Running Bear's Coffee Shop LXIII

[Raincoat2]

Hi Johnny, I meant to reply sooner. A switch will route power to the correspond rails depending on how the points are positioned or thrown, either to the main line or the siding or possibly to a second siding.

To do this, power has to be routed or connected to the switch either by it being connected to the main line which is powered or power has to be connected directly to the switch, especially if the switch is insulated/isolated from any powered rails such as a block section. This can be three to six foot section or longer that is insulated from the other adjoining rails and gets it's power from an Atlas controller, as an example, which has three on/off slide switches. Power is routed to the controller from your buss line, the power feeders are connected on one side of the controller and then routed to the block/s to deliver power to them as you desire. A block can be part of the mainline or an actual siding or one section of a run-around. I isolate both rails from any powered rails and connect two wires to each block to deliver power to them as desired.

I have all my switches hot or powered all the time and use the controllers to deliver power to the blocks as I desire or to shut it off. I use a white and green wire to represent the positive and negative and yellow and blue for the feeder wires to keep things consitant. Your buss lines are best run around the edge of the layout that is easy for you to reach and the feeders can be routed to the various blocks. You just have to remember that if your letting the outside rail be the positive rail on one side of the layout it the same when standing over on the other side just as the inside rail is the negative rail. The only time it can get confusing is if you have a reverse loop that ties back into it self. This requires a reversing switch arrangement which Atlas also makes.

I hope I've helped you a bit. If you have any questions feel free to write or call.

David - Up early this morning, are we?! Hey, thank you for the suggestions. I posted a fuller account of the problem on one of the other forums and Iron Horseman replied with what seems to be the solution, but I haven't had time to work on it yet.
Here's a more complete explanation of the problem: I'm running HO scale DC. Not interested in DCC yet. The layout is still in its early stages of track laying and wiring, so at this point there is no complete loop in the layout yet. So far I've been laying some track, then wiring and testing that section before laying a few more sections of track, and doing the same with that. I have several Peco and several Atlas switches on the layout. The problem switch is a Peco electrofrog - it's in the curve closest to you in the photo below. It switches the train to the outside mainline or to the inside trainyard. Remember, the track is not connected in a continuous loop anywhere yet - the lines you see going off to the left and along the back wall do just that - - they go out of the photo, and stop a few feet further out. I have power lines to the track in various places, but they are not all connected - I hook one up at a time via alligator clips just to do test runs. What was happening was the engine would run fine on the outside ("mainline") track, but when I threw that Peco switch to route to the inside track the engine would stop wherever it was on the outside track. Iron Horseman suggested insulating the switch, but I haven't had time to do that yet. I'm familiar with basic electrical stuff, and have been careful to keep the outside rail + and inside rail - on the layout. If insulating the TO is the way to go, I can do that easily; if running power directly to the switch from the buss line is the way to go, I can do that too. Just want to know why the switch was making my engine act that way and how to solve it and avoid that problem in the future.
Thanks for taking the time to explain stuff to this rookie.

 

[Raincoat2]

Good morning everyone. 42 and cloudy, chance of rain here in SW MO.

Greg - what'd you do, chain those soldering irons to the benchtop?!?
Willie - I checked out the Scalescenes website - where you got that cardstock structure download from - they have a few free downloads. I'll have to try one of those - didn't realize freebies like that were available. I'll have to check out the CleverModels that you mentioned, too.

Not much news from the trainroom - putting the finishing touches on the engine barn and preparing to lay more roadbed and track on the layout. Got to solve that TO wiring problem I mentioned in another post so I can finish laying track in the trainyard. Got an MBKlein order coming in tomorrow, including a NYC loco for the layout. Christmas in March

See ya later. have a good day everyone.

 

[new guy]

What railroad is the 2-8-2 ?

It says "Missouri Pacific Lines" in vey small letters on the tender, the road number is 1430. Whoever was asking about the track cleaning car, its a Centerline and brass and VERY heavy, it's the kind with the pads on the roller action.

Facebook? LOL! As long as you post NO TRUTH you will be ok! I posted the simple FACT that FERAL CATS are the leading cause of DEATH among SONGBIRDS and was spammed. hacked, and generally messed with including death threats. It is a FAD and serves no one but Sukerberg. Sorry (not) but I shoot feral cats AND dogs when and where found!

 

[Boris]

Joe, our local fire department got a new pumper truck in 1975, when the 1921 Mack (hand-crank start) wouldn't start to go to a call. IIRC, it was a P73 Ward La France /C600 truck. I don't know if I have any pictures of it, I'll see what I can dig up. It did have a blue bubble-gum machine light.

Terry: Thanks. The Ward on the TV series "Emergency" was a P80, with 2 bubble-gum lights.The Ward P73 was the commercial chassis model, mounted on chassis such as the Ford C, the Mack CF Mack MC etc. Scanning photos of late 60s era rigs, most had gum balls. Visabars began showing up in the '70s, initially on smaller fire trucks, like the Mini Pumpers and Midi Pumpers, mounted on pick up or 1 ton chassis. There are some ward P80s owned by Chicago, that sported Visabars in 1974. My department operated mostly ageing Mack and Seagraves, from the 50s. There was one custom CF Cab, a tack on to a FDNY order, and a Great Eastern, purchased in the 70s, that were delivered with gum balls.

I was able to identify a prototype for each of the Ford C fire trucks offered by Athearn, including the Heavy squad. All had Light bars, although similar pieces came with gum balls. Like railroad equipment many emergency vehicles were modified and retrofitted as time went by. When the usable life span is 25 years, that happens. It appears that the only way I'll get the desired ladder truck, is to buy a Walthers Scene Master Ladder truck, and amputate the '90s cab replacing it with a Ford C. They also still catalog the Alloy Forms mack B61 with open cab, but it's out of stock at present, listing for double my "choke" price.

 

[montanan]

Good morning. We're at 33 degrees with some overnight rain, but the skies are clearing.

Karl - I really enjoyed the video in the WM shops. It is quite a job working on steam locomotives. I have had the opportunity to have visited ther Union Pacific shops in Cheyenne, but there was nothing torn down this far in their shops. Thanks for posting that. I am a real fan of steam.

Joe - Like the photo of the Aero Train. Here is the Athearn Mack pumper. The detail is really good. When I got it and saw it I wanted to get one or two more, but like you, I found that they were sold out. Terry is correct about Ford bringing out the C body in 1957. I did research that as I do have a couple more tractors and trucks from Athearn in the C body. This is the kind of fire trucks that we have in the area. In rural areas, there are not a lot of hydrants around and the fire dept may have to draw water out of a river, irrigation ditch or pond to fight a fire.



Later

 

[Sirfoldalot]

Good Morning: It's 58 this morning, only supposed to reach 61 for a high. Overcast sky with a few scattered sprinkles mixed in the fray.

Karl - Thanks for the info and link. After I watched that - I managed to whittle away a couple more hours watching other videos of trains and planes, but no automobiles. lol

Great photo this morning, Chet ! Hometown had a fire truck almost identical except an International - and that top deck was loaded with hose laid back and forth.

 

[Greg@mnrr]

Good Morning:

Raincoat2: I have two of the Radio Shack iron holders that have a plastic like base and a metal corkscrew holder for the irons. All I did was position them close together and used a screw with a large washer to apply downward pressure on either side of the iron holder bases to hold them in position. I have a duplex electric outlet mounted on the side of the work bench and the iron holders are with inches of the electrical outlet. Not completely bullet proof, but will keep the holders from being pulled or knocked out the work bench.

Chet: Yes, I need to start building the kits I already have and stop buying more "estate" cars, kits or RTR rolling stock. I need to get the freight yard expansion finished to store the rolling stock. That is in the works for late 2017.

I also have to do an inventory of my rolling stock to prevent me from buying duplicate equipment. I have two pairs of the same locomotive which I purchased before I did a locomotive inventory.

Odds and ends today in he layout room.

Thanks.

Greg

 

[montanan]

Greg - I have also came across some kits that I rat holed away years ago and forgot about. Some are wood craftsman buildings. Also have a few Tichy freight car kits and I just came across some Walther Gondola kits. Don't think I need any of them. I have more freight cars than I really need and really have no places for any buildings left on the layout, except for possibly one spot I could put a farm house and barn. Sure does feel good to be that far ahead on the layout.

Most of what has to be done to the layout is to put smaller details in and freshen up older parts of the layout. When I do go down to the train room with all good intentions to get some small projects started (or completed) I find myself just running trains and enjoying it.

 

[Greg@mnrr]

Chet: I forgot I have an old LaBelle wood kit of a Russell snow plow that I must of purchased circa 1980.

Greg

 

[Raincoat2]

Good Morning:

Raincoat2: I have two of the Radio Shack iron holders that have a plastic like base and a metal corkscrew holder for the irons. All I did was position them close together and used a screw with a large washer to apply downward pressure on either side of the iron holder bases to hold them in position. I have a duplex electric outlet mounted on the side of the work bench and the iron holders are with inches of the electrical outlet. Not completely bullet proof, but will keep the holders from being pulled or knocked out the work bench.

Chet: Yes, I need to start building the kits I already have and stop buying more "estate" cars, kits or RTR rolling stock. I need to get the freight yard expansion finished to store the rolling stock. That is in the works for late 2017.

I also have to do an inventory of my rolling stock to prevent me from buying duplicate equipment. I have two pairs of the same locomotive which I purchased before I did a locomotive inventory.

Odds and ends today in he layout room.

Thanks.

Greg

Greg - I have been building structure kits at a salvaged bench from an abandoned build. It's way too small and too low. Can't store any tools on it or there would be no room for kit building. In fact, I end up doing much of the gluing on part of the layout benchwork, which needs to stop because I'm about to start laying track there. So I'm waiting for a workbench to go on sale at Harbor Freight - It's not very sturdy, at least the showroom model was weak, but I think I can reinforce it with either 2X4's or steel and make a useful modeling center out of it. It has a couple of drawers, a couple of shelves, a light (which seems kind of dim, so I may need to put a better system in), and a multi-plug outlet on the side. So I would have a place to put my soldering iron instead of sitting it on the floor . The stand you describe sounds good - seems to me I've seen things like that, so I may be on the lookout for something that would work.

 

[Beady]

33 and sunny. Rest of the week supposed to be drippy and in the low 50s.

Got a fleet of four n scale police cars yesterday, now I just need a donut shop. I know this sounds mundane, but I have always regretted not taking a certain picture: I was on my way to work, and rolled into a Dunking Donuts with three cop cars parked in front. This was before smartphone days, though, so I do have an excuse.

Which reminds me: For my birthday, this next Saturday, the wife took me to the nearest Legoland and let me buy the Simpsons' Kwickee-Mart set.

This signature is intended to irritate people.

 

[D&J RailRoad]

Things are coming together for the ops session. The classification yard ballasting turned out pretty good. I have one turnout that needs to have a rail insulated. It shorts the yard out when I throw it. Ballast looks good as I buried the ties as typical in most yards. Had to use fine ballast to do that.
I removed about 15 locos from the tracks as I think some of the visitors will be bringing their own motive power. People like to run their own locos on this empire because of the distance and the long trains they can pull. Also, because when they are running a long train, they can usually see the whole thing on one long stretch of track vs. tight 90 degree turns and chasing its own caboose.

 

[PRR Modeler]

Afternoon All,

Warm here today. Earlier I raked the yard and ended up with 22 lawn bags of oak leaves for a total of 39 bags this year. There are 6 oak trees that border my property plus my 4 oak trees. Lesson learned- Never buy a house with oak trees. After that I trimmed bushes that go down the side of the driveway and cleaned the pool filter. After all that I took Alieve and sat in my wing backed chair and here I sit!. I still need to clean gutters and trim the hedges against the house-Next week. No MRR today.

Joe- I like the photo.

Karl- Sounds like a fun trip. Great video.

Louis- How times change.

Johnny- Are you sure you haven't inadvertently hooked one set of your track feeders opposite of what it should be? I have made that mistake several times. When you meter in that situation it shows power available but it isn't the right polarity. Looking at your photo both tracks (inner and outer) should have the same polarity.

I hope everyone has a good night

 

[Raincoat2]

Afternoon All,

Warm here today. Earlier I raked the yard and ended up with 22 lawn bags of oak leaves for a total of 39 bags this year. There are 6 oak trees that border my property plus my 4 oak trees. Lesson learned- Never buy a house with oak trees. After that I trimmed bushes that go down the side of the driveway and cleaned the pool filter. After all that I took Alieve and sat in my wing backed chair and here I sit!. I still need to clean gutters and trim the hedges against the house-Next week. No MRR today.

Joe- I like the photo.

Karl- Sounds like a fun trip. Great video.

Louis- How times change.

Johnny- Are you sure you haven't inadvertently hooked one set of your track feeders opposite of what it should be? I have made that mistake several times. When you meter in that situation it shows power available but it isn't the right polarity. Looking at your photo both tracks (inner and outer) should have the same polarity.

I hope everyone has a good night

Hey, Curt - I've been really careful about maintaining the correct rail polarity throughout the layout thus far, and I'm using appropriately colored wires from the power source to match the feeder wires - so they should be hooked up correctly. I'll be working on insulating that switch tonight or tomorrow, and of course I'll do some test runs. I'll post how things turn out. Thanks for your suggestions.

 

[Bruette]

Beady you have a wonderful wife! I am a Simpsons fan myself.
Have you seen this one?

Curt you are so right! One of the reasons I love my trains so much is that they take me back in time. No flux capacitor needed.

 

[Beady]

Beady you have a wonderful wife! I am a Simpsons fan myself.
Have you seen this one?

In fact, I just ordered that for my cops. There's also a Dunkin Donuts I'm thinking about.

The last MRR show I went to, there was an entire layout made with Legos, and with a full cast of Simpsons minifigs. I took a video of the whole thing, but I messed up and it came out sideways. [emoji35]

This signature is intended to irritate people.

 

[Bruette]

In fact, I just ordered that for my cops. There's also a Dunkin Donuts I'm thinking about.

The last MRR show I went to, there was an entire layout made with Legos, and with a full cast of Simpsons minifigs. I took a video of the whole thing, but I messed up and it came out sideways. [emoji35]

This signature is intended to irritate people.

I wonder how much that Lego layout cost? I've been buying Lego figures and sets for my boys (grandsons) for the last 3 years, but they have not caught the fever. We have a couple of plastic cabinets on wheels nearly full. I hate to think how much I have already spent. I never count the money I spend on my boys.

Ask Terry if you can fix the video, he is pretty savvy with video and most things really. Either way don't be upset with yourself. I carry the phone and never think to even take a picture. I still have not downloaded the few pictures I have taken.

 

[Boris]

Good evening. 26°, clear and very dark, without any moonlight. Winter just doesn't want to go away.

Joe - Like the photo of the Aero Train. Here is the Athearn Mack pumper. The detail is really good. When I got it and saw it I wanted to get one or two more, but like you, I found that they were sold out. Terry is correct about Ford bringing out the C body in 1957. I did research that as I do have a couple more tractors and trucks from Athearn in the C body. This is the kind of fire trucks that we have in the area. In rural areas, there are not a lot of hydrants around and the fire dept may have to draw water out of a river, irrigation ditch or pond to fight a fire.

Chet: One thing we had the advantage of, was a system of water mains, with a relatively high rate of pressure. That alone, allowed the city to buy smaller capacity pumpers, (750 GPM / 1000 GPM) with smaller booster tanks (275 Gal), than the organizations out in the County had. Most were Macks, similar to the one in your photo. BTW, that's a nice scene. Then again, there is nothing not to like about your layout. It's all very well done.

I had an interesting morning, as I accompanied my wife. She had medicine to pick up, as well as shopping for her mother. Once we finished we delivered the goods to the MIL. Once back home, I watched Miami crush the Mets. After dinner, I retreated to the kitchen, and watched the Toronto Maple Leafs beat the Columbus Blue jackets. The Leafs are a fun team to watch, this season. In any event, I did not do anything with the layout.

 

[Beady]

I've had too much to drink and I have to pee.

Good night.

This signature is intended to irritate people.

 

[Trussrod]

David - Up early this morning, are we?! Hey, thank you for the suggestions. I posted a fuller account of the problem on one of the other forums and Iron Horseman replied with what seems to be the solution, but I haven't had time to work on it yet.
Here's a more complete explanation of the problem: I'm running HO scale DC. Not interested in DCC yet. The layout is still in its early stages of track laying and wiring, so at this point there is no complete loop in the layout yet. So far I've been laying some track, then wiring and testing that section before laying a few more sections of track, and doing the same with that. I have several Peco and several Atlas switches on the layout. The problem switch is a Peco electrofrog - it's in the curve closest to you in the photo below. It switches the train to the outside mainline or to the inside trainyard. Remember, the track is not connected in a continuous loop anywhere yet - the lines you see going off to the left and along the back wall do just that - - they go out of the photo, and stop a few feet further out. I have power lines to the track in various places, but they are not all connected - I hook one up at a time via alligator clips just to do test runs. What was happening was the engine would run fine on the outside ("mainline") track, but when I threw that Peco switch to route to the inside track the engine would stop wherever it was on the outside track. Iron Horseman suggested insulating the switch, but I haven't had time to do that yet. I'm familiar with basic electrical stuff, and have been careful to keep the outside rail + and inside rail - on the layout. If insulating the TO is the way to go, I can do that easily; if running power directly to the switch from the buss line is the way to go, I can do that too. Just want to know why the switch was making my engine act that way and how to solve it and avoid that problem in the future.
Thanks for taking the time to explain stuff to this rookie.

View attachment 61084

Say Johnny: I think the situation your dealing with is a two fold issue in that Peco probably routes the track power to correspond with how the points are thrown, which seems to be what your saying? As in the picture you posted, which is a good example as well as your clarification of the outside being [+] and the inside being [-], so when the switch is thrown so the Loco will be directed to the outside track the points are pressed against the inside Left stock rail of the switch which is [-] causing the frog to become a negative polarity and the Left rail leading out from the switch to also be [-] while the Right stock rail of the switch is [+] as is the connected outside rail leading out from the switch. So if you had a Loco on the outside line beyond the switch with no other power connection to those outside rails if the switch points were thrown to route a different Loco to the inside rails it would kill the power to the outside set of rails by changing the polarity of the from [-] to +] thereby keeping the same sequence of track polarity on the inside rails, but killing power to the outside rails which in essense would become [+] [+].

This isn't a problem as long as you pull a train down the outside line to wherever you want to stop it and then change your switch points to divert another Loco to the inside line, but the same issue arises on the other end near the back wall where the inside line again connects into the outside line as if both switches near and far are not routed the same, for through traffic it will cause a reverse polarity situation and cause a Loco to stop a ways into that line. Again, I'm work in straight [DC] building my own turnouts and hand laying my rails on ties and spiking them them both down. As I mentioned prior, my switches are always hot with power being delivered to the two outside Stock Rails and I let the Points route the power to the Frog depending on how they are thrown? The rails leading out from the Frog are not connected to the extending tracks from the switch as I use separate power feed wires to them as I treat them as a separate block with the power feeder wires coming from the Atlas Connetor/s which get their power from the buss line.

Well Johnny, as you can see I'm again burning the midnight/early morning Oil again.

Good morning everyone. 42 and cloudy, chance of rain here in SW MO.

Greg - what'd you do, chain those soldering irons to the benchtop?!?
Willie - I checked out the Scalescenes website - where you got that cardstock structure download from - they have a few free downloads. I'll have to try one of those - didn't realize freebies like that were available. I'll have to check out the CleverModels that you mentioned, too.

Not much news from the trainroom - putting the finishing touches on the engine barn and preparing to lay more roadbed and track on the layout. Got to solve that TO wiring problem I mentioned in another post so I can finish laying track in the trainyard. Got an MBKlein order coming in tomorrow, including a NYC loco for the layout. Christmas in March

See ya later. have a good day everyone.

Say Johnny: Thanks for mentioning the two sources for the printed card stock buildings. I may have to take a look and see what they have available.

Beady, Pass the little blue air sickness bag please. Where did you find that pic of my Ex and her sisters anyway?

Say Karl: No wonder you had a stroke! Good Lord Man. LoL