eldavo

Looking very neat and tidy Geoff.  Good to see you've started a thread.

Cheers

Dave

This is how it looks this morning for this Android tablet user...

I'm not sure how Andy puts up with this. It really seems as though the owners of this forum have completely lost the plot.  If I were a new member coming to this site for the first time the sight of all this advertising with intrusive video and creeping adverts would send me away never to return.  Would I be taking a subscription to get rid of the adverts?  No,  because I would never have get as far as seeing the wealth of good stuff.  The chances of picking up new subscribers seems little to none.

If the site needs proper funding then it needs a radical rethink. A mass of tacky advertising is not going to do it as it will drive new subscribers away not attract them.  If you want to extract money from the users you have to provide something of extra value while still allowing new users to get a hint of what they can get.

The current state of things is simply pissing off many longtime users and the site has become unusable.

Cheers

Dave

P.S. It took me ages to type this as there's a stupid video pop-up getting in the way and a really annoying creeping thing coming down from the top of the screen. Time for me to take a break from this site until it sorts out it's identity, either a really useful modelling resource or yet another tacky bit of click bait.

1 minute ago, AY Mod said:

 

Someone has been tinkering testing again and it's a mess. Really don't need this today so I'll be having some 'conversations'.

 

If there's an X visible at the top of the ad closing it will help, a little.

Cheers Andy.  From my 40+ years of software development it really seems as though the control of this site is now in the hands of the wrong people.  The fact that folks are able to make fundamental changes on a live system with clearly no testing is a recipe for disaster.  RMweb is becoming increasingly like many other tacky sites overloaded with advertising of a dubious nature.  It's not the site you created and worked hard for.

Cheers

Dave

Argh!  This is getting more and more maddening.  I'm now getting a blooming great video at the top of every page and a white window that creeps down from the top of the page and obscures useful content.  If someone is "testing" new advertising features they need shooting.  Do this sort of style change on a test system not on a live one. The site is almost unusable!

I'm not one to moan, especially about something that is free, but this is ridiculous.

Dave (very frustrated)

After a bit of pondering of photos and drawings of goods sheds I've knocked together the basic shell of a shed.  This looks about the right size for the layout and let's me finalize the track plan for the goods yard.

Originally I was going to put a cattledock at one end of the shed but this would make the yard too cramped for my liking.  I will move this to the short platform road or omit it completely.  I will retain the same number of sidings but one will become a short stub for dumping brake vans and odd bits rather than for cattle.

To access all this I need a couple more turnouts and I was looking at a simple pair of B6s.   Nothing ever stays simple on this layout and these have morphed into an all right-hand tandem turnout with the smallest being a B5.5.  just need to get it built and working!

Cheers

Dave

Failing again for me.  :-(

Cheers

Dave

Whoopee, it's working again.  Makes it so much easier to find the threads you're interested in.

Cheers

Dave

Having finished wiring up the recently laid track and tweaking the servo controllers it was time to go back to working on the top of the baseboards.  Some "testing" has been carried out which has resulted in some track fettling and then it was on to ballasting and painting.  30 odd feet of track takes a while to ballast (if you are picky like me) but it's done now.

I'm also trying to finalize the goods yard layout and have printed a couple of templates from templot.  Not entirely convinced by my current plan and may leave out one of the sidings.   I think I need to build a goods shed and see how it looks in the space.

Having laid the long goods siding it needs a bufferstop.  I've got some white metal kit jobbies but not enough so I thought it was time to scratch build something.  Initially I thought I would build a sleeper-built bufferstop, based on a Midland Railway drawing, using coffee stirrers.  Cutting stirrers is a bit of a fag so I ended up sketching out the core structure in 3D CAD and printing it.  Some bits of bent rail, fishplates and a bit of timber and it's mostly there.

Painted up, bedded in and a turfed soil pile added and it looks like this...

Up close you can make out a printing anomaly but standing back a bit it doesn't look too bad.  It's had a bit of weathering since I took the photos and I think it will do the job.  Clearly I'm not working fast enough on this project as the grass is growing!

Cheers

Dave

Following on from the bufferstop question, a bit of fiddling in my favourite CAD program and the 3D printer came up with this...

The proportions don't look quite right as it's designed to be inset into the baseboard.  In the intended location it looks ok.

Cheers

Dave

Recently the "Content I posted in" option has stopped working for me. It always times out with a 524 error.  It's there a fix in the offing?

Cheers

Dave

Having pretty much completed the coaling shed I've created another problem for myself. Originally I was going to build a fairly small affair along the lines of the one at Leicester but somehow it grew into something rather larger like the shed at St Albans.  With the larger shed I've sort of run out of space for a bufferstop on the coal road.  Certainly no space for a standard Midland rail built stop.

After posing the question on the Midland Railway Company thread Dave Hunt came up with a photo of a wooden stop at Whitwell.  My first thought was to build something like it out of coffee stirrers but I ended up back in the CAD software and giving the job to my 3D printer.

It's a tight fit but it should stop wagons ending up in the turntable well!

Of course as with all these things you can't really see it properly.

Is not wonky, now!  On to the next problem...

Cheers

Dave

More wiring has been done which involved lifting (or scrabbling underneath) all 6 scenic boards.  Just to add to the fun I realised I had missed out catering for the goods headshunt which can be switched between different control areas.  Additional feeds had to be strung between board 2 and the control box and extra work done in both sections of the control panel.  Not too arduous but...

Some of the boards are getting quite busy.  Still signals to add!

Having the boards up gave the opportunity to address a couple of issues on the snagging list.  One or two of the connections to the servo control boards have proved to be a bit flaky so I've rewired them all. 

Another issue is that occasionally some of the servo control boards will flip the orientation of throw of their turnout.  Annoying to say the least.  I suspect this is because the ATtiny85 chip is sensing the configuration pin has been grounded.  The way you change the orientation, if you actually want to, is to short the 2 pins at the bottom of the board.

To try and prevent this I've added a pull-up 10k resistor between the input and the 5volt supply.  Unfortunately I hadn't catered for this on the original board design so it's a bit of a crude fix.

Time to look at other things.

Cheers

Dave

Hmmm.  Not sure what's going on, I see all the save options except the "Save Changes" button.  This happens both on my Android tablet and my Win 10 PC.  Very frustrating.

It would be quite nice if the system just "worked" as it used to.  For me the problem only started happening a couple of days ago.

Cheers

Dave

I'm obviously being thick as I can't see a "save" button.  I can save the changed options as a new stream but can't change the default options.  What am I doing wrong?

Cheers

Dave

2 hours ago, rowanj said:

I get the error when I try to get onto the site through "Content I posted in" - on PC, Kindle Fire and Android Phone. All the other "ways in" work fine. I e-mailed the mods a couple of days ago, but no answer yet,

I have exactly the same problem. I've cleared the browser cache (Chrome on an Android tablet) but still always fails.

Cheers

Dave

3 hours ago, Dave Hunt said:

 

 

Dave,

 

The only illustration I have been able to find of anything other than the usual rail built or infilled wooden Midland stop blocks is this one at Whitwell. I don't have any drawings or dimensions but from known dimensions such as gauge and buffer height you should be able to produce something if you so wish. Whether it would fit in the space you have available is another matter....

 

 

I hope that this is of some help.

 

Dave

That's great Dave. Exactly the sort of thing I'm looking for. Looks like a job for coffee stirrers.

Cheers

Dave

All this discussion of coal stacks is very interesting and somewhat timely for me as I'm working on the engine shed area of my layout and had planned to have at least one stack.  In addition I'd like to pose a problem to this learned company.

As with all layouts things are rather compressed and one area is causing me a problem.  Below is a shot of the rear of my coaling shed.

As can be seen the coal road exits the coal shed very close to the turntable pit.  I need a bufferstop.  I have some standard rail built jobbies and drawings of a sleeper built version.  Both of these are really too big for the site.  So, does anybody have references to photos or drawings of a small Midland Railway bufferstop?

Cheers

Dave

Is the problem occurring with one particular decoder or all decoders?  I have seen the same on my setup but I'm struggling to remember how I overcame it!

Cheers

Dave

51 minutes ago, Tricky said:

Why go to the time and effort to stack coal so neatly rather than slinging it into coal staithes?

Probably because they seemed to stack it on every available free bit of ground.  There are photos of lines of locos with stacks between them and just enough space for crews to get to the locos.  They clearly bought big time in the summer.

Cheers

Dave

More coal bins have been produced and paint, weathering powders and coal have been thrown at them.  The crane has had chains added and been painted.  It's still an approximation but a much better approximation after help from some Midland Railway Society members.  Being the impatient soul I am this have been glued in position almost before the paint has dried (the PVA holding the coal hadn't!).

With the layout arranged as it is at home I can't see any of this detail!  With the shed in it's position on the layout I have to use the selfie camera to get a look at it.

I really should stop tinkering with this now and get on with some wiring.

Cheers

Dave

Finally got my whatsit in gear and drew up a coal bin in my CAD program. Didn't take too long and is probably good enough.  First batch off the printer...

There are a couple of compromises and they are missing the door release lever and a grab handle.  I may be motivated to add the missing bits on at least those that are visible in the murk of the coaling shed.  With a touch of paint I think they will pass muster.

Cheers

Dave

I seem to have spent rather a lot of time digging around trying to find info on the Midland pedestal coaling shed cranes.  A lot of them look to have had a twin jib arrangement but there are very few clear photos and I can't find any drawings.  I've hacked the start of something together based on photos of St Alban's and Buxton along with looking at what others have done.

The cogs and pulleys are 3D printed (what a surprise) and the rest is cobbled together from bits of plastic, card and wire.  Thank goodness for strong super glue!  More to do including adding the chains.  Next is back to the CAD program to create some coal bins that I can 3D print.

Cheers

Dave

More work on the coaling shed sees it structurally complete.  Tiles/slates have been added along with leadwork and rainwater goods. Now I need to sort the crane/hoist and get the paintbrushes out.

I think it will fit into it's planned location ok.

Onward.

Cheers

Dave