Weekend Update 12/30/12

[craigolio1]

BTW, anyone got any ideas how to add the "chains" across the door...? chain is too big... maybe 0.008 wire ?

jNj safety chains.  They are etched and look great but will be hard to find.

Craig

[Dave Schneider]

Got started on the backdrop for the Beer Line with the installation of the first curved corner. This was my first attempt at making a curve and it went pretty well.  I sprayed water on the back of the tempered hardboard, and let it sit for 30 minutes  or so. I put three stout finish nails on the right side of the backdrop (to the left of the window) to hold that position and then pushed it into place. It really took some effort to bend it, and I really could have used another hand. I put some screws it to keep it in place for now. I will let it sit overnight in this shape and then use construction adhesive to attach it to the furring strips.

You can also see the Super Strut rails I have installed, onto which the sectional layout pieces will rest. I had a bunch of these strut fittings in my garage (for the past 15 years) and I think it makes a very nice solid framework, and leaves the underside of the layout open.



Best wishes, Dave

[chuck geiger]

Nice Dave - back in Anchortown Saturday at the dealer, need a new amp for car tuner - I
can help you hang the rest of the Masonite. Also need to seam those lips at the bend.

[Lemosteam]

BTW, anyone got any ideas how to add the "chains" across the door...? chain is too big... maybe 0.008 wire ?

Puddington, I was thinking you could twist two 0.005" diameter wires together...  No holes but it would be awfully small...  I've seen the technique before but never tried it.

[BCR 570]

And I was never fearful of trains until I took a frail geriatric RDC on Vancouver Island from Qualicum Beach up to Courtenay BC.  The old beater RDC I rode, more like a horse than a train had obviously lost the usefulness of the springs to dampen the ride.  I never bounced, jounced, and bobbled our way down the track like I did on that thing, I was actually nervous for my son and I's safety.

And that was a CP RDC!   


Pud:  Athabasca also offered etched brass safety chain in several sizes - not sure if it is still available as my original package has lasted forever.

Mike:  Good work on the bridge, and the NAR units look great.  If those are reasonably accurate I may have to get one.

Rick:  Congrats on the nolix progress - a big step forward.


December is typically a slow or non-existent model month for me but I have a week of holidays in front of me in which to get back to work on some projects.


Tim

[Hyperion]

Worked on a CAD model of a small locomotive shop, that I can use for dimensions for building the actual model.   This is a slightly scaled-down version (surprisingly, the prototype only has 1 track too) of a KCS/GETS shop in Kansas City.  On the prototype, all the pretty stuff faces away from the tracks towards a street -- the track side is nothing but a 220' flat slab of nothingness, so not much visual interest there -- so I'll turn the model around so that all the work on the 'front' isn't for naught.

Building (minus freight ramp) dimensions out to 160'x68'.

[Norway2112]

This weekend was all fun run and no work.  Attended an open house on a friends of mine's layout, he models the Santa Fe in New Mexico, so the scenery was a bit off for my engines but still looked great none the less.  It was nice to be able to run some of the stuff I have been working on as my layout still is in the benchwork stages.  The pictures are of an Oriental Brass NP A-3 that I custom painted as an SP&S E-1, #700 that now resides in Portland, Oregon and is operational.  The loco was re-motored with a coreless motor, the tender chassis was scratchbuilt from plastic and now utilizes Bachmann/Spectrum trucks from their C&O long vandy tender so that I can have 12 wheel tender pick up.  The loco is still adding some additional pickup from one rail.  I had found the original pick up scheme (tender left rail, loco right rail) just wasn't enough for the sound decoder.  I now run a Tsunami 750 Heavy Steam decoder for sound and a TCS Z2 is in the boiler to run the motor.  This is probably my best running loco, very smooth and not too picky on track.

Phillip

[peteski]

Puddington, I was thinking you could twist two 0.005" diameter wires together...  No holes but it would be awfully small...  I've seen the technique before but never tried it.

I started another thread about N scale chains.
https://www.therailwire.net/forum/index.php?topic=28291.0

[NARmike]

Seen helices built with threaded rods, but using threaded bolts for bridge base is brilliant!
(or, it is in concept until I mangle it in practice!)

Any words of wisdom on the windings?
[p.s. locos look luscious, too]

Thanks M.C., I'm quite flattered. It's a solution to a problem. I guess the engineer in me took over on that one.

I needed a way to mount the bridge very solidly on the module so it would survive transport and I also needed a way to accurately spot it to keep a constant grade (3%) and have the deck not sag or hump. I was too lazy to calculate all the positions of the footings and my modelling was too sloppy to count on the legs of the towers landing where they were supossed to go.... So, I came up with this. It allows infinate "fine-tuning" to have the deck be nice and even and as a bonus will let me remove the bridge later (won't be easy but possible) if I ever have to do major surgery or want to change the grade.

I measured where the footings "should" be off the bottoms of the towers then punched holes through the foam with an awl for the rods (leaving extra room to allow for "variance"  ). The Fine-N-Scale footings were then drilled and tapped to accept the rods... this worked out to be a great excuse to buy a drill press too  . Once in place, I set the bridge on the footings, fine tuned the height with the top nuts and positioned and then glued the bridge to the footings. Now I can either lift the bridge out by taking the bottom nuts off the under side of the benchwork and lifting the whole thing out, rods and all or just loosen the nuts and spin the rods out of the footings so that the rods stay in place.







Mike

[Puddington]

And that was a CP RDC!   

True enough Tim; I rode it and it was like riding the "Tilt a whirl" at the PNE...... 

RDC's live and die on the quality of the trackwork and road bed. Having taken the VIA RDC's from Peterborough to Toronto on CP's Havelock Sub from 1983 to about 1986 numerous times (University to home) I can attest to the fact that the trip from Peterborough south began as a kidney puncher as the Havelock Sub track was (and still is) in poor shape. As you reached the Cavan swamp area the track side to side sway made you feel like derailment was about to occur.... then as you got south near the CP mains the track became better and the ride evened out..... Alas we got there each and every time.....

Now, if it had been a CN RDC, well......................... 

[Puddington]

....just because I CANNOT...WILL NOT.... WILL NEVER ALLOW my final offering of the year to be a picture of one of those "other guys" (Crash Naturally...CN  )... I humbly submit a photo of a few "foamers" catching a shot of that CPR "passenger geep" rounding the corner at Northhill....



Happy New Year to the finest n scale modelers around... the A@@hat's of Railwire !

[Cajonpassfan]

This weekend was all fun run and no work.  Attended an open house on a friends of mine's layout, he models the Santa Fe in New Mexico, so the scenery was a bit off for my engines but still looked great none the less.  It was nice to be able to run some of the stuff I have been working on as my layout still is in the benchwork stages.  The pictures are of an Oriental Brass NP A-3 that I custom painted as an SP&S E-1, #700 that now resides in Portland, Oregon and is operational.  The loco was re-motored with a coreless motor, the tender chassis was scratchbuilt from plastic and now utilizes Bachmann/Spectrum trucks from their C&O long vandy tender so that I can have 12 wheel tender pick up.  The loco is still adding some additional pickup from one rail.  I had found the original pick up scheme (tender left rail, loco right rail) just wasn't enough for the sound decoder.  I now run a Tsunami 750 Heavy Steam decoder for sound and a TCS Z2 is in the boiler to run the motor.  This is probably my best running loco, very smooth and not too picky on track.

Phillip

Phillip,
 that is one beautiful loco! Amazing what all wheel tender pickup will do for brass steam performance, isn't it?
Nice job, Otto K.

[Scottl]

Nothing photo-worthy yet, but I made substantial progress on my Cisco bridge (here is a proto image: http://www.railpictures.net/viewphoto.php?id=346633&skip=1) that I hope will be the centerpiece for my new layout (see https://www.therailwire.net/forum/index.php?topic=27858.0 for the track plan and concept).  I am basically scratch building it in styrene from shapes and some CV and ME parts.  I ran out of materials but completed most of the bents and the arch beams.  I'm heading to Toronto later this week and hope to resupply with the parts and get the main bridge structure complete.  I think though, the walkways are going to bankrupt me!

Happy New Year to all!

[Lemosteam]

NARmike, is that a laser crosshair for your drill- where findie?  Me wantie!  Awesome idea for the bridge footings.  I thought they were just there to hold the model for painting...

[C855B]

NARmike, is that a laser crosshair for your drill- where findie?  Me wantie!  ...

Drill presses with laser crosshairs are pretty common these days. I picked one up at Lowe's about six years ago. A benchtop, it was under $100 IIRC.