The pot of coffee is always on [even after 2 years have passed]. Come on in. Sweet ice tea too.

[csxt30]

Mitch : sorry to hear about your tires. That's awful. Very costly.

Buckeye : I read where they suspended a lot of activities around Ohio state & changed times of school football games & other stuff. They also mentioned no weddings take place on that day !!

Thanks, John

[jonadel]

Mitch--
Sorry to hear about the vandalism to your car, I only hope they (the police, if the choose to) will find the sorry little pukes and do the right thing. I know, don't hold your breath. So much for trying to do the right thing and make them responsible citizens AND follow the basic rules of society.... hard to deal with the knuckle draggers and their parents.

Jon

[Brutus]

Hi guys - cold and wet here - maybe snow tonight and tomorrow morning, but it's up to 40 tomorrow so won't last.  Thanks for the well wishes on my birthday - I got my wish, no more political ads!  Will finally be caught up to my allowance this Friday - I went a little over getting stuff for Halloween and all.  I got an iTunes gift card.  Took a few minutes to figure out how to Not charge stuff to my credit card - now I need to figure out what songs I want.  I guess ones that I would never buy the album in a million years, but I do like that one song....  No new train stuff this week, so haven't been posting much, but you guys keep it going pretty well without my contributions!  Take care everybody, and hope Dougdagrump feels better soon.  Sorry to hear about the tires, Mitch.

[ChiefEagles]

Sorry about the tires.  There needed to be a sniper around the corner.   No trail, just justice.   Got the ceiling holes cut in plaster with robotool and paster bit.  Did it get hot!!!!!  Made lots for dust.  Mounted boxes and pulled wires.  Now when I get home, clean the whole room again and get dust up.  Mount the fixtures and wire to switch.  Today's part was the worse part.  Made County meeting.  Packed.  Up early.  If don't get to check in, everyone have a great next few days.  Marty, got email from US Airways.  Gave all the advantages of merger.  If they get Delta, they get big overseas routes.  Our frequent flier miles can then go to those flights.  Later

[dbaker48]

OH MY GOSH !!!! (haven't heard that in a while I'll bet)  MY WIFE AND SON, CAME TO THE OFFICE HOG TIED ME AND TOOK ME TO ARNIES TRAIN SHIP THIS EVENING.  I WAS SCREAMIN ALL THE WAY.   CAME BACK AND THE TRUNK OF THE CAR WAS FULL OF STUFF.

HE'S HAVING A 20% OFF SALE, (PRICES AS GOOD BETTER THAN MAIL ORDER IN A LOT OF CASES.)

GOT TO GET BACK TO WORK SORTING THINGS OUT...........

[csxt30]

Have a good trip Chief !! Oh, where's the popcorn ? !!

Oh, Don, good haul !! 

Thanks, John 

[jefelectric]

Good evening,

Just got back from Cool Trains.  Wired the display layout and got DCS set up.

Doug, We were running an ATSF ten wheeler as a test engine.

Sounds like Don has been hitting the sauce.

Chief, Have a good trip.

 

[mitchelr]

OH MY GOSH !!!! (haven't heard that in a while I'll bet)  MY WIFE AND SON, CAME TO THE OFFICE HOG TIED ME AND TOOK ME TO ARNIES TRAIN SHIP THIS EVENING.  I WAS SCREAMIN ALL THE WAY.   CAME BACK AND THE TRUNK OF THE CAR WAS FULL OF STUFF.

HE'S HAVING A 20% OFF SALE, (PRICES AS GOOD BETTER THAN MAIL ORDER IN A LOT OF CASES.)

GOT TO GET BACK TO WORK SORTING THINGS OUT...........

Don - you gotta love a wife like that  You'll have to post a list of some items and some pics of your train room as you get further along.  This shopping expedition and the CalStewart Meet.  You are having one fine week...

Mitch

[John Bakeer]

Jim,
Over here we have five major car makers; Ford (Ford UK, Land Rover, Lotus.), General Motors (Vauxhall), Honda, Toyota and Nissan, plus a number of small volume/speciality firms aka Morgan, TVR etc. Rolls-Royce are BMW, Bentley is Volkswagon.
At one time British Airways had a stranglehold but new outfits have muscled in; EasyJet, British Midland, RyanAir etc. Like us I'm sure your regulators will see to it that competition will flourish.
+13 here in Blighty.

[AKKevinT]

Checking in from the northland, temps still hovering around -20°f tonight, it could be cooler so I am happy. As I am turning in for the night some of you are just now starting your day.

Doug & Bob: Thanks for the feedback on the settings and contacting the folks at CTT I will try both later today while I am at the office. One way or the other I will figure the problem out and let you guys know what it was. I appreciate the suggestions and advice.

Next week we will be putting up a Christmas tree in our office and there will be train running around it. Students and staff are always amazed when they walk in and see it. This year I plan to take a different train to run the rails each week before the Christmas break. I will post some pictures once everything is up and running.

Regards from the Freezer,

Kevin T.

[Jumijo]

Good morning all.

Foggy and mild here this morning.

The wife lost our tickets to the Polar Express train ride and was somehow blaming me for it last night. Even though I had nothing to do with it. I didn't even know she ordered them! Women . . .

Have a safe trip, Chief. Steal me an ashtray!

Stay warm, Kevin. Throw another seal on the fire!

Doug, You don't sound any loopier than usual! 


Jim

[ChiefEagles]

Morning.  Storms passing through.  Out the door.  Hope the hotel has computer.  If not, New England Yank will talk bad about me.  Good Luck BUCKEYES.  

[cheapclassics]

Good morning all,

It is windy and cool in SE Indiana with temps in the 40s today.  Mitchelr, sorry to hear about your tires.  I had a rock tossed thru the back window of a car a long time ago.  It is aggravating to have people tear up your stuff.  I went to a public meeting on the road construction around the Honda plant last night, but there was not much new to learn about.  No TV, just the YMCA.  I hope everyone has a good day.

Keep on training,

Mike C. from Indiana 

[Jumijo]

Morning.  Storms passing through.  Out the door.  Hope the hotel has computer.  If not, New England Yank will talk bad about me.  Good Luck BUCKEYES.  

What a terrible thing to say. I never talk badly about you, old buddy. You're the cat's pajamas in my book. Have a nice trip!

Jim

[Blueberryhill RR]

Good Morning from Blueberryhill....

It is a dark, rainy 58 degrees and only going up to 60 today. That's better than freezing. Rained all night.

Today is a normal day of chores and running errands. Later, I want to work on the layout. Can't quite decide on how to run the new upper loop track. Looking at a couple of options. Lots of work, either way.

Chief...You have a safe trip.

Time for the Dining Car and breakfast. Later.

Y'all have a great Thursday. Keep dry.

Chuck

[Jumijo]

I forgot to mention this before.

This morning on my way to work, I put the radio on and tuned to my favorite station. They were playing Christmas music! From today until Christmas the station is only playing Christmas music.


Jim

[phillyreading]

Good Morning from south Florida, the weather is very nice down here, can go outside in shorts and a tee shirt, temp. around 65 degrees overnight, around 83 degrees during the day. The main thing to watch out for is hurricanes down here and I don't mean the football team from the University of Miami.  Over the years it has got down into the 30's during late December and January.

Supposed to cool off by saturday according to the TV.

There is one radio staion down here that plays Christmas music from Turkey Day till 26 Dec. To play only Christmas music till the 26th of Dec. is over kill for the holiday.

Lee F.

[cnw1995]

Good morning from a grey and cool northeastern Illinois where the sun has not appeared for what 2 weeks now? The bride is going to visit a friend in the hospital. I'm to help with the home-schooling this morning - oh yeah, and work too: the real reason I'm here today and every Thurs. Had fun last evening rearranging some scenery and trying to fit the R transformer with Atlas connector to the new sidings - the small train-set transformers always get so hot. This'll reduce the transformers plugged into me power bar from five to three. Safer I think. So I hope to get to continue to play with all this today. I guess I like to continually mess around with the layout instead of declaring it done and then just running trains. At least I can always run something in the background on one of the five different lines too.

Too bad about that vandalism. I've had every single one of the hubcaps stolen off my 1996 Hyundai Accent in the train station parking lot - one at a time - over the years. Who would want a plastic, cracked, worn wheel cover? Then someone keeps trying to wrench off the license plate....

[laz 57]

HI GIZ,

  More rain today 1-3 inches.  Then turn colder.   Had pheasant soup last nite mmmmm good.  Got to get another one or two this Saturday, I hope?

Laid some 0-27 track last nite to run smaller motorize units around my town.  Looked good last nite going to check it out over the weekend and see if it will stay or not.

Oh yea,

HAPPY FRIDAY EVE!!!!!!

All be safe.

laz57

[Buckeye Riveter]

Morning.  Storms passing through.  Out the door.  Hope the hotel has computer.  If not, New England Yank will talk bad about me.  Good Luck BUCKEYES.  

What a terrible thing to say. I never talk badly about you, old buddy. You're the cat's pajamas in my book. Have a nice trip!

Jim

Like they say, it is better you than I.  Of course, while he his gone, the Ohio boys will do our best to bad talk the Chief with words he doesn't understand. 

Only two days to the GAME.  The newspaper has a Buckeye story in every section.  The first party is Friday night.  We start again on Saturday with brunch before the game.  Millions of $$$$ are pouring into the Central Ohio economy due to this game.  Students are selling their tickets and then paying their tuition for a semester.

GO BUCKS!! BEAT MICHIGAN!!

[Blueberryhill RR]

It sure is quiet and peaceful.

[Jumijo]

It sure is quiet and peaceful.

Somewhere above us, in a jet liner, it's not.

Seriously, it's been very quiet here of late. Not much new to read. There seems to be an influx of newcomers. And the regulars aren't posting as much as they used to. There used to be a lot more discussions about all sorts of good things going on.

Jim

[trainmasterz]

Thanks John n John,

Hey, I got a question.  Annyone know anything about dynamic braking?  Annyone seen the most recent episode of Trains on Modern Marvels?

Does anyone use resistors on the down hill side of their track layout to simulate a train braking going downhill?  Any insight would be cool. 

Typically we used to have them speed up going downhill and that just looked bad.  So we just lay our track level, eventhough it was elevated, it had no grade. 

So Im thinking that a person could put some type of resistor on the lead going from the main bus to the downhill sections of track?

[Blueberryhill RR]

It sure is quiet and peaceful.

Somewhere above us, in a jet liner, it's not.

Seriously, it's been very quiet here of late. Not much new to read. There seems to be an influx of newcomers. And the regulars aren't posting as much as they used to. There used to be a lot more discussions about all sorts of good things going on.

Jim

I noticed that too. Seems like everyone is gearing for the Holidays.

I sure hope they gave Chief the " BIG " seat. He will complain to us for weeks, if they didn't.

[cnw1995]

Drew, that's what Speed Control like Odyssey is all about. I prefer to jockey the throttle myself going up and down the grades.

I don't notice any slowdown at all. Just skip a day and see what piles up. There's a fair number of new threads that appear - and wonderfully, they are mostly created by forumites other than us. It would make an interesting statistical analysis

News flash: World's Largest Rubber Band Ball visiting downtown Chicago next Tues. It'll be just outside my office.

[Buckeye Riveter]

News flash: World's Largest Rubber Band Ball visiting downtown Chicago next Tues. It'll be just outside my office.

Darn it! My trip to Chicago was cancelled for next week.  I'm scheduled to clean my sock drawer instead of seeing the World's Largest Rubber Band Ball.  Bad luck again.

As to the activity on the forum, if you haven't noticed some of the seasonal "old" timers are not posting this fall.  I know that one of those old timers in a private email told me that the new sofware killed their enthusiasm for the forum. 

[jefelectric]

Good afternoon,

Raining like cats and dogs right now. I nearly got drowned getting to my truck after leaving the fitness center this morning. Wasn't raining when I went in so naturally I didn't take my unbrella.

Then I did a little Christmas shopping in the rain. Added to my wife's collection of teddy bears. Also picked up some gifts for the staff at the fitness center.

Doug, Looks like you need to give up on the small transformers and buy a Post War ZW. There are still a lot of them around that are in good shape and parts are still available. I bought one about 5 years ago from Cool Trains (LHS) and it has given my good service. It sounds like the Chief is going to use them to power his new layout. If you buy one on ebay be careful to buy from a reputable seller and watch the shipping cost as they are heavy and are easily damaged because of the weight.

Drew, What you suggested has been done a lot when everyone ran conventional. You can set the transformer to the correct setting for going up the hill, add some resistance for level running and still more resistance for descending the hill. It works but is a lot of hassle unless you are going to run the same loop continuously, such as on a display layout. The new technology with odyssey & EOB does this automatically.

I am trying to figure out how to change my outer loop on the old layout from 042 to 054 curves with the least amount of work.  Just discovered that the version of realtrax software that I have loaded does not have 054 curves.  I have a newer CD here that I am going to try after I finish posting.

Jim F.  My wife is still looking for a puppy, if you recall we discussed this months ago.  She hasn't found the one that just screams 'Take me home with you'.

[csxt30]

It sure is quiet and peaceful.

Somewhere above us, in a jet liner, it's not.

Seriously, it's been very quiet here of late. Not much new to read. There seems to be an influx of newcomers. And the regulars aren't posting as much as they used to. There used to be a lot more discussions about all sorts of good things going on.

Jim

I noticed that too. Seems like everyone is gearing for the Holidays.

I sure hope they gave Chief the " BIG " seat. He will complain to us for weeks, if they didn't.

Good Evening Everyone !!

Yeah, & you know what else ? He will probably be so mad he won't make us any more microwave popcorn !!

Well, it's Friday for me !! Got tomorrow off !! Part of my new plan, get every Friday off I can, so I can go with my wife to get groceries, & keep putting stuff back from the cart, when she's not looking, so I have more train money !!

Hope everyone has a nice night !!

Thanks, John  

[ChiefEagles]

Evening.  Off to Cabela's party.  Good day.  Chat later. Sure is cold up here in Yankee land.  Their high is lower than our low this AM.

[Blueberryhill RR]

Evening.  Off to Cabela's party.  Good day.  Chat later. Sure is cold up here in Yankee land.  Their high is lower than our low this AM.

So much for peace and quiet !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!