ColinK

Brilliant.

I have led’s in buildings (and coaches), wired in parallel and powered by batteries.

I use PVA

Agree, for my first etched brass attempt I built one of his wagon kits, it went together well and the extra instruction book he sent me was a great help. Almost worth building one as a learning experience. While I’ve soldered electrical joints for a very long time, soldering brass kits is different. I went to one of the Merseyside 009 meetings (open to all) where the chap from Worsley Works showed me how to solder brass kits successfully.

DCC Concepts make a high power CDU, the price is reasonable given that it is mains powered and includes the transformer in a sturdy metal case.

I wouldn’t be surprised if WCRC are trying to get The Scottish Govt to fund CDL.

My Heljan 26 and 33 are superb runners, but their shunters are awful, I think it is pickmup problems with the shunters.

I use Devcon, bought in fairly large bottles from Squires tools. For modelling I use the 5 minute setting stuff which works fine. I did buy the 3 ton strength stuff by mistake once, it is great for jobs at home. Repaired a chair with it several years ago and the bond is still rock hard.

Typical, I’ve just finished building a kit of one - chosen because it wasn’t available as RTR.

Go for variety, that will keep more people interested.

I agree it is probably the long sequence of the engine starting up; it will not move until that has completed. What you can do is, with the sound off, move your controller to speed step one, then turn the sound on.

Thanks, had another go at the 3 way point today. All 4 solenoid coils are getting power, but they will only set the straight direction. One suggestion is that because it is a symetrical 3 way point, when trying yo set the left or right direction, the two sets of point blades try to move, but because they are moving against each other the point will not change. Anyway, I’ve removed one of the 3 way points from the layout and one of my more electrically competent friends is going to try and get them working.

Interesting plan, looking forward to seeing it develop. I had a 0-16.5 layout of a rail served chocolate factory - it was called ‘Quality Street’ and was very tongue in cheek.

Got to make some space in my railway room, just found this kit behind some boxes.

Shame that Rails difn’t do 41002 and the NRM 41001.

Today I had an unexpected free day. Chose to go to the Rainhill Model Railway Exhibition, partly because there was a free vintage bus service to The St Helens Road Transport (bus) Museum. The museum was much better than I expected. Well laid out with lots of buses, plus a few cars, lorries, bikes etc and loads of really interesting displays, some of models and artifacts, but lots of photographs with extensive captions. I could have spent all day reading them. I had driven two of the buses, both LUT Guy Arabs, when they were training vehicles. Indeed I took my PSV test on one of them. I did like what the info boards said about them.

Unexpectedly I had a free day today, giving me a choice of visiting Preston or Rainhill exhibitions. I chose the latter because I wanted to see Crinan and because I had never been to the St Helens Museum of Transport. Crinan was excellent, better than the photos on here and the revised quayside superb. Very friendly show too. In the morning I took the free vintage bus to the St Helens museum, that was far better than expected. As well as the expected buses (two of which I had learnt to drive on) there were smaller displays throughout the museum which were well worth reading.

One to avoid is Testor’s Dullcote, it disolved some transfers on one of my locos. vallejo, Lifecolor and Humbrol acrylic varnishes have all worked well for me, either brushed on thinly or airbrushed.

There is a radio programme on today (Sunday) comprising only of train songs. It is on Alive107.3 at 11am and Radio Northumberland at 8pm. Most people will need to listen online by ‘listen live’ on the radio stations websites. If you miss it this week it will be repeated next Sunday.

The white baseboards on top of the framework were made for me by Tim Horn, eight boards all to bespoke sizes. I’ve also used White Rose Woodworks from Bedale and they were fine. I exhibited my G scale layout last weekend. It was on the top level, but now has moved down so a new OO layout can be built on the top using the Tim Horn boards. As you can see, I’ve now got to find a home for all the stuff that had collected where the G scale now is. Incidentally the framework is softwood, but painted with teak stain.

Nope, I spotted the missing green wire before the points were installed.

Well spotted, the green wire wasn’t connected when I took the photo, but it is now.

I’ve built one of the Craftsman 02 kits, took me at least 30 years from starting to finishing. Recently it has been DCC fitted which involved replacing the motor.

The DCC Concepts CDU certainly has enough power to change several solenoid motors at once. However both three way points do not work as expected. While they will set the straight route, neither will set the left or right routes. Any suggestions on how to get them working properly appreciated.

I have RGB+W strips that run on 24v and are very good. But for my next project our electrician has recommended CW or BW as you get more light than RGB strips