So You Want a Model Railroad
A cautionary tale…
Alice visits Mr. Agony with her latest problem with Joe. They had given Junior a toy railroad for a Christmas present, and Joe had taken it over and become obsessed to the point he has built a railroad empire using all of his time, energy and money. Sound familiar? Watch what happens next….
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tPEWvlb5m5g
The Staging Level is complete!
It took the entire Christmas break and weekends in January, but the staging level is now complete. Track laid and wired, tortoises installed, panel built and soldering skills perfected. I am now a lot closer to running trains than I was a month ago – and it feels pretty good!
After building the main layout at 42 inches high, I realized that although it was optimal viewing level for the kids, I wasn’t enjoying looking ‘down’ on the trains. If I rebuilt the main layout 9 inches higher – at 51 inches – I could solve 3 big problems that I identified with the ‘first’ layout:
- The layout was just too low for me. Funnily, I have read that the #1 thing that most railroaders would change about their layout is the height.
- Not enough staging on the first iteration… now I can stage five 12′ trains (each train approx. 15 cars plus 3 locos) eastbound and five 12′ trains westbound (see trackwork pics below).
- Single mainline now runs through a scene once on the viewable level. In the previous version, I had the train out and back for continuous running on the same visible level. While this was great to watch, it wasn’t very prototypical – especially since the QGRY is mostly single track.
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- explained!
Starting over and ripping up a year’s worth of work was REALLY painful and I had my doubts; but I bit the bullet, took the leap of faith and it was worth it.
Next up will be to test, test, test the trackwork (and test it again!) to insure perfect operations before I start to bury the staging level and build the level above it.
The (Model Railroad) Origin of the Word ‘Hacking’
The MIT Tech Model Railroad Club was founded in 1946 and at times was a 24/7 operation. It’s also at MIT – the holy grail for technology creators. Imagine the environment there over the last 70 years or so as the development of computers and the internet were taking place!
And it’s where the term ‘hacking’ originated!
Andy Miller has been a member of the Tech Model Railroad Club at Massachusetts Institute of Technology since he was a student there in the 1960s. Hidden away next door to the MIT Museum, today the club is still going strong, albeit with far fewer members than in its heyday (mainly alumni). More remarkably, this was the birthplace of such legendary geek phrases as “hacking” and “foo”.
Happy (Progress) New Year
Can’t believe how quickly time passes – as it’s been months (ok embarrassingly, it’s been 3 months) since my last post. No excuse really; however, in my defense I’ve been busy downstairs WORKING on the layout. As those of you who blog and work on a layout know, sometimes it can be difficult to do BOTH.
New Year’s Day is always a big train day for me as we hold our annual open house/new years day party. It’s the big event where I try to get something substantial accomplished to show off to my non train friends and the neighborhood kids. This year was no different…
Over the holidays I really got a lot of work done and have all but finished the under layout (partially) hidden 10 staging tracks. I knew that I wanted to use tortoise switch machines here so I installed 12 of them and built a control panel.
YES…I (an electrical idiot) build and wired a control panel! How you may ask did I navigate the world of DPDT switches and bi-directional red/green LEDS? YouTube of course. Found an excellent series by csxmad on YouTube that took me through the design and build of a panel, step-by-step again proving that you can find anything online.
Check out the excellent Wiring Leds & Dwarf Signals for Control Panel – Model Trains Part 17 for how I created this wonderful mess!
Sunday Shoutout
Great fun was had yesterday in Bowmanville and today in Woodstock! In addition to a couple of wonderful finds (and spectacular deals), the best part of both days was connecting with some model railroad folk and having some great conversations.
In Bowmanville, I bumped into Ralph Renzetti who does amazing weathering. Ralph has a great ‘how-to’ series on trainmasters.tv called Extreme Weathering. Ralph is a great source of information and recommended a fiberglass brush for distressing paint that works well. He also suggested I try a rubber cement fading technique that I am excited to test out. Ralph has also inspired an upcoming post that I am working on…stay tuned!
Sunday in Woodstock, I met up with Muskoka Steve who won first place in the YouTube Model Builders BIG Build Contest. A big congrats and kudos! I blogged about Steve’s fantastic Maple Leaf Mills model here. You can watch the big win on YouTube below.
Steve is very involved in NMRA and told me about the 15th Annual Hamilton & District Layout (H.O.M.E.S.) Tour on Saturday, November 7, 2015. Layouts are open from 9am to 5pm (with a break for lunch, 12:30 to 1pm). There will be 20 layouts in various scales open to layout tour participants, several of which have never been on the tour before, and including the HOMES and Burlington club layouts. Mt Albert Scale Lumber will also be open for demos. More info here.
And a final shoutout to Luc from Sarnia, who you might remember from my first Sunday Shoutout. Luc is working on a new layout and it was great to hear about this plans. He also received a delivery at the show and is now one of the rare few that have a set of my HO scale beavers 3D printed from Shapeways. Always great to connect with friends, mentors and the folks who inspire me to be better and do better!
Raspberry Pie
Yum! Who doesn’t love a slice of pie? The Raspberry Pi is a cheap, credit-card sized computer that plugs into a computer monitor or TV, and uses a standard keyboard and mouse. It runs Linux and is capable of doing everything you’d expect a desktop computer to do, from browsing the internet and playing high-definition video, to making spreadsheets, word-processing, and playing games.
And it runs JMRI Model Railroad Interface!! Or it is supposed to…
I have been playing around with it and it works… sort of. With no Linux programming experience and some help from my company’s IT guru (who sold me his used Raspberry Pi model B for $20) I have DecoderPro up and running on the Pi and can turn main track power ON and OFF by using DecoderPro and also can control a loco on the mainline with a JMRI throttle.
But, for some reason, I am getting a serial port error (see pic above) in the JMRI preferences pane and can NOT read or write or program any brand of DCC decoder. Which is strange as you’d think that JMRI would either communicate and work or NOT communicate and not work at all.
Since it is a serial port issue I googled “Raspberry Pi JMRI Serial Port issue” and found this post online at http://www.nscale.net/forums/showthread.php?37250-JMRI-on-a-Raspberry-Pi-2
One issue that Raspberry Pi users run into is that JMRI requires a package called RXTXcomm. It is included with JMRI but the version included does not work on the Raspberry Pi. That means you must install the package from scratch and then replace the file included with JMRI with the one in the newly installed package. (A file named RXTXcomm.jar should be copied to the /opt/JMRI/lib folder.) Once I had JMRI and the supporting packages installed I plugged in my Digitrax PR3 to the remaining USB port (remember I used one for Wifi, one for the keyboard and one for the mouse). I then started JMRI and it opened at the “Preferences” window where I selected “Digitrax” for the interface manufacturer and PR3 as the interface. From the drop-down menu I was able to select the USB port the PR3 was plugged into. Finally I selected the Command Station I have (Zephyr). If you don’t have your interface connected to the RPi2 and powered up when you start JMRI you will get an error indicating the hardware wasn’t found. Also you need an external power supply for the interface because the RPi2 USB ports can only supply about 100mA of current.
Like all things computer, more googling is necessary and I need to find the time to ask for help at https://groups.yahoo.com/neo/groups/jmriusers
When I get it fully up and running I will (re)post this entry with the process and (hopefully) the solution.
This is the BIG Weekend
Train show double header… Saturday I am heading to the Bowmanville Annual Train Show…
And Sunday is the WOODSTOCK MODEL TRAIN SHOW AND SALE, from 10 a.m. to 3 p.m., in the Oxford Auditorium and the Mutual/Market Buildings, on the Woodstock Fairgrounds, at 875 Nellis Street. Expanded to two buildings and featuring up to 180 vendor tables of Model Trains of all scales including Train Sets, Locomotives, Transformers, Rolling Stock, Track, Structures, Photographs, Videos, DVD’s, and Railroad Memorabilia.
Comment below if you are planning on attending. See you there?
Brampton Model Railway Show
Tradeshow Tuesday
THIS Weekend is the Brampton Model Railway Show!!!
http://www.bramptonmodelrailwayshow.com/
OCTOBER 3rd and 4th, 2015
12942 Heart Lake Road at Old School Road.
Minutes north of Mayfield Road
Show is in the 33,000 Sq. Ft. Pavilion
SATURDAY OCTOBER 3, 2015:
10:00AM to 4:00PM
SUNDAY OCTOBER 4, 2015:
10:00 AM TO 4:00 PM
ADMISSION:
Adults $7 NMRA member $6
Seniors and Teens $5 Children (6-12) $3
Children under 6 free
FREE re-admission on Sunday
33,000 square feet of model trains.
Operating layouts in many different scales.
Thomas play area for the kids.
Vendors selling all kinds of new and used model trains.
railroad memorabilia for sale.
Great Food service.
Free parking.
Handicap accessible.
What is this? Any thoughts?
Was railfanning the CP line at the CPR Lambton Yard in the Junction area of Toronto on the weekend when I photographed this oddity.
Looks like it could make a neat scratchbuilding project. Anyone know what it is?
Our Home and Miniature Land – Free Doors Open
Did you know there is a $2 million dollar HO scale model train layout taking shape in Mississauga called Our Home and Miniature Land that is based on a similar, hugely ambitious set-up in Hamburg, Germany called Miniatur Wunderland?
Construction began on January 1, 2014. Since then, 25,000 man-hours have been expended on the project and I’ve been and it’s pretty awesome. Now you can see this for yourself. And the best part is that it’s free!
On October 24th, Our Home and Miniature Land is inviting you to come and see what they’ve built so far. Bring your family and friends to their open house. Your visit will include the competed Toronto exhibit, as well as Hamilton which is still under construction.
Only 131 tickets are available and you must register in advance at the eventbrite site link below:
https://www.eventbrite.ca/e/our-home-and-miniature-land-open-doors-tickets-18750772064
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