Wow Phil - stunning.  :thumbs

Very convincing.   :thumbs

Thanks Peter & Max, appreciated:)

After about four years of just building stuff and not running loco's, I decided to get things working again, not a good idea to leave things that long as the track for starters needed a really good cleaning, also pount motor switches needed cleaning, some rail joints re-soldering.
Then I found that all the loco's needed to be stripped for oiling and the wheels cleaned including where the pickups made contact, a lot of work, at the moment I have only a small part of the layout track cleaned and running but still not 100%  :roll:

Oh dear !!  I have that to face at some time in the future ……………..

Any problems with split axle bearings Phil ?  Apparently, they can dry out through non-use and become very brittle.  I had to have a very expensive repair on a G Gauge Shay because it hadn't been used for an age and the axle bearings had dried out…………….I ended up replacing both trucks.  :sad:

The loco's run perfectly last time I used them Peter, I put each loco on a rolling road, they barely run, but after a lot of persuasion, I got movement, then everything seemed fine until I put them on the track, the trouble with a rolling road is that it is in a straight line, on bends, wheels and pickups move sideways  :roll: and when frogs electrics also play up it adds to it all, but it will come together….eventually  :roll:

More problems, double slip point blades needed re-soldering.

My room gets very warm in the summer, so lots of expansion and contraction, so a few rail dry joints, problems seem to keep popping up!

Everything seems to be working ok now, although there was a stage where I honestly thought of scrapping everything as the layout is nearly thirty years old! I came to the conclusion that if I did scrap it, there would be a considerable amount of work laying a new track and constructing new buildings and scenery over an area of 18' x 10'.

I have two tunnels which are difficult to get too because of my recording desks etc, I could get my hand into the ends by about a foot to clean with a rubber but not the centre parts, luckily I have a CMX track cleaner which after a few runs, sorted out the oxodized track.

Now you've got it all running Phil, you'll have to do a video  :lol:



Ed

We wouldn't have allowed you to scrap it Phil - 30 years old or younger !!!

It's a brilliant layout and glad to hear the CMX dfid the trick - great bit of kit and, whilst expensive, worth it.  Did you use IPA as the cleaner ?

It was a bit of a downer with things not working especially when pointwork is difficult to get to because of buildings and bridges etc :roll: Anyway, thanks for the support :)

Yes Peter IPA, but I'm told that Acetone works good too. They are very expensive, I paid £100 for mine many years ago but I've not really used it as I've not run trains for a long time, the last time I looked they were around £145! a great piece of kit though. In fact, none of my steam loco's will pull it, being so heavy, lots of wheel spins, I had to buy a diesel loco, twelve wheel traction sorts it!

A video…now that's a project on it's own, but interesting :)

Hi Phil

Glad you have it sorted…….it would have been tragic if you had binned Pen Y Bryn.  Its a truly iconic layout which I always look forward to reading about.

There is no question that running regularly keeps the locos in trim and, with DCC, also keeps the track clean. When I was rebuilding the engine shed last year I just focussed on that and I sure noticed the difference when I started running trains on track that hadnt been used for six months  :oops: :oops:

Best wishes

John

Thanks John, I'll not leave it five years in the future  :roll:

[user=6]Petermac[/user] wrote:

We wouldn't have allowed you to scrap it Phil - 30 years old or younger !!!

It's a brilliant layout and glad to hear the CMX dfid the trick - great bit of kit and, whilst expensive, worth it.  Did you use IPA as the cleaner ?

Too true!  It was another of those layouts that got me started.  Not that I thought I could emulate the wonderful work, but just an inspiration to make something.  So glad it is all up and running again - it really doesn't look 30 years old and when I think how much the hobby has changed in that time, that is a testament to your craftsmanship.

Regards

Michael 

Thanks Michael.

As most of you will know, I left the layout for about ten years, when I retuned, the difference with the new modelling stuff on the market was an eye opener!

Just had Model Rail magazine, very pleased with the nine page article on Pen y Bryn :)

Deferred maintenance bedevils railways large and small alike

Model Rail Magazine out now has my step-by-step on how to create scrapped cars, some of the pictures were posted here a couple of months ago.

Thanks Terry.