George Washington's birthday

Lots of little things have happened since the last post on progress. I made a trip to Caboose Hobbies last Tuesday, on the way to Denver airport, then the kids and I made another trip on Saturday. As the momentum builds on the layout I now have 3 kids with definite interest (the other could not care less, but that's cool, too).

So let's see what has happened in the past week:

1. I built a short test section of scenicked track, using leftover blue foam and a bit of leftover Peco track. In the process I learned a few more things that don't work plus some that do, and now I have a test section that looks decent. I will cover the process I used in a later post after I've completed the ballast for first section of track on the main layout.


2. Started the track scenery work on one section of the main layout. In the process I realized I needed to finalize and document my scenery plans for that area of the layout. You see, you can put ballast on the track, but properly done it will "spill over" onto the track side ground. This means you probably should have the track side ground scenery in place, or at least know what it will be so that you know you won't need to do this. If you start thinking about that you then realize that you should also know the exact dimensions of the right of way, which means you probably need to understand the whole scenic plan for that area. So, I've been making drawings and doing research on prototype rights of way and also of the dimensions of things like streets, blocks, buildings, etc. in similar midwestern cities (Google Earth has a nice tool for getting exact linear dimensions.)


3. Lots of decoder work with Daniel. The big effort has involved his Bachmann 4-4-0 from a train set he got 4.5 years ago, a tiny locomotive with a design not updated since 1979. No one in their right mind would add a decoder to such a locomotive, but we have a cunning plan -- and actually it's working really well. We've taken progress pictures and will describe the process in its own post when we finish. Daniel found a way to isolate the motor from the track pickups without having to take the tender (where the motor resides) apart. We plan to house the decoder in the first box car behind the tender. At this point all is working except we need a permanent solution for the box car to get power from the track. We asked for advice on this at Caboose Hobbiesm but they told us to call on Wednesday when their N scale expert is back.


4. Daniel also installed, with my help, a TL1 decoder in a tender of a Proto 2000 2-8-8-2. I installed a DZ123 in this back in 2005 but the rear light in the tender receives direct power from the track, with a small diode/capacitor light board to make sure the light only was on when the DC power was in one direction. On DCC the light was on all the time. The rear light now is controlled by the DCC F4 function, and Daniel did almost all the work himself.


5. Athearn support has been just great regarding decoder problem with the HO scale F59PHI locomotive that I mentioned last week. They sent us a new board which arrived on Saturday, but unfortunately the symptoms persist with the new board. Sent them a follow-up email this morning.


6. Daniel successfully installed 4 other decoders in various Kato and Atlas Santa Fe locomotives. We can now run the Super Chief train that we got in 2006, tested once on DC, and hadn't run since! Unfortunately, the motors for the F7Bs both are now failing to run intermittently. We've taken them apart and verified the problem is the motor itself. Kato doesn't have a support line like Athearn, Atlas and Digitrax so I'm stuck right now. I'll post a question to an on-line group.


7. We started trying to figure out how to add a decoder to an Athearn 2-8-0. Couldn't find any instructions on line, except a couple comments that it can be done. I bought a TCS M1 decoder at Caboose Hobbies because this is thought to be the absolutely tiniest decoder available, and it does fit under the plastic coal load in the tender if you scrape out some of the excess plastic from the casting process. It looks like wiring up the motor won't be too hard, but the front light appears to be independently powered from the engine's pickup wheels, so I'm not yet sure how we'll wire that from the decoder in the tender.


8. Daniel solved a clicking problem with a Kato F7A locomotive. Found some debris that got caught in the gears above one wheel. Good to get this experience, as we are both gaining confidence in our abilities to address N scale locomotive problems. We are certainly not experts yet, but we're not novices anymore either.


9. Picked up some scenery books at Caboose Hobbies, including one on backdrops that my oldest daughter, Paige, picked out because she is interested in painting them.


10. I also wrote some posts earlier last week while traveling, including a third one on the detailed design (for the freight yard) that is nearly ready for publication.

For the coming week the focus continues to be scenery. The goal is to complete at least the track and track side scenery for the SAMR line -- about 21 feet, double-tracked, with 9 switches. Almost certain not to be completed in one week, but want to have portions that are complete.