G'd Evening Gang,
Brunhilda, I haven't seen you for a while. When you get a moment would you please bring me a peanut butter/raisen bagel and a mug of HC. I'll run that through my blender then down the tube.
Welcome to winter. It has sure settled in here, -18c and snowing. Supposed to get colder tomorrow and the day after that as well. Got the little motorhome parked for the winter and got the three batteries out of it and into the garage today..
A big thankyou to Ulrich & Petra, Charlie, Garry and others for the very nice Birthday wish. I will never see 77 again.
Terry in Wisc. Glad to hear your operation went smoothly and that you were released so quick. But really do take care, we don't want to hear that the release was too quick and you have had a set back.
Brent, thanks for posting that video. I remember it now, but I had forgotten about it. It is good, I only wish they could have had the scenes more in tune with the music. such as when Hank is singing about Quebec they are showing Niagara Falls and when in Ontario they are showing shots of Castle Mountain (Mt. Eisenhower) sure doesn't fit very well.
Not much new here, haven't had much energy for a couple of months. I am set to decal a Gp-30 with the last Mountain Lettering and crest tomorrow, and a few things on the RIP track.
Steven ( the young one not Br.Otte) good luck to you job hunting, you deserve a shot at a good job.
Found a funny thing with my B-man Gp-30s (3) on my test track, I have an old MRC power pack with Pulse power on it. The Gp-30s are DCC ready, but I only run DC. When the PP. is on pulse the locos will only run in reverse no matter what the direction the PP. says it will be. I don't have pulse on the layout so I never noticed that before. The layout has three Control Master 20s. powerring it.
CN. Charlie, a belated Happy Birthday to you, and anyone else that I might have missed along the way. Please forgive. Charlie I hope you got your planting done today as I don't think you'll be wanting to do it tomorrow. Sorry about the Cold.
Garry or anyone else, can you tell me when did Cape Jim pass on. saw that on the RIP Track and had been wondering as we usually emailed back and forth.??
Also any word around from Phil (Flip) another great Guy I haven't heard from in a while.
Johnboy out......................For tonight.
from Saskatchewan, in the Great White North..
We have met the enemy, and he is us............ (Pogo)
Good Morning...
Other kids were collecting baseball cards —
not me!
CNR_6401 by Edmund, on Flickr
I hope everyone has a fine day.
Regards, Ed
What´s for lunch?
We just had lunch - a wonderfully unhealthy meal of fries, "Leberkäse" ( akind of spam) and fried eggs, along with a sidedish of German coleslaw.
Frugal, but tasty ...
Tomorrow´s lunch will be a lot less greasy!
Happy times!
Ulrich (aka The Tin Man)
"You´re never too old for a happy childhood!"
Only problem there Ulrich is that you forgot the smile made of bacon ;)
Though, I'm more a fan of German potato salad.
Got those pictures of the LED control board now. I think it turned out pretty well, what for it being the first time that I soldered a SMT component.
-Dan
Builder of Bowser steam! Railimages Site
Dan,
Nice looking board, what do you use as layout software?
I used the online tool "EasyEDA" to layout the schematic and PCB. It's decent, and interfaces with their sister companies lcsc (components) and jclpcb (pcb fab).
The only "downside" to the jclpcb service is that you have to order the PCBs in a minimum lot of ten (10). If you're okay with the "standard" boards (1 oz copper, 0.062" thick, green, up to 4x4" square), they're $1.50 a board, shipped -- well, at least for now; I think the $2/10 baseprice is a sale.
Between my planned layout, and the present for wifey; I only need two of them. The rest would collect dust here, so if anyone wants a board, shoot me a PM.
Good Morning,
A frosty day here in aptly named, Winterpeg.
Johnboy, I did a search of Jim's name as I was concerned that I hadn't heard from him in a long time. His obit came up that said he passed away in April, 2018. No cause was mentioned but he did pass away in a hospital.
Maxman, we don't lose that much seed to squirrels as we use a feeder called the Squirrel Buster. It really does stop them from getting seed. They only get what we put on the ground and we do put out some for them too. My wife has a couple that will actually come to her if she calls their names.
CN Charlie
Dan:
The boards look very professional. Nice soldering!
I'm going to go back to your thread in the Electronics/DCC forum and read it again. I have some IR detectors that I mounted on standard perfboards but they look like crap. They would look much better on a dedicated circuit board, and probably work better too.
Dave
I'm just a dude with a bad back having a lot of fun with model trains, and finally building a layout!
I am going to make some signal controller boards, crossing signal flasher and servo controller boards for our layout at the museum when I get the "round tuit".
Thanks Dave!
Yeah, the SMT microcontroller was a bit worrisome when I got it, but it went together quite easily.
Afternoon Diners
Flo, give the gang and I a please.
Nothing much to report today, cold weather has hit. Today high was 40 F degrees which is not a awful cold but sort of cold.
Got the big hook out and cleared the derailment. Looks like the B&O box car caused the mess again. Will look at the trucks again. Maybe the ones I replaced them with had more ware than I thought? Well it is a B&O car so I won't give up on it!
Stolen Valor Being X Military I do watch stolen valor videos. But 27 year old man saying he was sergant in the Boy Scouts? I love it when the 27 year old man said he did not have his BSA socks on because his Mom had not washed them!
Ray, any thoughts on this one
Later Ken
I hate Rust
I went to bed early last night and woke up, wide awake at midnight. Watched a bunch of youtube videos including Rapido's latest, James Wright review and my favorite The History Guy. I have an interest in WW2, because my father was in the navy at Guadalcanal and in the invasion of Southern France.
The History Guy doesn't limit himself to WW2 and I watched videos on the Meuse, Hannibal's elephants (which may have been fake Roman history) a couple of 82nd Airborne medics that landed on D-Day, took care of Germans and Americans in a church, while it changed hands between the US, Germany and US, Coast Guard life saving during D-Day, the USS Barb, a submarine, that landed sailors on Japan to destroy a train, a slave captain of a Confederate boat, that stole the boat, and turned it over to the Union, the first black pilot in WW1 and a couple of US marshalls that sort of lived their lives like the Lone Ranger.
Best of all was the Pacific Clipper, one of those big amphibious airplanes that flew before WW2 in the style of the best rail travel, i.e. well cooked meals and sleeping accommodations. It got trapped in Australia after Dec 7th. They ended up flying across Africa, to South America and eventually to La Guardia, where they had to fly in circles for an hour before they were allowed to land.
By then it was 5 am and I went back to bed until 9 am. Maybe I need a history intervention.
I did some scenicking around my yard and turntable.
Henry
COB Potomac & Northern
Shenandoah Valley
well, I'm going to try again,
still got work to do on this. Sorry Guys..
cudaken But 27 year old man saying he was sergant in the Boy Scouts?
But 27 year old man saying he was sergant in the Boy Scouts?
I was a MSgt in a video game once ... and then mom hit the reset button
Evening diners,
I have no idea what today's topic is but whatever.
My story of the day,
Had to pick up some furniture my Grandmother bought off LetGo, as me and my brother are loading the table into my truckbed the guys daughter comes outside, well I'm going about tying down the furniture when the guy asks "Hey are those shoes comfortable?" I look perplexed, he adjusts the question "your Yeezys, are they comfortable?" I now knowing the context of the conversation say "yes, yes they are." The guy then continues "yeah my daughter saw them and was saying 'dad he's got Yeezys on!' She looked them up and they're like 300 bucks right?" I replied yes, but I got them for FREE, see they were in lost and found for three months and nobody claimed them so I got them." The daughter now chimes in "wow that's so cool, they're your size too!" I said " yes, I saw they were my size and I was like yeah I've got 300 dollar sneakers for free."
And so that's how a pair of (Free) Yeezy Beluga 2.0s ALMOST got me a girls number.
I didn't ask because well that's weird cause I'm there to pickup furniture and I'm trying to pickup his daughter.
Then again they're Texas Longhorns fans so I'll probably see them around town when I'm in my Burnt Orange.
Hook'em Horns!
Back to the other news, tomorrow I have to return some applications and I'm going to get some more, hopefully I'll get a few calls.
Steve
If everything seems under control, you're not going fast enough!
Good morning folks. We are 2" away from the highest recorded rainfall ever, and it's raining now. It's been such a warm fall, I find this mornings webcam view of Deshler Ohio surprising.
Good morning ....
Henry ..... It looks cold and wet in the photo ... Record rainfall ? Over what period of time ?
Briefly for now... Catch you later.
GARRY
HEARTLAND DIVISION, CB&Q RR
EVERYWHERE LOST; WE HUSTLE OUR CABOOSE FOR YOU
Bleh, snow/rain mix this morning. Flo, I think I'm gonna need the big mug of hot chocolate to get the chill off... maybe some bacon and eggs.
Least I was able to get the leaves up into piles yesterday. Now it's just carting them to the lawn for pickup. It's going to be a complete mess this year, the trees are still pretty heavy with leaves.
On the train front, starting to brainstorm my next project -- a JMRI- / CMRI- compatible interface for it (so one can tell it "hey, it's nighttime, turn on the lights"). Maybe even a replacement of the cpNode / SUSIC / SMINI.
Goood Morrrnninng alllll.
we might have the wet white stuff Monday into Tuesday here in W KY
Strating the desk top Christmas "layout" just have some track down, tetsing the fit. I need some more straight track.
Garry for the year we have had 60", normal is 40"
Afternoon folks!
Chloe, I'll have a mug of decaf with cream and some stevia, please and thank you...
Currently 34°F with little white thingies falling out of the sky at the moment. Won't amount to anything as the ground is still well above the freezing point.
I'll still put in this though:
The handyman came and unhooked my hose that seemed to be welded hard onto the outside faucet today while I was over getting 4 more miles of walking in at the fieldhouse this morning. He also got the spray attachment off for me as well. He told me on the phone that he is seeing a lot of this type of thing as the manufacturers are using some recycled metals for the connections that isn't very pure.... Says the trick is to use 3 or so rubber washers in the conections so the hose isn't as far onto the faucet.
Tonight I will be at the Smith Opera House in downtown Geneva for the Geneva Concert Series with the Rochester Philharmonic Orchestra with Ahri, Kim solo cellist for the Schuman Cello Concerto in A minor as well as several other major works. I am looking forward to it and hope my hearing aids work as good as they have been for me to actually enjoy music recently.
I will be spending part of the afternoon packing stuff for the Batavia Train Show this Sunday. May have to do some shopping for items Saturday, but most everything we need should be in stock already. Hopefully I will be passing some of the stuff off to the guy who likely will become my successor for the Division and so may have less in the car for the ride home....
Hope you all have a great day!
73
Ray Seneca Lake, Ontario, and Western R.R. (S.L.O.&W.) in HO
We'll get there sooner or later!
Eveing Diners
Flo, the gang and I will have a and I will take a side of candles.
Seems some one or some people cannot drive. Electrict company called and said they would be turning off the power at 5:00 PM till 6:00 PM for repairs due to a car accident. Guess Honest Abe had good night vision! I had 8 candles going and did not see that great. Power was off for 45 minutes so not that bad I guess.
Saw a few snow flakes fall. Nothing stuck and there was very little of them anyway.
Train Front Started working on the Walhers Proto 2000 Bessemer SD 7 last night. One of the problems I had is a number board feel out. Got that back in places and will start to mess with the broken side frame.
Later, Ken
Howdy
Ray ... Regarding winter weather in North vs. South . Actually, a severe ice storm in the South is no joke . I would prefer a winter storm with a foot of snow instead of one with an inch of ice. We experienced the KY Ice Storm of 2009. Similar to the rest of the western half of KY, we were stranded for nine days with no electricity , no land line phone , and no county water. Our road was complety blocked with broken trees.
By the way, I recognize the interchange in Alabama in the photo.
Also Ray.. thanks for posting your photo in my parks thread. I like your park scene a lot.
Everybody ...
Garry, we get our fair share of ice as well up here. We just have the roads salted (or brined for the interstates) before the storm shows up, and the truck crews out in the worst of it, clearing things before it can get too terrible.
The problem with winter weather in the Deep South is 1 we get ice but no snow, and we ain't got no salt, no plows, no nothin. All we have is gravel and sand, not to mention that people down here aren't as acquainted with winter driving.
I'll have my tow straps ready to lend a helping hand to anyone that got their car ditched.
Evenin' folks!
Heartland Division CB&QRay ... Regarding winter weather in North vs. South . Actually, a severe ice storm in the South is no joke . I would prefer a winter storm with a foot of snow instead of one with an inch of ice. We experienced the KY Ice Storm of 2009. Similar to the rest of the western half of KY, we were stranded for nine days with no electricity , no land line phone , and no county water. Our road was complety blocked with broken trees
Well, Garry, I hear ya! But, a major ice storm up here in the Northeast ain't no joke either, my friend. We tend to be a little better prepared and knowledgable with how to handle those things.... One Christmas Vaction, My son's and I drove down to Florida to visit my Sister (the Rev.) We got caught in a snowstorm that dumped a foot of sn*w in Georgia. That was not fun down there, I tell ya! Up here it would have been a nuisance but we have the equipment and the know how to handle that. We ended up spending a night in a school opened up as an emergency shelter (actually we slept in the truck. More comfortable than the bleachers in the gym, and we could roll down the windows, run the engine a few minutes and have heat now and then as well. It was all of 40°F inside the school and most of the people didn't have heavy coats to wear either.) Not fun and I appologize for poking fun at it, but sometimes ya just gotta, you know.... Oh, and yes I use the BBQ grill year around. Had a piece of chicken done on it tonight while the final flakes of sn*w were falling through the pouring rain (40°F)....
We had an inch of ice here several years back with major power outages, damage to trees (Major), with some falling on houses, etc. I was one of the lucky ones who had a wood stove that I used for most of the heat in the house. We had running water as that is buried deep around here and the have emergency generators at the reservoir.
Went to the Rochester Philharmonic Orchestra Cnocert at the Smith Opera House downtown tonight. All I can say is WOW! My hearing still is improving and the concert sounded so much better than they did 20 years ago to me.
Have a good one out there!
Good evening all.
Zoe - A hot cocoa please. Thanks.
Weather - Yep - Snow is here! "Winter Weather Advisory" in effect for Erie County Pa, and Chataqua County NY. Wet snow with 3-6" expected by tomorrow evening. (Some places up to 9" possible.)
Too bad I'm too busy to get some snowy rail shots....
Ulrich - Glad to see you here in the diner again. Sorry you are having so many issues though.
Ray - Yep, BBQ tastes good all year long, snow or not. And, smoked ribs are very good in any weather...
Ken - Glad to hear the wife is recovering well.
Garry - I will take all the snow it wants to throw, sans ice, thanks.
W*^k - Still getting 40-45 hrs each week, but getting very irritated at my version of "Jerry" of late. I do something, to make our day easier, and he un-does it in 5 minutes of starting the day... Because he "doesn't like it" the way it was set up.
Remodel front - A wall will be coming down, then the floor gets refreshed (floating hardwood flooring?) before the layout can be rebuilt. The walls will be a nice "sky blue" color ("Billow") so that will help the layout out very quickly.
Hope all are well, and all enjoy the night.
Ricky W.
HO scale Proto-freelancer.
My Railroad rules:
1: It's my railroad, my rules.
2: It's for having fun and enjoyment.
3: Any objections, consult above rules.
howmusAll I can say is WOW! My hearing still is improving and the concert sounded so much better than they did 20 years ago to me.
Well, they've had twenty years more practice
We got our usual wet, heavy "Lake Effect" snow today and more due over the weekend. I'll be in the basement "playing". I helped my son put a larger wood stove into his fireplace tonight. Not the best arrangement but I think it will work. He has a stainless steel liner threaded into his existing chimney and fireplace.
The fireplace must have been built by amatuers. No combustion chamber or smoke shelf and the firebrick lining stops just above the lintel and the rest of the "combustion chamber" if you want to call it that, is a sloppy mess using cored face brick. No way to build a fireplace.
At least with a brick-lined steel insert and the SS liner it will be a safer setup.
I have some ancient Life-Like F-M "C-Liners" that I decided to put sound decoders into. That might be this weekends project. They run smooth and pull like tanks. I think they're one of the "unsung heros" from back in the early Proto 1000 days.
I had Digitrax DH-121 decoders in them. I'm going to try to mount all the handrails, too.
I finished up an old NKP Products PRR Business Car this week. The brass has to ride in class...
PRR_Z74_Business Car by Edmund, on Flickr
I hope everyone is doing well these days —
gmpullmanThe fireplace must have been built by amatuers. No combustion chamber or smoke shelf and the firebrick lining stops just above the lintel and the rest of the "combustion chamber" if you want to call it that, is a sloppy mess using cored face brick. No way to build a fireplace.
I did a quote for a fireplace insert a few years ago and what the customer showed me was pretty scary. They knew something was bad when the chimney fell over one day. It had been added to the house by a previous owner and whoever did it didn't pour a base for it and didn't tie it into the house wall. It was only dug into the ground about six inches and the only thing that was holding it up was the eavetrough where it went past the chimney. All it took was a wind storm to topple it. I was shaking my head. The customer laughed and told me that that was nothing.
He took me downstairs to look at the fireplace. From a distance it looked normal but then he told me to have a look up the flue. There was no flue! There was no smoke box or liner either! Just brick up to the ceiling. The floor above had been cut away so that the smoke could get up to the level of the bottom of the chimney and it was left just like that! The perimeter floor joists were exposed and charred somewhat but the fire had never spread!! The owner said he had tried the fireplace once and all it did was fill the rec room with smoke so he never lit it again, thank goodness.
I don't know if he had a home inspection done when he bought the place. Looks can be deceiving!
hon30critterI did a quote for a fireplace insert a few years ago and what the customer showed me was pretty scary.
It is a wonder more houses haven't burned down, blown up or people asphyxiated.
I used to do side-jobs, kind of a handyman thing. Somebody called me once to look at their gas water heater, they couldn't get the pilot to stay lit. Thermocouple, I thought.
I got to the place and looked things over. Looks OK at first and I do try to light the pilot but it goes out as soon as you let up the safety button.
As I'm looking things over I see soot at the top where the draft vent hood is and there's soot all around it? I tapped on the vent pipe and it sounded like a solid oak log!
More snooping reveals that the homeowner installed a wood stove next floor up and chiseled into the furnace chimney. All the wood ash had fallen into the chimney and plugged up the water heater The gas furnace would have been next but it was cut in about two feet above where the water heater went in. Back then it was OK to share the two.
I politely told the lady of the house that this situation requires more work than I'm capable of. "But we don't have any hot water!" she says. Sorry, no can do but you had better get somebody here right away because you have a dangerous situation. This was the 1970s and I don't think there were any household CO detectors then.
I hope they got it straightened out but I wasn't about to assume any responsibility for that mess. People gripe about paying for permits, inspections and professionals but when you see stuff like this? and they had two young children in the house
Another time I saw a gas dryer piped up with about two-dozen 1/4" x 6" nipples and couplings, then a water stop & waste valve coming off the main, no valve at the appliance! I asked the homeowner what he was thinking. He says at the hardware store the half-inch nipples are three times the price. That isn't fair, says he. 1/2 inch is double 1/4 so the price should be double NOT triple.
Sheesh!
Just amazing what a little bit of knowledge can do.
Enjoy the weekend, everyone!
Cheers, Ed