14/7/2010
With the holiday season upon us, attendance was low again.
Ray and I fitted some guiding spacers to two of the new fiddle yard baseboards for Little Mill. They are now safely stackable and we can store them out of the way so more can be done to Hazelhurst.
These blocks of ply seem to do the job.
I hope we did a really good job cleaning the surplus glue off, or we won't be able to separate them again.
Rod's fight with DCC continued. The program is DecoderPro and this utilizes SPROG and a device that plugs into the USB port.
It should be in the COM5 port and it WAS in the COM5 port and we told DecoderPro it was there, but it wasn't having it, wouldn't believe us.
So after several re-boots, uninstalls, reinstalls, Rod finally gave up and resorted to the help files. After trawling through these, not finding much useful and not changing anything he gave it another try and yes, it worked! Don't you just love computers?
I didn't wave the camera much, so no more boring pics of computer screens this week.
And Wagon Man did what Wagon Man does. Just the four of us.
So Rod has decided to change Llanastr over to DCC control and has had all his stock (five locos) at the club to be tested and programmed. The lovely Lady Cornelia (Manning Wardle class I) was one of the candidates and the opportunity for her to meet Steve Neill's King was not to be missed. The 7mm - 4mm scale diffference is exaggerated by the difference in the prototypes of course.
Now Steve is a 7mm modeller so you can understand why putting a P4 loco on the correct track defeated him.
Back on an even keel.
Then someone said, 'Look how small she is, I bet she'd fit in the smokebox!'
Not really practical, but the tender will do!
And as yet her Ladyship has not been fitted with a DCC chip.
2/7/2010
Well, the previous Wednesday was a NagNag night and progress was made on the Little Mill baseboards. These are built around a plywood internal door as these are manufactured flat, a critical factor, and should stay flat. With some strengthening sides they really should stay that way. Mike and I had built a prototype the day before in my garage
and then the Naggers did another two – only 2 more to go. So these were generally admired on Friday.
and shown to be still very flat.
Now, five blokes staring intently at a computer screen.
It can only mean one thing . . . .
Yes, its a SPROG program.
A neat bit of software that lets you read all the variables on a DCC chip and set lots of those variables too. For example address, feedback, acceleration rate, shape of the response to knob twiddling curve (don't even think it!).
So there was lots of "Lets change this and see what happens"
As you can see from this pic we overdid it on the acceleration.
Menwhile, in the background shunting practice was in progress with the G6 and freight stock with Dingham Autocouplers. Like all these systems, setting and adjustment of the couplings is critical. But Uncle Don declared himself impressed with them, and no-one argues with the big guy.
And finally
"I can resist anything except temptation"
Oh look, on two ginger nuts left.
Yes, I had the rest.
25/6/2010
More apologies for no update last week.
This week saw Rod take the bull by the horns and start converting his DC engines into DCC, to run on the revamped Llanastr. Rod wants to be able to control the layout from the front...one more in the crowd won't hurt!
Thank goodness for 7mm wagons...
Rod programmed the chips (under the watchful eye of the youth section), and then checked that the engine ran before remounting with the body. One engine had lost its quartering, but this was soon solved as the rear driven axle had slipped.
All of the engines have now been chipped.
This event did not go as smoothly as planned as some of the chips did'nt want to work...could not see any of the registers...and as these were Zimo chips, they're going back to the supplier for replacement!
The youth section brought down his wonderful King Arthur to play with. Another supreme model from Steve beautifully painted by Mr Rathbone.
Just magnificent!
Ray has compleyely finished his jobs on the new board, the approach to the fiddle yard is complete and the 3 bridges are in situ as well. Nicely done that man!
Now for the buildings...
Steve was busy tidying up the electrics at the back of the layout - no change there then! - and Dave has been sorting out the electro magnets for the Dingham couplings, which now work, hurrah! This will make the shunting on the back roads a lot more interesting with out the aid of the big hand in the sky intervening.
As for me, well I've finished the Std class 5 build and that's ready to go to the paint shop. If you remember the Royal Scot that I built last year, then here's a photo showing the paint and lining progress to date. My thanks to Dave Hagger for putting up with all my badgering over getting this and a load of coaches painted while the weather is fine....I did paint his Std class 4 tank as well, which we need a photo of!
Starting to look the part...
The tender is covered in cellulose paint only, the engine is cellulose for the Brunswick green and matt black enamel on the rest. I have to say if you have not tried spraying with cellulose, then do, it's far easier to use than enamel and a hell of a lot less messier! If you spray regularly you'll know what I mean. Last year I also built 8 coaches, well they are also painted and lined, here's an LMS brake corridor. Again painted with cellulose paints.
Really pleased with the results.
Not many of us again this week, lets hope more of us turn up next week.
Sorry about the different size fonts on this page, the size 3 that I normally use, does not seem to work any more, so I've had to increase the size to 4. I've also noticed that I can no longer edit the photos on the web page and these need to be resized once imported, there's an editing tool on the 'File manager page', the largest size picture we can accomodate on the site is 650 pixels, without squashing the sidebar.
That's it for this week, more fun next week!
11/6/2010
It was more of the same this week.
As work on last week's board was waiting for alignment connectors and electrical stuff, we decided to have a look at the other boards. As Tony said in his addendum last week - 'to fix, the same problem at each end of the fiddle yard'
Well, we found exactly the same problem, so at least we have a method for fixing it.
You can see here the trusty spirit level. (Yes Rod, we did turn it round to check it read the same the other way!)
The packing is MDF and thin card - less than last week - and the standard steel distance piece.
We need to get this bit right as it leads to the single road entry to the fiddle yard. It takes lots of traffic in both directions and at Bristol we got away with temporary packing (wooden lolly sticks and chip forks!)
Work in progress, with a discarded chip fork to the right of the point.
As last week's board was still up in the workroom we had to do this in the corridor, trying not to annoy the Bingo Ladies and their access to the kitchen.
Here we still have to fit new, longer track pins, then remove the rusted old ones. They are so well rusted in that the best method is to just cut off the ends of the sleepers where they are. Then lay a new piece of track across the baseboard joint. It was at this point we realised that as its alignment was critical, we had to get the job finished that night and the pace of work picked up.
So as it was just me, Ray and Tony that was all that happened.
Except Ray has now put Ginger Nuts in the biscuit tin - my favourites, and also Tony's.
4/6/2010
Last week's work on the new section of track ended in frustration. We just could not get it level with a smooth joint between the baseboards. We decided that we had to get the structure and baseboards truly level as a starting point. So it was get out the spirit levels - the best quality ones with the accurate shrimp farts in the glass.
This meant the two boards had to now be erected in the workroom and everybody had to (try to) duck under them to get in.
What we found was that the curved board, borrowed from the test-track, was absolutely not flat. A substantial amount of packing was needed, adding up to over 1cm. You can see we used our standard 4 mm ply plus bits of card. The pins are there to maintain the existing alignment.
Packed up.
At about this point Rod turned up having spent the start of the evening packing Llanastr ready for its outing to Scalefour AGM
What we are aiming for is the short siding for PushPulls and D or EMUs called, for historical reasons going way back to Long Suffren, the North Siding. Yes, we know the siding is close to the left track but that won't be in use on show. By the end of the night the main line was joined up, the siding extended and packed up by 1cm as well.
The North Siding
Alastair dirtied a few wagons with his usual acrylic-mix-and-wipeoff method, before having an in-depth conference with The Youth Section about his Toplights.
Sorry about the reflection
And as a final thrill for the night we had a late visit from Uncle Don, full of good cheer, advice and suggestions as normal.
That's it for this week, more fun next week.
28/5/2010
Another apology for no update last week. Not many of us present at the club and personal circumstances did not allow for time to update this site, but the good news is...it is this week!
Dave and TFC continued with the new extension on the back of the coach works. Getting the whole thing level proved to be a bit of a challenge but the boys got there in the end and the re-railing commenced. First job was to undo all the good work we'd put into aligning the original boards. So gald we did not use a good quality wood glue or we would still be peeling away the support beam.
That support beam has to come out and be re-attached at the correct height.
Ray was working on the retaining wall on the new board and fitting in the bridges in a permanent fashion. Its all coming together rather nicely.
Getting ready for the wood yard...
Alistair has been working his magic on the youth sections coaches. The interiors have been built and are now ready for fixing in, once they've been painted. Job well done this, as there is no way of getting the roofs off this particular set of coaches.
Grand job by the 'wagon man'.
I've been working on my Std class 5, and most of the pipework has been completed, just a few final details to be added.
Not many of us again this week and if we are going to hit our target of a completed railway for Telford, a few more hands on deck are going to be needed.
If you live in the Newport area and want to have some fun in helping complete 'Hazelhurst' why not pop along to our club rooms on a Wednesday or Friday evening.
That's it for this week, more fun next week.
14/5/2010
After last weeks scheduled clean up of the club rooms, we got down to more fundamental matters. TFC and the youth section continued with the tidying up of the rear and it looks to have been quiet successful if this picture is anything to go by.
Nice one Tony...
Dave was looking into reasons why certain rolloing stock had not performed as we'd wished. So, out with the surgical appliances and down to business.
The devil is in the detail.
The youth section has now decided that we need another spur at the back to carry our DMU and other assorted Electric units, so out with the hammers again and we lifted more track, so that more could be put back in a different way.
P4 modelling files are in the foreground..
Ray continues his sterling work on the new board.
Green stuff gets added and still a long way to go.
As for me, I had resurrected a very old project. My 7mm Britannia, the youth section has been building the chassis and valve gear (thanks Steve) for the last couple of months and ideally I'd like it to go to Telford.
Long, long way to go.
Still no news on Mr Thorn and we haven't seen Nobby for a few weeks either. Uncle Don has been busy building a cart to move the layout about when on show...look forward to seeing this.
That's it for this week, more fun next week.
7/5/2010
First, sincere apologies to anyone who came looking for an update over the last 2 weeks and didn't find one. Reason being very busy getting Hazelhurst ready for the Bristol show. A retrospective for this can be found in the side bar, cunningly entitled 'Bristol 2010'...just in case you missed it!
This week was a general tidy up in the club rooms and putting together a plan to attack the problems we experienced over at Bristol. The youth section, ever mindful of NMRS engineering standards, coaxed the Fat Controller into tidying up the back of the carriage works...it'll never work again!
"This'll go there with some blutak!"
Dave has suggested a new way of sorting lame O gauge engines, frankly our trusty work bench won't cut the mustard on seeing an engine of size move over an area of 3 feet! You can just see the suggested design in the background.
This should ideally be about 6 feet long...
Elsewhere, members were being a little more circumspect about there modeling areas/bench places. Well, truth be known I was feeling a little guilty over the mess on my side of the bench!
Eventually we got it all sorted, everything back in its right place. Alistair has struck a deal with the youth section for finishing off all the coaches, that's interiors and windows plus the occasional grab handle, Steve will build Alistair's Ivatt 2-6-0 chassis for him in return. I suspect a person of youth has got the better of this...ah well at least the kit'll get built and thats' another one off the shelf!
Of course I never read the instructions....
That's it for this week, more fun next week.
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