What did you do on your layout today?

Mark Boyce posted:

 

As to the KW, did you open it up yet to see what burnt?

Thanks Mark!  I opened it up and I have no idea to be honest. 

RSJB18 posted:

Mike- the swing gate looks great. I hope you are going to add more cross bracing to it. With the controller behind it I can see it being leaned on a lot.

Given the planning that went into your control panel, I'm sure you have this all figured out already.

Thanks, you bet I do, just haven't made it that far! 

 decoynh posted:

Really looking good.  As far as the KW goes, let go R.I.P.  Today you should be using the newer Transformers with quick trigger circuit breakers.  I have a KW that I use as my bench transformer with an inline 10amp fast blow fuse.  If you are in love with your KW, contact a friend (EE) of mine - Jim Lawson, jimjerrielaw@tds.net.  He is an OGR member and rebuilds these things.

Say hi to the good looking blonde for me.

Thanks, and I will!  She wasn't allowed in there last night after just getting a bath and saw dust everywhere!  

Not in love with it, may get something else, not sure what, going to start a thread about it now.

I proved that a pantograph and a little yellow paint can spice up the drabbest diesel switcher!

https://ogrforum.ogaugerr.com/t...toration-photographs

Mitch

Gents, 

Since I do a lot of buildings and more to come.. I have been weathering cars lately and putting together 2-rail work train.. tie gondolas (i.e. Atlas gons0, depressed center flats which were MTH.. The crawler is two Lionel Crane Kits.. the weathered bull dozers are from? I forget.. I bought them ten years ago.. In fact, all these cars are ten plus yrs old or there of and finally getting around to making this trainset. Thanks for looking.. Dan

trumptrain posted:

Ran trains early Friday morning 1:30 - 3:17 a.m.  I just could not resist the urge before going to bed .... thinking I'd only run them 10 minutes.  Somehow I got into the Zone and next thing I knew it was 3:17 in the morning.  I LOVE running trains!!!

While doing so I planned a new siding off my outer main line.  This will require me to purchase an 054 Gargraves or Ross switch and will require some urban renewal.  This will be a fun project!   

At the request of another formite, I took some photos of my overall layout.  Due to room constraints I could not get the entire layout into one photo so I took several from different angles.  Click on photos at bottom for captions/view info.

Trumptrain,

Pleasure meeting you several weeks back at the B&O Museum! Layout looks fantastic. Give Rich and I a call and we'll bring over some trains and beer!  

After a bit of a hiatus and re routing the furnace drain pipe I got back into the swing of things again. Today got the frame work for a table done. Tomorrow I hope to get it into place and screw plywood down. Pic.......... Paul 

Paul, glad you are back onto the layout build again!

Still working on the elevated reverse loop. The idea is to build this with the least interruption to the finished layout below it.

Yesterday I did get a jig made to glue the 45 degree pieces for the bents I am making to hold the elevated level straight section that will have the # 50 gang car MOW bump run directly running under it.    It will be about 13' of straight run. It is also the straight section between the two reversing loops.

Here is a look at the concept of where I want to go and a few of the bents.

One other good thing is it has given me reason to buy a couple of new tools for the shed.

Today was spent making up a few legs that I needed for the table I am working on. Once I got them on I secured the frame to the wall and got the level out to see where I stood as to being level. Surprised myself just about dead on. That's as far as I got today. Tonight is a train get together. Pic of the table in place.......Paul

Paul, the bench work is looking great, but I don't think its big enough for all the Menards product you have coming and the stuff you just haven't ordered yet!

Thanks Mike, as long as I keep adding shelves under the tables I'll have room for all the stuff coming. But if I put down some track on the tables they can sit in the open. The table in the pic is the first of the L shaped island. Once I get the plywood on that section I can plan out connecting it to the far tables. What I'll be doing is using that die cast bridge from Lionel along with girder bridges on both sides. The bridge with girder bridges will span an area basically 60 inches. So I got my work cut out for me before the weather turns better and they yard work begins. But I will be applying the same thing I have done over the past few years. If it is raining it is a work on the layout day. So Mike we will just have to bide our time till the brewery comes along............................Paul

SIRT posted:

What did you do on your layout today?

Nothing, it's been done for years now.  

DONE!!!!!????

A layout is never done or it ain't no fun!.

Today, I am looking forward to my new addition of a post war Locomotive: Hudson 2055, $300. and a video that it runs....

Thoughts from the community? please

Miggy posted:

Today, I am looking forward to my new addition of a post war Locomotive: Hudson 2055, $300. and a video that it runs....

Thoughts from the community? please

For that price, that loco had better be in factory fresh condition AND serve you beers! 

Mitch

Miggy posted:

Today, I am looking forward to my new addition of a post war Locomotive: Hudson 2055, $300. and a video that it runs....

Thoughts from the community? please

Love my Post war 2065 Hudson, almost the same. Good runner, smoker, and puller. If you are happy with what you paid, it is all good. Knowing it would run is worth something for sure but $300 is kind of up there.

 Enjoy yours!

KRM posted:

Still working on the elevated reverse loop. The idea is to build this with the least interruption to the finished layout below it.

Yesterday I did get a jig made to glue the 45 degree pieces for the bents I am making to hold the elevated level straight section that will have the # 50 gang car MOW bump run directly running under it.    It will be about 13' of straight run. It is also the straight section between the two reversing loops.

Here is a look at the concept of where I want to go and a few of the bents.

One other good thing is it has given me reason to buy a couple of new tools for the shed.

Does your truck have a bumper sticker that says " my other car is a John Deere"  Nice tractor

RSJB18 posted:

Does your truck have a bumper sticker that says " my other car is a John Deere"  Nice tractor

Thanks RSJB18,

No but nothing runs like a Deere,     And I spent 36 years working at Caterpillar. 

#MITCH  hmmm, what kind of beers? funny, oh, typo. $30.00 thirty not 300.

Not too far fetched. After WW II my grandfather bought a yellow Minneapolis-Moline tractor that had a cab, headlights and a radio.  It was advertised that you could plow during the day and take Mama in to town at night. it was sold and today is a show tractor worth a lot more than it cost.

I finished installation of my Atlas O PRR block signals, which are playing nicely with my bidirectional grade crossing actuators.  I had my doubts I would get everything working right after it was packed away for 3 years, but the handwritten notes I took when I dismantled my prior layout were adequate.  On this layout I need another grade crossing actuator, and oh how I wish I had saved Peter Riddle's article from years ago!  As it is I will have to reverse-engineer one of my existing actuators.

I also need one more Atlas O PRR block signal.  *sigh*  I know I'm not the only one who wants them.  All we can do is wait it out and hope that they eventually become available again.  They're backordered everywhere I checked.

Next up will be adapting my traffic lights to work on this layout.  I have the Circuitron TL-1 traffic light controller and the FL-2 grade crossing flasher circuit that Circuitron tech support helped me to modify to flash more slowly.  The signals themselves are scale sized LED units, the style with the signal head atop a pole, one at each corner of the intersection.  A relay toggles the signals from normal sequence during the day to alternate flashing (red one direction, yellow the other) at night.  I added small capacitors to the outputs of the FL-2 so the lights will fade like incandescent lamps when they're flashing.  Overall the signals add a lot of interest in a small space.

#JIM My grandfater workined in the Minneapolis MOLINE here in the Hopkins area of Minnesota. I had a little pedal tractor for the sidewalks, "Minneapolis Moline". Gramps retired there..... from his early days in the Proctor Minnesota Roundhouse working on the Mallets!

thanks for the memories, JIM

Miggy posted:

#MITCH  hmmm, what kind of beers? funny, oh, typo. $30.00 thirty not 300.

That changes everything,,,,,,,,,,,     

Miggy posted:

#MITCH  hmmm, what kind of beers? funny, oh, typo. $30.00 thirty not 300.

Oh!  Well, then, ya got a swell bargain! 

As for the beers...I WAS going to say something else, but this is a family-friendly forum. 

Mitch

Miggy,

Looks like a winner to me!!

$30 was a steel.

Retinpa

i have some spare atlas/custom signals if you are interested. When Terry at Custom Signals was shutting down I purchsed a dozen spares.

contact me by my email if you are interested. 

Dick

Good buy, Miggy.

Last night I cut the hinge side of the track and added one of a few push buttons in the door frame.  This particular push button will kill the power to the door track and three other pieces on one side if the door isn't 100% closed.
 

Very nice Mike!

Today was a good day but a slow day. I started laying down the plywood after I found out the wall behind the table was not true so when I started to screw down my first piece it was off. Usually it is my cutting that is messed up. It was just slow because I am trying to use up scrap wood I have laying around so this table will have three pieces screwed down. So all and all it was a good day. Maybe after dinner I'll try finishing off the last piece. Pic......Paul

KRM posted:

RSJB18 posted:

Does your truck have a bumper sticker that says " my other car is a John Deere"  Nice tractor

Thanks RSJB18,

No but nothing runs like a Deere,     And I spent 36 years working at Caterpillar. 

 

 

LOL. we have a Deere tractor at the college I work at. Been a great machine for us.  We use it for everything landscape work, snow, and a back hoe for trenching. Had a couple of 6 wheel gators buy they died a couple of years ago. 

Bob

Miggy posted:

#MITCH  hmmm, what kind of beers? funny, oh, typo. $30.00 thirty not 300.

For $30 bucks that was a great deal. 

paul 2 posted:

Today was a good day but a slow day. I started laying down the plywood after I found out the wall behind the table was not true so when I started to screw down my first piece it was off. Usually it is my cutting that is messed up. It was just slow because I am trying to use up scrap wood I have laying around so this table will have three pieces screwed down. So all and all it was a good day. Maybe after dinner I'll try finishing off the last piece. Pic......Paul

Hey Paul, don't be to hard on yourself. We all are a little off keyster  and a little slow. Heck some of us don't even know what way to move to become plumb! Looks good from my house!

Amazing work done by you guys over the last few weeks. I hope my layout will be as half as good as some of you. 

I haven't had to much layout time lately but tonight I snuck into the layout room after the kids went to bed and played with plaster cloth.  

Hope to have all the plaster cloth done by the end of the month then to weather the rails and start ballasting.  

Some footage of recently acquired equipment:

This is the "Emphysema Express", so called because it came from a rather nicotine-stained estate collection:

True to its name, the Express belched nasty-smelling smoke and had a barely wheezing whistle.  One new whistle board and one fresh 'Pac-Man' packing in the smoke generator later, the whistle is nice and loud and the smoke smells of smoke fluid, like it should. 

This Katy caboose is a nicely painted and decaled job, based on an early postwar chassis.  Needed the wire to the light and the pickup roller replaced, but now its light shines out on the layout!

Mitch

Wow... talk about powerful train “transformers!” Is that big fella AC or DC?

~Andy

#MITCH luv it Mitch, very nice sir 

Ironbound posted:

Wow... talk about powerful train “transformers!” Is that big fella AC or DC?

LMAO! 

Neither.  The Razorback Traction Company pays him in Energon cubes. 

Miggy posted:

#MITCH luv it Mitch, very nice sir 

Thankee kindly! 

Mitch

After 13 months of building, laying, tearing out, relaying, wiring and whatnot, I finally ran a train!  I have a lot of switches to wire up but all the wires are in place and just waiting to be connected to terminals.  I'm very excited.

Only had a few minutes this morning.  I checked on the drying of the paster cloth.  It is rock solid but still damp.  I laid the track back over it and placed the buildings where I want them to go.   Tonight the cloth should be pretty dry and I can actually screw the track right too it.  I hope to get more plaster done tonight but i am running out.   Need to put in another order at Amazon.  

Basil posted:

After 13 months of building, laying, tearing out, relaying, wiring and whatnot, I finally ran a train!  I have a lot of switches to wire up but all the wires are in place and just waiting to be connected to terminals.  I'm very excited.

 

Basil,

Congratulations!  The first run is always exciting!!  The layout is looking good!!

I did the same thing before I got back to construction I thought I run a train so it may be my last run until after York