A layout in progress, slow progress...

[user=1801]Passed Driver[/user] wrote:

…………………………………………………….. But today “the district nurse” told me that my. Blood Pressure was okay but my pulse was too fast.  Best wishes Kevin

Was the District Nurse young and voluptuous Kevin ……………………………….just asking ……………. ;-)

Hi Petermac.    Thank you for your reply. No, quite the opposite in fact. Best wishes Kevin

Steady on Barry, don’t encourage me – I could ramble on for days – and then what minimal progress I’m making in the loft would come to an end.
 

  Kevin, I’m referring to the mid 60s – when I bought my first motor, and decided that I enjoyed driving ‘quick’, not that quick as it was only a Minivan, the speed came later. The layout I had at the time was sold, my interest in railways in general waned and Motorsport took over. The return to model railways followed the heart attack back in ’07 – and continues to this day, and hopefully for many more ….that is when there’s not something else I ‘should’ be doing….


  Keith
  

Not much progress of late as we get accustomed to this ‘self-isolating’ regime… and far too much time spent fighting with an overloaded website as we attempt to move from regular trips to the supermarket to on-line shopping ….on sites that were never designed to handle the current levels of usage ….just to find what we need is out of stock, or goes out of stock between putting it in our ‘basket’ and getting to the ‘till’. I’m sure in normal times things do run smoothly, but for now at least we just have to accept the status quo. That said, we must be doing something right, as our first order arrived safe and sound this morning.  Living in a rural area we have had lots of offers of help, but while we can manage this on-line lark, better they help the folk who can’t. There is still some sense of normality as we can do our four mile thrash around the forest straight from our door, for our ‘exercise’, usually without seeing a soul, which is a useful and welcome break from ‘shopping’.

In the loft however another fraught session in the fiddle yard as a result of a simple switch problem which yet again left the air that dark blue colour, could even have had a tinge of purple Peter, and this time the dreaded red mist started to form. The main problem was the West pilot, which had shorted right at the back of the fiddle yard, as the 2P with the five coach 10.40TC from Barmouth  headed out. The usual solution – to push down a few other coaches by hand and then use them to pull out the offending loco and coaches – was a non-starter, with the removal of the front coupling….. and in any case such an exercise would have left the traction tyres needing replacing, again. As it was, in the cold light of a new, calmer, day, the penny dropped, and all was quickly sorted – I had just forgotten to cancel the power on the back road of the yard after the pilot had returned from shunting the coaches for the 2P. As the 2P moved out, unseen so did the pilot until it bridged the gap in the rails between the power sections, and with the point ahead against, it duly shorted. Just a nudge on the pilot with a handy stick was all it needed – and that power switch.

Meanwhile above ground the English Electric type 1 has now reached the goods loop, awaiting access to the goods depot/marshalling yard as a Stanier tank passes with the 1.08pm semi-fast service from Chester, due Woodside 1.37…. on time, as ever!




..pity about the baseboard join.….and after all the problems, the 2P finally emerges from the fiddle yard with the TC from Barmouth



What this latest blue/purple air/red mist event did show was that the lack of operational time in the loft of late needs to be addressed before anything else, otherwise such simple errors will continue. This does mean that the green bits, and even the signals at Woodside, will have to wait for now.

   â€¦.meanwhile, we’ve now got to try to book another slot on the supermarket website……

Keith

Keith

I love reading about the happenings on a real railway and the timetabled operation you have makes it a real railway.

I presume that you operate to a schedule rather than a timed timetable - I intend to operate my behemoth in the same way and have been very much influenced by your layout - the timing of trains and purpose for everything just brings the layout to life.  Its not just a bit of scenery and a collection of trains. 

To avoid situations like the one you describe above, I am going to put my schedule on a laptop using PowerPoint and then have a number of practice running sessions (cunningly titled "playing trains" days) to ensure that the screens include prompts to turn switches/power sections off, check clearances etc.  I dare say that you are not the first to have left a switch closed or a point set wrong - Peter Denny describes such an event on Buckingham (in his book) when one of his sons sent the Aylesbury Fast up the branch line!!

Having just moved to Merseyside, loving Birkenhead Woodside even more!!!

Barry

Morning all.

Ah, the joys of having points set in the wrong direction for an approaching loco - usually in a remote location, well hidden from sight and damned awkward to get to in order to give a nudge if required. Easily done. Fortunately, I don't have many such points in such locations. My only problem is, once a loco has bridged and shorted the DCC over a wrongly set point, irrespective of where it is, the whole darned thing comes to a halt, everything, with the possible problem that an otherwise running loco in a remote, hidden location fails to restart once the power has been restarted. Then the fun starts and these professional contortionists have nothing on the twists and turns required to get to the offending loco.

It's all part of keeping the blood pressure raised and the air a gentle shade of blue - and the fun of running a model railway. And Keith - we seem to be in a similar frame of mind - that's nothing compared to the on-line shopping craziness. On-line slot - what on-line slot? They seem to be scarcer than rocking horse manure! I seem to have more luck with Iceland when they release their slots (around mid-morning, so I've found) than with any of the other more major supermarkets - always fully booked, even for click-n-collect. The world has gone totally barmy to the detriment of us poor souls who have been told to stay indoors no matter what. Anyway, rant over!

Back to railways - and a good couple of shots of the Class 20 and the 2P. What join in the baseboard? Thought thought you'd modelled an earthquake and the ground had split open!  Shows the strength of British Steel rail though!

As Barry says, it's good to have a timetable to operate to, gives more depth to the running of our trains bringing with it that sense of "reality". One day I'll devise something - too busy building stuff to operate the trains.

Keep up the good work guys.

Power districts Dave - it's all about power districts !!

When I had my layout running, I hit the same problem - a loco derailed somewhere and the whole system shut down.

Then John Dew posted …………………..

He recommended splitting the layout into sections and having a circuit breaker on each section.  That way, if one area went down, the rest kept running.

Neither expensive nor difficult to do but well worth the small effort.  All you have to do is decide where your "districts" will be and wire them independently through a circuit breaker.  It could be the whole of your "up line", a yard or a section of the layout.

Can't remember offhand the make I used but I think it was a "PCB 1" or something similar, from Tam Valley perhaps.  I'll check and get back to you …………………

Here's the circuit breaker I was talking about Dave - as with most things, the cost has gone up since I bought mine but all the info is here:

https://tonystrains.com/pdf/dcc_specialties/PSX-Manual-Rev-N-Software-Rev-L-Booklet.pdf....

Knowing me, probably old hat now and superceded by a space age gizmo but it was a great gadget back in the days of black and white - kept the rest of my sound locos purring whenever I hit a wrongly set point somewhere………… :thumbs

Thanks Petermac for the info and link -  regrettably the link itself didn't seem to work (404 error), but a bit of digging around got me to it; made an interesting read.

My problem is in creating the power districts now that the layout is down and fixed and a lot of it hidden in difficult to get to places. It's not that large a layout and shorts due to incorrectly set points is a bit of a rarity. And I'm not sure it would be that easy to modify the layout even where I can get to to lift the track and put the isolators in. However, it is food for thought.

So, thanks again.

I realise it's late in the day Dave but you don't really need to put isolators in - just cut the track……………….

Splitting the wiring into sections could prove more difficult depending on how it was wired originally.

The best thing is to make sure you don't run into a wrongly set point ………………… :It's a no no :cheers

S’mae Barry

I always accept it is each to his own, but couldn’t agree more – for me it’s a model of a railway, and as such it has to be operated as a railway. What I find fascinating when running the timetable is the way Woodside station can have all platforms in use, and then half an hour or so later it is deserted.  Assigning locos to the various rosters during the day, and every now and then having a loco ‘fail’ so that another loco has to be found to take over the run – just as it used to be, is, for me, what the hobby is about. I am very envious of the scenic modelling skills of other folk on the Forum, my skills in the scenery department are somewhat limited, so I tend to concentrate on getting the railway to look the part, with signals and signage, and then do what I can with the green bits. I haven’t even managed to get all of the track ballasted, but at least the stations and some of the main line sections look OK. I did finish my last layout ….but that was back in 1963!! Not too sure when, or if, I'll ever finish this one.

I just run to the chosen published BR timetable, currently Winter ’61, with a clock which reads ‘layout time’, when the controller is powered up I switch on the clock. I have already worked through the whole day so I have a script/schedule of all loco/stock movements. The difficulties arise because at the start of the day the rolling stock is never in exactly the same place and so from time to time (at the moment every other session, as I get back into the swing of things) I have to spend a while sorting out the fiddle yard – and for those sessions the clock remains off. Once I’ve completed this run it is back to 1956, the West Kirby branch was still open for passengers – which will make Hooton more interesting – and most of the diesels will be back in their boxes.
I have fond memories of weekend trips on the ferry with my mother over to Woodside, then walking up the hill to catch the Crosville bus to Loggerheads. While we waited for the bus to leave, from the top deck I could see most of Woodside Station – which may have something to do with my almost weekly trips to 6C in my later trainspotting phase and the choice of Woodside for the layout.

How is the hunt going, for that suitable building for the layout, with associated house?

Keith

S’mae Dave

It’s good to know I’m not alone …and yes I reckon I could give any professional contortionists a problem or two they’d find difficult to reach. Obviously I can’t help with the DCC problem, I’ll leave that to Peter, but it’s good to know that even in DCC these ‘old world’ problems still exist. I’m sure my blood pressure starts to rise every time I climb the loft ladder, remembering what happened the last time…!

As to on-line slots…. we’ve had more luck with hens’ teeth! I hadn’t realised this on-line supermarket shopping lark was restricted to just one visit, and that’s it. The site we’re using stopped publishing slots for three weeks, and reduced it to two weeks – but no slots available for two weeks, so now they have reduced it to one week!!! I just don’t understand the logic in that.  At least now you can get on the site, but of course you can’t get what you want delivered …it’s what they call progress…. Unfortunately Iceland haven’t yet reached this part of mid Wales and yes, I agree, the world has gone totally barmy, but at least this self-isolating keeps the madness at arm’s length.

…and that gap/join – you’re almost right, I have actually skilfully modelled that world famous geological feature - the Hooton Fault Line, I’m sure you’ll find it on the Interweb!

Once you’ve got the trains running as you want that’s when you get the timetable sorted.

Keith

S’mae Peter

All this DCC stuff is all a bit too much for my overworked grey cell. Given I seem to be spending more of my time trying to remember where I left something, or not noticing the odd incorrect point or switch I've set and then wondering why nothing will move, I'm waiting for someone to produce a magic box which can boost my memory and my grey cell or possibly just tell me how to fix the problem. I fancy I'll be waiting for quite a while….

Keith

Keith

Re the house - all the elements are coming together but the country has gone into shutdown and that includes all the various solicitors, agents, Inspectors and shed builders.  On the bright side, we haven't actually bought it yet so its not costing us any money to sit idle!!

I will update my own thread with progress (if we get any) to save hijacking yours.

Keep safe

Barry

[user=1798]Woodside[/user] wrote:

S’mae Peter

All this DCC stuff is all a bit too much for my overworked grey cell. Given I seem to be spending more of my time trying to remember where I left something, or not noticing the odd incorrect point or switch I've set and then wondering why nothing will move, I'm waiting for someone to produce a magic box which can boost my memory and my grey cell or possibly just tell me how to fix the problem. I fancy I'll be waiting for quite a while….

Keith

The magic potion you're looking for Keith comes in a bottle - normally 37.5% proof but if you can get the 40% proof, it works faster ……………………….. :cheers :cheers

S’mae Peter

  I’ve tried that before when I had a fully functioning memory, the main drawback was always the after effects the next morning….

  Meanwhile the on-line home delivery shopping saga gets dafter ….had an e-mail yesterday, another supermarket is now delivering in our area… great, get on quick, better chance of a slot ….signed up for six months …. then on to the shopping, and first get a slot …..slight problem, now they tell us that they are not taking on any new customers…. so why bother telling us that they are now delivering in our area!!

  I’m going for a lie down…..

  Keith
  

Sounds like a typical left hand and right hand Keith.

At least they're delivering - no such luck here where we live.  The very lucky ones managed to arrange a "Drive" slot but they are now fully booked.

S’mae Peter

I’m assuming your  â€Drive” slots equate to our “Click and Collect” slots… doesn’t help us, even if there were C&C slots available, as for the only supermarket we’ve managed to sign up with, their nearest branch is around 55 miles away – and we’d have to pass several other supermarkets on the way – so not exactly playing to the new  Government rules. However, good news – after another failed attempt at 00.15 this morning SWMBLT managed to get a slot at 01.30! So another couple of weeks of self isolation sorted…. then there’ll be another six to go, unless the Government changes the rules.

Keith
========================

Meanwhile a successful operating session in the loft, that makes a change. Early afternoon now, and 6C is looking a bit full – after the morning rush some of the 2-6-4Ts are now back on 6C to get fed and watered, and a quick check over before they’ll be back out for the evening rush hour – or covering another loco which may ‘fail’ (hot box or the like) during the afternoon. Just like Woodside station 6C can go from more than half empty to quite full in a relatively short time.



There are four 2-6-4Ts on view here, another view in the gallery, this time one of the Stanier versions brought up the morning coal train from Chester, after the scheduled 4F ‘failed’ – that will go back on one of the rush hour trains to Chester. In the background the E.E.type 1 has made it to the yard and is about to shunt it's stock up to the goods depot.

I know the lack of ballast here is not good, I keep thinking it would be far better to get that done  - and get some water cranes in the yard, they are in a box somewhere of course - so that it looked more like a shed. That job went on one of my lists many moons ago… but looking at this, it may just have climbed above the green bits.

Stay safe everyone out there.

Keith

A very nice scene…. and great to hear the operating procedures.  It seems quit a few of us are using time to run trains!  Ballasting is one of the last glamorous jobs to be done and I put it off as long as I can… It doesn't look like you have too much to do though.
Michael

I can only echo Michaels comments - very nice shot of the "yard" - with or without the ballast! I've a brand new tub on the side just waiting to be scattered around the layout. Good to see a busy shed though, all sitting idle, awaiting their turn into the wider world and the countryside.

And like yourselves, this supermarket delivery business is a right pain in the derrière. We're lucky with four supermarkets fairly close to us that will deliver - one of which won't accept us on their list as our name isn't on their Government list of acceptable persons (damned cheek of it - we've had the letter; but it's not enough). Their loss, not ours. And trying to get a slot of any sort from the others is just plane (plain?) crazy - but having said that, I did manage to get a rare delivery slot this morning to come on Wednesday. I wonder just how much of the order will arrive this time. 50% (like the others before) if I'm lucky.

Anyway, at least this lockdown is giving us modelling time - if only I could get motivated a bit more, I might get a bit more done. At the moment it's just ploddling around, bitting and bobbing at things. And now the sun has been out……

Cheers for now Keith, keep up the good work.
Dave