AndrueC

Hi, I'm in the process of adding more turnout motors and have run into a problem with my PSX-AR circuit breaker tripping. The working configuration is: * NCE PowerCab. * PSX-AR Set to trip at 1.27A * Three Cobalt turnout controllers with five motors attached. * Three locos on the layout (N scale) = .42A or * NCE PowerCab. * PSX-AR Set to 1.27A * Two Cobalt turnout controllers with three motors attached. * Seven locos on the layout (N scale) * Alpha Mimic driving four LEDs. =.47A After investigating I've found that the PSX-AR only trips on start up. If I have the Alpha Mimic switched off then switch it on all seems fine and the PowerCab reports 0.52A. So I'm wondering how to proceed here. I already have a booster for the accessory bus that I haven't fitted yet which would appear to solve the problem but I have a couple of questions: * Should I care that the trip occurs or is moving the load off onto a separate bus a perfectly valid fix? I don't just want to kick a problem with my track power further down the road or ignore a warning sign. * The booster says it has overload protection (at 5.6A) but it's the auto reset type and only cuts power for 1ms - would it be sensible to buy a second circuit breaker than can trip permanently to protect the accessory bus?

It wasn't supposed to be this way.. As per my previous post I'd left the job half done. I don't like doing that. I could have lived with only two turnout motors installed but one installed and one just sat by the track is not acceptable. So with a spare hour left in the afternoon I pulled myself together and went back to the layout. I connected the turnout to the track, plugged it into the controller and switched on ready to check the positioning. B E E E E E E E P! What the..? My circuit breaker has tripped. Is the new connecting wire fouling the track? Nope. Did that lost connecting wire find it's way onto the track? Damn. So I grab a spare wagon and start minutely inspecting the track around where the wire could've pinged. No sign of it. Ah but while working under the board I hit my head and made things rattle. Perhaps some rolling stock has jumped the rails and caused a short. So I inspect the South Yard and find one coach and two wagons off the rails. Well the wagons can't be at fault because although they do have metal wheels they don't have lights so can't cause a short but of course coaches can. Reseating the coaches is tricky in a packed staging yard so I remove them. Then I power the track back on. B E E E E E E E P! Okay, this is disturbing. If it's that connecting wire I'm going to have a devil of a job finding it. Those things are small. First step - remove all the rolling stock from the South Yard. The only good thing about doing that is that it was already on my to-do list because I want to ballast that yard. What I love about N gauge is how long the trains can be. In my case a metre long. So that's five coaches/freight wagons and double that number of coal wagons. The South Yard was full so that's four trains to dismantle and pack away. Joy. Oh and although I kept all the boxes I obviously wasn't assiduous about packing them up because I'm damn' sure that a Maunsel coach should not be going into a box that says 'DCC fitted' on it and this class 53 does not fit into the box with its name on it. But after half an hour it's all done. Rather than power the track back up I grab my multimeter and check for continuity between the tracks. Beep! You have continuity! What? Right next sensible thing to do - I've been playing with the electrics so maybe I've damaged something. So I dig around under the board and disconnect the bus from the power feed. Time for the multimeter again. Beep! You have continuity! Now I'm flumoxed. I move all the rolling stock off the North Yard rails (only three trains on this side thankfully) and I don't bother to pack them away. Test the MM Again. Beep! You have continuity! Frankly this is getting ridiculous. I begin to have visions of unsoldering track to find out where the problem is. But then I have another idea. When I built the layout I fitted a snubber. Not because I thought I needed one (let's not have that debate) but because it was cheap and no-one said it did any harm. So I unscrew one of the wires. And test with the MM again. <silence>. You do not have continuity. Wow. Better test the snubber on its own. <silence>. You do not have continuity. So I wire the snubber back in and bracing myself I test with the MM. <silence>. You do not have continuity. So I wire the bus back to the output and flick the power switch. I get the usual clunks, clicks..and nothing else. No Beeping. All is right with the world. So I've fixed the issue (hurrah) but don't really know what the problem was. The connectors on the snubber are possibly not intended for 14 gauge wire and the ends of the wires were bit frazzled. I can only assume that in my haste many months ago I had a frayed end or two hanging out and somehow today I brought those into contact with each other. You're probably asking if I've now finished installing the second turnout. No. I'm now even more frazzled than I was before lunch. I can only take consolation from knowing that next weekend I can lay my at-grade crossing and ballast the South Yard which will finally complete all my layout's ballasting.

What's in a name? So I'm beginning to formalise the names of some areas of my board. Here are a few of them: North Yard, South Yard. The two staging yards. Cleverly named for the fact that one is on the north side of the board and the other is on the south. North Yard, to the left, South Yard to the right. Then there's Castle Curve because, well, duh! Then there's Beekle's Crossing (named after a Budgie I used to share my house with) A couple of weeks ago I posted a picture of Wilf's Junction (named in honour of my late Dad) and mentioned Angry Tunnel (the train is coming out of it). I was hoping someone would ask me why it was called Angry Tunnel but to my disappointment no-one did. It's simple really. It's because the lines cross inside:

The point of it all (part 2) Earlier this year I had an exciting time installing point motors on to the North Yard. It was made most difficult by me having to lift the turnouts in order to remove the over centre spring. For that reason I've been putting off doing the South Yard. But Saturday's train running session showed that I really wanted motors on both yards. It just felt so primitive to move turnouts by finger. But the good news is that I've discovered a technique for removing the spring that doesn't require track lifting. So here is how you remove the over centre spring from Peco N-gauge Setrack: Set the turnout to straight ahead. This makes the spring more accessible. Insert the tip of a scalpel under the spring and raise it (it'll reach about 45 degrees). With a very small pair of wire snips grasp the spring. Don't bother trying to snip it. Twist the snips while steadying the points with a finger. It doesn't take much force but the spring will eventually come out. And so this morning's task was to install three turnout motors. To be honest I was hoping to have all three done this morning but I ran out of gas and only managed one. Here's what happened: I had to connect the first turnout to the second controller (already in-situ) by extension cable. The controller is the baseboard so I had to get on my hands and knees. When I'd installed that controller I set it fairly high up and the plug I needed was the top one so it took five minutes of finagling before I got it home. Then I had to adjust the throw. Remembering last time I was careful to copy the settings of the previous turnouts. On the Cobalt controllers for N-gauge '+' and 'S' appears to the setting to use. Then I just had to fix install the motor itself. First issue - I picked the wrong linkage and in the process of working this out I managed to ping the linkage..somewhere. I looked and I looked but I couldn't find it. Thankfully a quick test showed that it hadn't landed on the track but now I've got to buy a magnet because I can't leave a small piece of metal kicking around. Sigh. Then I had to position the motor. Doing it by finger was pretty easy (although I can never remember whether '1' is out or in even when I'm testing it. Having determined the position I gently screwed it in. Tested it and the motor wouldn't budge. Eh? So I unscrewed it and double checked the position. Apparently I was off by a millimetre. So reposition and try again. Same thing. Now I'm getting a bit irritated. A few more attempts and it seems that I can only screw this motor down at the rear. Meh. It's secure enough and a little bit of play doesn't seem to bother it. On to the second motor. For this I need to install a controller. It started well enough. Drill small pilot holes, screw controller to baseboard side. Now I just needed to run some wire from the previous controller to this one. Simple eh? Cobalt stuff is easy to use because it's all plugs and screw connectors. Hah! I still don't know exactly what happened but one of the screw connectors just didn't want to play. I couldn't get the wire in no matter how much I swore at it. Eventually in exasperation I unscrewed the controller so that I could get better access. Still no joy until I stuck my screwdriver into the hole and gave it a waggle. Finally the wire goes in. The connectors don't look like they have a clamp inside them, just the screw itself but it seems like sometimes they need some persuasion. By this time I've been crawling around the baseboard for over an hour. Several times I'd left tools somewhere stupid so that I couldn't find them or had to crawl back out to get them. This is an old habit that I thought building a model railway had cured me off but apparently when I'm annoyed I go back to my old habits. Anyway the way it's left at the moment is that the second motor needs to be positioned and screwed down. I've also noticed that the motor cables will need a bit of adjustment to avoid fouling the South Outer Cutting.

It'd look better with some weathering effects

You certainly can do. I did. Although what I've actually done is run a dedicated spur off the start of the main bus and daisy-chained my motor and light controllers together rather than using 'droppers' for them. It works fine but I have 8 locos on the track and with them idle my controller (NCE PowerCab) jumped from .2A to .4A. That's still well within the controller's ability but I've got 12 more LEDs to add and one more motor controller so have bought a booster that will allow me to isolate accessories from track. It will also mean that if run a loco against a turnout I can still operate the turnout even if the track bus fuse trips. Depends. I bought the NCE PowerCab which is very popular. You have a hand controller that plugs into a PCB. The PCB has a power jack and two outputs. You connect your track bus to these outputs and that's it. Don't be tempted to just connect the track and rely on fishplates for conductivity. If it all possible solders droppers to every individual piece of track. Speaking from experience as a relative newbie (only started myself a year ago) I can attest that fishplates are not reliable conductors. Yes. The motors (actually their controllers) are just responding to DCC commands the same as the locos are although they use separate range of addresses. Mimic panels are actually doing the same. It's a bit of a shame they are called 'mimic' panels because it seems like a cheating term to use. They are basically just devices that monitor the DCC signals and respond to commands like anything else. One use of them is to respond to the same commands as are being sent to something else (thus they 'mimic') but to me that's a specialised usage. I'm using an Alpha Mimic and it's purely to operate my LEDs. The reason for that is the LEDs are guarding the entrance to sidings and driving each one off the corresponding turnout motor would still require me to 'decode' the light pattern to determine valid routing. Instead I have four sidings with four LEDs and whichever LED is green is the valid route. But technically the LEDs aren't mimicking anything. The controller is programmed to set the colour of each one for the route I've activated. Yes. You will need to isolate them but it's not a problem. It's recommended for large layouts anyway.

If you have laid Peco N scale turnouts and are wondering how to remove the over centre spring - it can be done. It can be done in situ and isn't even particularly difficult. The problem is that the flap we're supposed to remove is underneath which makes things more difficult. However I've just discovered that if you move the turnout to the straight position there is just enough room to get the tip of a scalpel under the spring and lift it about 45 degrees. There is then just enough room to get a very small pair of wire snips in. From there just twist the spring a bit while stabilising the points and the spring will come out. I doubt you'll get it back in again but hopefully you won't need to. Some websites (and Peco) claim that removing the spring weakens the turnout. I don't know why they'd claim that. All it does is what you'd expect it to do - leaves the points flapping in the breeze. Attach a motor and they will be fine. The reason I had to remove mine was because Cobalt-SS motors won't budge a Peco turnout with the spring in place. Of course ideally you'd allow for motors when laying the track but I'd made the conscious decision at the time not to bother. I assumed I'd never take this layout far enough to need them. So now I have a new project for this Monday. Adding motors to my South Yard.

Giving yourself the run around.. So it's been a while since I actually ran any trains. Last time I did Miss Behaviour lived up to her name and kind of put me off. Instead of running trains I buried myself in my show piece diorama. That's coming along nicely and will be the subject of another post in a week or so. But I'd promised myself that today would be train running day. Rebuild some confidence in my layout. So this morning I have run: * Miss Behaviour (class 43). Not a single break-away but her unpowered rear struggled to keep the lights on. Bit odd that - it now has a Zimo decoder installed but I can only assume there's a pickup problem somewhere. The important thing is that she ran for ten minutes without dropping any coaches. * DRS Bertha (class 67). Ran without an issue. * Little Bertha (class 53). Didn't want to move at first (seemed dead other than lights) but after removing her bogies (ooh er missus) I found some scenery in her gears. After removing that she seemed fine. * Blue Gorgeous (another class 67). Ran without an issue. So that was nice. I'll run some more this afternoon, might take a look at the trailing car on the '43 to see if I can sort that out.

Indeed not. Unbelievably no-one does. Farish did one but it seems like it wasn't DCC ready. They were going to release one this year (no idea if it was a retool to support DCC) but they seem to have given up on the idea. No gronks for us it seems

I have a Dapol 2S-007-016D-PO and it doesn't run very well at low speed. When changing direction it sometimes buzzes instead of moving (sounds to me like slipping gears as it's almost a whine). I bought it cheap so thought it'd be interesting to try and repair it myself. Unfortunately so far I've only worked out how to get the cab off - lift and pull - which gives access to the decoder. That reveals two clips that allow the back of the boiler to lift up but I can't work out to get the front to release. When the back lifts up the entire rest of the body 'hinges' about the base of the smoke box as if there are supposed to be clips to release that but I can't find them. I don't know if this is related at all but it was a bit of a struggle to reprogram the decoder that came with it. Took several attempts before I finally got the new address to take with it struggling to read CVs.

Sounds awful. At least the Chiltern line was clean and punctual and since I was working in Birmingham not London it was always possible to find a seat.

Several years ago I was commuting to Birmingham by train and standing on a station platform at 7am on a winter morning has nothing to recommend it especially when you know that at the end of the journey is a day's work

That's true. We still have February to come. February can be a cruel, cruel month. My birthday is in February - that's how bad it can be

G o L F ! Okay so I play all the year around but I can't currently play in the evenings. It's a coming!

Yup. What I'd like to be able to do is just issue the command 'Run Big Bertha'(*) and the computer will park any train that is in her way, switch the turnouts and get her rolling. (*)Actually that might throw up an error. My Big Bertha is a class 56 by Dapol and she's never run anywhere. 'Crawl slowly' is more accurate

I need to improve socially as well. Thankfully I don't have any health issues at the moment but it can't be healthy long term to never see anyone other than delivery drivers and golf buddies once a week (albeit more frequently in summer). I've never felt the need for social interaction previously but the various lockdowns have proven that even I do have a minimum level of contact that I need. It's sad to think that 'going to work' was pretty much my entire social life especially since as a programmer I mostly just sit at a desk muttering obscenities to myself I'm intending to retire in 2023 so I'm hoping I'll be able to foster some stronger friendships at that point. For sure all the advice is that you need social interaction to enjoy a healthy later life. I even promised myself I'd get out more once Covid was gone and that gives me mixed feelings about Omicron at the moment. It's giving me an excuse to stay in my solo comfort zone. On the modelling front I'm progressing well with my new diorama and I'm determined that this Saturday will be 'play with the trains' day. Last time I ran them was after putting some back on one of my yards after painting it and my reward was carriages breaking away. I've been almost dreading running them again for fear of that. Which is daft because: a) I know from summer that breakaways don't have to happen. It's solvable. b) It's only ever one train anyway. My class 43 is called Miss Behaviour for a reason. c) I bought some better couplers to replace the Arnolds I'm currently using. But there's something dispiriting about a breakaway on a roundy-roundy layout I feel. I suppose it's because it suggests that the layout is fundamentally deficient. Roundy-roundy, stoppy-stoppy, restarty-restarty But onwards and upwards! ..as the actress said to the bishop Oh and @woodenhead I feel your .NET Core pain. One of the reasons I want to retire now is I'm sick of having to follow Microsoft's machinations with .NET. We currently have active solutions using Framework, Core and Standard with dependencies between all three. Add in that we use both WPF and Xamarin and frankly it does my 'ead in!

Oh by 'simpler' I didn't mean less. I've learnt that lesson now Next layout will have droppers on every individual piece of track. But I currently have two loops (one is a figure of eight) and trains can run from one to the other or they can be operated separately. I have two staging yards with four sidings in each. But the wiring is just a bus and droppers. No need for isolation sections or switches for sidings. I'd call that simpler. I do now have turnout motors but they currently have their own bus - or at least they daisy-chain off a single point near the head of the track bus. One of my projects for this winter is to install a booster for them. But I agree that block detection is going to be interesting problem to solve on my next layout. I can imagine some solutions might not even be compatible with N gauge.

The simpler wiring was my attraction to DCC but I also want my next layout to be fully computer controlled. I'm a computer programmer so setting that up doesn't bother me. I know all the correct swear words and after twenty years with Visual Studio a little bit of home automation should be a walk in the park

Apparently I live in the country's Omicron hotspot. Can't say I've noticed but then I never did have much of a social life. One of the things I like about golf is its lack of mandatory social interaction. In one competition I mentioned to my foursome that I struggle to remember other people's names and one of the guys replied "I find it doesn't matter, much"

Here comes the sun... I don't celebrate Christmas but I always have a little celebration for the day after the solstice - saying hello to the new sun

Yeah. I've not yet got dejected but I was a bit exasperated recently after I'd removed all the stock from one of my yards to paint the track. Having had a faultless summer I made sure to number all the stock as I boxed it so as to re-assemble in the same way. Despite that when I tried to run my class 43 she kept suffering breakaways where she had last spring. I think I know part of the cause (I had the body off the rear unpowered unit to fit a decoder and hadn't properly clipped the chassis back in) but honestly I've been too 'scared' to run her again and haven't tried any of the other rakes either. My layout is definitely a round-roundy and seeing a train go wrong half way round is dispiriting. I'm still using Arnold couplers though and do have a set of replacement Dapol knuckles so maybe the time has finally come to fit those on the 43(*). The other rakes never did cause me trouble but the thought of discovering that they too don't like being disturbed is putting me off running. At least I have a major modelling project to concentrate on and I'm intending to devote at least one of the Christmas holiday days to running stuff. I'm sure once I've seen everything run I'll be happy again. Bite sized chunks is definitely the way to go. That's something I know from computer programming. I think my biggest problem at the moment is that I'm used to the speed of software development and also like to see results ASAP. I think one of my challenges when I retire is learning that modelling is a journey and getting to the end is no longer desirable (*)I call her Miss Behaviour for a good reason. Le sigh.

Yes. It's inspired me to review the ballasting of Wilf's Junction to see if I can improve it. Mine is a bit too uniform and bland although the lighting has made it look more bland than it really is. I'm also still not completely happy with the colour. It's still too white I think. Sadly at this point I don't want to redo the ballast again so just got to see if a bit of dry painting can improve it.

Very clever but I agree with the previous comment about reversing. My current layout has two small staging yards and access to both is via a single ramp. I do find that the thought of having to first reverse down a ramp to get to the mainline puts me off running the trains a bit. It's not so much the risk of derailment (only time it ever happened was with my class 43 and that was due to an issue with the power pickups that I fixed) as the hassle. It detracts from what is supposed to be the primary attraction of my layout, namely running trains through the landscape. And once you've run a train you've then got to get it back up the ramp and into its siding. My next layout is going to have pass-through sidings so that when I fancy running trains I can just switch on and go with whatever train was last running and when I fancy running a different train it's just a matter of stopping the current one in its siding and switching the turnouts.

Bert and the maintenance crew(*) exit Angry Tunnel and negotiate Wilf's Junction heading toward the main up ramp. Perhaps they are finally going to straighten out the track near the top? (*)Not to be confused with the 1960s popular group 'Fred and the Maintenance Gang'

Well for the record I'm not a CEO. In fact I'm not even a manager. I've been a programmer all my career and since I intend to retire in a year or so (age 55 or 56) that's all I'll ever be. But generally speaking I believe in letting market forces decide remuneration (although I agree it's significantly unbalanced at the moment). But hey this is not addressing the original question so I'm happy to leave it at that.