MERG kit # 1 and some photos of the terraces

The week's evenings were fairly much screwed this week apart from Friday. I took advantage of this and undertook the build of the first of the MERG kits. It took me two hours to do all of the soldering and the instructions were simple and easy to understand. I've mounted the PCB onto a piece of ply to be used as a test bed for the other kits and a simple CBUS setup along with inputs and outputs. I just have to source an appropriate power transformer but I have been having problems with that as Jaycar doesn't seem to have what I need. I might send an email to one of the other local MERG members and ask what he uses and where it was sourced.

The MERG kit packet

The kit's contents

The tools

Hi res view of the completed board

The test bed with kit # 1 mounted

No work on the terraces this week but I have included some photos of the work to date.

The front without cover paper

Interior (however I have elected not to put too much in the way of interior fitouts as I can't see the point when it is sealed up)

Floor views

End view

Rear view of floors

Rear view of interiors

One other thing I scored was 40 metres of 8-core control wire. We were at the Aspley Hypermarket on Sunday and in their reduced lines aisle was a swag of Nylex garden irrigation control wire packs, reduced 50% from $10 to $5. Each pack was 10 metres of cable, and each core colour coded. So I bought four packs as I think these might come in handy for connecting accessories to the MERG boards if I go forward with these as a layout control system. I'll still use Cat5 as the CBUS bus and power system as these are twisted pair whereas the Nylex cable I am not sure about as yet.

This week maybe continue work on the terraces and might even get in the second MERG kit if time permits. The Tour De France starts Saturday night so I might be distracted from the hobby for a few weeks!