well filled baps The Sheep Chronicles. The adventures of a Sheep, the Works Forecat and the Works Apprentice, George.

[John Besley]

9 hours ago, F-UnitMad said:

...droopy F.A.R.T ..... tight butting surface ...

Great choice of words, there. Cue much schoolboy giggling.....

Defiantly after a heavy Friday night

[durham light infantry]

10 hours ago, NHY 581 said:

The other issue with Project W is that the actual depth of the boards is 38mm as opposed to 50mm so I really want to avoid catches on the sides. I have a schemey sheep plan but I won't know until I'm in the throes of implementing it if it will in fact work..............which knowing me as I do will be the evening before it's first outing. 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

[durham light infantry]

There was some text in that...

 

Anyway, 9mm mdf. 125mm at the front should give a depth of 95mm to play with. Enough room for Cobalt ip point motors, latches on

the sides, alignment dowels and hand holes. Lightweight fascia is 10mm Foamex, rigid and stronger than foamboard (Sheep Lane actually lives on top of that).

[Tim Dubya]

52 minutes ago, durham light infantry said:

Foamex

 

Love foamex, used to make exhibition graphics panels out of the stuff.  I hadn't really thought about using it for fascia or backscene's but as you say, rigid yet curvable too.

[franciswilliamwebb]

10 hours ago, durham light infantry said:

 

 

The layout on the bed, of course!  SWMBO will be thrilled when she finds we do actually have room for one more! 😇

[SteveyDee68]

It’s just occurred to me that all these layouts built on what IKEA originally intended to be household furniture (or shelving) all fall under the general banner of being IKEA hacks!

 

Who is going to be brave enough to post a layout picture on the website dedicated to suchlike?! It might make a pleasant change from examples of turning a lampshade into a salad strainer or a bedhead into a bookcase* - and if posted on 1st April would fool a lot of the site’s usual readers into thinking it was a joke!

 

As Mrs Doyle would say, “Go on. Go on. Go on go on go on go on go on!”

 

Steve S

 

 

* I know, it does beg the question “why?” when IKEA are quite well known for selling bookcases!

[NHY 581]

10 hours ago, durham light infantry said:

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Morning Mike, 

 

Sadly, the nest of tables as used by yourself ( and me for four layouts), has, in a moment of sheer folly, been discontinued by IKEA last year. 

 

Hence my switch to a different base board solution for Project W. 

 

Rob

[John Besley]

26 minutes ago, NHY 581 said:

 

 

Morning Mike, 

 

Sadly, the nest of tables as used by yourself ( and me for four layouts), has, in a moment of sheer folly, been discontinued by IKEA last year. 

 

Hence my switch to a different base board solution for Project W. 

 

Rob

 

Showing a complete Lack of joined up thinking by IKEA 

[durham light infantry]

52 minutes ago, NHY 581 said:

 

 

Morning Mike, 

 

Sadly, the nest of tables as used by yourself ( and me for four layouts), has, in a moment of sheer folly, been discontinued by IKEA last year. 

 

Hence my switch to a different base board solution for Project W. 

 

Rob

 

Morning Rob

 

I am using an alternative for the next layout (actually it's number 3 or 4 in the build queue now)...

 

 

 

 

[durham light infantry]

1 hour ago, franciswilliamwebb said:

 

The layout on the bed, of course!  SWMBO will be thrilled when she finds we do actually have room for one more! 😇

 

Rest assured, the layout was only resting on the bed while the railway room was being reorganised. The allocation of a dedicated room in the house is on the condition that there is no modelling anywhere else.

[John Besley]

DCC HELP PLEASE

 

Just a quick bit of advice - seeing as how ive asked back in December regards DCC, so it goes like this the two chassis have now been sorted and one has a bassic no sound DCC and the other (The Baldwin) has a full fat sound etc all set up and working well...

 

Ive fitted the front plate module to the board and all is working having rewired from this into the track supply block, turning all the old fashioned section switches to 'on' how ever when Exhill was built I hadnt thought through where I would be now and this was set up as DC so I now need to keep sidings live when the points are closed to them to allow for Playing shunting and the sound fited loco to stay 'live'

 

I thought ahah if I wire a jumper from one side that is neg to the opposite track this will solve the problem - Wrong! dead short when I close the point, so where am I going wrong,

 

 

The attched picture shows the supply and the arrows show where I wired the jumper wire to and from..

 

Below is the track plan

 

[PaulRhB]

26 minutes ago, John Besley said:

thought ahah if I wire a jumper from one side that is neg to the opposite track this will solve the problem - Wrong! dead short when I close the point, so where am I going wrong,

John, with an electrofrog point you need insulated fishplates where the yellow lines are so the frog is electrically isolated from the sidings. You need jumpers where the arrows are.

 

 

the area in green is all electrically common and powers up off the rail it’s touching. 

 

Overall you want this,

Edited March 15 by PaulRhB

[John Besley]

Ah OK Paul

 

So seeing as my track is already in situ if I cut a slot with a dremel disc and fit a insulating shim that will solve the first problem I guess then rewire my jumpers past there as shown..

 

So my theory was almost right, but Id missed out the isulating gap

 

 

Edited March 15 by John Besley
Reload

[John Besley]

All sorted, realised that either side of the points is a baseboard gap so removed the no non relivant bridge wires and rewired the track feed as the above photo, tested and all good.

 

My next puzzle is if i select loco 7635 The Baldwin and have the sound running thats fine she can now sit on a siding with its own feed supply, select loco 1000 The battery loco and run this one which dosnt have sound, when i go back to select 7635 the sound cuts out and the light and I have to restart her sound again... does this mean I need another hand set to keep both locos live or is this what it is with just the one hand set..

[F-UnitMad]

4 hours ago, John Besley said:

My next puzzle .....

... does this mean I need another hand set to keep both locos live or is this what it is with just the one hand set..

What hand set is it?

[John Besley]

7 hours ago, F-UnitMad said:

What hand set is it?

Powercab NCE

[F-UnitMad]

3 minutes ago, John Besley said:

Powercab NCE

Strange. That's what I have, & sound locos don't 'restart' when sellected again. Are you using the Recall feature?

The one issue I do have is with Zimo decoders, which don't remember light settings between operating sessions. When switching the layout back on, the Zimo fitted locos need their lights switching back on. 🙄

[woodenhead]

11 hours ago, John Besley said:

All sorted, realised that either side of the points is a baseboard gap so removed the no non relivant bridge wires and rewired the track feed as the above photo, tested and all good.

 

My next puzzle is if i select loco 7635 The Baldwin and have the sound running thats fine she can now sit on a siding with its own feed supply, select loco 1000 The battery loco and run this one which dosnt have sound, when i go back to select 7635 the sound cuts out and the light and I have to restart her sound again... does this mean I need another hand set to keep both locos live or is this what it is with just the one hand set..

You need to use the Recall button. By Default it is set to two locos and you can expand it up to 6.

 

You basically scroll through up to six loco slots that you can store locos and and when you go back to one in the Recall slot it remembers the last settings on it i.e. lights and/or sound.  If you re-enter a loco address it resets to default lights off/no sound.

 

To add a loco to a slot simply click on the recall till you get to a slot that is either empty or you want to overwrite and select a new loco for that slot.

[John Besley]

14 hours ago, woodenhead said:

You need to use the Recall button. By Default it is set to two locos and you can expand it up to 6.

 

You basically scroll through up to six loco slots that you can store locos and and when you go back to one in the Recall slot it remembers the last settings on it i.e. lights and/or sound.  If you re-enter a loco address it resets to default lights off/no sound.

 

To add a loco to a slot simply click on the recall till you get to a slot that is either empty or you want to overwrite and select a new loco for that slot.

 

That's brilliant, getting to grips with DCC... 

[woodenhead]

1 hour ago, John Besley said:

 

That's brilliant, getting to grips with DCC... 

The recall button is great, it allows me to have a shunter draw empty stock out of the station and have the train loco creep along behind it until it reaches the stop signal all under full control.

[LBSC123]

On 14/03/2024 at 09:13, NHY 581 said:

 

 

 

So, here we go...........

 

Generally, when I adopted the wider LACK Table tops ( 40cm ) width, I stayed with using the LACK shelves for the Fiddly Area Re-shuffling Tables ( F.A.R.Ts ). I used bolts passed back through the end boards which connected with "L" shaped brackets on the FART. These again were from IKEA and tightened up using wing nuts and washers. 

 

 

 

 

However, if the boards are the same width, this is a bit more tricky. 

 

Project W presents this very issue and I'm probably going to use dowels of some sort to allow the boards to go end on. I need to then work out a way to then keep them ( the boards)  together. I have some ideas, complicated by the fact I may well opt for some sort of rotating F.A.R.T to reduce stock handling. Main issue is to of course negate a droopy F.A.R.T so a tight butting surface is essential, ensuring they are squeezed together. 

 

So, stay tuned but it will be a while. 

 

Rob. 

 

Thanks for this  NHY 581, very helpful.

 I think there were some comments about ‘Sheepcroft’ a few pages back at Ally Pally show, I attach a photo of this for interest! It was a rather nice little EM gauge shunting layout. 

[F-UnitMad]

13 hours ago, John Besley said:

 

That's brilliant, getting to grips with DCC... 

Don't worry, I found DCC was a very steep learning curve!! And I still can't speed-match locos, unless they're the same manufacturer & type, with the same decoder fitted in each loco, with identical CV settings.!!

[Oldddudders]

10 hours ago, F-UnitMad said:

Don't worry, I found DCC was a very steep learning curve!! And I still can't speed-match locos, unless they're the same manufacturer & type, with the same decoder fitted in each loco, with identical CV settings.!!

I agree. DCC is a splendidly deep cornucopia of goodies, into which we can each dip just as far as we choose. Using only the most superficial of facilities still puts your layout ahead of an equivalent DC layout in terms of operational flexibility and simplicity of wiring. But as confidence grows, we may feel encouraged to reach further into the remaining scope. Only costs militates against it being all things to all modellers, which is why DC will continue to dominate for the foreseeable future. .

[PaulRhB]

11 hours ago, F-UnitMad said:

I found DCC was a very steep learning curve!!

Yes overly techy information confuses us mere mortals but when broken down into manageable bits it’s actually quite simple in the wiring. My mantra is wire for DC, but with isolated frogs / crossings on electrofrog points, and then just swap the controller. 
 

12 minutes ago, Oldddudders said:

DCC is a splendidly deep cornucopia of goodies, into which we can each dip just as far as we choose. Using only the most superficial of facilities still puts your layout ahead of an equivalent DC layout in terms of operational flexibility

It is but sometimes we can do a lot of the things with dc as Rob’s shunting layouts ably demonstrate. Finding what works for you is the key. 
I find DCC is an advantage for sound and for the ‘big’ modular ideas I’m building. I’m also still building and running stuff on DC at home as I just can’t afford to DCC everything in one go. Certain items it’s really not worth it as they’ll never get sound or runner a show but I’ll enjoy playing at home. 
 

 

Edited March 18 by PaulRhB

[Captain Kernow]

2 hours ago, Oldddudders said:

Only costs militates against it being all things to all modellers, which is why DC will continue to dominate for the foreseeable future. .

Plus the fact that some of us simply don't have the kind of brain that understands the necessary alchemy to achieve DCC success. For me, DCC will forever remain a closed book...