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chris

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Posts posted by chris

  1. Colwick Station got some attention Sunday. Currently this is the only scenic section of Amblethorpe mainly because it lives in the conservatory. It only gets taken outside on days when the weather is definitely set fair so I don't have to worry about it been weather proof.

    One day last summer we had a massive cloud burst, and a small, but significant, amount of rain got into the conservatory through the slightly open windows. This wasn't a disaster, but Colwick wasn't looking at it's best.

    I relaid the cardboard platform surfaces which had lifted (more glue was required) and fixed some of the columns on the overall roof. It wasn't much work, but it's looking great again and ready for spring.

  2. I didn't get much done on Amblethorpe through December. An accessory decoder which controls 12 points has developed a intermittent fault, which is vexing me somewhat...

    It was nice Sunday morning and the forecast was good so I painted some backboards. By 2pm it was overcast with some light spitting so they were rushed back into the shed, still wet. They need another coat, which I'll do when I have an hour free.

    I will need to sit down and start doing some planning of the scenic elements, at the moment I'm slowly building up a collection of buildings and features and it's time I work out where they are going to go.

  3. The Network Rail Class 31 is an excellent loco, but there isn't much RTR stock to go with it. I'll be putting in an order for the Model Rail gauging coach which is in the pipeline, but otherwise I'm on my own.

    I've watched plenty of YouTube videos and got an idea of what I need and first up is a Mk2e in Network Rail yellow. Having very little experience of doing a re-spray I'm not keen on spending £20 on a perfect coach and then potentially making a mess of it so I've taking a different route. My very first train set was and Inter-City 125 which I received back in 1980, I still have it. The coaches are the wrong size, to make them pass round 1st Radius track Hornby made the Mk3 (23 meter) coaches the same length as their Mk2s (20 meter) with 7 windows rather than 8. They are wrong and they are an ideal candidate for a re-spray.

    I don't have an air-brush so I'm working with a Humberol aerosol and it's coming along nicely. If I'm brave enough, I may even take photos.

  4. Picked up a new DCC chip today. It's my first decoder from DCC Concepts and it has their Stay Alive module which is a clever little capacitor that keeps the loco moving (without stutter) when it passes over a bit of dirty track.

    I've popped it into my new Cass 31 and given it a run up and down the sidings in the shed. First impressions are very good. It ran smoothly without any stutter or light flicker. I ran a DMU (with a TCS chip in it) around for a bit and and that proved that track was far from perfect!

    The Stay Alive could be a very usefull bit of kit for DCC in the great outdoors.

  5. Three will be no work on Amblethorpe this Sunday. We are heading up to Northumberland for a weekend break. We'll take the camera and snap some photo's of local buildings and structures to bring back some inspiration for scenery.

  6. It only takes two minutes to run an extension cable out and another couple to put it away, but that is a chore when you only need power for one minute to drill one hole. At this time of year the fixed supply will be very helpful, I can throw the switch in the conservatory and the lights in the shed will come on making trips to the shed in the dark a lot easier.

  7. I've been trying to snap a good picture of a seasonal favourite round these parts, English electric Type 1's on Rail Head Treatment Train (RHTT) duties. The problem is that it's been so dull in the Vale that it's been hard to get a non blurry image, even at the slow speed these trains pass at. Anyway, heres a couple of shots of the Choppers passing.

    20ea76a01d16f52e359f5089f9e5ebca.jpg

    cris4.jpg

    cris5.jpg

  8. mick said:

    I'm glad that I didn't rush into making a start on anything and have allowed myself time to get used to the garden. There's so much to learn and discover just by spending time out there.

    There's a real tension between getting stuck in and spending the time to think it through. I could have had the baseboards of phase 3 down months ago, but I decicded that I wanted a canopy over one area, but before I could make that I needed to re-felt my neighbours shed :!: The delay was long, but the results are worth it. I've also found that time spent thinking it through is never wasted, it saves a lot of time in the long run. I wouldn't have had enough time to install my cable trough yesterday if I'd used my previous technique, but an hour or so of thinking and trialling and I came up with a quick installation and a better result.

    Keep thinking and imagining what it could be.

  9. The fog didn't lift from the Vale of York today so not a great day to be out in the garden.

    I want to get a mains power feed permanently installed into the shed to save me having to run out an extension lead each time I need more than battery packs can supply. The baseboard of Phase 3 gives me the perfect route with it running from 1 cm away form the conservatory directly to the shed. Todays job was to create a cable trough underneath it.

    My salvaged aluminium T girder had been used to brace the boards in place of the Gypframe I had previously purchased, but the Gypframe was still ideal for the job of troughing. The challenge was to come up with the best way of fixing it in position. On Phase 1, where the Gypframe was preforming a bracing role, I'd used blocks of wood to fix it to the boards, but these did get in the way when I fed cables along them. I decided that I would attach them to the bottom of the T girder using nuts and bolts left over from my aluminium shelf brackets. This was going to be difficult as it would require a lot of accurate drilling in inconvenient locations. The bottom of the T wasn't helping as it splits into two as can be seen here.

    ea374549fba8e705de304518212c55bb.jpg

    I sat down with off cuts of T and Gypframe and tried to work out how to position them. I came up with a strategy for drilling and bolting, but as I played around with these two bits of metal I made a wonderful discovery, the Gypframe would slot into the bottom of the T and lock on place without the need for any bolts, perfect.

    This simplified the job massively and within a couple of hours I had a cable trough with my bus cable laying in it.

    DSCN0539.JPG

  10. Dave said:

    I've been watching the price fall on the Hornby Toy Story 3 train set for a while

    Me too. I've seen it in ModelZone with the price dropping. Currently its at £35 so Amazon is in the lead.

    Let me know what it's like and how out of gauge it is. I've got tunnel mouths that will cause problems :!:

    PS. Can't see a DCC ready logo on it ;)

  11. Just opened up a driving car of my Cross Counrty Voyager and to my great surprise all the lights are filament bulbs. I did wonder why they were so dim on this model.

    At first it looked like a complicated job, but having taken it to bits it doesn't seem so hard. I'll be following my usual guide http://s374444733.websitehome.co.uk/class-221/index.htm but won't be going for separate day and night running lights.

    I'm not sure when I'll getting my iron out, but having the experience of 156 under my belt I hope there will be a lot less procrastination.

  12. Glorious morning here in York, but the day never really warmed up. Frequent breaks were required to get warm with a cup of tea.

    After the big bang last Sunday, today was mainly tidying up the loose ends. I got a lot of felt down in a hurry last week and that required a trim. I needed to finish off felting the last 4cm of baseboard which had been left uncovered :!: and I also "plumbed in" the Skaledale bridge. That completed the job.

    I did have a running session for 20 mins or so, but I have a intermittent fault on the accessory decoder which drives most of my points, so my fun was somewhat curtailed. I'll have to get to the bottom of that problem soon, but I think I'll get the heater from the loft and put it in the shed first.

    With the baseboard is in place I can consider running cables underneath it. I'll have a track bus coming out from the shed, but I also what to instal a mains cable from the conservatory to the shed so I don't have to run an extension lead out each time I want to work or play in the shed and garden.

  13. My Amblethorpe thread is going off track so it's time for me to fork it with a new thread for what goes on about 5 meters east of Amblethorpe...

    traingeekboy said:

    I have a weakness for electrics because we don't have them here. Got any pics of things like class 87?

    Apart from the Class 91's which go by about three times an hour on Intercity 225 services, electrics are very rare around here.

    One of the odder things to happen at the bottom of the garden was this parkingup

    cris2.jpg

    By far the oddest I've written about here http://copmanthorpe.org.uk/transport/de-rail.htm

  14. Thanks for all the positive comments chaps.

    Yesterday was one of those day where weeks of preparations paid off in a "big bang" of work. The shelf brakets went up months ago. I'd painted the baseboards weeks ago. The girders had been predrilled, the roofing felt sorted and I'd spent every hour I could grab during the week getting the embankment slope ready. This meant I could really crack on, but also when I came across a problem I could solve it quickly because I already knew which was the right saw to use on Aluminium and which size drill bit was needed. It was a good day.

    Ian, Winter was a big motivation for me, I wanted all that wood and felt out of the shed so I'd have the space in there when it gets too cold to be in the garden. My house is very visible form the railway. Amblethopre is much harder to spot.

    traingeekboy, the sounds of the railway are rather good. All work stops when I hear something different approaching. At the moment I have the treat of the Rail Head Treatment Trains (leaf busters) going by with Class 20's "Top and Tail" and I'm not going to get bored of them anytime soon. And yes, Phase 4 will complete the loop, well that's the plan...

  15. The rules for Amblethorpe are simple, if you go passed the end of the garden then you are allowed on. This is meant to limit me in the stock I can purchase. The problem is that living South of York just about anything can turn up.

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