End of steam shunting and goods - small

[The Johnster]

Progress!  

 

 

[MrDobilina]

Quick photo based update guys. 

 

I feel hapy with the track layout now. The two tracks coming in from off scene allow for down and up operation or shunting on a side line. 

 

Ive been painting the sides of the rails with a woodland scenics pen and am happy with the initial look of it. 

 

Also so very happy with the track curves. 

[MrDobilina]

Quick update. Might not look like much but this is a tortoise point motor switching and also changing a bi colour common anode led when switched. 

Common anode is attached to frog output from tortoise and normal cables are attached to track power for the point. 

 

Apologies for poor camera work  was far too excited that this worked :)

 

[south_tyne]

You're making excellent progress there! I love the flow of the trackplan and it should offer opportunity for some really interesting operation 

[MrDobilina]

Quick update. Might not look like much but this is a tortoise point motor switching and also changing a bi colour common anode led when switched. 

Common anode is attached to frog output from tortoise and normal cables are attached to track power for the point. 

 

Apologies for poor camera work  was far too excited that this worked

 

[MrDobilina]

 

Hey guys. So here I have a quick example of the points working with direction lights. 

 

To explain, the lights show green when the points are set to straight and red when they are diverging. Left one is left point right one is right point. 

 

I’ve set 4 macros for straight on, both diverging and then cross one way and cross the other. 

 

Fitted my 64xx with a 6pin doc decoder and it runs beautifully!

 

Finally, I’ve fitted 5 point motors and I need to buy 2 more. 

 

Any way just a quick update 

[MrDobilina]

Quick update again. 

 

Ive wired up the point motors under the three way point and macroed them on the cab so they will turn correctly. Only issue is I have a strange dead spot right in the middle when going straight.  The left and right work fine but there’s no power in the middle. Must be something I’m doing wrong but I can’t see what 

Edited February 20, 2019 by MrDobilina

[MrDobilina]

Evening guys,

 

There are two little updates today. I have gotten myself a Hornby snap track starter pack (for £20) so I have a test track /programming track for new locos to run in.

 

I have solved the threeway point issue, it was a poorly soldered rail causing all my issues. Trains are now running correctly and nice and slowly over the threeway point. 

 

It now falls to me to point out that the gap at one end is of course too tiny to get anything other than one loco on....which means an extension....and possibly putting the whole thing on legs. Which is somewhat exciting!

 

I've been playing around with designing the left hand side of the board and have come up with a concept for the rail crossing that I like. Around lunch time I'll get an image or two uploaded.

 

I did try to ballast the sidings but I think I may have used too much water as it feels wet still after 12 hours. Tonight will be a bit of proof to see if it has dried, but I don't know what to do if it hasn't. I've used fine sand so it will be harder to pull back up if it's not settling.

 

All in all a positive week and I'm looking forward to the future of this endeavour now!

[MrDobilina]

[MrDobilina]

Hopefully you guys might agree that this is looking on the right lines 

[calvin Streeting]

hi. nice can i ask what manufacture of ballast etc this is (and is it painted) 

 

Many thanks

[MrDobilina]

46 minutes ago, calvin Streeting said:

hi. nice can i ask what manufacture of ballast etc this is (and is it painted) 

 

Many thanks

 

Morning Calvin,

 

It's just basing sand at the moment. It will be partly covered in das modelling clay before being painted and weathered.

This is the same kind of stuff that I used:

https://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/Macterials-Fine-Model-Basing-Sand-200g-First-Class-Post-Kiln-Dried-Miniatures-/263008093448

[MrDobilina]

I have been experimenting with clay on a throwaway piece of track. 

 

I quite like the look of the embedded track so will be using the clay on my layout more. This is based on the workings of chris nevard, examples here http://nevardmedia.blogspot.com/2011/08/creating-effect-of-ash-ballast.html and here 

 

 

 

 

Here I have worked the clay into the area between the tracks on the left side as a road bed and run a rule over it to create the effect of tyre tracks. not sure how effective it looks but it's a start.

[MrDobilina]

Both tracks now clayed up. Hoping this works!

[MrDobilina]

Hey guys. I’ve been working with the das modelling clay and I’m finding it a lot easier to use than I had anticipated

not quite perfect results but it’s a work in progress. 

Only other news is that I’ve hooked up the last point motor I own and it works well so I have a couple of routes open now. 

[MrDobilina]

Afternoon all, It's been a long old while since I have looked at my layout. Things went a bit squiffy for me last year but I'm working well now

 

I would like to say there's been progress but honestly there hasn't. It's been stored in the cellar or loft space and has taken a bit of damage over the course of time.

The top board is a bit warped and I'm not happy with various bits of it. I'm going to try to remove and save as much as possible and use what I can in a new build that I'll keep going in here. 

 

So on to what I've been thinking about. 

I've moved in the past 12 months out of a little 2 up 2 down into a lovely little house and my gf has joined me (along with a border collie puppy in the last month!).

 

I have a good loft space now, but it's only insulated in the floor and not boarded up yet to walk around in. 

I do have a lot of excess laminate floor that I've pulled up from a room in the house that I've knocked through into the kitchen to create a kitchen diner (so tiled the floor to make it match the kitchen).

 

I need to insulate and put the laminate down to get a good base to work with, then look at putting insulation in the rafters. it's one of those annoying  /w\ shaped loft spaces so there is a lack of room to manoeuvre. 

 

There are a couple places I'm looking into to get some laser cut base boards and I'd like to have a shunting area when I get around to making it. so same era, same concept but a much larger MGR style layout as well. Not going all out on the fiddle yard. single entrance exit for now with a couple storage bays either side. 

 

I am hoping the shunt area will be with a little station area similar to a certain mr nevards work in the past, and on one side of the layout, a carriage siding similar to the amazing work done by everard junction in his tutorials on how to.

 

Well this has been a wall of text, not sure many will read this all. I'll look into track planning (including a stage by stage concept as this will take a long time to do) in the coming week.