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This is just a bit of thinking aloud - there is no intention, as yet, to actually build this...

Supposing, all three points were Y points. The model could go on a circular baseboard with a turntable like a lazy susan. No backscene, but rather taper the landscape down to a feather edge all round. View from any angle. No point controls = very simple controls, I think three pairs of wires for the whole layout. I like this, something different but still very much in the Carl Arendt mould?

- Richard.

Here's a diversion to the built environment - two views from "Level 72" on Saturday 18th July. My golly we got a clear day for the trip. Ilford XP2 with a deep yellow filter - quite moody.

- Richard.

Welcome to the forums! This layout looks rather fun - and I think with your final caption "layout still to be finished" you will fit in well here.

There is a special area of the forums for peoples's layouts. If you start a topic here for your own layout, you will probably get more readers and viewers. I think a lot of members will like the layout, and your video as well.

- Richard.

Back in the Spring of 2005 there was a brief period when holders of a Gold Card (annual season) issued by "First Great Eastern" had their free weekend travel honoured by the new "Anglia" franchise. I went out for the day with a mate, and here are my logs from the day. We drove to Colchester North to start.

(Anglia withdrew the perk after a while, and I never bought another Gold Card. It was only Hatfield Peverel to Chelmsford after all!)

- Richard.

Any news regarding the excursion for the first 250 people who pre-ordered? I was told that I was in the list, but heard nothing since. Apparently we are also going to have our orders dispatched in September instead of a collection on the day of the excursion.

 

I'm curious as to how many of these S8 Stock models have been produced and if weather they will sell out or not. If they do, then Bachmann might see this as a good market opportunity to expand on. It is a niche market but it is becoming more popular.

LTM could commission a 2009 Stock Model or perhaps Bachmann could go in another direction like by producing more modern surface London Transport Rolling Stock (London Overground Cl 378).

I wrote to the shop last week:

Hi, Thinking about my order number LTM-001-75094 for one of your S class train models, can you tell me whether I was early enough to qualify for the special trip? Many thanks,

and they replied:

The Howes site does not list them with a chip fitter but fitted with a 6 pin DCC interface. I used to call them sockets.

Yes. I guess, the people offering DCC-ready models have done the work for you.

- Richard.

something to think about when you're in the supermarket http://action.ciwf.org.uk/ea-action/action?ea.client.id=119&ea.campaign.id=40249&ea.tracking.id=05bb9ddb

More grimace than smile - a bit off topic?

- Richard.

 Looks easy enough as per the instruction sheet. Might need a bit more insulation on the inside of the recess to be on the safe side.

Hlt05Medelling-024-Editsm.jpg

P

There must be something akin to madness to buy a brand new model, which is available with a decoder fitted, and proceed to take it to pieces. But thanks ever so much for posting the photo!

- Richard.

It was still there yesterday! Unfortunately we were sitting near the back of the train coming home (a 360 Desiro). I tried the shot with my phone as we pulled away but we were going too fast by the time we went passed it.

- Richard.

Forgive me. Later pictures have a better finish on the wheel rims, presumably the flash on some of the vendor shots. But still - visible steel axle and rims. The paint/staining finish is disappointing. Isn't it? Compare with e.g. a Hornby J15.

I don't have a J15, but the photos online suggest its wheel tyres are thinner (and the plastic inserts correspondingly larger) so I suppose the shininess of the sides of the tyres is less obvious.

Perhaps a chemical blackening process would help on the Heljan tyres. I'm looking at DIY cold blackening:

Blackening uses a chemical compound that clings to the surface of machined metal (in all the nooks and crannies). It creates a porous base that bonds chemically with the workpiece surface. In cold blackening, that chemical compound is copper/selenium (CuSe).

A while ago I had some Tillig flexi track  which was chemically coloured (I don't know the process), a dark brown colour. This was nickel-silver rail. The coating was electrically conductive but you could not solder to it. I restored the shininess of the running surfaces with very fine wet and dry paper, used wet.

It's work remembering, shunter wheels can get shiny from oil deposits, but the low speeds won't allow the built up of the bulk brake dust seen on main line diesels.  So some semi-gloss, very dark grey paint may give a suitable effect.

To be honest, I'm happy with the wheels and indeed the whole model - I just found all the sand pipes.

Edit: Carr's do a range of metal blacking products.

- Richard.

It would be slightly unfair to compare those wheels to a nice, shiny, 1980s Mainline 03. And - yes - it's not much work to correct, but, I'd expect a bit better for around £100. I'm sure once we see some home-weathered examples I'll lose any jitters over the upcoming Metropolitan Bo-Bo...

Sorry you've lost me here! The wheels look like they were moulded specially for his model and they look much like the real ones to me. If this was a kit for the same money.most likely it wouldn't have any wheels at all -  I think its cheering how prices are still this low compared to Continental models. Now to get mine run in :-)

- Richard.

I do want one of these - but I hope the mechanism is more "128" (to be honest, near perfection) than "14" (too much sideplay) or railbus (heavily over lubricated)  ... the selfish question is whether to order it now, and post the pictures of it as a public service, or wait for someone else to do the same.

 

- Richard.

Mine arrived in the post today and exceeds expectations. My layout is 'down' for more construction so the loco has only run in the fiddle yard and on a rolling road today, but it seems well made and a lot of character. The wheels seem commendably fine which is good because they are quite prominent on this design, and the cab lifts off if you want to put in a driver, which seems worthwhile with so much glazing.

My opinion of Heljan really is a whole lot better than a few years ago (I sold off my railbus on eBay) - the 05 is another very good model.

Edit: mine is a blue one from Hattons, who reported nine of these in stock on Wednesday and now seem to have sold out. Popular.

- Richard.

I purchased an 05 this morning running qualities are good

I've noticed Hattons are already showing one of the versions as "limited stocks" - I've got my order in!

- Richard.

 

When you and Arthur dig up a quote, you can put it up on a relevant list and I'll apologize.

 

Andy

Andy,

I've never met Arthur, but we have exchanged a few PMs and it does seem we are equally cheesed off by the same thing. If you will excuse me replying on my own (without asking Arthur) I think straight away of this topic: Minimum radius for industrial sidings in 00-SF. A chap asked an innocent if possibly slightly naive question, and you waded in with the second reply: Since 00-SF automatically causes a greater minimum radius restriction, why not use plain 00. Tight radii with RTR is one of it's main features. If the section is going to part of a larger layout, you are bound to get larger engines entering the section occasionally. So trial and error has to include those size locos as well.

No one in their right mind builds 00-SF plain track, but you launched your offensive with the most confusing reply you could manage ("a greater minimum" and "why not use plain 00") at the earliest opportunity. By the end of the whole topic, you had managed to move on to self-guarded frogs - as if a first-time track builder would want to try such a thing!

I don't want to come across as a prig, but I do try to post constructive posts which might help other modellers. I've stopped posting in the hand-built track forum (except here) because I am totally fed up with being trolled, ridiculed and put down by ignorant, uniformed, twisted and deceptive posts made by a couple of people who never offer examples of their own work, but would rather come across as competing members of a faux standards board.

Is that enough for you?

- Richard.

Edit: Addendum: Perhaps the worst thing is that by 11:30 today, two people (not including Arthur) have found themselves voting this post as a "like". That's a pretty poor thing to happen for a post which no-one (including me) should feel the need to write in the first place.

- Richard.

For example: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kvQsvkGpEs0

 

I work very hard designing and testing, long and to extremes,  to make sure that what I claim works, does in every expected way. Those cars are running on a smaller wheel base equivalent of the MK1 bogie shown in Post #1

 

I don't like to use the term compensation, as it is rather vague and often has some far from ideal implementations.  I went back to basics and designed my working suspension and track systems from scratch, deliberately avoiding the need for the sort of major skills and effort that doing P4/EM  the craftsmanship way requires. I have implementations for all bogie types in the works already and similar designs in my head for most steam locomotives. ITMT Bill Bedford's springing units for 4 wheel vehicles would seem to OK as is.

 

I'm not one of the armchair suggesters. If I can't show it, I don't suggest it.

So I suppose it's reassuring to conclude, your repeated bad-mouthing of 00-SF is founded on ignorance and prejudice?

- Richard.

I do want one of these - but I hope the mechanism is more "128" (to be honest, near perfection) than "14" (too much sideplay) or railbus (heavily over lubricated)  ... the selfish question is whether to order it now, and post the pictures of it as a public service, or wait for someone else to do the same.

- Richard.

OK thanks for this. I was wondering, if the crossing was made from steel, it could have some locating pegs to protrude downwards into the sleeper base, and a neodymium magnet buried into the base to hold it down. I would not have a use for 00-P, but the technology might allow an upgrade of Setrack points to 00-BF.

- Richard.

How will this system fix the replacement crossings onto a commercial track base like Peco, which is rigid polythene?

- Richard.

There's nothing wrong with demonstrating anything, but expecting a buy-in for a demonstration as a new standard is a completely different matter.

As far as I can see, 00-P would suit a finescale modeller of the Middleton Railway or the Penydarren Tramway, but such a modeller will be building their track from scratch to preserve the look of the original railway. I suppose they could set up an oval of Peco track to use to run in their models.

Apart from this, 00-P it would suit a modeller with a P-87 or similar layout who fancies running some modern 00 RTR. Nothing wrong with this, probably a bit oddball in some people's eyes, but not the basis for a new standard.

- Richard.

I suggest 00-P is a farce, dreamt up to make a cover for a faked misunderstanding of 00-SF which has finally fallen into public view.

- Richard.

...

 

For your sanity and for the longevity of your train, I highly recommend that you build a casette that takes the entire train. Leave it permanently coupled and just put it in the back seat of your car to take to shows or the club. We've reduced the "fiddle factor" of separating the cars but there is no way to reduce the fiddle factor for reconnecting all of those plugs. It will take you a good half hour to set up, at least.

 

...

What would be a sensible length for a cassette, to hold the 4-coach model plus 12 mm foam at each end?

No back seat in the Mazda but there is a parcel shelf and a boot.

- Richard.

I realise this is an international forum, and some modellers outside the UK may have very specific objectives.

The present options of 00, EM and P4 give us some choice between interoperability, ease of construction and realism, but 00-P doesn't seem to have much of any of these.

So in the UK, 00-P seems like DAB radio - a solution to a problem which doesn't exist.

- Richard.

Here is a photo of the relay board wired up, I took this yesterday just before I fixed the rear profile panels onto the baseboard:

The foam board is quite good for cable management.

- - 

When you have the TinySine USB adaptor (my last post), you can change the factory configuration of the Bluetooth module. You have to take the module out of the relay board and put it into the USB adaptor. Move two DIP switches on the module. Connect the adaptor to a PC USB port and run up the utility software from TinySine. Make the config changes. Power down the module, reset the switches and return it to the relay board. This is very easy to do but you do need the USB adaptor, you cannot do this with the module installed in the relay board.

You can change the device ID string, password and baud rate. I set the device ID to the name of the layout and kept the default 9,600 baud. So when the freebie Android app is connected to the layout, the screen now looks like this:

After you have made one successful connection, the Bluetooth module appears in the app's list of its previous pairings:

And, if you look around before pairing, your other Bluetooth devices can find it:

I am sure some members will see all this as intellectual m*st*rbtn, but it's not much different to putting the name of the layout onto a control panel with a bit of Dymo tape.

I'll wait and see who hacks the layout at its first show.

- Richard.

The Bluetooth module identifies itself as 'BluetoothBee' with a pre-set password. You need a USB adaptor to change these details and to change the baud rate. I've ordered up one of these boards, partly for engineering satisfaction but also so I can set the ID to match the name of the layout.

The USB adaptor arrived from China today, 12 days after placing the order - seems good service to me, especially for only £3.40 P&P.

The board has header sockets for the Bluetooth module, a USB socket, and five solder pads:

5V

Gnd

Rst

Tx

Rx

so it looks as though you could use this board (with the module) to turn an existing RS232 device into a Bluetooth client. Hmm.

Edit: or a host. Either is possible.

- Richard.