MinerChris

Its both, Metal frames with plastic spacers.

Was it when you did the Sunshine Stock and Autocoach underframes? (both excellent kits BTW...)

myservo.read is only the last command sent to the servo, not the position of the servo itself, and is consequently lost when the Arduino is powered off, hence why I think it is slightly better to get a switch to read where it should be (you will still get a rapid movement if the switch state is changed with no power, when everything is turned back on again) Or even better, attach a microswitch to the movement to see where it actually is... Best Regards, Chris.

Thats pritty much it, but I have just used one side of the DPDT as how a push button would be wired, but that's not to say that how you've wired it wouldn't work too. I've just retested my circuit again, and I remember that the servo's do still buzz from startup until the switch polarity is changed, which I think may be because my transistor is only dropping the feed voltage to 4V across the servo when the pin is low and when the board starts up it seems to put 2V into the signal lead, which I have solved by setting up the servopins as outputs Best Regards, Chris

Valentin, Another common cause of buzzing could be that the potentiometer cannot match the final value being asked of it, particularly with servos of the cheaper variety, causing it to flip backwards and forwards as it tries match the signal. As Nick and Nigel mention dropping the signal feed should stop this which can be done using myservo.attach and myservo.detach commands in the main loop rather than the setup at the start of the sketch. Something that you may want to also consider is that on St Ruth, arcing from conventional motor contacts and dirty wheels has been known to generate "false signals," so you may want to drop all power to the servo once it gets to the final position, using a Transistor driven off another pin of the Arduino, and put ~100nF capacitors across your track feeds. I've also build in a mechanical stop to protect my points should all else fail, and a reduction mechanism to try and use as much throw as possible, its a little belt and braces, but I don't think my easitrack points are particularly strong in shear. Alternatively, you could do as some others have done and rip out the electronics and convert it to a stall motor with use of microswitches. You don't mention if you are using a pushbutton as on the webpage, or a toggle, personally, I'd use a toggle as there is then a way for the Arduino to take an educated guess as to where the servo is when it powers up, and decide if it needs to move or not. it also then has the ability to switch the frog if you use a DPDT, I've attached my sketch to drive two servos from an MICRO board, feel free to adapt this for your needs if you wish! Best Regards, Chris. Congdons_Shop_Servos.ino

Definitely think that the new grass looks spring-like, as opposed to the post drought of the old lint. I do wonder if the dye has faded over the last 10 years in the sun, you don't have a old piece stashed away in your bits box for comparison? Best Regards, Chris.

Welcome to the world of printing small things... You don't say what scale you are printing, but for the pricing, I'd guess 4mm? I had some WR disks printed in FXD 'print it anyway,' that came out pretty well, having holes in all the right places to make everything work. I'd be interested if you run into 'wire' issues too with them. In the end I'm not sure about the robustness of the material, hence why I haven't done anything further since last year. I just envisage that a over zealous track cleaner would shear it clean off from the the base. Best Regards, Chris.

Pity he hasn't written it up then! Would this mean a commitment to write more than once per year? why buy one, when you can get two, to support your friendly association... Best Regards Chris,

Thanks Both, I'll forego the resistor next time too methinks. still just a couple of bits to get around to before I bring it back. Just the two sets of etches, soldered and stripped many, many times. Isn't there a race on between John and Steve? Best Regards. Chris.

Late to the party I know, but here's my write up of my build of the 14xx chassis, after many failed attempts, as I know not everyone reads the blog's. http://www.rmweb.co.uk/community/index.php?/blog/1134/entry-17763-fixing-the-vomit-comet-part-2/ Best Regards, Chris

The second instalment in this ongoing saga has been three years and two international moves in the making; thankfully the end is nigh, with no casualties as a result of a chassis catapulted in anger across the room. An update for those who didn't read part 1, I am slowly working through an 14xx conversion kit from the 2mm association for the Dapol model, designed by Chris Higgs in order to produce my first steam loco for use as an branch passenger train on the groups layout St Ruth and my own layout(s). Last time I had got to the point of fixing the motor, I did eventually get around to attaching the gears and wheels and painting that version, but the result was a chassis that still had a severe limp at one of the two speeds available, hence it seemed like a good idea to start again (again) rather than writing up yet another failure. Hopefully writing up the trials and tribulations up will be a help to someone starting from fresh in the future anyway. 7. Too much time drinking beer, still After the predictions from the last time I wrote about this kit, I have changed. I now drink Gin and Tonics too. In fact it helped more than once to go and have a beer instead of trying to muddle on with some infernal problem. Listening to the archers used to be a good excuse for a break too, but it’s gone all eastendersey now instead of the relaxing nonsense it used to be. 8. Go away and build some other kits. I think this is possibly the most important step. The last time I had built the chassis, with the combined experience of a couple of BR 4 shoe chassis’ for vans and a mineral wagon starter kit. I’ve now gone through close to 40 wagons and a couple of coaches before starting this time. I have also invested in a temperature controlled soldering iron, and whilst I don’t usually vary the temperature, I think the feedback from the iron helps to control the amount of heat into the piece. 9. Strengthening. Last time, the attempts I had made to give a little more rigidity to the chassis, after making it banana shape, involved soldering brass rods to the inside faces of the chassis sides, but this hadn’t really worked too well as there was still an weak point around where the spacers were placed. Taking inspiration from the more recent of Chris’ chassis, I took the last iteration of the chassis (MK7 or whatever, I lost count,) straightened it out, filed off some of the more protruding bits and used it as an overlay on a new etch. It helped to keep the new sides on the etch keeping them flat whilst sweating the two together using the bearings as alignment pins. If I was starting from scratch, I’d advise myself to buy two of the kits and do this again. 10. Simpson springs I tried Simpson pickup springs again on the new chassis, using the same wire I used in the previous attempt. This time, however I drilled the bearings out to 1.55mm to give a little ’engineering tolerance.’ I also didn’t bother to fit springs onto the pony wheels, given that they should be relatively easy to retrofit if pickup becomes a problem later on, and liable to damage during the assembly process. I tried to fit top acting wipers to the driving wheels, but in the end they were causing too much resistance on the wheels when testing. Possibly because there is very little room to fit them on the side frames meaning that they had to be sprung greater than they would otherwise be if attached above the wheel. 11. Assembly Having overlain the chassis, the supplied assembly jig was now useless as it would not fit in between the slots. The association chassis assembly jig was pressed into service to help keep everything square. However all is not as simple as it seems, as pointed out on the VAG some time ago, the central spacer on the jig is designed to set the spacing for PB frame material and not for the PB Bearings (which were coincidentally, just about, protruding through the double thickness chassis.) This was solved using a piece of square tube of approximately the correct dimensions with a perpendicular(ish) hole drilled through the middle. It would be nice to get a new pair of spacers to fit the jig turned on a lathe, to get everything entirely square and accurate but this’ll do for now. The spacers were then soldered underneath and on the top, wicking the solder up to meet the sides of the chassis creating a, on the whole, more solid joint than just attaching to the folded tab on the top. 12. Motor and gear selection. Chris suggests using the Association flat can motor for all of the kits, however having heard many good things from Jerry and Ian, this time I plumbed for a Nigel Lawton micromotor. It’s true that not many motors would fit in the 14xx body, the Faulhaber 1016 wouldn’t fit, but the micromotor does and seems to handle a chassis with more stiction at lower speeds better than the flat can motor. I used a quality engineering approach to attach the motor to the chassis again this time, it’s epoxied onto a piece of plasticard epoxied onto the chassis. It helped to runs some volts though the motor whilst there is still some plasticity to the glue to get the worm and shaft all aligned with minimal binding. As the motor is closed there was no need to worry about paint getting into the internal mechanism too. I originally used the now discontinued imperial 30:1 imperial worm set and in the spirit of starting again I replaced this with the metric 30:1 set with a brass worm gear, which seems to have solved the meshing problems seen in the previous incarnation along with a more diligent assembly of the etched gearbox. After pushing the driving gear onto an new muff I epoxied it in place which stopped it from skewing, or at least to a lesser extent, as I believe that this was the primary issue behind the bad running in the first place. I think it helped to only push the gears onto a muff once, as after this I think there is too much horizontal slop, which means the gears don't mesh properly together. The modifications to the chassis spacing meant that it was necessary to file back a part of the gearbox supports and reverse the order of the spur gear and wormwheel gear, but all’s well that ends well. 13. Coupling rods and crankpins. In stripping the old chassis, I took the precaution of removing the old pins from the wheels and starting again with these too. This time I used the flanged crankpins instead of the normal crankpins in an effort to keep them square to the wheel from the outside face. After fitting these it was time for another polish. I only managed to stab my hand with the crankpin once whilst it was spinning in the minidrill… On the last assembly, I had decided that the old coupling rods were irretrievably bent, so new ones were fashioned from the generic stainless steel coupling rod etch from the association. Unfortunately there weren't 14mm spaced rods on this etch, so a hole was drilled through the coupling joint in one of the pannier sets. I think that this bodge may have resulted in a spacing that may have just been a tad off still, so these were retired with the arrival of a completely new etch. The new coupling rods were sweated together with a thin layer of solder between each of the layers, copious flux, pressure to ensure that all were aligned flat and plenty of heat. The holes in the coupling rod were then opened out slowly with a reamer until they were close fit on the crankpins with minimal slop. Rather than shortcutting to get to a running chassis underneath the body, with insulation washers, this time I kept the crankpins at the original length. Once happy that everything was running along nicely, I soldered the turned washers on and used the edge of a thin track file to cut the rest of the pin off, with the minimal of displacement. 14. Quartering jig. It’s worth every pound in my opinion. Yes the wheel s will still need a little adjustment afterwards, but the wheels will be safely pushed on without distorting the chassis or crankpin square-ness which I was extremely careful about in this build. 15. Lubrication. Having applied some power to the wheels, I was astonished to find everything moved as it should. I then ran it up and down my test track on full speed for an half an hour or so, (more in amazement than actual planned running in.) I’d probably put some oil on the gears straight away next time as there were some suspiciously bright spots on the worm gear following the initial run in. Strangely, slow running improved a hundredfold after I had applied some oil (I think I shouldn’t have used bicycle chain oil, but it’s all I had and seems to work fine.) And so that’s it… probably not some of the best practices in loco building, but I managed to get a chassis to work smoothly at an reasonably low speed in my opinion, without resorting to a backhand deal with a deity. A small drawback that was found after finishing, possibly as a result of using the flanged crankpins, was that the coupling rod washers were fouling the body when it was sitting down on the chassis correctly. This was rectified by cutting the body around the crankpins giving them clearance but upon reflection was probably caused by the use of the flanged crankpins over normal ones. I also made some modest improvements to the Dapol body: filing off the bottom of the boiler, replacing it with a piece of brass tube, gluing on the etched bufferbeams and replacing the handrail on the boiler, hence it looks a little more like a reasonable likeness to the prototype. I don’t really want to do too much more though, renumbering to 1419 (or 1434 if I want to stick the top feed on) adding some of my personally mined coal and touching up the new paint is probably all I will manage without a complete repaint and the dreaded lining. Stuffing as much tungsten putty into every orifice available in front of the centreline also seems to enhance adhesion to the rail and may even mean that it can pull a couple of autocoaches along quite happily. It may also mean that the rail doesn’t have to be completely spotless to ensure that something moves. I don’t think it’s going to be the next yard shunter on St Ruth, but as long as I don’t have to follow it with a finger on the branch passenger run, I’ll settle for that!

The Salt lake city branch of the Carlson wagon workshop continues at a pace, albeit glacial, with a Harris all steel open and a couple of Bob Jones' 21T hoppers... Painting of all wagons in the works is still ongoing. Thanks to a free shipping voucher from Shapeways, and the new FXD material I decided to push the limits of what can be done... Yes that's right, 3D printed ground signals for St Ruth (12" WR style disks), its not too bad on first glance and has surprisingly mostly survived the shipping across the country. for comparison, the original design. I suspect making these work, and attaching a lamp is going to be challenging to say the least. Best Regards, Chris.

Perchance it only sleepeth? Chris.

Pickled please... Best Regards, Chris.

The knowledge of RMWeb knows no bounds! Sadly from the topic content, Steve seems to have had difficulty from getting these from Bryn previously. Nonetheless I will try and contact him to see if the artwork still survives, and if he is prepared to let anyone else borrow it for personal etching. Best Regards, Chris.

As this seems to be an invitation for another wishlist thread ... One that I've not seen Mr Jones, Mr Harris, the NGS or the society do, is the Herring Ballast Hopper wagon... Thank you as ever Chris for your efforts to supply us with new and interesting wagons and coaches! Best Regards, Chris.

Apologies, The only reason was that I completely forgot about the SEQAG, Its a pity as I had my Class 22, a coach and controller in tow. If I make it out to Aus again I'll be certain to get in touch and try and bring something interesting.. Chris.

Very Apt!! Looks like you had a good St. Piran's Day!

... And then onto the point rodding for St Ruth? Chris.

Seems like sound engineering principles... Engineering flowchart: Does it Move? WD40 vs. Duct Tape (original artist unknown) by dullhunk, on Flickr

Is the insulation destined to keep the coupling rods on the hall too? Do you have any idea about how the moulded handrail brackets compare to similar ones from NBrass or the 2mmSA etched ones, as I guess this is the option for replacing the broken ones? Chris.

Thanks Pete. Hopefully the delay to move down to the states won't be too much longer, and I can get started...

I have to admit It is a little daunting... I think that the sensible thing to have done would be to have got some of the more complicated pieces of point work out of the way before building the boards, but you only live and learn. I'm also hoping that building normal points will become much quicker once the new pegged easitrack point kits are available. Chris

I had thought that the return of the winter weather would have resulted in slightly more activity on the bench, the new low score being -27oC, but as per usual life managed to get in the way of the things I would have liked to have done. First up some housekeeping on Hingston Down Halt. After much deliberation, including considering picking somewhere that was a double to single track junction, I have installed a missing catch point on the siding for the quarry. Apparently it’s very much best practice to rip up perfectly good 2FS trackwork at some point, although I feel a bit late to the party. Admittedly I probably should have realised a catch point was required when I was laying the original track, but then planning and building the baseboards in an afternoon means that these kind of details are missed. Days after I had glued this down and wired up the new feeds, I took a look at some photos of Luckett on the Callington Branch, I realised that the blade should have only been on one of the rails. Nevermind… This went together in an evening, even with evil chair plates. Unfortunately there is a very slight curve to the whole panel, presumably as I hadn't put enough tension on the rail when soldering. The class 22, bubblecar and minerals that I tried all seemed to navigate through without difficulty, so I'm not worried, just means that you’re unlikely to see a shot looking down through there any time soon. I thought it would be wise to build a small cover for the layout to avoid rails being bent, buildings being smashed up (“when I get around to it..”) as the storage picnic hamper also holds the power supply and controller. Cue some handy foam-board and a few offcuts of square dowel, and hey presto… one cover. Secondly I felt that I needed to revisit the planning for Lydford, 7 boards of 2’3 x 4’ just wasn't going to be practical for storage nor building strength. So I reduced this down to 6 boards of 2' x 4', using a little more compression to the mainline and removing the down war sidings. There is still over half a mile of scale running, plenty of opportunity for locos to stretch their legs. I'm still unsure about including the Lyd viaduct on the Southern up side, as I don't have any measurements and the views are obscured by the dense woodland in the valley. Having settled on this for the time being, I went off on my bike to collect the materials needed from the local “Hardware Store,” The result was probably bemusing to most locals to say the least: Extruded polystyrene boards made the most sense to me thanks to their low weight, and if they couldn't be taken with me, they would probably make a nice pontoon to swim out to in one of the many local lakes. The wood was attached with no-nails and 3" screws to provide the foam some protection on the edge, more than anything structural. I suspect that this may yet prove to be a hindrance when I try and marry the boards together with dowels, as the hardwood maple was fairly green when they were assembled meaning that in all likelyhood, nothing will be square. I will most likely put 3mm ply on the top surface before laying track, as it is still pretty vulnerable. It turned out that I just had enough room to lay 5 of the constructed boards out... Aren't I glad that I didn't choose to have 7! Finally, in the run up to heading back for Warley this year, I attempted to build a decent length of Stephen Harris’ mineral’s to bung up shunt the goods yard with on St. Ruth. Despite being snowed in at Sudbury airport for 6 hours, drinking the bar dry, I made it with my wagons intact. Thanks to some fairly disastrous shades of grey (yes, the vac fitted 21T’s are supposed to be brown, so I realized,) and drinking fine beers instead of applying transfers and weathering powders, they didn't make it and a number have been stripped off waiting for improved weather and another attempt. This is likely to be my last post in Canada as I am about to be relocated to the neighbours in the south. I happened to stumble upon a Flickr photograph showing that a miner having to up sticks from Cornwall isn't a new thing. At least I have some hope to have a return to the UK someday... cornwall - gwr emigrants train arriving redruth station by johnmightycat1, on Flickr Until next time; my fellow ostriches…

Carrying on the current theme of Midlands Area Group trying to get things ready for Warley... Unfortunately the three in the background away from the ensemble probably won't make it due to some disastrous painting, something that I suspect can't be remedied without stripping back and starting again. Chris.