nhdesigns

I’m in the same boat with the springs. The couplings on one of my intercity TSOs was wonky and trying to fix it resulted in the springs flying out. I found one but not the other. Can’t seem to find replacement parts for it.

I've been looking at that myself for concrete sleepers on my trackbed. Mainly for a dull and weathered appearnce than having it look all natural in the plastic finish.

So basiacally I've gone and got some more paints for weathering the track on my layout including some of the mig ammo paints. I have got some other paints in the form of Humbrol and revell paints which I'm use to using. I'm wondering if anyone has used mig ammo paints or the other types of mig ammo products. I've heard and read about Tim Shakleton using them for weathering tasks such as with locomotives and rolling stock. The paints I got for doing track weathering both the sleepers and rails are: mig ammo :- 035 Dark Tracks 072Dust Colour 035 Rust Tracks Humbrol 173 Matt Track colour and Revell 87 Matt Earth Brown I do have other paints for basic weathering mixing such as matt leather and gunmetal with black as well on hand. So firstly are these mig ammo colours suitable for track and sleeper weathering? And how good are they? And how easy are they to use for airbrushing as most of my weathering is done this way.

So basically I got some Revell paint mixing cups but just can't make sense of them. The measurements are in CC/Ml which doesn't make sense to me. I know when it comes to mixing paints and glues it's done with percentage ratios like 50:50 for or 5 parts paint and 5 parts the thinners etc. Can anyone help me out with reading these cups? Or any mixing cups that are easier to use, like ones with mixing ratios on them.

So basically I’ve been thinking about 3D printing and have seen some introductory 3D printers at a fair price for me. I’ve done 3D modelling while I was at university so got experience with 3D design but don’t have any when it comes to 3D printing. I was wondering if anyone can help me out or have any suggestions or advice. Also wondering what sort of software is the easiest to work with as I’ve never done anything like this before. I don’t plan on doing anything big and fancy like parts for trains in the form of locomotive parts or parts for rolling stock and the like. I’m looking more at doing small scenic items and detailing parts such as interior items for shops and the like. I model in OO gauge and model more of the urban sort of aspect of the hobby. I don’t intend to have anything over the top with a lot of complexity. I’ve already seen one or two around £75-£90 that I can see should be okay with what I have in mind to do.

As the title suggests I was wondering if anyone can help me out with weathering track that has concrete sleepers. I know how to weather wooden sleeper style track and points but don’t know how to go about the same with concrete sleepers. Most of the track is PECO code 100 concrete sleeper style track used on my layout. My layout is set in the BR sector era of the West Midlands area of the west coast mainline with overhead catenary. I know how to weather the rails and where to add buildups of oil and dirt from trains that would be stationary close to the signals but don’t know what to use for the concrete sleepers. I do intend to use an airbrush on weathering the track but just wanted to know what colours would be suitable for giving the track sleepers a worn in look and heavy use. Thanks for any help and advice on this.

Okay that’s good to know. Would the point motors here be suitable for the location and the era? Or would the Westinghouse point motors be better?

I'm wondering if anyone can give me some help and advice on detailing points and how to go about it. The photos show two express points I have on my layout here just before the four track section of my layout. I've begun to place some details loosely such as point heaters and dummy point motors. I have some orange trunking and relay boxes along with concrete trunking ready to fit into place as well. I've also purchased some dummy westinghouse point motors as well but just don't know what will be better, either these Peco dummy point motors or the Westinghouse point motors. Also not sure what else is needed for points like these. I assume that I would need mechanical point locks and possibly one or two linesinde telephones but I don't exactly know. My entire layout is in OO gauge and is fictionaly based around the West Coast Mainline in the West Midlands region of the BR era in the 1980s - the present day if this also helps.

I wish traintronics modern signal gantry was still available too. In the end I’ve had to go and make my own signal gantry which I’ve done as close as a real one based around Rugby. The only trouble I’ve been having is the signals themselves. Already gone through two lots of traintech four aspect signal heads because of the wiring was a right pain in the backside! This is how my gantry looks with the signals now working.

I was wondering if anyone would be able to help me out with a problem I'm having regarding signal control. Basically I have two four aspect signals and another one with a feather that I have controlled using the heathcote electronincs signal sequencers but can't seem to get power to them. I have one with a feather which I have wired to my DCC power bus and linked to a point that works but I can't get the two seperate sequencers to work. I think it's because I'm using the NCE power cab system, and it's not powerful enough to operate external devices. I am of course running these on a medium sized OO gauge layout with DCC as well using the NCE power cab system and have two DCC concepts slow action points wired to my power bus as well, if this also helps. Would I need to have a seperate power supply fitted to control external things such as signal controllers? If so what voltage power supply would I need? I know these can run between 12 - 16 volts AC or DC but don't know which would be right since I have two sequencers and signals. Any help or advice would be much appreciated.

Hi yes I did find out what it was. Turned out it was a case of bad wiring and poor connections that was giving me problems. It wasn't so much a problem with my controller but the fact the power bus wires were poorly fitted to terminal blocks that were slightly smaller and thus not big enough to feed or hold the wires together. I've resolved the problem with that by using bigger terminal blocks and ensuring the wires at the ends of the power busses are twisted around properly and not strangling around. Always has to be the simplest of things that feels like a catastrphe! Got power to my track and to my two slow motion points which is the main thing. I think with the signals and sequencers I amd using, I might have to look at running them on a seperate power bus since I'm using the NCE power cab system and it's not powerful enough to run them.

I’ve done exactly the same with my locomotives and rolling stock. Organised in a similar fashion with models sorted by era, steam and BR blue on the left side of one shelf moving up to privatisation at the other end. Done the same with my rolling stock. Having passenger coaches sorted by type, MKI on the left side going up to postal coaches. Just need to try and do the same with my freight stock. Not easy to do with 31 locomotives and a total of 72 items of rolling stock! Might just look at adding some extra dividers and shelves so nothing is piled on top of each other.

I’ve not used copper cladding at the joints on each board this time since the layout is permanent but I did do that when I originally built the layout.

No I haven’t changed the points to electrofrog and still use insulfrog points with those clips to make the points live at all times. I did fit insulated joiners to the points on the V side of the them but they didn’t work. I mainly fitted them to prevent shorting out everything whenever a stray wheel would catch on them.

Sorry I meant to say that there are two wires , red and black, from the track bus which are connected to to the track output on the transformer.

I get power from my transformer to my controller so it's not the controller that's at fault. The transformer uses the standard red and black wires connected to my power bus. Everything was working before when I used wired fishplates added to my power bus and I was able to control my trains normally. I wired my layout by means of dropper wires soldered to the underside of the rails, connected to my power bus using crimp blades and spade connectors. I only added droppers to just four tracks on the front of my layout and don't have any other dropper wires fitted or connected. The only other wires fitted to my power bus are to my point motors and signal controllers. I tried to connect the power bus together but it just shorts everything out so I don't know what is going on.

Correct me if I'm sounding like a broken record here. I've been having a lot of trouble lately with getting power on my OO gauge layout that I've never had before and don't know what's going on. I've done all the basics of troubleshooting and read everything I can find and what I know about DCC wiring and have tried everything to correct what is, to me personally, a very basic problem with model railways, getting power to everything. Basically I've relaid the scenic side of my layout with concrete sleeper tracks and kept everything else the same. Only things I've done is change from using the Hornby Elite to the NCE powercab, fitted Cobalt Ip digital slow action motors and traintech MAS sequencer boards for three four aspect signals. Apart from this the only other thing I have connected to my DCC powerbus is a Hornby accesory decoder to operate two side mounted point motors. I did use fishplates with dropper wires attached, such as those from Peco Electrics, but found it was supplying power to the track and not to anything else and just one point. I have since taken them out and gone back to hardwiring/solering droppers onto the underside of the rails but it's not done anything. The dropper wires were attached using spade/crimp blades and splice blade/suitcase type connectors onto the power bus. The power bus I've got is 1.55mm2 multistranded copper core cable rated at 21A, from Express Models. I've used heavy duty terminal blocks at the ends of the bus wires that are connected to ready wired JST connectors. I have tried to connect my power bus together using these JST connectors but they just short out everything. Even just plugging one pair of JST connectors shorts everything out and causes hissing and buzzing noise of a short on my controller. I don't know wether I need to add more dropper wires to my track on each board or if I need to replace my power bus and connections. I don't mind replacing my power bus and it's something I might just do anyway since my main bus cables have been used for almost ten years and has had a lot of splice blades added and removed over the years as well as some wear and tear from when I dismantled my layout temporarily. Again I would really appreciate the help and advice. I've never had a problem like this before and I'm getting frustrated and have no idea what is going wrong, when all I want to do is run my trains, switch points realistically and have signals that change to danger when a train passes beneath them. "Is that too much to ask for!?" Seriously, can someone help me or at least tell me what I'm doing wrong. Thank you.

Thanks everyone for the help with this problem I'm having. I'll do just what you all suggest and hopefully things will be okay. As I said I got one cobalt Ip digital motor that works fine and it's just this one that must have got lost somewhere in the programming. As I say I'm rather new to using the NCE powercab system and have a lot to get around with it. Overall it does more than what I could ask for with digital control and is simply worth every penny, espically for slow shunting movements and speeds.

I’ve recently got an NCE power cab and have two things I need some help with. I’m using a Hornby accessory decoder to control two Peco points at the start of my fiddle yard and I don’t know if I can still use them with my NCE power cab. secondly I have a cobalt ip digital point motor which fails to switch points when my other one does and works fine with my NCE power cab. I don’t know if I might have changed it from running to set. I went to see if I needed to readdressed it but I think I might have messed it up as I didn’t know what cv values I had to put in. Any help would be really good thank you. I’m still rather new to using one since I’ve always used a Hornby elite and wanted something like the NCE power cab as it looks easier to use and feels more professional in my mind.

I’m having a little bit of trouble with my one being the wheels and one of the bogies slipping off the rails so don’t know if the wheels need popping back into place.

I have a traintech four aspect signal with a left hand feather and wanted to know how to go about having the feather controlled seperately. Basically I have two points operated by DDC concepts Cobalt IP slow action point motors and wanted to know if the feather of my signal can be illuminated when the point switches to the left/diverging route and off again in the other way. Is this possible with one of the cobalt IP slow action point motors? They're DCC operated and the rest of the signal is controlled by heathcote electronics signal controler if this helps as well. If it is possible, how do I go about setting up the feather on the point motor itself.

Hey thanks everyone for the really helpful advice and photos. I’ve been able to use some of the photos as reference and got a signal gantry made up. I wasn’t so sure at first because I’ve seen one recently in the previous issue of BRM and didn’t think I was going about it the right way. I managed to make one as seen here that follows a similar sort of design that I managed to use as reference. The majority of it is made using scale model scenery items with a plastruct H beam girder and lattice girder. The signals are from train tech that I’m yet to wire up. There’s a little bit more work to do with it before I fit it and have it operational. Only thing needed to do is add a ladder in a cage going up to the top and perhaps adding some more height to the leg. But overall it’s my first real scratchbuild of railway infrastructure. I’m not fussy about the infrastructure or operating side of railway modelling anyway but still like to have things as close to reality as I can and what I know.

That's the sort of thing I'm looking at and can easily make. I was strarting to make something like that using parts from Scalemodelscenery items and plastruct girders and I beams but after I saw a signal gantry on Davidson Parkway thought it was back to drawing board! But now I've seen this, I can make something like that now. Thanks ever so much for the helpful photo.

Hi Richie; That is a real big help indeed to me. I've had a good look at what Heathcote Electronics offer and what you suggested fits the bill. I've asked them for their advice as well as train-tech to see if they can be of help. Train-tech told me that the LEDs are common negative fitted to a PCB with solder pads for wires. I was able to clarify all of this with Heathcote electronics who said these signals will work since there's no complex fittings like the plug and play and auto signals. I've also been told that the boards have resistors fitted so there's no need for adding any as suggested in the intstructions, unless I would choose to lower the brightness by using the resistors supplied with the signal kits. Given the posistions of the signals and the lines they control, I would think the IRDASC-4RI -2EW would be suitable for use on the single four aspect signal with a feather as I intend to have it work inline with the setting of the points from the main, up fast line, to the diverging, up slow, line. I've looked at it and it would be more likely to suit the setting of this signal to red whether a train uses the up slow or up fast. I would think that the MAS Sequencer(s) would be as you said better to use for the signals being on a gantry or perhaps the IRDASC 4RI since the signals are going to be controlling the up fast and up slow prior to them converging and would set the signals accordingly to which way the point is set.

I've been trying to track down the traintronics modern signal gantry but can't seem to get it anywhere. I've been looking at alternatives but none of the ones out there seem to be suitable for the era and area I'm modelling. I've started to look into making my own signal gantry but I just seem to have trouble finding any close detail or blueprints showing how a modern signal gantry is designed and built. Does anyone have any advice or possible blueprints showing a modern signal gantry? I'm mainly looking into making one with the signals lower down in the caged formation like that used around the West Coast Mainline. I'm also working in OO gauge with my layout set in the 1980s to present day around the West Midlands and WCML electrification if this also helps. Appreciate any feedback and help thanks.