RMweb Gold roundhouse Posted July 5, 2013 RMweb Gold Share Posted July 5, 2013 Tom Those GC buildings are so nice that it makes me want to model part of the GC!! Have a good time in York. If you do make DEMU, we will be in one of the smaller side halls. Ian Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
37114 Posted July 5, 2013 Share Posted July 5, 2013 Good luck with this project, always good to see new blood coming into the hobby, it looks like he will have a lovely layout when it is finished. Hope you enjoy Northamptonshire, despite being back "home" now I miss the countryside around the Towcester/Silverstone area which was great for cycling with the kids. Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
nathan9117 Posted July 6, 2013 Share Posted July 6, 2013 Nice man its looking good this plus your nephew has alot of potential ! Getting stuck in with cleaning real locos and decorating the room ! what a lovely lil lad hope he likes his layout its nice to see young modelers keeping the modeling going. Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
Tom J Posted July 9, 2013 Author Share Posted July 9, 2013 Hope you enjoy Northamptonshire, despite being back "home" now I miss the countryside around the Towcester/Silverstone area which was great for cycling with the kids. Funny you should say that! I used to be a motorsports photographer and at the time did not drive, so I used to cycle the A43 from Northampton station regularly! I still carry the after-effects of an injury sustained when I aquaplaned coming down the lane from Wood Burcote back to the A43, and had to ditch my bike (with panniers) to avoid an HGV... The news is that our builder will be taking the sashes out of the window and glueing the loose piece of stone on the window ledge this week. The wall is prepped for lime plaster to be reinstated, a new cast iron radiator has been made and arrived the other day, as did the beautiful wooden framed second fix electrics, which I need to paint. I have some reclaimed floorboards to piece into the floor where melamine faced chipboard had been let in(!) and we will then be ready for some paint, carpet and baseboards! Meantime, you should have seen the teacher's face when I went for my meeting with her on Friday and greeted Thomas Ivor by telling him his toilet had arrived!! It would seem my son is the only little boy in her class who had been saving up for an N gauge 'gents' ;-) My only disappointment with the buildings has been the windows, which are printed and therefore scarcely possible to repaint - Rothley's colour scheme will have to do, I think. The subway entrance might benefit from replacement glazing without the 'ripples' in it, which seem to be a result of the length of the piece and the lack of support. It was York, a quick trip to the GCR and DEMU at Burton this weekend - last visit before his summer holiday with us. For those who have enjoyed the pictures, a representative sample of each! Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
Tom J Posted July 18, 2013 Author Share Posted July 18, 2013 Thomas Ivor turned five on Wednesday; being half way between visits and having not seen him on his birthday since he was two, I travelled a 500 mile round trip to see him for 15 minutes at school as a surprise. Like the Queen, his official birthday will follow next week. As such, I have an 'A4' to run in, other things to wrap, and have at least made a start disassembling a Farish Mk2a BSO for a repaint and reincarnation as support coach 14099. Body came off easily enough, as did the roof. Window mouldings broke before the glue gave way, but no matter. Has anyone successfully removed the corridor end door mouldings? They look to be very heavily glued. Need to source some transfers (lining anyone?) and try to find somewhere to set up the airbrush. Roof vents to change, interior to re-hash. Meantime, the model railway (bed)room window sashes have gone off for refurbishment, and the first scratch coat of lime is on the wall. We are getting there! Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
Tom J Posted August 3, 2013 Author Share Posted August 3, 2013 A week and a half down and one to go on Thomas Ivor's first stint of the summer with me, so have got on as best we can, despite setbacks mainly related to his bedroom! First fix electrics and two skims of lime plaster are now on the wall; whilst the top sash is fixed and will be back in this week all being well, the bottom of the frame requires repair and the lower sash was too rotten to salvage. This has delayed any considerations regarding baseboard building. Painting the second fix electrical fittings proved to be another one of those practical tasks that will help Thomas Ivor with his modelling skills, of course. Thomas Ivor's official birthday was celebrated last Saturday - various friends and family saw to it that the rolling stock fleet expanded, and we are waiting on a replacement 'A4' after 'Silver King' overheated and slung a con rod within running in mileage! He came with me to the post office to send it back and insisted on saying goodbye to the parcel and wishing her well in the works! I also invested in a SPROG, and a first DCC chip, so we could use WiThrottle for driving trains, as used on 'Banbury' - but this too has a fault so unfortunately we are waiting for that to return, too! 'Big railway' work has been varied during the reporting period - my wife and I celebrated our wedding anniversary in the middle of last week, and since we had our reception on the 'Pullman' rake at the GCR, and Thomas Ivor was prevented from attending, I roped him into waiting at table for a surprise meal I managed to arrange on the service train. Steak with dauphinoise potatoes, as served by fGW! We also had a day at the shed on Thursday, when we polished brasses - mainly works plates, as the little chap can sit on the running plate with me stood next to him to do most of these! Finally, we have actually done some modelling - this afternoon, thanks to a kind donation of a compressor from my sister-in-law, we cracked out my (new at Warley three years ago and hitherto unused!) airbrush to weather some 16t minerals, one of which was purchased this morning as a reward for learning to ride his bike without stabilisers. It was quite amazing the difference the incentive made!! Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
andyram Posted August 3, 2013 Share Posted August 3, 2013 I am really enjoying reading about you and your son's progress. Great to see you getting younger children involved in all stages of the hobby. Great to hear from a fellow GCR volunteer. Congrats on your anniversary too. My wife and I celebrated our 3rd anniversary on the "Wine and Dine Wednesday" service last month. Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
Tom J Posted August 9, 2013 Author Share Posted August 9, 2013 News Update - two arrivals today. First up, in the post, the replacement SPROG - up and running within minutes - I can't post pictures of the little chap driving the freshly-chipped 'Black Five' because he was using my iPhone to do it! Three cheers for WiThrottle! Lunchtime has brought Parcel Force, and another shoddily constructed Dapol A4, which has caused much wailing and gnashing of teeth... Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
RMweb Gold roundhouse Posted August 9, 2013 RMweb Gold Share Posted August 9, 2013 Tom isn't it frustrating when you have spent hours thinking its a setting you haven't got right only to find out it was a hardware failure!! Good that its all working now. Ian Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
Tom J Posted August 9, 2013 Author Share Posted August 9, 2013 Drove me mad, Ian, but by the time this one arrived I had learned more about the software than I otherwise might. It was rather a shock how quickly I had it all up and running! Thomas Ivor wanted me to tell you ('The Banbury man!') in particular that we had got it working! WiThrottle is a real hit. We are encountering one or two problems with the SPROG needing to be reset, but all in all we seem to be doing well. So far I've only used it with my Mac, but will probably gravitate to using an old laptop PC reserved for the model railway. Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
RMweb Gold roundhouse Posted August 9, 2013 RMweb Gold Share Posted August 9, 2013 Tom The 'Banbury man' says glad hes enjoying it! I have a feeling that my SPROG is no longer working but must connect it up again in the near future to double check. I haven't used the SPROG to control a layout as yet but just for testing and programming locos so not encountered that issue. On Sunday I had my iPad running with Wi Throttle on a fiend layout. Using the Web server option we had two throttles at the top and the track plan lower down so we could just touch the turnout on the iPad and the turnout changed on the layout. I will be trying this on Banbury in the near future to supplement the tow touch screens. Ian Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
Tom J Posted August 9, 2013 Author Share Posted August 9, 2013 Is that a feature of the paid-for version of WiThrottle? Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
RMweb Gold roundhouse Posted August 9, 2013 RMweb Gold Share Posted August 9, 2013 Is that a feature of the paid-for version of WiThrottle? Yes it is. However you will need to be able to set up the turnout in JMRI and draw a track diagram so a bit more of a learning JMRI to get to that stage Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
Tom J Posted August 9, 2013 Author Share Posted August 9, 2013 More to the point (no pun intended) we will need more than just an oval of track!! Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
Tom J Posted August 9, 2013 Author Share Posted August 9, 2013 Well, we had a nosey down to the model shop just before closing time and picked up another Bachmann 36-558A 6-pin decoder. With a little friendly persuasion it went into the slot on the loco (only just, though!) and it is running as I type. Having settled down on DC, it is running jerkily on DCC and not always responding to commands - particularly to set off from rest! The 'Black Five' is doing fine in this regard and the track is clean so I assume the pickups become number one suspect... Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
Tom J Posted August 10, 2013 Author Share Posted August 10, 2013 We have now mastered running two trains at once, Daddy sits at the computer and Thomas Ivor uses Step-Mum's iPad (better battery life and Daddy gets his iPhone back!) so our oval of track can now accommodate two trains taking it in turns to run through the 'scenic' section of the test-track. For anyone who is thinking of giving it a go, I encourage you to try it. Software is JMRI on the computer, which is a free download, and WiThrottle for iOS devices, the 'lite' version being free also. £45 for the SPROG IIv3, a few quid for a power adaptor and postage. You can pick up a 6 pin chip for less than £20. At that, bring your laptop to the layout/test track (or in our case the test track to the iMac!) and live a little! Our second SPROG was up and running within minutes of the postman's knock. I am most impressed with the Farish 'Black Five', which is now capable of running reliably at slow speeds I never imagined an N gauge steam loco could manage. The Dapol 'A4' is a little recalcitrant, but will I am sure benefit from some more weight to help the existing pick-ups, and some more if need be. I am now really quite excited about chipping Thomas Ivor's 'Blue Pullman' and playing with some lights. Hooray for DCC! Just a bit scary thinking about all those decoders we will need... Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
Barnaby Posted August 10, 2013 Share Posted August 10, 2013 Great read. Regards Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
Steve Williams Posted August 10, 2013 Share Posted August 10, 2013 Really enjoying this thread. Definitely a topic to follow. Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
nathan9117 Posted August 10, 2013 Share Posted August 10, 2013 Looks like its coming on good. Nice to see when a kid of this age knows how to respect and look after model trains instead of trash them. Big ambitions huh gonna have a lovely big layout. Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
D802 FORMIDABLE Posted August 11, 2013 Share Posted August 11, 2013 Great read mate.. Glad to see you enjoying the hobby with your boy. Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
sjl1973 Posted August 11, 2013 Share Posted August 11, 2013 Cracking thread! great to see your little one getting stuck in to everything. Hope my 2 year old lad takes an interest as keenly as yours. Know what your going through Tom with the courts as Im fighting for my lad to live with me Simon Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
Tom J Posted August 15, 2013 Author Share Posted August 15, 2013 Thank you all once more for your interest and kind comments. It has amazed me, given the opportunity to try, just what a little lad of Thomas Ivor's age, and younger, can do, in the right environment. I remember reading an old Usborne parenting book years ago which said that children should be given the opportunity to use certain hand tools at a very young age, because they are perfectly capable of doing so safely with care. At two, Thomas Ivor could rail four-wheel n gauge wagons on code 80 track. He was also a dab hand at using a mallet to put wooden dowels into pieces of Ikea furniture! When I saw him for the first time in two years, last October, what did I take to the 'observed contact' session? His layout, some PVA, and bags of scatter material. He had no recollection at all of anything 'railway', but he took to it once more like a duck to water, laying sand from the beach at Dawlish which we had collected three years earlier onto mod-roc which he had laid himself back then, as well (see my avatar!). It all goes back much earlier than that, mind you. I taught him to crawl by sitting him in the middle of a OO gauge 'Thomas' train set, and moving the train every time he got near it! Most recently he has been privileged to have time with the 'real thing', and this has been the making of him in many ways, including socialisation. He knows too that his having such opportunities is contingent on impeccable behaviour! We recently met the author of the 'Peter's Railway' books at the GCR and I heartily recommend these as a way of tying the insistence of primary schools that children read fiction with their parents (I got in trouble for reading 'RM' as a child!) in to railway and practical themes. Like Frank Spencer, he is getting a different tool each week - this is the first week(!), and he now has his own spirit level having learned about them in the 'how to' section of the first story. Because for most of the year father and son only get one full day together every three weeks, progress will not be fast - indeed, because of the sheer cost of commuting to and from the West Country to collect him, (any my wife, our sole breadwinner, having been on maternity leave) our modelling budget is decidedly modest for now, but I wouldn't want to progress the layout faster than Thomas Ivor can take in, understand and participate in what we are doing. When he is away, it's a matter of 'facilitation works' - which is why today, once his baby sister goes down for her siesta, I will be piecing in new floorboards under the area where the layout will be constructed! Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
RMweb Gold McRuss Posted October 19, 2013 RMweb Gold Share Posted October 19, 2013 Hello Tom, I hope you could make same progress on Thomas Ivors room and layout. Markus Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
Tom J Posted October 28, 2013 Author Share Posted October 28, 2013 I had hoped to make progress, too, but it's not gone entirely to plan. Three and a half months after the window came out, we have sacked the builder, because the hole is still boarded up! We have retrieved the mortal remains of the original sashes and I am soliciting quotes from carpenters today. The plaster finish was not up to scratch (no pun intended) and I have had to go through the soul destroying process of hacking the plaster off the same walls twice in one season. More encouragingly, a new heritage plasterer has started work and we are now confident that the finish will meet our aspirations! On Friday, however, we had the sort of surprise that's rather more common with old houses. Taking down the damaged plasterboard on the partition wall at the end of the room, we discovered that it had previously been used as a walk-in cupboard - indeed, the dismantled door frame was sat there! Bringing this space into the room is an option, as is moving the wall back to where it used to be. Both would have a significant effect on the plans for the layout. Most likely outcome at the moment is that we will leave the wall in its present position, and put a door back, to allow insulation and inspection of the roof space with a new storage area as a bonus. At that, the optioneering has prompted me to start using an interior design app in the iPad, which, combined with the output from the track planning software, rendered this mock-up for me: Meantime, Thomas Ivor continues to help with the work and was at Peterborough the other week. He has started asking for a model of 37198, in yellow, for Christmas! Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
Tom J Posted December 13, 2013 Author Share Posted December 13, 2013 Just as it felt like all the momentum had been lost from our efforts, the originally intended completion date having long since passed, we are making strides forward once more. The plasterer has just left having completed his work, and it's beautiful. It ought to be, for the price, but it has been a pleasure having a true craftsman in the house. Fingers crossed, we hope that our new joiner will be able to fit the beautiful replica sashes he has made, in time for Christmas. We have had a couple of nasty surprises when things Thomas Ivor would like for his layout suddenly went out of stock everywhere in a hurry, but a Yellow '37' is now run-in and ready for wrapping. It was a bit surreal taking the children to see Father Christmas at the GCR and Thomas Ivor explaining that if Father Christmas wasn't sure which loco he wanted, he could point it out to him in the yard! Likewise he was reminded as we passed through Quorn that he would like some more Mk1 TPO vehicles, and after a bit of searching (and now having to pay much more than might have been the case a few months back!) we have found some to put away for a future occasion. Farish having delivered so little recently, it will pay to have some items 'in stock'! Layout wise, I am constructing a quarter scale model of the layout to test things like topography and sight lines. I am concerned that we have a running line parallel to the baseboard edge at the moment, but there is little we can do about it without losing some of the fiddle yard. Thomas Ivor has seen precious little of us of late, and we have at least now got the police to understand that their time is being wasted, each time I am falsely accused of abducting him! He's been very brave in challenging circumstances, according to his teacher, and the other day narrated a showing of 'Snowdrift at Bleath Gill' for the rest of his class of five and six year olds! Althoguh we have been able to do very little from a modelling perspective, he enjoyed a lovely day out as a guest of Ivan Romodanovsky helping to operate 'County Gate' at Spalding recently, and we are looking forward to painting his room and getting stuck into the new layout before his next 'holiday' with us, at February half term. Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
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