hobbyhorse

Some significant progress has been made with the baseboards with all the frame work complete. The next big job is the ply tops for those boards that haven't already been added. Simon

Just been informed the next years dates have moved to 29th/ 30th August. Simon

Progress is a bit slow because the layout is fitting around the walls in my workshop, this has some drawbacks as quiet a few benches need lowering and lots of stuff needs moving. Any way another two boards done. These are for the hidden storage yard, plus I've made some wall brackets to support them. As you can see some of the wall lining has been removed, not pretty but once the back scenes are added it'll cover the hacked wood. Before building any more boards I want to establish the hidden yard configuration of the turnouts and how the cement processing plant that is on top of the yard will work. The cement plant boards will be open top as these are on two levels. Good progress this week with another four baseboards, two for the cement works and two for the main line. The next boards are going to be a bit more challenging to build as these will provide the link between the lower yard and the high level main line. It's amazing how much timber is eaten up with these boards, another trip needed to buy some more. Simon

Well the complicated electronics work which is very satisfying. I've added JMRI to the test board and after a learning curve it works as well, one problem so far is if manually throwing the points it doesn't show on JMRI which if I understand correctly is because the Tam Valley decoders don't have a loconet connection, so no feed back. I have just linked up the Digitrax point unit and that does give feed back to JMRI. One bit that I was certain wouldn't work was using my smartphone via JMRI and router, and to my amazement it did. (This section was written in April 2017 on Facebook, and after extensive testing with the sevro point throws the reliability wasn’t that good. So the I went for the Tortoise type with the DS52’s to control them, which gives the required feedback.) Before cutting any timber I've draw some bits of the layout full size. One benefit is to check it all fits and more importantly the operating bits of the points don't fall on joints, the the motors can be located with conflicting with the cross bracing. A start was made on the first two boards for the loco shed and lower yard. Nothing complicated just soft wood frame with ply tops, the next board is a lift out board as it crosses a door way, so I've made up some pullout dowel connections, with alinement for the rest of the boards I’m using pattern makers dowels. Simon

Putting the various brake and expansion plates onto the models was fairly quick, what took a bit of time was making 50 dummy bolts for detailing the chassis. That's it for a while as I'm going to be doing some work on my ON30 layout. Simon

Until recently I've only publicised the North Kent Light Railway on Facebook, which was OK. But it's now time for a proper thread, so I'm going to start from its beginning which started with a small test board. Apologies to those that have followed it on Facebook, but this thread will go into greater detail. The theme for the layout will be industrial based on cement manufacturing, very freelance but using my experience working for BR visiting locations in North Kent and the Medway area, you might recognise location names which won't be anything like the real place. The idea is that most of the works and quarry's are connected by narrow gauge lines that feed a standard gauge line, and when built all the equipment was American, but as time progressed locos and rolling stock would be rebuilt making them look a bit more English. Why ON30/ 0-16.5, well I've done 00, EM, S4 and 0 gauges over the years and want a new challenge. My space is limited and the model will fit into my shed above my other toys (machine tools) at a track height of 55 inches for the main line. All the boards will hang from brackets fixed to the walls. ON30 enables some quite tight radius curves, and the main line will be 24 inch. The plan gives a flavour of what I'd like located in two parts of the shed. Next is to draw the plan full size. One important area is the layout is being designed with operations in mind using the car card and waybills system, which should keep 5 operators fully employed. Anyway onto the the test board, this will test out different radius points, servo point motors and the electrical control gear for power management, detection, signalling and JMRI control. I've not built a layout in over 20 years but have been heavily involved with other areas, so this will bring me up to date as this is going to be in a new gauge to me, 0N-30/ 0-16.5. Using 5 different radius points will prove which locos can be run over them, one Peco, two Fast track and two Roy Link types, these are assembled up in copper clad, with the Roy Link ones having pivoting switch blades. Initial thoughts are the hidden storage will Peco track, and the visible parts all hand made. With all the various boards and servos connected up and tested, no problems encounter with the electronics. A couple of issues with the point motor servos, firstly out of the five servos two have died, one with gear problems and the other with the built in circuit board. These are the servos supplied with the driver boards and are a cheap type. The other issue is the need to attach a switch to give feedback for point position, my thoughts are going towards the tortoise type. Simon

Back on the build after a short holiday. Lots of bits manufactured for the brakes and boiler expansion plates. I'm still pondering how to make the handrail knobs for the safety valve cover plates, but I've got an idea so just need to make some form tools. Simon

Kent Garden Rail is my local in St Mary Cray, it's got a good stock and very friendly. Simon

I've been putting off making the safety valves for a while, but bit the bullet this week. After deliberating which way to make them, I decided to follow the prototype exactly which meant some quite small parts, especially the buckle at the pivoting end of the valve. In the end I made the actual valve drop into the housing, this gives the correct shape to the valve tops. The rest of the part are straightforward machined parts, except the springs which took the longest to make. The cover plates have also been made, but not fitted yet as I need to make the handrail knobs that hold it down, which is the next job. Lastly the couplings have been fitted to the front plates. Simon

Concentrating this week on the smokebox door, it's fixings and some of the smaller details around the smokebox. Also soldered the chimney bases to the smokebox. Just got to make the darts which will hold the doors on.

This week I've been working on the chimneys, it's one of the things I really enjoy making. Using various jigs and tools speeds up producing them. The shorter chimney was the easiest one to make because I've got the works drawings, but the taller one just relies on some notes and a few photos. The reason for the taller chimney was because of a visit we made to the Linton & Barnstable line, shortly after finishing the restoration. The weather at the line was extremely wet and windy, so the decision to fit an enclosed cab and tall chimney was taken. We used the original base but cut off the tapered top, replacing it with a tube which came from a lamp post, and fitting a top which one of us had.

I had lots of problems until I fitted the Digitrax WiFi interface, works perfectly now. Simon

This week it's cab sheeting time. The lower cab consists of three sections, two sides and the back. The back section was made in one piece, and using the hand shaper to groove the fold lines, this ensured two crisp bends. The sides used the bottom fixings as a template for the bends. The top rails on the full size loco used a slightly rounded top, so once soldered on the top was rounded with files. I've not rounded off the rails on one loco as the tall cab will rest onto it. One tricky job was machining a notch into some 2mm nickel silver rod, these form the vertical hand rails that allow the side sheets to fit into, on the prototype we use tubes. And lastly was fitting the angle around the bottom of the cab footplate. Next job is the two chimneys which are both different. Simon

Before applying the rivets to the backplate the small additional thickening plate that allows the blowdown valve to be fixed to the bottom was made. The rivets required two different methods of fixing, those on the wrapper are soldered in, and the backplate ones glued in from the rear. A little bit of cleaning up is needed with solder around rivets, bit other than that I'm well pleased with the result. Next was the firehole doors, runners and tray. These have to operate to cover the fixing screws in the door recesses. Simon

The front end of the loco will be heavily weighted, and as it'll only be hauling a couple of coaches it shouldn't be a problem. On the full size one you had to be very careful when running chimney first as it could lift at the front end, it was OK when coupled to some coaches. Simon

With the basic firebox/backplate test fitted its starting to look like Darent. Cutting the backplate was a bit time consuming with a multitude of different holes sizes required for regulator, gauge frames, washout plugs, rivets etc, from 2mm down to .7mm. Those above 1mm used the cutting tools on the engraver, but the .7mm for the rivets used a slightly different approach. Firstly the location is spotted then drilled to size on the drill press. The frame for the firebox uses two endplates and three spacers, with access holes to enable fixing to the saddle and boiler. The backplate is fixed to the endplate using 12ba screws located in the recess that is the fire hole, and two other points that are stays with hex headed fixings. The fire hole fixings will be hidden by the doors. The wrapper uses the same rivets as the back plate, so with a lot of holes to drill in thin nickel silver a drilling template in brass was made first. Rolling the wrapper did cause a bit of distortion because of the holes, but was easily removed with some emery cloth. Next will be profiling the radius on the back plate, I've made a template to help with that. Simon

It's been a while since I did any work on the Darent models, so on with the build. First job was to complete the wrapper on the second tank, which is a bit time consuming but with a bit of careful work fits well. I've been putting the next stage off for some time as it's the most detailed bits of the locos, the firebox and backplate. Quite a lot of time was spent pondering the best way of producing the parts before the drawing and cutting the templates ready for the panto engraver. As both parts aren't clothed the rivets are very prominent, and I just happened to have some brass ones of the correct size. The wrapper will be in .45 nickel silver and the back plate 3.70 brass machined to the correct thickness. With the templates made next stage is to start cutting. Simon

I'm a bit belt and braces when it come to wiring. For my ON30 layout which is quite large I've used 16/0.2 for the droppers with short runs to the connector blocks, each section of rail has 2 droppers, from these the baseboard internal wiring is 24/0.2. Then the main bus is 32/0.2. The rail code is 83 so quite a small size with the droppers soldered to the bottom which becomes invisible once ballasted. The layout is designed for operations with upto 8 people required, and lots of locos on the layout requiring quite a lot of power. Hope this helps.

I've had the Digitrax system for ten years and very pleased with it, recently upgraded it and added extra bits which all work well with the original bits. One thing I'm impressed with is the backup Digitrax has if you have any problems, I needed a bit of advice with the signalling boards as I wanted to do something with them not designed to do. Simon

That's definitely a ESU lokpilot basic, replaced a lot of them over the years. Simon

I wouldn't give up on DCC. I've not had any major problems using DCC, it's not the system you're got but I'm sure someone will sort it for you. Or you could always sell it and change systems. Simon

First point is how does it run on DC only. Simon

I've been using the juicers for a few year now, 3 ways, singles, turntables and reversing sections, never had any problems. Can't fault the products from Tam Valley. Simon

I was involved with a working group before retiring that looked at platform signage to try and reduce stopshorts and wrong side releases. What starts out as clear guidance for drivers can soon change as this photo shows. It's easy to blame drivers for mistakes but clearly no one has complained about this situation. Simon

Thanks Michael, I'll have a look out for some. I do have some concerns with the Cadmiun in woods metal. Simon