Blog Archives
Well, I’m still here..!
Hi all,
Apologies for the lack of posts since April 2022. Here’s a brief catch up.
Bogie Ballast Plough
I completed the assembly and detailing of the Stephen Johnson Models bogie ballast plough kit.
I got it to the point where it received a primer undercoat, but that got stripped off again as I wasn’t happy with the finish. It’s currently still sitting on the workbench.
UP Staging Yard extension – Part 2
Work commenced on removing the existing turnouts at the other end of the Up staging yard to accommodate some new 3-way turnouts to complete the lengthening of these yards.
All the turnouts were removed and the PCB sleepers and rail salvaged. Two new 3-way turnouts were built.
New source of XPS foam for scenery
Ever since Bunnings ceased stocking the Knauf XPS foam sheets, I had spent time trying to source a replacement. I contacted a few suppliers but most wanted exorbitant shipping costs to Port Macquarie. I eventually found a building supply company near Canberra that could ship unlimited sheets to me for only $85. So an order of 25 sheets (2400 x 600 x 30mm) was placed just prior to Christmas. The cost per sheet came to $28, and as these were double the size of the old Knauf ones, they ended up being about $4 more expensive. I can live with that. Having replenished my stock of foam, I can now resume scenery work between Doughboy Hollow and Ardglen.
Spline prep at Ardglen for future turnout controls
One of my goals for this year is to continue tracklaying through Ardglen and onto Pangela. For this to proceed, some cutting of the spline at the turnout locations was necessary.
The locations in the main area of Ardglen were quite straightforward. This involved removing a section of spline with a router down to a depth of approximately 6mm to accommodate a piece of ply. Once this was glued in position, the remaining spline underneath the ply was cut away. Extra supports either side of the cut-out are also installed where required.
However, the turnout leading from the loop extension into the ballast sidings required a bit more thinking of how to get the router in there, considering I had already laid track on the mainline.
So a plan was devised to support the router over the mainline track using some old melamine shelving that I had. This did the job well.
New motive power arrives
In the last week, Auscision Models delivered their ALCo 44 class locomotives. I had pre-ordered four of these Mark I type. Another superb model. Looking forward to weathering these beasts.
As I mentioned above, I hope to complete a lot of work on the layout this year. One of the first jobs is to complete the ceiling panel and backscene prep over Ardglen for the sky blue paint. Then I want to get back into some scenery foam installation around Ardglen and where the tunnel will start. Once a few of the turnouts for Ardglen are complete, I can also commence tracklaying through Ardglen, through the future tunnel and onto Pangela.
That’s it for this update.
Cheers.
Ballasting at Kankool
I have recently started applying dirt and ballast around the turnouts at the Werris Creek end of Kankool. The picture below shows the initial application prior to gluing. The ballast tends to darken once glued, but I have been going over it again, once dry, with either pastels, grouts or dirt to lighten up again.
The section of track curving away in the upper right hand corner is the “run-off” from the loop on the falling grade. It is essentially a catchpoint protecting the main line. This short section will be modelled as overgrown with grasses and not much ballast.
Sleepers and rail have been weathered using pan pastels. The track has previously been sprayed with Krylon Camo Brown, and the pastels take to it nicely. In the picture below, you can see the difference between the weathered and non weathered section of track. You can see the difference in the rail colour at the extreme left.
Tracklaying, turnouts, weathering & sound …
Hi all,
Well, it’s been quite a while since my last post, and since then, quite a bit has been achieved.
I have now got CV track and rail laid from the Sydney end of Kankool up to the approximate location of the Up Home signal at Ardglen, which is shown by the red line in the image below. A total length of around 38 metres (125 feet). This was achieved over about a six week period.
I continued with the rail laying process as described previously here.
Work has also commenced on the first of the Ardglen turnouts at the Kankool end.
During the last few months, I also spent some time finishing up the weathering on three more 45 class locomotives and the fitting of Loksound Select DCC decoders and sugar cube speakers.
I fabricated my own speaker enclosures to fit two 8 ohm, 11 x 15mm ‘sugar cube’ speakers, wired in parallel.
Below are some shots of the weathering on the 45’s.
Cheers.
Kankool frame installation – Part III(a) …
Hi all,
Whilst recently carrying out final adjustments to the wire-in-tube controls to turnouts 7, 9 and 12 at Kankool, I discovered a minor problem with the control of turnouts 7. On the prototype, lever 7 controlled two turnouts, both labelled ‘7’. See the diagram below. These two turnouts operated off the same single rodding run, as they were required to operate in tandem.
My original thought was that I would be able to simulate this in model form by operating both turnouts from the one control wire from the frame. This was done by passing the control wire from the frame through turnout 7 on the loop first, then terminate at turnout 7 on the main. This seemed like a good idea in theory, but when it came to adjusting the throw of each turnout, I couldn’t get both to operate successfully in tandem.
So I decided to terminate the existing control wire at turnout 7 on the loop and run a separate control wire from the frame to turnout 7 on the main and to connect it to lever 7. See the result below.
Two of the brass ferrules were soldered together to enable both control wires to terminate on the one lever.
I was now able to adjust each turnout independently from each other.
Cheers.
Kankool frame installation – Part III …
Hi all,
Well, the Kankool lever frame is finally fixed in its position in the layout.
Whilst I was at the Liverpool model railway exhibition in Sydney over the October long weekend, Dale Richards made some modifications to the locking bed of the frame, as we had found some errors in the interlocking.
Upon returning home, I decided it was time to permanently mount the frame and connect the levers to the wire-in-tube, especially to the turnouts, so final testing and adjustments could be done.
I found that I also needed to make some changes to the direction of travel of some of the signal runs. Eight of the signal runs require a “pull” rather than a “push” movement to enable the signal actuators to work correctly.
So, the cranks were disconnected from these levers, and new connecting rods made.
Below is a picture of the changes made.
Below is a picture of the frame now fixed in place with the redirected signal tubing clamped to a new mounting block. The existing horizontal runs can also be seen.
I can now do final testing and adjustments to the turnout runs.
Cheers.
Kankool trackwork – Part IV …
Hi all,
Apologies for the long time between posts.
Since the last post, I have completed the trackwork at Kankool, which included completing laying of the CV tie bases, fixing down the two turnout assemblies and gluing rail to the CV ties.
The above pictures show both the Willow Tree end and Murrurundi end turnout assemblies now fixed in place. Prior to fixing down, they were carefully washed in soapy water to remove any solder and flux residues, then painted with the Krylon flat brown paint. I’m hoping it will provide the same flat base to allow for weathering later on.
Once the turnouts were in place, I could start laying the rail on the plain track sections. The process is the same as was used when I laid the first section of CV ties and rail in the Temple Court section. Refer to this post as a reminder. The only difference now is that I am painting the rail with the Krylon prior to fixing in place.
Another extra task that is being done prior to painting the rail, is to add cosmetic fishplates. I did not do this in the Temple Court section, but they will be added to the rail later and touched up with paint.
I am using 3D printed 6-bolt fishplates from Ray Pilgrim. There are superglued every 40 scale feet along the rails.
They are a bit hard to see in the picture above, but I am hoping once the rail is weathered, they will stand out more.
To finish this post, below are a couple of shots of the finished trackwork looking from each turnout.
Cheers.
Kankool trackwork – Part III …
Hi all,
Following on from my previous post on the tiebar installation, I have been carrying out testing of the new tiebars and turnouts in situ.
As outlined in a previous post, the wire-in-tube (WIT) hardware were mounted on timber bases directly underneath the spline at each turnout location.
The wire from the turnout back to the lever frame was temporarily connected to the frame using brass screw ferrules from terminal blocks.
During initial testing, I found that length of the vertical drive shaft attached to the brass block had too much flex in it to work the turnout reliably. Due to the thickness of the spline at around 25mm, the resultant drive shaft length was around 30mm. The image below shows the vertical drive shaft and brass block. (Note – image shows the revised drive shaft length)
It was also found that the length of tube attached to the underside of the tiebar was too long. So this was reduced to around 3mm in length.
To reduce the drive shaft length, I realised that a reduction in spline thickness would be necessary at each turnout location.
After carrying out some tests with different drive shaft lengths, I found that a length of around 15 to 17mm operated much more reliably. I decided to reduce the spline thickness to 10mm. This was removed quite easily with my multi tool and saw blade. At one of the other locations, I had to use a router.
Once the spline was cut away at each location, the previously made timber mounts for the WIT hardware were re-attached to the spline by gluing in place.
I am quite happy with the result, so the next stage will be to paint the turnouts and fix in place.
I have made a short video showing the turnout operating from the lever frame.
Cheers.
Kankool frame installation – Part II …
Hi all,
I’ve done some more installation of the Wire-in-tube (WIT) system for points and signals at Kankool.
Some timber bases were made to fix the WIT hardware to underneath the spline at the Willow Tree end of Kankool loop.
These have been made adjustable to allow for final tweaks when the turnout throwbars are installed.
The photo below shows the mounting block for the WIT signal hardware for the two Down starters on the left hand side, as well as the mounting block for the WIT point hardware for the runaway turnout in the loop and the mainline catchpoint.
The next photo shows a shot from underneath the spline of the mounting block for the Up Home Main & Loop bracket signal and the mainline turnout to the loop.
The next photo shows a shot above the turnout complex at the Willow Tree end. The loop of WIT that can be seen is to connect both mainline and runaway points to a single cable (lever #7).
This now completes the WIT installation for the Willow Tree end of Kankool. Scenery installation can now commence in this area.
Cheers.
More foam roadbed & CV track installation …
Hi all,
I have completed installation of the foam roadbed all the way from Chilcott’s Ck almost to Ardglen. I have also laid quite a bit more CV track base from Chilcott’s Ck through Kankool to just before the first peninsula.
The process was the same as outlined here when I did the Temple Court section.
Under where the turnouts are located at Kankool, I laid 3mm cork down instead of the foam. This was done to make it easier cutting out a hole for the future throwbar rather than trying to cut it out of the soft foam. In hindsight, I probably only needed a small section of cork directly under the toe of each turnout rather than under the whole turnout. That is what I will do on future turnouts.
Taking on board an idea from Andrew, I also commenced installing strips of the high density yellow foam to the sides of the spline. The idea here is to lay continuous foam strips along the spline to not only allow for shaping the trackbed, ballast profile and drainage, but to also make it easier to install the main scenery foam later on, rather than trying to cut many small irregularly shaped foam pieces to try and fit against the spline.
Cheers.
Storage yard tracklaying complete …
Hi all,
A quick post tonight. I reached another major milestone today with the completion of tracklaying in the Down storage yard. I have laid a total of 263 feet (80 metres) of track and turnouts in the two yards.
The keen observer will spot that I am yet to install the curved closure rails in most of the turnouts. This should be completed tomorrow.
The next job is to fit the point blades and Cobalt motors to all turnouts.
Cheers for now.
Liverpool Range 