What's funny is all the major browsers have spell check built in now - but however this forum implements the editor, it disables or blocks that. My posts would look a lot better if it didn't disable the spell check.
--Randy
Modeling the Reading Railroad in the 1950's
Visit my web site at www.readingeastpenn.com for construction updates, DCC Info, and more.
Progress continues on the layout. We have a bunch more mainline track laid. Brian, our chief track layer, is able to do about 30' of track in approx. two hours with a couple of guys assisting him. He has a unique method of offsetting the rail joints without creating any gaps in the ties. I'll try to remember to take my camera so I can show you how he does it.
We also have about 1/3rd of the bus wiring in place. Rene (Dutchman eh!) and Ron were under the layout soldering feeders to the bus tonight. Rene swore he wasn't going to burn himself but of course he did manage to drop some hot solder on his hand! That made him really swear!!! The two of them forgot to offset the feeder connections so we have a bit of insulating to do, but no big deal.
We looked high and low for the rail cutters and couldn't find them. Then we realized that Ron had them under the layout and was using them as wire cutters. Fortunately it was copper wire so no harm done, but he couldn't understand what the fuss was about. He had no idea what they were for.
We have made a small change to the position of one of the turnouts in order to lengthen the spur coming off of it. It will require some patchwork to install the subroadbed where needed.
Bob spent the evening bevelling the Homasote so we can have deeper ditches along the mainline. He managed to get the cuts nice and even and parallel to the cork roadbed. Cutting the Homasote seemed to be easier than I thought it would be, but we were using fresh blades so I'm sure that helped.
We are also working on rebuilding our portable layout. The wiring has been giving us problems for quite some time. We are in the process of replacing all of the original feeder wires as well as adding a bunch more, and we are using terminal strips to connect everything together instead of trying to solder the feeders to the bus. The terminal strips help us to keep the wires flush with the bottom of the modules. They used to hang down and were constantly getting snagged when the modules were being slid in and out of the storage boxes. To tell the truth, the original wiring was a total botch job. In many places they were relying on turnout points to feed two or three feet of track, and they had used telephone wire for the feeders. We are using 18 ga solid because the layout gets bumped around pretty good while it is being transported.
We also solved a problem with the turnout motors on one module. They were operating intermittently. Turns out the old power pack that we were using to supply them had gone belly up. One minute it was producing 17 volts and the next minute it was down to 3 volts. Of course, instead of measuring the output right from the start we fiddled and farted around for about an hour before we got to the source of the problem.
The portable layout is also suffering a lot of damage to the scenery. I think it is a result of being dragged around in a trailer on rough roads. Ballast is cracking and several of the buildings are damaged. Once we get the wiring up to snuff we will go to work on that. Some of the scenery is pretty amaturish too so we will eventually have a go at that as well.
That's all for now.
Cheers everybody!
Dave
I'm just a dude with a bad back having a lot of fun with model trains, and finally building a layout!
(Warning, the first three paragraphs are concerned with club insurance and are off topic as far as the layout construction goes.)
We held our monthly General Meeting and we made a couple of key decisions. One decision was to no longer be a 100% NMRA club. Before you go nuts on me, please let me explain our reasoning. The most important reason was that the NMRA club insurance was redundant. We are required by our landlord to have Canadian based liability insurance which we have purchased. It covers all of the things that the NMRA policy does so why pay for two policies?
Another reason for dropping the NMRA coverage is that there is a question of how much protection a USA based policy would offer in Canada. According to the NMRA itself, the NMRA insurance has not made a payment to a Canadian club in several years. That's not to say it wouldn't, but we couldn't get a clear answer that said it definitely would. In the opinion of our insurance broker, the NMRA policy is primarily designed to protect the executive members of the NMRA itself. It does not provide coverage for the executive members of local clubs either here or in the US.
That brings us to the issue of Directors and Officers coverage. Our basic liability policy does not protect the Directors, nor did the NMRA policy, so the club agreed to buy Directors and Officers insurance. Many of the club members said they would rather pay their $30.00 annual fees for NMRA membership to the club to cover the D&O policy instead. If any members wish to continue to belong to the NMRA that is their choice (I will).
As far as the layout goes, we decided to appoint an Acquisitions Manager for the new layout, which happens to be me. We have had a couple of small problems regarding purchases and donations. In regard to the purchases, we have been tripping over ourselves when buying various tools and supplies. For example, it was determined that we needed more knives or box cutters to work on bevelling the Homasote. The next week I showed up with two carpet knives (box cutters) and Henk shows up with two large knives with the snap off blades. Voila! Four knives when we only needed two. Another example was the feeder wires. We thought that we were almost out of the 18 ga. solid wire that we are using for feeders. Sure enough, I ordered some and Henk bought some so we ended up with more track feeder wire than we will ever use. We don't want to use the surplus for things like structure lighting feeds or signals because that will make wire identification under the layout very confusing.
As far as the donations from members, we want to avoid being given cast offs that won't be usable (we already have a policy in place for donations from the public which I won't go into). For example, one member gave us about 200' of telephone wire. We have no identified use for telephone wire at this point so it will now be my job to ask the member if he wants it back. If not we will offer it to the other members, and if they don't want it, it will go for recycling.
Part of my job will be to inventory all the stuff that we already have on hand so we don't buy something that we already have. That almost happened because I was trying to find suitable DPDT On-On toggle switches for the Tortii and I even ordered some samples. What I didn't know was that another member had already donated 84 DPDT On-On switches which will be more than enough for all of our switch motors. Nobody told me!
When we do need to acquire something, rather than just buying it, we will ask the members if they have said supplies available to donate. If not we will ask for suggestions on where to get the best price. Once we decide where to get it I will ask one of the members to purchase the items (because I live out of town and don't have a car through the day), or I will buy it through Amazon or eBay.
I don't mind taking on the role of Acquisitions Manager at all. Most of the layout design work has been done so that isn't taking anywhere near the time I had been spending on it.
Hope that wasn't too boring!
What you need is an e-bay officer to sell unwanted stuff on e-bay for you, takes care of alot of problems. Now I don't know Canadian law but asume it is similar to US in that if you incorperate as a non profit, directors are safe.
Or during open houses, have a sales table for the unwanted stuff - even if someone donates some old Tyco train set cars, if they are all together and not destroyed, offer them to the public if they aren't usable on the club (in before Wayne shows some of his modified train set cars that you could never tell the origins...so they may be useful after all). One of the clubs around here does that, and a bunch of years ago I managed to pick up a favorite book I used to check out of the library when I was a kid - David Sutton's The Complete Book of Model Railroading. Certainly some of it is dated, but it does have 2 chapters on ASTRAC, which convinced me that command control was the way to go. And there wonderful high quality photos.
Another nearby club also usually has a table of donated items for sale cheap. Sell enough old train set cars for $1 each and eventually you'll have $5.
rrebellI don't know Canadian law but asume it is similar to US in that if you incorperate as a non profit, directors are safe.
Not so in Canada. Virtually every non-profit organization in Canada carries insurance against lawsuits aimed at the Officers and/or Directors. The primary reason for the D&O insurance is to cover your legal fees if somebody does sue. There are other coverages included of course, but that is the main reason. Getting sued doesn't necessarily mean that you are going to lose the lawsuit, but it does mean that you are going to have to spend a wack of money defending yourself no matter how frivolous the lawsuit is. It also protects you and your spouse's assets in the event that the case goes against you.
hon30critter rrebell I don't know Canadian law but asume it is similar to US in that if you incorperate as a non profit, directors are safe. Not so in Canada. Virtually every non-profit organization in Canada carries insurance against lawsuits aimed at the Officers and/or Directors. The primary reason for the D&O insurance is to cover your legal fees if somebody does sue. There are other coverages included of course, but that is the main reason. Getting sued doesn't necessarily mean that you are going to lose the lawsuit, but it does mean that you are going to have to spend a wack of money defending yourself no matter how frivolous the lawsuit is. It also protects you and your spouse's assets in the event that the case goes against you. Dave
rrebell I don't know Canadian law but asume it is similar to US in that if you incorperate as a non profit, directors are safe.
rrebell And here I thought Canada was less lawsuit happy than the US, boy was I wrong.
And here I thought Canada was less lawsuit happy than the US, boy was I wrong.
Maybe, but with as polite as Canadians are, there's really only 3 things worthy of suing over - taking someone's beer, taking someone's back bacon, or blocking someone's view of a great hockey play.
(you know we love our Northern neighbors - no offense intended)
(lawyers, on the other hand..... j/k - I have lawyers as friends, just not the type that advertise on late night TV and give the whole profession a bad name)
Now, as far as railroads and clubs go - better safe than sorry, and if all the bases of that boring, mundane nature are covered, the REAL reason for having the club can take center stage and everyone can have fun.
rrinker Maybe, but with as polite as Canadians are, there's really only 3 things worthy of suing over - taking someone's beer, taking someone's back bacon, or blocking someone's view of a great hockey play.
Thanks for the laugh Randy!
rrinkerNow, as far as railroads and clubs go - better safe than sorry, and if all the bases of that boring, mundane nature are covered, the REAL reason for having the club can take center stage and everyone can have fun. --Randy
Well said! I think that we are fortunate in that all of the BARM club members agree.
Figured out the cork for the south end of the main yard on Monday night. We were prepared to do a lot of cutting but things didn't work out that way at all. The main yard has five tracks plus the arrival/departure track, all on 2" centers (in the straight parts). We looked at the Midwest cork sheets that we had, and they were too narrow to fit under all the tracks. However, a wee light went on in my head. I put a strip of Midwest cork regular roadbed on either side of the big sheet and voila! Perfect fit (+- 1/8"). That was too easy!
Henk and I did have a heck of a time trying to position the cork sheets. The wall that the yard section is up against was apparently installed by a drunken sailor and it wobbles a lot! Finally we just drew a line with a long straightedge that was close to being equidistant from the back wall.
I have to put in yet another plug for 3rd PlanIt. I printed the south end of the yard at 1:1 and it made it so much easier to plot the positions of the turnouts. I tried to convince Henk that we could just glue the 1:1 track plan right on top of the cork. It would disappear once the ballast is laid. He said he would think about it. He is going to be away for a month so I may just make an executive decision in his absence and glue the paper plan down whether he agrees or not!
Cheers guys!!
It probably will disappear, but white will show through any slight gaps in the ballast. The other thing you can do is just assemble the turnouts on the template and then move the whole works onto the cork. Or slide the paper out ala pulling the tablecloth off while leaving the dishes intact. Tape the paper down just a little, and cut some slots across it in places where you can put some track nails in the turnouts without going through the paper - then you can pull the paper out from underneath without disturbing the position of the turnouts. The gaps in the printout won't prevent you from lining the turnouts up properly, there will be plenty of track and tie line on either side of the gap.
Coorked wavy walls are all too common - I remember heling my neighbor turn part of his garage into an office, he wanted to put a chair rail around to make it look nice instead of just big slabs of plain drywall. Over a 10 foot sectioon, if the piece oof chair rail was held tight against the wall at one end, it was a good 6 inches out at the other end. Luckily thin molding is flexible so it was just a matter of attaching it to the wall from end to end but the curvature of the wall was amazing. Floors are often not level, espcially in a basement where they may slope down to a floor drain, which is why measuring up from the floor isn't a great way to get a level benchwork. Doesn't matter for open grid or L girder with risers, you can compensate by adjusting the risers, but for flat top areas you could end up with a tilted flat surface where everythign rolls off one end. Plus I'm fussy enough to want the base reasonably level as well even if there will be risers to set the actual level of the track. Thank goodness for the laser levels that project a level line around the entire room, no more water levels and long straightedges to get a level line marked on the wall at the desired height.
Randy:
You make a good point about the white paper possibly showing through the ballast. What we could do is use the template as a guide for drilling the holes for the Tortii levers and the frog feeds. Once the holes are in place it will be easy to position the turnouts.
rrinker Floors are often not level, espcially in a basement where they may slope down to a floor drain, which is why measuring up from the floor isn't a great way to get a level benchwork. Doesn't matter for open grid or L girder with risers, you can compensate by adjusting the risers, but for flat top areas you could end up with a tilted flat surface where everythign rolls off one end.
Floors are often not level, espcially in a basement where they may slope down to a floor drain, which is why measuring up from the floor isn't a great way to get a level benchwork. Doesn't matter for open grid or L girder with risers, you can compensate by adjusting the risers, but for flat top areas you could end up with a tilted flat surface where everythign rolls off one end.
That's where I went wrong on my first layout, cutting 36" legs only to result in uneven framework where the legs sat in the dips in the floor. On my new layout. I am using leg levelers.
Rich
Alton Junction
I used levelers on my last layout, which was in a fully finished bedroom. Some ended up screwed tight in as far as they would go and others were almost out as far as they would go without falling out.
What's not attached to the wall on my new layout will be L girder so I can keep the legs to a minium. As such, the leg always extends well above the joist so I can level the whole thing up without any adjusters on the bottom. However, I will still put something on the bottom of the legs so the wood doesn't directly contact the cement floor, even though I intend to epoxy coat the floor (and use carpet tiles, but only in the aisles where people stand).
richhotrainWorse yet, the concrete floor itself may not be level
Don't make me laugh! The floor in our clubhouse has dips and high spots everywhere. Building the permanent layout has not been a problem because we attached it to the walls first and then built the legs whatever length was needed.
However, setting up our portable layout has been a whole different story. It was never designed with uneven floors in mind so getting it level in the new place was a challenge. The first time we set it up it looked like an earthquake had hit it.
Thankfully, someone was thinking even way back when when the club modular layout was first built, and every leg has a T-nut and bolt in it for leveling. Important since we set up in all kinds of places. Newer modules have permanently attached folding legs, but they still get the t-nut and bolt. The old sections just have pockets in the corners and in many cases the legs don't even have bolts and wing nuts, the legs just go into the pocket and the weight of the top keeps them on. First couple of sections go up and it looks VERY wobbly, and it is. But once the whole thing is together it is plenty solid and handles crowds jostling into it just fine without dumping everything off the rails.
Brian, our chief track layer, is able to do about 30' of track in approx. two hours with a couple of guys assisting him. He has a unique method of offsetting the rail joints without creating any gaps in the ties. I'll try to remember to take my camera so I can show you how he does it.
Brian
My Layout Plan
Interesting new Plan Consideration
railandsail I'd be interested in seeing that info as well Brian Eiland
Thanks for reminding me Brian. I'll take my camera on Tuesday night.
railandsailI'd be interested in seeing that info
Hi Brian:
You will have to wait a week or two for me to record how our Brian does his offset flex track joints. Tonight all they did was install turnouts, and next week will be taken up mostly with loading the portable layout to take it to a Seniors Home and then to Bracebridge on Saturday for the Muskoka show.
Hopefully in two weeks I can get some photos of his process. It is worth exploring because there are no ties lost in the joining process and the rail joints are offset. No need to install replacement ties down the road.
I'm interested from two standpoints, track on my eventually layout plan, and more currently the track in my helix structure (still a few weeks away).Thanks Dave
Not much new to report. Track laying on the mainline is almost complete. We have moved a couple of turnouts so we have to add in some sub-roadbed etc. to support the spurs. The cork for the main yard is about 3/4s installed, and the track lines have been drawn. We moved the passenger station track a bit further from the mainline at the front of the layout so we can have a decent sized ditch between the two.
I learned yet another lesson in terms of paying close attention to how others are doing their work. One of our members was installing feeders tonight, and I had been coaching him fairly closely to make sure that he was putting them in the right places. However, I missed the fact that when he was drilling the holes for the feeders he was leaning on the drill pretty heavily. When the drill broke through the sub roadbed the chuck was hitting the rail quite hard. One of our more experienced members pointed out that the rail had been bent downwards in some places where the drill chuck had hit it. The depressions were noticable and no doubt would have led to tracking problems.
The depressions were fairly easy to correct simply by putting a knife blade under the ties where the dint was and then using a couple of large 'C' clamps to apply a bit of pressure to the top of the rail either side of the dint. The knife blade prevented the dinted part of the rail from being pushed into the cork and the rail straightened out quite nicely, thank goodness. To prevent this from happening again, we are going to use a small piece of Homasote between the rail and the drill chuck to cushion the impact. Of course, not leaning heavily on the drill would help a lot too, but we couldn't seem to get said member to understand how to not do that.
More next week!
We took the portable layout to the Muskoka Rails train show in Bracebridge, Ontario last weekend. Bracebridge is at the entrance to cottage country in central Ontario. It is a very picturesque little town with a river running right through the middle. However, if you visit, don't expect to go in a straight line from point A to point B! I swear the town was modelled on a bowl of spaghetti!
The portable layout once again proved that it is haunted. Everything ran fine for most of both days. We tried an SD40 on the inner most of the three tracks despite the tight radii. It seemed to run fine. That has never been possible before. OOPs, spoke too soon, the SD40 started to short out the layout one one particular turnout, but only once in every five laps or so. That will take a bit of work to sort out.
Steve ran a Rapido F9 (?) for hours on both Saturday and Sunday and there were no problems until about 3:30 on Sunday when it suddenly decided to derail in the tunnel on every lap!
I ran my rail truck for about three hours on the outside loop with narry a burp, but when I switched it to the middle track later on Sunday afternoon it wouldn't run at all.
There were other problems as well on Sunday afternoon. Finally it donned on us that the temperature in the building had risen considerably during the afternoon. The gremlins must be related to the additional heat. Figuring out how to cure that will be a challenge!
A few layout pics showing progress to date. The mainline is almost complete. We should be able to run a loop in the next week or two.
We have several bridges that need to be built. One is a JV Models curved trestle kit which we just received:
https://www.walthers.com/curved-wood-trestle-kit-36-x-16-quot-91-4-x-40-6cm
I believe the proper description is 'craftsman kit'. It is a box full of long sticks of wood, and some short ones too. I'm going to be asking a lot of questions when the time comes to build that one!
Wickman scratch built a couple of trestles not too long ago. There is some good information on this thread:
http://cs.trains.com/mrr/f/11/p/262601/2959610.aspx#2959610
We also have a bunch of Micro Engineering bridges to build but that is a topic for another day.
Looking good Dave. Thanks for the progress update!
Mike
Don't forget a "Golden Spike" ceremony when the first train completes a lap of the layout!
rrinkerDon't forget a "Golden Spike" ceremony when the first train completes a lap of the layout!
Thanks Randy. We will have to arrange a special meeting, and I will try to make sure that nobody sneaks a lap in before the official event.
Does anyone sell golden spikes in HO scale? I wonder what a jeweller would charge to make one?
hon30critter rrinker Don't forget a "Golden Spike" ceremony when the first train completes a lap of the layout! Does anyone sell golden spikes in HO scale? I wonder what a jeweller would charge to make one? Dave
rrinker Don't forget a "Golden Spike" ceremony when the first train completes a lap of the layout!
Hey Dave-
Congratulations and high fives all around!
If you really really want to do this . . . you can get a solid 18K gold 'spike' for about ten dollars; 14K for about six dollars. You can get a pack of 10 gold filled 'spikes' for about five dollars. Use earring posts. Very close in size and shape to HO track nails.
Search for "jewelry findings gold ear posts".
Robert
LINK to SNSR Blog
ROBERT PETRICKIf you really really want to do this . . . you can get a solid 18K gold 'spike' for about ten dollars; 14K for about six dollars. You can get a pack of 10 gold filled 'spikes' for about five dollars. Use earring posts. Very close in size and shape to HO track nails.
Hi Robert!
Wow, thanks for the idea! Those options are certainly affordable.
We have a jeweller in Newmarket, ON who crafted a wedding ring for me a few years ago. We gave him some not particularly valuable small diamonds and a couple of old gold rings. What he created was way beyond our expectations, and his price was reasonable, and he did the work on time during the busiest season which of course is Christmas. I'm inclined to have him make a real miniature spike with the square sides and the offset head. If he wants hundreds of dollars then it will be a non-starter, but if the price is reasonable then I might just go for it and donate it to the club. The entertainment value would be well worth the money.
Alternately, I have a real track spike that I could spray gold and mount on a board with a small engraved plaque to commemorate the date. I think having a tiny real gold spike on the layout would generate a lot more conversation.
Somewhere I have one of those, a real track spike, spray painted with gold paint, mounted to a small board. No engraved inscription or anything, I think my grandfather just made it up for fun. Being a carpenter, I think he made the base himself. The spike is glued to it with some sort of 2 part epoxy.