What did you do on your layout today? (N scale)

[Pauljag900]

Spent the last two days building the two tier viaduct station,I’ve set the height of the double viaduct to 5”, then if I decide to take it over the tram module I should be able to gain clearance of most of the buildings ok.Bit of fine tuning tomorrow and cut to the correct length to be able to connect up the four viaduct tracks and then I ll be able to see where everything else will fit as everything comes off the station area.

also managed to assemble three of the four inner loops but need a bit of track to complete,watching ebay at the mo,there s a job lot on there that’s got all I need.

Once I ve cut it to size the white bits will be covered with brick or concrete card.

[cteno4]

Paul,

 

great coming along! Have you run trains with the foamcore on top of the foam? Curious to what the sound is like. May have to set that up here to listen to. Always curious how unitrak sounds on various sub beds.

 

jeff

[Pauljag900]

4 minutes ago, cteno4 said:

Paul,

 

great coming along! Have you run trains with the foamcore on top of the foam? Curious to what the sound is like. May have to set that up here to listen to. Always curious how unitrak sounds on various sub beds.

 

jeff

Hi Jeff,

thanks mate.

once it’s set up and running I ll do a video and mail it to you,I ll run it on the viaduct then run the same train on the polystyrene/ foam combo,not completely accurate but may give you some idea,👍😀

paul

[gavino200]

4 hours ago, kvp said:

The first thing is getting the current capacity of the motor. This could be done by measuring the resistence of the coils by measuring between the wheels or the brushes of the motor. Rotating the motor a bit helps as many times more than one coil is connected and some older units tend to have blind spots on their commutator. Then you have to measure the rotation of the wheels unloaded, so with the loco on its top but at full throttle. This gives us the rotation at 12V without load and the resistance in ohms, so max voltage (12V) / resistance = max. (stalled) current while max. current * max voltage = the max. (stalled) electrical power. If the controller can't supply this much current, then you have found a bottleneck. (and please add in the current needed by the lighting and a bit more for track power losses) Then you have to measure the power of the magnets and the motor geometry to calculate the actual physical power of the motor and substract the mechanical loss of the transmission.

 

 

 

No, sorry, perhaps I wasn't clear. I'm not interested in quantifying the power of a motor I already own. If I own it, then it's already too late.

 

I was trying to ask, if there are any statistics or details released by a train manufacturer that a model rail enthusiast can use to predict weather a model train motor would be strong or not.

[gavino200]

4 hours ago, kvp said:

ps: One more thing to add, the permanent magnets are not really permanent, they tend to loose power when used, so an old motor usually has weaker magnets. The sideeffect is that these motors run faster unloaded and loose more speed as they are loaded, since the motors are actually weaker. (the higher speed is due to the weaker magnetic field, which builds up and collapses faster, but with less power)

 

Thank you. That's very interesting. A motor with a weaker magnet might still run well on flat track but struggle on the incline. 

 

I wonder how uniform the magnet quality of the motors used in Kato models is. 

 

 

[Das Steinkopf]

10 hours ago, railsquid said:

I've noticed all kinds of odd formations now I keep my eye out for freights, on the Musashino line (mentioned elsewhere recently) was an EH500 with a train of 4 or 5 covered wagons (some sort of toki I guess [*]) and an EF65 or EF210 with just two takis in tow.

 

[*] probably a similar working to this:

 

 

 

 

That's the Toho Zinc train, it has Taki 1200's as well as Toki 25000's as part of it's consist.

[nah00]

11 hours ago, bill937ca said:

 

Have you thought of using a  Kato 20-045 http://www.1999.co.jp/eng/10003037 conversion track and Tomix Wide Tram Track for paved track in the container yard?

 

I have but I would have to switch out a lot of Kato switches for Tomix ones and that would involve some fiddling with the switch boxes. I used some Tram Track in the airbase siding to get it at the right level but I had more space for the adapter track. I could just skip that and just switch out the 2 main tracks though, don't know how much of a gap they'll have but I still have Tram Track left over from the airbase.

[railsquid]

Unusual but colour-coordinated action as a loco-hauled (or propelled) passenger train returns to the Chuo line for the first time in decades.

 

br141-e233 by Rail Squid, on Flickr

 

;)

[IST]

Almost unnoticeable change on the T-trak moduls, I added another 2 layers of grass. It became not so boring and looks better but I definetely has to try to add another types of grass (maybe some longer and/or with different colours), turfs, bushes, flowers next time. And 2-3 trees as well.

 

     

 

My next 2 moduls also were in focus, both got the earth imitation which will be the base of the grass.

 

[Das Steinkopf]

On 24 January 2018 at 3:34 PM, railsquid said:

BTW you can put takis and containers on the same consist, though (AFAIK) not randomly mixed.

 

I finally found the shot that I was looking for.

 

 

http://blog-imgs-52-origin.fc2.com/m/y/x/myxbxsidexlife/IMG_2423_1.jpg

 

Edited January 26, 2018 by Das Steinkopf

[nah00]

On 1/25/2018 at 12:16 AM, railsquid said:

I've noticed all kinds of odd formations now I keep my eye out for freights, on the Musashino line (mentioned elsewhere recently) was an EH500 with a train of 4 or 5 covered wagons (some sort of toki I guess [*]) and an EF65 or EF210 with just two takis in tow.

 

[*] probably a similar working to this:

 

 

 

Now if only Popondetta would get their act together and release a not completely messed up Annaka freight I would be running close to this exact train...

[nah00]

On 1/24/2018 at 9:49 PM, Das Steinkopf said:

 

 

I was thinking about unofficially claiming the crown of King Koki but looks like I still have some work to do before I can usurp you from the position, I will be sitting at 74 in the next couple of weeks with the arrival of the Tomix 98979 Koki 50000's and will be adding a couple more Koki 106's later on. I would love it if Tomix brought out a Koki 104 with taillights and do a re release of 2778 so I could purchase another ten of the 2778 Koki 104's and renumber them, the only deficiency in my fleet at the moment is Koki 105's and Koki 104's and I won't be purchasing the Kato ones due to it being a sub standard model which is rare for Kato.

 

I was going to get the Tomix Koki 50000 set but backed off on it. I have a few Kato 50000s and with their gradual phasing out over the past few years adding that many more isn't something I necessarily want to do. On the other hand though if I went that route I could retire all of my off-color Kato koki-104s and their old 18D containers. I do really like the extra handrail detail on them though. I wish they'd do a rerelease of 2786, I don't have many 40 foot containers in my collection. 

[Das Steinkopf]

7 hours ago, nah00 said:

 

I was going to get the Tomix Koki 50000 set but backed off on it. I have a few Kato 50000s and with their gradual phasing out over the past few years adding that many more isn't something I necessarily want to do. On the other hand though if I went that route I could retire all of my off-color Kato koki-104s and their old 18D containers. I do really like the extra handrail detail on them though. I wish they'd do a rerelease of 2786, I don't have many 40 foot containers in my collection. 

 

I refuse to buy any of the Kato Koki 104’s due to them missing the steps on the platform end, I did have the Kato 10-317 Koki 104’s but got rid of them due to that as well as the fact of the blue being totally wrong. With the 18D’s I wasn’t overly concerned with loosing them as they were all retired from service in January 2013.

 

Regarding the Tomix 2786 I wouldn’t be in too much of a rush to get them, only 96 cars picked randomly from cars 1-1280 were modified in 1996 to carry the ISO containers, in 2003 they were reverted back to normal configuration due to the introduction of the Koki 106 and Koki 200’s.

Edited January 27, 2018 by Das Steinkopf

[railsquid]

Back to passenger traffic, it's 2008-ish on the Chuo Line somewhere in the west of Tokyo not far from the mountains.

 

station-chuo-line by Rail Squid, on Flickr

[kvp]

Ttrak module parts work in progress: (module legs and front plates for use with transport frames)

[Pauljag900]

 

Today I trimmed up the station bases and married the track up to the viaduct track,lots of measuring and cutting,oh ,and mess,I swear this stuff has a mind of its own,especially when trying to clean up!😂😂tomorrow I ll do the other side and hopefully it all meet in the middle.As you can see I need quite a lot of viaduct track support piers😂😂tho some of the ground level needs raising yet,I ve used the equivalent of 5 sheets of 8’x4’ x 1” polystyrene,more on the way.’

[NXCALE]

 

I was trying to see if a couple of bus lanes could be fitted in one end of the layout (below in red).

 

There is not much room for that as the layout is quite narrow but I will keep triying...

 

 

and then just adding some plastic covers to protect it from the dust.

 

Edited January 28, 2018 by nxcale

[JR 500系]

Nice! Great idea to cover up the layout... I have much experience with dust on layout and they do pose huge amounts of trouble on the tracks....

[Pauljag900]

Love the dust covers,and like Sammy I ve had the same issues because it’s in a shed so I ll be putting dust covers over mine when it’s finished

6 hours ago, nxcale said:

 

I was trying to see if a couple of bus lanes could be fitted in one end of the layout (below in red).

 

There is not much room for that as the layout is quite narrow but I will keep triying...

 

 

and then just adding some plastic covers to protect it from the dust.

I ve come up with the idea of putting a false ceiling in 3’above the layout and will hang curtains from it to keep the dust off,I say curtains but it ll be plastic sheeting like yours👍

 

Edited January 28, 2018 by Pauljag900

[NXCALE]

 

4 hours ago, JR 500系 said:

Nice! Great idea to cover up the layout... I have much experience with dust on layout and they do pose huge amounts of trouble on the tracks....

Yes, the dust is a total killjoy so I started to cover the layout at a early stage.

 

54 minutes ago, Pauljag900 said:

Love the dust covers,and like Sammy I ve had the same issues because it’s in a shed so I ll be putting dust covers over mine when it’s finished

 

Yes, it is a good idea to use dust covers.

In my case, I could tell how dust affected the performance of trains in just few days.

[cteno4]

Nxscale,

 

This is in the basement, correct? Then most of the smutz on the layout will be coming from the bottom of exposed floorboards above. The older the house the worse it is! I put up a Masonite and batton ceiling over the joists in the basement and it cut the crap down like 95%. A air filter then running all the time has taken out a lot of the remains regular fine dust. I was shocked how well it’s worked really! One of club members here has a huge basement unitrak layout and sadly exposed floorboards and it’s a mess to clean it up for running.

 

jeff

[lighthouse]

Today I used the afternoon to finish the first buildings, then it was time to prepare for a test.

[cteno4]

Added M8 threaded inserts to our support girders for the basic layout to try using the $4 ikea legs on the layout whenwe are on flat floors. Unfortunately found one of the girder connection threaded inserts 1/8” off, a chip of wood must have gotten behind the fence stop! Bummer, so drilled out 3/4” hole around it and glued in a maple dowel so I can redrill the hole, hopefully in the perfect spot located with the centering punch. Bummer out of like 40 holes, a goof! I was so smug with the whole rig, but a moments inattention and one drill wood shaving...

 

jeff

[NXCALE]

17 hours ago, cteno4 said:

Nxscale,

 

This is in the basement, correct? Then most of the smutz on the layout will be coming from the bottom of exposed floorboards above. The older the house the worse it is! I put up a Masonite and batton ceiling over the joists in the basement and it cut the crap down like 95%. A air filter then running all the time has taken out a lot of the remains regular fine dust. I was shocked how well it’s worked really! One of club members here has a huge basement unitrak layout and sadly exposed floorboards and it’s a mess to clean it up for running.

 

jeff

Thanks for the info Jeff. The situation is not too bad but I will still need to see how to reduce the dust.

I have been also thinking about applying a water based sealer on the wall (layout's background). 

[Pauljag900]

14 hours ago, lighthouse said:

Today I used the afternoon to finish the first buildings, then it was time to prepare for a test.

So how was the test? Looking good there buddy👍👍