JimFin

Still going strong and had a great day up with the Jarrow MRC at their exhibition. Hoping we have the same again tomorow, drop by if you are visiting.

Hobbytrain Vectron for the standard gauge section of Obervaz.

I said it was going to be Zona Industrial rather than Heidi Land - no idea what they make in there but I am sure they have the correct permits.

Not been abandoned, just been busy with other things.

Electrical testing etc all complete and started some scenic works. 

Mock up of the motorway position in card to get the templates for the plywood formers.

Base layer down for the concrete apron and first  fix steelwork for the Weyland plant to check dimensions.

On 12/04/2023 at 18:37, Hibelroad said:

I’m not sure that rule1 overrides the laws of physics. 

I am sure it would be OK as it only has to contend with 1:76 gravity. 😉

Super review - many thanks. Shame the control cars seem to have gone out of stock everywhere. Based on what you said, wonder if they had a disproportionate number of returns compared to the other vehicles in the rake. Reluctant to commit to any of the rest of the rake without the control car.

22 hours ago, Michanglais said:

Anyway, I attach a photo with a component - don't know what it is - and wondered if it was a necessary part of DCCing? I don't think it's a 'stay alive' because the loco stalls rather easily at low speeds even on clean track.

It is a stay alive - which is an optional component, you don't need that as a matter of course, especially not with a loco of that wheelbase.

Stalling at slow speed suggests the stay alive is possibly not working, poor/dirty wheels/pick ups are the next possible reason or the decoder has not been optimised for the motor. To resolve that you would need to start investigating/changing CV's but have a good look at the connectivity between the rails and the motor first.

21 hours ago, Gordonwis said:

 

Ready for use on the A66 today!

Almost needed it to get into the shed - let alone along the road!

7 hours ago, Gordonwis said:

 

Almost certainly not. At first I thought it was the camera angle but then I realised something had fallen off 618!

Not quite! 618 was on the workbench in the middle of getting a microtrains coupling fitted and the most conveniently to hand for the comparison.

Face to face on the "dual gauge" track. 

Some nice pictures of the last refurbishment of 647 here - 

http://www.haribu.ch/coppermine/displayimage.php?album=1118&pid=14768#top_display_media

More testing with a short consist.

This is using Hunt magnetic couplings between wagons which seems to be more tolerant of grade transitions than the Dapol knuckle couplings.

Testing is going well, nothing major just a few bits to fettle. 

The Microtrain couplings are also playing nice with the Dapol magnets. 

Point motors to fit to this board and then ballast are the next jobs.

If you have an Anycubic printer, the answer is No, don't upgrade unless you have a specific issue which you know the upgrade will solve if their support team have directed you to do it..

They are very poor at issuing release notes and it appears some firmware changes have been made simply to accommodate slicer enhancements - so you upgrade your firmware, find your favourite slicer wont work and either have to change slicer or revert to the previous version - which is not always possible as some of the updates are not reversible on older motherboards.

For any other printer, I would want to have a careful read of the release note for the upgrade to understand what the benefits / advantages are and the process to revert if need be.

Essentially - as if it's not broken, don't try and fix it in this instance.

This suggests CV113 for ESU decoders - https://www.dccconcepts.com/product/3-wire-small-stay-alive-for-zen-black-blue-decoders/

This project got parked for a long time due to other commitments but please to say I have reached a milestone in that all the track laying is complete -

The fiddle yard level and furthest away baseboard had their wiring full completed, tested and ballasted before being stored so I "just" have to wire up the top level of this board and fettle any issues. Glad I hinged the boards to save crawling about underneath!

Maybe on a main line layout, SBB / BLS but never RhB as it would be the wrong gauge.

I have both resin and filament printers and find, like many things, different tools are better for different jobs. Simple answer, bug and bulky, filament may be best, resin for finer detail.

Before you jump into resin do research all the safety and usage aspects. The stuff is actually toxic and smelly, completely incompatible for use in any kind of living space. Apart from the smell and any spills/splash, the VOC's it gives off, particularly after printing, can leave a sticky residue on anything within about a meter and a half of the print. The whole print and post print process needs to be contained ideally in an environment that is well (mechanically?) ventilated and has a device to maintain the temperature of the resin within it's operating window during the print.

Just bear these factors in mind when you plan where you will do your printing and I am sure you will find it very rewarding after a sharp learning curve.

On 30/12/2022 at 23:23, Bundah said:

Is it prototypic for these wagons to carry anything besides 20ft reefers or 20ft non-refrigerated containers ? 

Sorry it's a late reply but I believe the issue is -

The coop, postal and others like VOLG and Samedan are not strictly containers, they are truck demountable swap bodies and don't conform to the ISO container standard.

They are slightly longer but lower than ISO. I guess the locating points and  restraints will be different to ISO which is why you will not see a standard 20ft ISO container on a Lb wagon.

5 hours ago, Hobb0 said:

Little has been said about Bachmann controllers - any thoughts

 

I use the Bachmann Dynamis Ultima on my home and exhibition layouts with RocRail software on a laptop and the control is all by mouse from the screen.

Bachmann of course don't make this stuff, it's a rebadged ESU Navigator with a fairly dodgy hand controller that links up (on a good day) with an IR connection. Since the Ultima has a USB connection it's ideal to link it to the computer.

I don't use and automation but some route control so that one button sets all the points for that route. As locos are identified by thumbnail images on the screen, no real issue knowing numbers to key onto a handset. I have set the display up (wide screen gaming monitor) with the full available roster, a digital mimic board for the point, accessory and sound controls, adjacent to that a section for locos rostered for up traffic, next for down traffic and finally a section for station pilot  / free direction stock.

Big advantage is it takes about 10 minutes for a new operator to be competent, including one committed analogue user who could not get on with digital but found this to be no problem. My grandchildren (7 and  9) were quite happily running the layouts at Warley this year.

We do some remote operation using the RocWeb add on which allows any phone or tablet on the same network to act as a hand held. To that end, each layout has a built in router and discreet WiFi.

About the only down side I know of - it would not support detection and it is limited to 20 functions.

Since I have no plans to use detection and probably only use 5 or 6 functions on the sound equipped loco's anyway - it fits the bill for me.

Essentially all I am using the Ultima for is a translation box to pass the data from the laptop to the layout in DCC format. 

Guess you need to really analyse where you want to end up with your system and buy with capability to match your ambitions.

Just based on my own experience, good chance you have got 1 pair of droppers cross connected.

17 hours ago, PaulRhB said:

Oh and Gordon corrupted my layout further several times by running MGB stock! 😆

Only one person mentioned the MOB coaches running on Neuburg at Warley. 😉

It's a real nuisance when 2 old geezers stand right in front of the layout when you are trying to get a decent photo

Maybe, it depends on the type of wheelset. If both wheels are insulated and can slide on the axle, probably. If one wheel is fixed to the axle and the other insulated, not really as the centre line of the wheelset in relation to the bogie pivot and consequently the vehicle body will be off centre by about 2mm.

Other issue, depending on why you would do this, the overall frame width will be about 4.5mm wider than manufactured for HOm and may not fit into the chassis recess of the model. If you are scratch building bodies, you may be able to fiddle it but with difficulty as there will be issues on tighter radius curves with the wider bogie fouling the body - or the body will have to ride rather higher than it should to give clearance.