Stockrington - Mojo ignited. Thanks, Heljan!

[Kal]

Hi

 

Dunno Scott, it looks pretty good to me.

[jukebox]

Good news, Kal - it works!  Did a mini session upstairs tonight and cabled all the runs for the Cobalts for the North Yard panel. 

 

Connected the first turnout up, to check I'd got the polarities right, and.. nothing!

 

Lifted the mimic panel up, and one of the wires I'd twisted fitted had come adrift.  Re-twisted it, and flicked the switch... rumble, rumble, and the blades went across.

 

I don't want a late night tonight, but in my next full session I'll take some insulating tape with me, solder all the joints I made and tape them up so there's no risk of shorting.

 

***

I'm thinking of calling the yard panels South Hetton and North Hetton.  Being on the Durham-Sunderland line, it puts it a little North of Stockton, in the direction of Newcastle, and in the general locale of where Stockrington might be.

 

And South Hetton has the distinction of being where Angus Sibbert was found executed in his Mark X Jaguar*, under the railway bridge there - the inspiration for Get Carter, and also Mark Knopfler's wonderfully biographical "5:15am".

 

 

Honestly, it doesn't really matter - it's only a name for a fiddle yard!

 

*If you care to learn more about this case, the photo above is from the website Villian or Victim, which Michael Luvaglio set up to present the case for his innocence.  There's also another reference site here.  Amazing stuff to read, from so far away, and what is now many years ago...

 

Cheers

 

Scott

[jukebox]

Lest you think Stockrington is a sanitised bed of genetically modified roses, today will set that record straight.

 

I spent the morning wiring up the Stage 1 turnouts to the Southern DC bus - 4 turnouts plus a double slip.  That was going smoothly, and as it's school holidays here, I even has Master Jukebox Jnr along as my assistant.  I asked him if he wanted to have a go at soldering up some of the wires, and he shrank back at the idea. I figured I had scared (and possibly scarred) him with tales of solder burns and the time I absent mindedly picked up the wrong end of the soldering iron (not recently - you only ever do that once...) so pushed him a bit harder, and convinced him to grab hold of the cold end of the iron and have a go.  He was tentative at first, but was mesmoraised by the way that flux on a wire can make the solder defy gravity and flow upward. Soon he'd done his first three joins and was growing confident.

 

We moved to the double slip. It took a good 15 minutes of messing around with the wires to finally get a handle on how the swtiches needed to be wired. To answer my question from before" No, it can't be treated like a crossover and switched with a single switch, as there's too many route variations. And the way I have my panel set up, the left hand switch needs to control the right hand blades. It all makes sense once you get it right... but getting it right on the panel took some mental gymnastics.  So I had all the connections correctly wired, and polarity sorted, when I knocked the mimic panel and all but on of the leads pulled apart.  Back to square two, as it were.  As soon as I had it sorted again, I got MJJ in and we soldered the joins up so that if it gets dropped again, nothing should come apart.  And I screwed an extra bit of wood in place to hold the panel more securely on the top of the benchwork.

 

That left the Northern DC bus to complete - just three turnouts.  I was progressing well, and had got to the point where I needed to test the polarity of the Cobalt wiring so the DPDT switches mimiced the movement of the blades... and one of the turnouts that had previously tested fine with a 9V battery froze.  I checked the bus - 9V. I checked the leads to the turnout - 9V.  I took the leads out, tinned them and tried to reinsert them. Nothing.  Time to walk away for a while....

 

After dinner, I went back upstairs, crawled under the layout, and decoupled all the leads off the dodgy Cobalt, and unscrewed it from the board.  I took a new set of leads, and tried it with a 9V battery. Nothing. I changed the polarity around. Nothing. I wiggled slide that moves and repowered it. Nothing. I wiggled the wire harness and tried it again. Rumble, Rumble, Throw.  Inverted the battery. Rumble, Rumble, Throw. Grrrrrrrrr.  So it was off with the old double sided pad, stick a new one on, back under the layout, and screw the damn thing back on, and re-plug the five leads. Throw the DPDT: R-R-T.  Grrrrrrrrrrrrrr.  Well at least it is fixed. But a PITA that it took extracting it from in-track and working on it topside, to make it right.

 

So that makes seven turnouts and a double slip all fully operational.  Stage 1 - turnouts ready.

 

***

 

I finished off the evening by starting to run the DCC control bus cables around the front of the layout. But by 10pm it was getting a bit late to be banging U-tacks into timber, so had to abandon that task until daylight.  Once I have that bus run and the NCE fascia panels attached (albiet temporarily), It will be time for a full room clean up and repack, ready for the final step before trains can run - wiring up the PSX and DCC booster.

 

Cheers

 

Scott

[Jaz]

The cold weather has obviously encouraged you to do some work, our mini heatwave is on the other hand halting work, while we melt......Some serious work, so can we expect some loco pictures soon?

[jukebox]

No, it's more my recession enforced 4-day week that has made modeling life a bit more productive, Jaz - less pay, but more life, so it's a bearable compromise.  I have peers that have been unemployed for over a year, so it's an arrangement I am prepared to live with.

 

***

 

Loco pictures?  Well yes, for sure!  I'm hoping to be able to generate (and post) video once I get something more substantial than point blades that move...

 

As they say, watch this space.

 

Cheers

 

Scott

Edited July 20, 2013 by jukebox

[jukebox]

So, Sunday evening rolls around again....

 

This week I've wired the (temporary) control panels for Stage 1 into place.  These include:

 

Stockrington North

 

South Hetton Yard

 

North Hetton Yard

 

(Yes, there will also be a Hetton Yard panel, for the ladders of turnouts I will add to the inside four yard tracks.)

 

I've got another shipment of DPDT switches on the water to fill in the gaps on these panels, and make the future panels.  Whilst these are only temporary, until I have the layout built and the fascia defined, in reality they will be in use for 2-3 years I expect, so I needed something presentable.  Once the bulk of the benchwork for the scenic side is done, I can tidy up the leads until I build permanent installations.

 

***

The power station is now completed:

 

I have also wired up the PSX-3, and the SB3a, so everything there is ready to go.

 

 

I have also run the DCC bus around the layout, and fitted two control panel hubs - again, these will find a more permanent home when I install a fascia, but for now I have nestled them to protect them from inadvertent damage.  I did the mods on these that include fitting a resistor and two jumpers, as well as an LED, so they will light when the bus is powered. I just liked the idea of a visual insdication of "DCC in" on that side of the room.

 

*** 

So I have a big clean up next weekend. The floor under the layout is covered in wire off cuts, wire insulation, and other detritus.  I need to vacuum that lot up, shift all the timber and storage boxes from the operating space to back under the layout, and then give the track a good vacuum.

 

By then, if my calendar is correct, it should be almost August...

 

Cheers

 

Scott

 

 

 

 

[David Todd]

[Andrew P]

Lest you think Stockrington is a sanitised bed of genetically modified roses, today will set that record straight.

 

I spent the morning wiring up the Stage 1 turnouts to the Southern DC bus - 4 turnouts plus a double slip.  That was going smoothly, and as it's school holidays here, I even has Master Jukebox Jnr along as my assistant.  I asked him if he wanted to have a go at soldering up some of the wires, and he shrank back at the idea. I figured I had scared (and possibly scarred) him with tales of solder burns and the time I absent mindedly picked up the wrong end of the soldering iron (not recently - you only ever do that once...) so pushed him a bit harder, and convinced him to grab hold of the cold end of the iron and have a go.  He was tentative at first, but was mesmoraised by the way that flux on a wire can make the solder defy gravity and flow upward. Soon he'd done his first three joins and was growing confident.

 

We moved to the double slip. It took a good 15 minutes of messing around with the wires to finally get a handle on how the swtiches needed to be wired. To answer my question from before" No, it can't be treated like a crossover and switched with a single switch, as there's too many route variations. And the way I have my panel set up, the left hand switch needs to control the right hand blades. It all makes sense once you get it right... but getting it right on the panel took some mental gymnastics.  So I had all the connections correctly wired, and polarity sorted, when I knocked the mimic panel and all but on of the leads pulled apart.  Back to square two, as it were.  As soon as I had it sorted again, I got MJJ in and we soldered the joins up so that if it gets dropped again, nothing should come apart.  And I screwed an extra bit of wood in place to hold the panel more securely on the top of the benchwork.

 

That left the Northern DC bus to complete - just three turnouts.  I was progressing well, and had got to the point where I needed to test the polarity of the Cobalt wiring so the DPDT switches mimiced the movement of the blades... and one of the turnouts that had previously tested fine with a 9V battery froze.  I checked the bus - 9V. I checked the leads to the turnout - 9V.  I took the leads out, tinned them and tried to reinsert them. Nothing.  Time to walk away for a while....

 

After dinner, I went back upstairs, crawled under the layout, and decoupled all the leads off the dodgy Cobalt, and unscrewed it from the board.  I took a new set of leads, and tried it with a 9V battery. Nothing. I changed the polarity around. Nothing. I wiggled slide that moves and repowered it. Nothing. I wiggled the wire harness and tried it again. Rumble, Rumble, Throw.  Inverted the battery. Rumble, Rumble, Throw. Grrrrrrrrr.  So it was off with the old double sided pad, stick a new one on, back under the layout, and screw the damn thing back on, and re-plug the five leads. Throw the DPDT: R-R-T.  Grrrrrrrrrrrrrr.  Well at least it is fixed. But a PITA that it took extracting it from in-track and working on it topside, to make it right.

 

So that makes seven turnouts and a double slip all fully operational.  Stage 1 - turnouts ready.

 

***

 

I finished off the evening by starting to run the DCC control bus cables around the front of the layout. But by 10pm it was getting a bit late to be banging U-tacks into timber, so had to abandon that task until daylight.  Once I have that bus run and the NCE fascia panels attached (albiet temporarily), It will be time for a full room clean up and repack, ready for the final step before trains can run - wiring up the PSX and DCC booster.

 

Cheers

 

Scott

Hi Scott, that is a great explination of life in general, hahhhaa

 

Bodgit

[jukebox]

Well mother nature has not just be slapping NE England around, but SW Australia, too.

 

110km/h winds and 60mm of rain in the last 24 hours.

 

In the space of 15 minutes on Friday morning, I'd seen a car that had planted itself deep into the side of a bus, and about 10km later, a van on it's side - both the result of Rain + Idiot Drivers + Speed = Inevitable Mess. Not unique to WA, but certainly seems to be symptomatic of the yoof in their cars here.

 

***

 

The view out across the Indian Ocean late yesterday was non too inviting:

 

 

However, upstairs at Stockrington, the railway room was warm and dry, bathed in the warm glow of red LED's:

 

 

Not only those up front, but behind the power station:

 

 

and also around the room:

 

 

I soldered the ends of the second mainline in place on the bridge, glued that piece in place, and connected the feeders from that track into the "switched" area of the bus, completing the first 1/3 of the trackwork across the bridge.

 

 

I also soldered a DCC bus terminator onto the far end of the storage track bus, which was the final piece of electrics to be done.

 

***

 

After a marathon clean up, and vacuum of the floor and the trackwork, when I plugged the power supply in for the first time, I was met with the reassuring glow of LED's all around the room. Using a piece of wire, I tripped the PSX and it behaved exactly as promoted on the box - the supply LED flicked over to the "tripped" LED for 2 seconds, then reset. When I held the wire in place, the "tripped" indication kept on, with the tell tale clicking if the board trying to reset every 2 seconds.

 

***

 

The rest of the afternoon has been spent restacking the materiel under the benchwork, and getting all the tools back in a tidy state so I can hook into Stage 2 in an orderly fashion.

 

With that done, I slid back under the benchwork, and taped all the soldered DC joints with insulating tape, as a precaution against short circuits.

 

***

 

So... it's the 27 July, and if I'm not mistaken, that means I am a touch ahead of schedule, and ready to start testing trains!

 

Cheers

 

Scott

Edited July 28, 2013 by jukebox

[Jaz]

I'm not too certain about what is going on in side, but I just sat a couple of minutes admiring your view outside, if that's a bad day...............

the last picture of the layout shows you have a great potential, purpose building it as you did is definitely working out for you.

Edited July 27, 2013 by Jaz

[Physicsman]

Scott, without me having to trawl through your thread, what's the gradient of the line linking the left and right sides of your trackwork in the photo above?

 

Apologies for my intermittent ventures to Stockrington. You spend a lot more time on KL than I do here.

 

And btw, I've not noticed any effect on SMP/Marcway Ni-Ag track using PVA. 

 

Jeff

[jukebox]

I'm not too certain about what is going on in side, but I just sat a couple of minutes admiring your view outside, if that's a bad day...............

the last picture of the layout shows you have a great potential, purpose building it as you did is definitely working out for you.

 

LOL - def a cr*ppy day, Jaz.  A nice one looks something like this:

 

 

Luckily that's not the view from my room, or I would not get a lot of modelling done...

 

Scott, without me having to trawl through your thread, what's the gradient of the line linking the left and right sides of your trackwork in the photo above?

 

Apologies for my intermittent ventures to Stockrington. You spend a lot more time on KL than I do here.

 

And btw, I've not noticed any effect on SMP/Marcway Ni-Ag track using PVA. 

 

Jeff

 

Hi Jeff;

 

The incline out of the yard is a constant 3%, the chute back down to it at the other end peaks at -5.5%. My mainline is targetted as having a max. grade of 2.5%

 

***

 

One last job today - I noticed the pad on the CMX catching on the turnout activating wires as I pushed it around by hand. So it was out with the Dremel, and with the aid of some steady hand work, it was short work to nip those all off below the top of rail level.

 

Cheers

 

Scott

 

edited for the usual ham-fisted typos...

Edited July 28, 2013 by jukebox

[Jaz]

That's just showing off!!!!!! lovely view Jukebox .....a little taste of pre paradise.

[jukebox]

Well after all that hard work, late Sunday delivered the payoff:

 

http://youtu.be/qaV7t3NYgTo

(It really had to be green and Gresley, didn't it?)

 

 

Cheers

 

Scott

[David Todd]

Nice.........straight forward easy build........................

 

 

 

[LNER4479]

Hurrah! A train runs. Bet it was a good feeling, eh Scott

 

Look forward to seeing more (go on, have a play...)

[silky_jack]

Wohhoooo! Well done Scott always good to           

[StJamesStation]

As everyone on the East Coast of Australia knows, when you go to WA, prepare to be enlightened on the art of driving. After living there for three years we quickly realised that the indicators are used to tell other drivers what you have just done. You do 80km/hr on the freeway in the far right lane, and don't let anyone merge or get past you, and do 100km in a 60 zone and run the red lights, surely they are advisory only.

 

Well mother nature has not just be slapping NE England around, but SW Australia, too.

 

110km/h winds and 60mm of rain in the last 24 hours.

 

In the space of 15 minutes on Friday morning, I'd seen a car that had planted itself deep into the side of a bus, and about 10km later, a van on it's side - both the result of Rain + Idiot Drivers + Speed = Inevitable Mess. Not unique to WA, but certainly seems to be symptomatic of the yoof in their cars here.

 

***

 

The view out across the Indian Ocean late yesterday was non too inviting:

 

2607A.jpg

 

However, upstairs at Stockrington, the railway room was warm and dry, bathed in the warm glow of red LED's:

 

2607C.jpg

 

Not only those up front, but behind the power station:

 

2607B.jpg

 

and also around the room:

 

2607D.jpg

 

I soldered the ends of the second mainline in place on the bridge, glued that piece in place, and connected the feeders from that track into the "switched" area of the bus, completing the first 1/3 of the trackwork across the bridge.

 

2607E.jpg

 

I also soldered a DCC bus terminator onto the far end of the storage track bus, which was the final piece of electrics to be done.

 

***

 

After a marathon clean up, and vacuum of the floor and the trackwork, when I plugged the power supply in for the first time, I was met with the reassuring glow of LED's all around the room. Using a piece of wire, I tripped the PSX and it behaved exactly as promoted on the box - the supply LED flicked over to the "tripped" LED for 2 seconds, then reset. When I held the wire in place, the "tripped" indication kept on, with the tell tale clicking if the board trying to reset every 2 seconds.

 

***

 

The rest of the afternoon has been spent restacking the materiel under the benchwork, and getting all the tools back in a tidy state so I can hook into Stage 2 in an orderly fashion.

 

With that done, I slid back under the benchwork, and taped all the soldered DC joints with insulating tape, as a precaution against short circuits.

 

***

2607F.jpg

 

So... it's the 27 July, and if I'm not mistaken, that means I am a touch ahead of schedule, and ready to start testing trains!

 

Cheers

 

Scott

[Markeg]

Nice going there Scott. 

 

Mark

[Andrew P]

Hi Scott, its looking good I do like all those LED's

 

Bodgit

[Jaz]

Congratulations
The first train is always special

Edited August 1, 2013 by Jaz

[jukebox]

So....

 

Cheers to everyone on the well wishes after Day 1 of operations - I must say I am seriously pleased with the Bachmann K3.  It has showed itself to be a really nice model - and tolerates the gradients and turnouts (and turnouts on gradients) with reassuring consistency. 

 

As Robert (4479) suggested, there was more than a little playing done this week, but that had an end game as well, as I do need to work my way through my roster of locos and determine which can do what, where and when, as it were.

 

If you have been following this thread from the start, you'll recall I kicked off just as the room for Stockrington was being completed.  So 90% of my locos and stock are in storage tubs, wrapped up.  What is available immediately is what I have acquired in the two years since the house extensions became a real thing - so there's just a number of D/E units and some Mk1 Pullmans (fear not, steam fans, I will be getting the rest out - the plan is a lot of testing before I continue track laying...)

 

So on hand I have DP1, KOYLI, Kestrel and Falcon, and these all had a run, and I also put the CMX into action behind them, to see how they went hauling that.  Curiously, the Bachmann units were not as powerful as the Heljan locos, and these couldn't lift the CMX across the Peco NS turnouts at 3% - but Kestrel did, and Falcon just romped away with it.  I only have 7 Pullmans on hand, and that also didn't stop Falcon.  Once I have more stock unpacked I will see how much I have to add before it has reached it's haulage limit.

 

I tried the K3, and was able to get three Pullmans up 3%, and four up the steel rails - but again, the Peco NS proved too slippery.  I am in the process of adding some extra weight inside the boiler, as I'd like to see the K3 with four on getting up that slope. Having said that, I stacked an extra 83g into KOYLI, taking it from 597g to 680g, but was still not able to get over the Pecos - yet Kestrel at just 598g romps away.  Must be down to some slippery metalurgy in Bachmanns wheels...

 

Interestingly, Falcon is extremely quiet - so much so that I was able to hear the flanges protesting in a couple of areas where my tracklaying is less than perfect - so I have flagged these and will go back and relay them to a better alignment.  The really good was that I didn't have anywhere where I was getting repeating derailments - just a few niggles where I had screwed down the track at a gapped joint using the collar screwes, and created some rough top, or a join between Peco and C&L on a curve where the gauge faces didn't line up.  With these sorted, I have been able to get consistant running with all the D/E's....

 

A big thanks to d.t. (ferriesdover) for a heads up on a sale on these:

 

 

A perfect fit for Stockrington!

 

Cheers

 

Scott

[jukebox]

As everyone on the East Coast of Australia knows, when you go to WA, prepare to be enlightened on the art of driving. After living there for three years we quickly realised that the indicators are used to tell other drivers what you have just done. You do 80km/hr on the freeway in the far right lane, and don't let anyone merge or get past you, and do 100km in a 60 zone and run the red lights, surely they are advisory only.

 

 

As an ex-Sydney boy, I can only agree SJS.  I came to conslusion some years ago that WA is unique in that you must walk into the car dealer, and when you are asked about things such as metallic paint, upgraded stereo, low profile tyres, that indicators are also on the "options" list, and most WA drivers choose to decline!

 

Besides merging, they have a unique perspective on roundabouts, too - stopping seeming to be the rule, rather than the exception. 

[jukebox]

That's just showing off!!!!!! lovely view Jukebox .....a little taste of pre paradise.

 

Nah, showing off would be this view Mrs Jukebox took one morning last week:

 

 

[jukebox]

Hi Scott, its looking good I do like all those LED's

 

Bodgit

 

Yes, Andy - Red isn't for Danger here!

 

Congratulations

The first train is always special

 

Awww - you edited that Jaz!!!!  I don't think the Mods are so anodyne here, you know!

 

Nice.........straight forward easy build........................

 

 

 

 

I have a long way to go to catch you up, d.t....  and plenty that is not straightforward.  Thanks for stopping by.