hon30critter We have chosen our project manager! It is me!!
We have chosen our project manager! It is me!!
richhotrain l'état c'est moi
l'état c'est moi
Perhaps the French king Louis XIV most famous quote.
"The state, it is me".
Alton Junction
Was that purposeful you used a French word to describe getting out of French class?
Also, I thought King Louis' famous quote was "It's good to be the king"
Oh wait, wrong Louis.
--Randy
Modeling the Reading Railroad in the 1950's
Visit my web site at www.readingeastpenn.com for construction updates, DCC Info, and more.
rrinker Was that purposeful you used a French word to describe getting out of French class? Also, I thought King Louis' famous quote was "It's good to be the king" Oh wait, wrong Louis. --Randy
Rich
rrinker Was that purposeful you used a French word to describe getting out of French class?
Of course! I couldn't resist the irony!
When I was given permission to drop the French class I felt like I was walking on air! The class was so incredibly boring. The only other time I felt that way when I was in school was when I quit high school entirely in grade 12. The Principal had caught me talking with a friend in a hallway. We were supposed to be in the cafeteria on our spare period. I was hauled into his office and told that if I didn't like the rules then I could quit! So, I quit!! He was speechless. I was thrilled. My dad wasn't!
I spent a year working at General Motors in Oshawa and then I went back to school, with, I might add, a ton of money in my pockets! That year at GM paid for most of my University degree. I can only vaguely recollect what classes I took. I never let my classes interfere with my education!
Dave
I'm just a dude with a bad back having a lot of fun with model trains, and finally building a layout!
hon30critter I never let my classes interfere with my education!
I never let my classes interfere with my education!
hon30critter richhotrain l'état c'est moi Pardon? (spoken with a French accent). No, not quite. I still choose to be a team player. I managed to avoid French class from grade 10 on. Stupid move on my part, but of course, at the time, by getting out of French class I thought I had pulled off a major coup d'etat! Now all I can manage are a few swear words! I have a nephew who is just about to graduate from a French Immersion high school in Mississauga, Ontario. He has travelled to Quebec several times with his family and each time he has been able to communicate quite easily with the locals. I guess they aren't teaching Parisian French in the schools anymore. Now the kids just might actually get something out of it! Dave
Pardon? (spoken with a French accent). No, not quite. I still choose to be a team player.
I managed to avoid French class from grade 10 on. Stupid move on my part, but of course, at the time, by getting out of French class I thought I had pulled off a major coup d'etat! Now all I can manage are a few swear words!
I have a nephew who is just about to graduate from a French Immersion high school in Mississauga, Ontario. He has travelled to Quebec several times with his family and each time he has been able to communicate quite easily with the locals. I guess they aren't teaching Parisian French in the schools anymore. Now the kids just might actually get something out of it!
To bring you up to date on the layout progress, we are at the point where we can start laying some track and doing some wiring. We are learning as we go. We have worked out a main power bus set up that has reasonable runs, 25' or less. We are going to use 12 ga. and 14 ga. stranded wire. I won't bore you with all the details, other than, thanks to the process of design by committee, it has taken us forever to make a few simple decisions.
I have calculated the position of each piece of the cookie cutter sub roadbed relative to the walls. So far the plotting process seems to have worked quite well for cutting the sub roadbed sections, so hopefully my numbers will work for getting them into the right positions on the benchwork.
I'm really looking forward to getting the individual teams up and running. That won't happen until January. We are setting up our portable layout at two different libraries in the Barrie area between X-mas and New Years, and our annual X-mas dinner is on Dec. 12th. Both of those activities have pretty much taken care of December as far as working time on the new layout goes. Once we do start work in January I can see myself getting run off my feet by all the team leaders who will no doubt have questions galore! That should be interesting! I'll keep you posted.
Cheers everyone!!
We took a break from the sawdust and glue last night. We went to a very nice Buffet in Barrie and had a good time. I ate too much of course, but how could I resist with most of my favourite foods right in front of me?
Unfortunately for the restaurant the weather was exactly what you can expect in Barrie at this time of year. It was cold, the wind was strong, the snow was really coming down and the roads were very slippery. I say "unfortunately" because the restaurant which could seat about 150 people was empty. They must have lost their shirts last night with all the food on the buffet that wasn't consumed. (Hey, I did my best to prevent anything from being wasted!). Somebody suggested that the leftovers may go to a local shelter but I'm not sure if that is true.
(Burp!)
Tuesday night we laid our first cork roadbed!
Henk, the President, and I were trying to figure out how to get members to come in on other than the normal Tuesday nights to work on the layout. If we only work on it on Tuesday nights it will take forever to build. We have put out several notices in the past where we will say "I'm going to be at the club at such and such a time so please join me", but it has more or less been on the spur of the moment. I think what we will have to do is set some specific times throughout the week for work sessions.
Maybe after the holidays are over and folks schedules theoretically clear up a bit, having Saturday Pot Luck work sessions may bring some in. Slate a descent portion (most) of the day for everyone to bring a dish to pass and time to kill working on the railroad.
Congratulations on the first cork roadbed! Please keep us posted on the progress. With no club local to me, I'm doing the railroad club thing vicariously through your thread!
Mike
This. After the stress and running around for the holidays is over, people will have more free time. A weekday evening is limited hours for people who work, so a Saturday session, especially if someone can be there nearly all day, will likely get more attendance.
What would really help is if you can get a TV in there so no one has to miss the hockey game. Or at least a radio. After hockey season I'm sure there will be no shortage of helpers.
Hey Dave
Having workers once a week is actually good news. You're making progress.
Tuesday night work session. Saturday morning coffee-and-donuts. Avoid pizza-and-beer. Great for getting people to show up; not so great for getting work done.
And Randy is right. Make sure to have a radio on hand so everyone can listen to the curling matches.
Robert
LINK to SNSR Blog
Thanks for the suggestions guys!
One of the challenges that we have had with our track plan is determining where to put the reverse loops. It took a long time to find solutions to the problems, and in fact we missed one problem area entirely until we actually started to lay roadbed.
One of the limitations of my track planning software (3rd PlanIt) is that it doesn't have a tool for determining rail polarity. I'm not sure if any of the software programs do have that capability. I decided to contact Randy Pfeiffer at 3rd PlanIt to suggest that polarity detection would be a great addition to the software. Randy got right back to me saying that he had been discussing exactly that with a client a short time ago. My suggestion came as a pleasant surprise and gave him enough of a push to get him seriously thinking about the design of the software. He actually wrote a fairly long note describing the possible approaches, and took the time to show me how he determined polarity on a Disney layout that he designed.
Polarity detection capability would be a huge advance in CAD programming especially for the more complex plans, IMHO.
Darn, then I guess I will have to upgrade after all. That would be neat - and maybe not all that hard to do, just have to allow for the left and right rails to be set to different colors instead of both the same.
rrinkerThat would be neat - and maybe not all that hard to do, just have to allow for the left and right rails to be set to different colors instead of both the same. --Randy
Actually, part of my conversation with Randy Pfieffer at 3rd PlanIt suggested the opposite. For one thing, all of your track sections would have to be properly connected which can take some time to do. Sometimes track looks to be connected but isn't, and that can take a bit of time to fix properly.
Secondly, Randy sees the process as being a 'try and try again' proposition. In other words, the program would show rail polarity but you would have to decide on the changes needed to address any conflicts. Once you make the changes you would run the program again to test for any new or remaining problems. It might take several tries before you have proper return loops long enough to hold your longest trains. Having the program be able to suggest solutions would require some pretty complex software.
None the less, there is now a light at the end of that proverbial tunnel, and it won't go out because of a short in the track wiring!
Making sure the track is connect was probbaly the hardest part of learning the program, but I'm pretty fanatical about it, because if the track isn;t connected, then your train stops or derails when you try to run it in 3D mode. And you get inconsistent results trying to measure the total length.
I'd have to say having it suggest solutions would be best left out, just the difference between DC and DCC changes how you would resolve many reverse loop issues. And of course 3rd PlanIt supports 3 rail track which would need to disable the checking entirely since there's no such thing as a reverse loop electrical issue with 3 rail. Going to be interesting to see what he comes up with.
Just a short update (partially so I can vent my spleen):
I went up to the club on Tuesday night (nice normal Canadian wintery 40 km drive with lots of slick roads and blowing snow) hoping to get the next steps in the construction of the new layout organized, and maybe actually get something done! Not much got done!
We needed to study the benchwork plans so we could determine what parts needed to be cut next. Henk forgot to bring the benchwork plans. Without the plans we couldn't do any planning, and we had only one small piece of Homasote that we could cut. When we went to cut it we discovered that the member who owns the jig saw we have been using to cut everything so far had taken the jig saw home for the holidays with our last blade in it. We had a brand new jig saw (mine, still in the box) but the single blade that was provided with it was hideously coarse and would likely have torn the Homasote to shreds. We eventually did get the piece cut by hand with a utility knife, but that was hard work and we will try to avoid doing that in the future.
The total effort on Tuesday amounted to getting a 16" x 18" piece of Homasote installed, and we pulled a bunch of push pins out of the cork roadbed where the glue was dry. We also relocated some of the raw materials and already cut pieces so we could get at the next section of the layout to install the plywood and Homasote, so the night wasn't a total loss.
Make no mistake! I'm still having fun, and I'm slowly getting better at herding cats!!
And I thought it was bad when I had to come up with activities to keep 2 others busy when they came over once a week to help me work on my last layout...
Practice makes perfectBrian
Brian
My Layout Plan
Interesting new Plan Consideration
BTW, didn't you say you never learned how to 'run the trains' with this 3rd PlanIt software? Have you ever tried that again??
Missed that. On my previous layout it was great as I was able to fully simulate my intended operations. Need patience for a larger layout, and you also need to be careful to make sure all track ends are actually connected, otherwise the train just stops.
Hi Brian:
railandsailBTW, didn't you say you never learned how to 'run the trains' with this 3rd PlanIt software? Have you ever tried that again??
I have learned how to run trains on 3rd PlanIt. I wasn't really thrilled. The trains don't run smoothly, or at least they didn't the last time I tried which was several years ago. They move a few inches, then there is a pause, and then they jump forward a few inches, then a pause etc. etc.... I found it to be boring. It helps if all the track sections are at proper elevations and connected properly.
What I have not mastered is how to create terrain and fill it in. I have given it a shot a few times but I can't seem to get the hills and the hollows exactly where I want them. I have cheated by simply placing lots of trees at different elevations to simulate the slopes so I can get an idea of what the terrain will look like.
I blame my lack of computer skills and lack of understanding of some of the concepts for not being able to use the terrain building software, not the program.
Dave this is a great thread and I have enjoyed following it for a while. I can't wait for the next adventurer in this layout.
Hi Robert:
So you don't mind all my whining eh? Thanks for your comments.
Next step as far as the benchwork goes is to see what subroadbed and Homasote sections still need to be cut to finish the benchwork around the outer walls. Then we have one remaing section of benchwork framing that fits against the south wall to assemble. Then we will have to tear down the walls of our existing storage area so we can store the portable layout in that space. That is going to be a messy job.
Once we can get the portable layout out of the way we can start building the rather large peninsula. It will be approx. 9' x 16' when finished. We will build it in two halves split lengthwise so we can reach into the center to do scenery. There is no track in the center area, just scenery. All the peninsula track will be within 30" of the fascia, most of it much less. Once the out of reach areas are done we will join the two halves together and do the track etc.
In the mean time, we will be laying cork and installing wiring and track as the benchwork gets finished.
I'll try to remember to take my camera next Monday.
Jerky motion in the 3D mode of 3rd PlanIt usually means an inadequate video card. Does your computer have a seperate video card? If so, what brand?
Not sure if this is still an issue, but way back in the day when I was first starting to mess around with 3PI, I had the one computer I've built over the years with an ATI (now AMD) video card, and it was horrible. Games were fine - but trying to run trains in 3PI, or even trying to move about the room in 3D mode, was horribly slow. But my OLD computer, MUCH slower at anythign else, was really good and smooth with 3PI. That was the first and last ATI video card I ever bought, strictly nVidia since then.
But even on my workbench computer, which just uses the standard graphics on the processor, no extra video card, it runs rather smoothly.
rrinker Jerky motion in the 3D mode of 3rd PlanIt usually means an inadequate video card. Does your computer have a seperate video card? If so, what brand?
I'm not sure what video card is in my current computer. Nothing ever seems to lag on it. In fact it has been so long since I tried to run trains on 3rd PlanIt that it may not have been this computer I was working with. I'm sure that Randy Pfiffer has updated the software since I last ran a train in 3D.
Dave (the computer dinosaur!!)
hon30critter Hi Brian: railandsail BTW, didn't you say you never learned how to 'run the trains' with this 3rd PlanIt software? Have you ever tried that again?? I have learned how to run trains on 3rd PlanIt. I wasn't really thrilled. The trains don't run smoothly, or at least they didn't the last time I tried which was several years ago. They move a few inches, then there is a pause, and then they jump forward a few inches, then a pause etc. etc.... I found it to be boring. It helps if all the track sections are at proper elevations and connected properly. What I have not mastered is how to create terrain and fill it in. I have given it a shot a few times but I can't seem to get the hills and the hollows exactly where I want them. I have cheated by simply placing lots of trees at different elevations to simulate the slopes so I can get an idea of what the terrain will look like. I blame my lack of computer skills and lack of understanding of some of the concepts for not being able to use the terrain building software, not the program. Dave
railandsail BTW, didn't you say you never learned how to 'run the trains' with this 3rd PlanIt software? Have you ever tried that again??
I think I mis-spoke about the train running aspect. I was thinking of the terrain aspect. Sorry
Brian:
No reason to be sorry. You have given me cause to go back and have another look at the terrain function. It would be really useful when it comes time to do the land forms and the scenery on the club layout. Communicating what I have in my mind's eye by waving my hands in the air and repeating the words "rock" and "tree" multiple times won't do a very good job.
I've been a fan of 3rd Planit since it was first released. I absolutely love the ability to run trains. Unfortunately, that's probably kept me in my armchair longer than it should have. I've modeled my proposed Ventura Subdivision layout and run a complete 24 hour 48+ train schedule to check for operating conflicts. Gets pretty hairy when three or four trains are running simultaneously and you have to stay on top of turnout routing! The best upate was when they added viewpoints so you could follow a train as if you were actually operating it around the room.
My only problem is that I've never had much luck with terrain meshes. The only successful method I use is to connect contour planes between two contour lines.
in addition to the Ventura Subdivision, I've also modeled the entirety of the Harlem Transfer circa 1954 including detailed models of every structure on the property. Lol, it looks and "operates" better than any of my actual layouts.
Ray