see the reason that people wouldn't want to have factory installed decoders.  The Digitrax are awesome - they run incredibly smooth, which I think is thanks to the BEMF.  I'm working with JRMI's decoderpro to work out the kinks in my twin C630's.  I think the electrical contacts need cleaning/fixing, as they suck on the track. 

 A picture of the real 4500, retired from CPR in '93.  She's still working on the Western New York Pennsylvania Railroad

My two C-630's in their maroon colours