Santa Barbara in N scale_ at the NMRABR 2022 convention near Crewe

[roundhouse]

No modelling done on the layout now for a few weeks but here is a link to some photos of the real place I have taken. I intend o do some further detailing on the layout in time for its visit to Moors Valley in July 2012.

 

http://roundhouse.smugmug.com/Trains/USA/23221646_dkCMww#!i=1874053811&k=4MQ5ZDx

 

Ian

[Adrian Wintle]

I had missed the Boeing train in the second photo above. Very nice (although Santa Barbara seem to be a bit out of the way for a Wichita to Seattle train ).

 

Adrian

Edited June 5, 2012 by Adrian Wintle

[roundhouse]

I had missed the Boeing train in the second photo above. Very nice (although Santa Barbara seem to be a bit out of the way for a Wichita to Seattle train ).

 

Adrian

 

It's been diverted!

 

That model was built by Mike, one of our operators. He likes doing unusual items of rolling stock so we have to run it.

 

It does get a lot of attention from visitors at shows especially the kids watching to see if it will hit the back scene as it disappears off scene!

 

Ian

[trisonic]

Ian,

Good idea to post some more photos of the real Santa Barbara - not many would realize just how neat and tidy a town it is...

 

Best, Pete.

[roundhouse]

Peter

Yes it's such a nice place. I have met English people in LA who said they would never go back to California again. LA and Santa Barbara are at different ends of the scale and only about 100 miles apart. San Diego isn't that far behind SBA (although much better for the craft beer scene).

 

Only downside to SBA is te cost of hotels and they rise even more at the weekend to stupid prices.

 

I will add some photos of the town itself when I get chance.

 

Anyway better get back to drinking my pint of Black Butt Porter.

 

Ian

[trisonic]

That would be good. I think "local colour" away from the rails is very useful to the modeller a few thousand miles away - it's too easy to plonk a generic East Coast house down (from Walthers).

 

Have a good one! Pete.

[roundhouse]

Here are a few photos of Santa Barbara scene away from the railroad to give some flavour of the place.

[roundhouse]

A new rake of Superliners in phase IVb livery have been obtained at a good price.

 

This have given me the impetus to now work on the Parlour car for the Coast Starlight.

Whne the Kato El Capitan set came out I purchased one so I could use the double deck veiwing/ parlour car out of it. An expensive way to do it but it was the only way at the time.

No sooner had I got this set, I found a Japanese supplier that was producing a brass ready finished parlour car in Amtrak livery, so tried to order one but they were out of stock. I have a number of brass models from them but they are not trading at the moment. Not sure if they got affected by the earthquake / Tsunami but that was the time they stopped producing new stock.

 

So now I am back to modifying the EL capitan car.

 

Here is a photo of it out the box. I will post the changes I make of the coming days.

 

Now what to do with the set of El Capitan cars minus this one??

 

Ian

Edited June 27, 2012 by roundhouse

[roundhouse]

I havent done as much progress on the parlour car as I would have liked in the last couple of weeks. However, the 'Santa Fe markings have now been removed and the panel where the Amtrak stripes go has had the fluting removed and sanded down smooth. A coat of varnish has been applied and is now rerady awating delivery of the decals direct from Mocroscale for the parlour car. The standard SUperliner decals I had are too narrow for this car.

 

The interior has had a coat of paint and will now have the seats and tables picked out in the correct colours before adding a few passengers.

 

The Superliner coaches that will go with this parlour car have had a bit of weathering carried out to the trucks and ends. I intend to fit working rear red marker lights to the last Superliner car in the train.

 

The baggage car will require quite a lot of weathering as they seem to not be looked after quite so much as the passeger cars and also being next to the locos the roof tends to get rather black.

 

Ian

[Supaned]

Those parlour cars are very distinctive - though speaking to the on-board crews I get the impression they're a bit troublesome (I suppose as a result of their age) - good to see one modelled.

 

I had noticed that Lookmodel seems to have gone offline , as you said , it does seem to be a result of the tsunami/earthquake - I hope that the proprietor is ok.

[roundhouse]

Those parlour cars are very distinctive - though speaking to the on-board crews I get the impression they're a bit troublesome (I suppose as a result of their age) - good to see one modelled.

 

I had noticed that Lookmodel seems to have gone offline , as you said , it does seem to be a result of the tsunami/earthquake - I hope that the proprietor is ok.

 

Despite their age Amtrak have done a good job on them including power points at most if not all seats and recently added wi fi onboard they make a great place to travel in. However, in remote areas the wifi isnt very reliable but better than nothing at all. I think that each time we have travelled in the Parlour car its been the same one, WIlliamette Valley, so I will be doing this one although the Microscale decals dont include the names.

 

Same here re Look Models owners and those who assemble the models.

 

They do / did some excellent models and service was very good when they had the required items in stock. The Surfliner set is superb.

 

I really need another set of Surfliners if I do make a model of San Diego in the next few years so hope they do resume production.

 

Ian

[roundhouse]

Not much done in last few days except fit a few more decoders to recently puchased locos such as the the Amtrak 40th Anniversary P42.

 

Here is a photo of the Parlour car in its current state awaiting the Microscale decals to arrive. The trucks have been repainted black.

 

There needs to be a panel added over the old Santa Fe number on the low level but I will cut that to size once I have the' Parlour car' decal that will go on it.

 

I have another week to work on an older layout that will be at the bluebell in just over a weesk time then I will be working on Santa Barbara to get it ready for Moros Valley. Might even get the Digitrax block detection up and running and activate the transponding on the decoders. This will then allow the Surroundtraxx system to work fully.

 

Ian

[roundhouse]

A bit more progress has been made on the Coast Starlight Palour car.

The wider Amtrak phase IV band has been applied along with the 'parlor car' emblems on a thin piece of plastic base.

The next thing to do is to add the red safety reflective ban that is just below the lower windows and to add the Amtrak logo on the band together with 'WIlliamette Valley' car name and numbers - now to work out how to do these tiny white fonts!!

 

This car will be in use at the Moors Valley show in two weeks time.

[Supaned]

Very nice job on that Parlour car - I'd like to see a pic of the whole rake when it's done.

[roundhouse]

Very nice job on that Parlour car - I'd like to see a pic of the whole rake when it's done.

 

Thanks.

 

Hoping to add the end of train lights to the rear seating car in the next few days. The baggage car still needs weathering.

 

The rake will be about 10 cars long plus two P42's.

 

Ian

[roundhouse]

Not much doen to the stock in recent days but this morning I did wire up a Hex Frog Juicer to the fiddelyard turnouts, so six of them at one end are now done. Still quite a few more to go but that does sort out a couple that were giving grief when the fiddleyard was in use with Banbury.

 

Another two turnouts on the Scenic boards will be done tonight then a start will be made to wire in the block detection hopefully in time for Moors Valley next weekend.

 

Ian

[roundhouse]

Just a few days to go before the layout gets loaded ready for Moors Valley weekend.

 

Both Hex Frog Juicers are wired but still leaves wuite a few turnouts yet to be converted in the fiddleyard. These will be done a future date.

 

The Digitrax block detection board (BDL168) is now partially wired and in place. Hopefully the RX4 transponder units will go in before the weekend and if all has been installed correctly we just might have the Surroundtraxx system fully working with Transponding but there is quite a bit of setting up so we shall see.

 

The newphase IVb Superliner set is now ready to roll along with the rear marker lights in the last coach. Subject to this performing satisfactorily the remaining sets will have this modification.

 

Then it will be the FREDS to install on the freight trains.

 

Ian

[roundhouse]

The speakers arrived in the post. However they turned out to be way too deep to fit under the baseboards within the depth of the framing so thats snookered me getting them installed for this weeken. Might have to just temporarily wire them up and leave them on the floor until I can come up with another plan.

 

The block detection and transponding boards are now wired up and the board checked that it has power to it and is workingng. However I havent had chance to actually set up the layout and check the wiring and that the detection and transponding is actually working. Hopefully will be able to do that tomorrow. A back up plan is in place just incase the wiring is wrong. I have a installed the board with a D connector to the rest of the layout track wiring and also there is a blanking connector just in case the board doesn't work and I can use this blanking plate ot put the track wiring back to how it was.

 

The photo shows the boards in place and also to the left the blanking connector cable tied to the wiring so it doesn't get lost.

 

Ian

[roundhouse]

The layout performed fairly well today..

 

Here are a few photos including oe of the new Parlor car in action.

Edited July 21, 2012 by roundhouse

[Supaned]

Nice pics - that F59PHI looks especially good.

[roundhouse]

Thanks Supaned.

 

Yhe F59PHi isan Ahteran one but with the newer chassis with the factory fittred Tsunami decoder. I bought a Railrunners one last Summer and swapped the body over. It wasnt a straight swap as the glazing and some other body mouldings have been changed to fit the newer chassis. Athearn are due to release the newer sound version in a number of Surfliner liveries but so far they are a couple of years late in arriving.

 

Ian

[roundhouse]

Union Pacific's preserved Challenger passes through Santa Barbara on a steam special.

 

The layout performed well over the weekend at Moors Valley although two Digitrax plug in board decoders failed. I have had a fair few of the newer boards that fit Katos newer locos go wrong. Also the UP SD70 ACE in CNW livery strip some of the gears in one truck. These locos have a different gear arrangement o earlier Kato mechanisms with much finer teeth. Will have to keep an eye on the rest of the ZuP heritage locos.

 

Yesterday morning I had the block detection and transponding fully working with one or to locos hitch had CV61 transponding enabled. Now the rest of the fleet will have transponding enabled and next is to get the Surroundtrax fully set up and sound moving between the under board speakers.

Edited July 23, 2012 by roundhouse

[roundhouse]

Only a few days to go till we take Santa Barbara to the High Wycombe show.

 

Not much done to the scenic side since the last show back in July but work is continuing on rolling stock including some more stock trays in the three stock boxes.

 

One or two locos have had some repair work done on them but I still have two locos with Digitrax decoders which were working but now are not. I cant see anything wring in the way they are plugged in or insulated from the chassis so must be a fault on the boards. ANy way theres more than enough locos to run the layout on Saturday.

 

I have been enabling the transponding on the locos fitted with Digitrax decoders so hopefully the Surroundtraxx system will be fully working (the block detection and transponder receivers were fully working last show but the multiple speakers had yet to be fitted).

 

The speakers shold get wired up tonight fingers crossed.

 

So if all goes well we will have under board sound that moves with the locos and another big plus of this system is that we can adjust the volume to suit the current hall noise with just a turn of one volume knob, the sound shouldnt be overpowering.

 

Ian

[Adrian Wintle]

... but I still have two locos with Digitrax decoders which were working but now are not.

 

I have this on occasion with board-replacement decoders, particularly newer (thinner) ones. It usually comes down to how well (or not) the chassis halves are making contact with the decoder. I typically put a dab of solder on each of the contact pads to thicken the decoder and increase the probability of maintaining contact. I recently had 2 locos stop working. One just required a good tap (i.e. an N-scale thump), but the other required me to pull the shell (at which point it started working again). The second may have had more to do with using the decoder intended for the Walthers GP20 (DN163L0A) in their new GP60 - it fits, but the wings that make contact with the motor teminals are a shade on the short side.

 

Adrian

Edited October 30, 2012 by Adrian Wintle

[roundhouse]

Adrian

 

yes these thinner boards dont seem to fit as well as the older style.

I sometimes use a bit of plastic to wedge under the decoder.

 

However the ones that have failed are due to some other reason.

 

I have had a few which did work fine but then only work in one direction but not the other then eventually fail all together. One the other day eventually had a burn out on the board. i cannot see anyhting that might have come into contact with the chassis where it shouldn't, so can only put it down to a problem with the design of the board.

 

I havent sent them back to Digitrax as for one I can remember when and where I bought them but now I have 4 or 5 of these boards that have failed so must get in touch with Digitrax

 

I haven't had any of the older style boards fail so dont think there is anything I am doing wrong.

 

Last night I managed to get all the transponding equipped boards enabled for transponding (CV 61) and have wired up the speakers with plugs ready to be fitted to the board wiring once I finish that by Friday.

 

The next stage will be to set the Surroundtrax box to work with 4 zones and set the block section ID for each of the speakers but this will have to wait till Saturday morning once we have set up at High Wycombe.

 

Ian