So what has been happening in the couple of weeks since the last update?
I have installed the NCE decoder in to the Sentinel Y1 steam shunter, finally!
I have been meaning to install the Digitrax decoder into the Class 08 shunter during the week, and actually came close this afternoon to achieving it, but the youngest asked to go for a bike ride to the bike track down in the park. So being the good Dad (at least for today!) I walked down to the park while he rode his bike.
The other activity I have been concentrating on while I am waiting for the hobby room to be finished getting painted has been learning about JMRI's PanelPro Layout Editor. I had drawn up Illavearf and set up the Turnout (Points) table via the NCE Simulator option in the absence of noting being connected to the layout at the time. So this afternoon I was happy enough with my effort to connect up to the layout via the NCE USB module. Nothing worked from the Layout drawing (mimic panel) but did directly via JMRI turnout control. Blast! Was it the SB3a. Swapped the Powercab in and tried running from the mimic panel, and still nothing. So not the command stations. Hmmmm. Then I had a light bulb moment. Open a new panel, setup a new turnout table and setup a DCC addressed turnout. Assign to the new turnout on the drawing. Test operation. It worked! I could be wrong, but my take is that the turnouts setup via NCE simulator are just that, a simulation. To operate on a layout, each turnout has to be 'seen' by JMRI when setup in the table. Once I had setup all the points again whilst connected to the layout, I was then able to restart JMRI, open the Illavearf mimic panel, and operate the points. Only problem is that at start up of JMRI at the moment, it doesn't know where the points are positioned as there is no sensor feedback at the moment. Possible fix could be to use a 'Start of Day' function and set the layout turnouts to where I want them to be. Have to investigate this further. Other things I was successful in was to setup a couple of 'Lights' controls, one being linked to an 'Internal Sensor' assigned to a button icon. Clicking on the icon made the Signal Box light go on and off. Wow progress. The it was onto the Signal heads. It took me awhile to work out the type of 'decoder type' JMRI was describing in the drop down box, but once done, it was easy. Now I just have to sort out the logic around the interoperability of the signals with the points. I was very happy with today's outcomes.
The other JMRI thing I did was set it up to save the User Files to a Dropbox directory. This allows syncing of device located files to a 'cloud' based location when the PC/laptop is connected to the Internet. Just a piece of mind. It will also allow the future ability of different devices to access the same set of files. Something to think about with the Pi in the future.
The Club's Buy and Sell was on today, but I didn't get to it as I didn't need to buy or sell anything at the moment.
The only thing this week was I purchased the decoders from the Club store that I required for the Sentinel shunter and Class 08 shunter. I had intended to install these over the weekend, but this didn't eventuate. So a task to do this week hopefully.
I didn't make it to the Brisbane Model Railway Show this year. Family commitments took precedence.
The ANZAC long weekend started on Friday with me going along to the local dawn service. I was quite surprised at the number of people who turned out. Maybe the weather had something to do with it as it wasn't cold at all considering the time of year. Afterwards I went home and quietly potted around, loaded the car with the rollingstock and Pi that I was taking to the club that morning, and just generally waited for the rest of the family to wake up. Once I had fed the boys and tidied up I waited for the missus to get up. Once up I said my good byes and escaped to the club. I was meeting up with another member who wanted to see the Pi working on a layout. PK was also there when I arrived. So after I connected everything up to the DCC system I realised I had forgotten to bring along the USB interface module, so back home I went. Lucky I am only 7 minutes away. Back at the club and everything working, PK was able to connect with his iPhone which was great as I haven't had a iPhone connect. I connected and we ran some trains from our phones. Amazing! The Prez rocked up shortly afterwards and also seemed impressed by the little Pi. Anyway by midday it was time to go home as we had plans for the afternoon, bicycling down at Sandgate.
The rest of the weekend was modelling free unfortunately as other things got in the way. The hobby room is no closer to being used as the missus decided to paint the inside of the cupboards as well, so the room is full of everything that was in the cupboard (big cupboard!). I did however take out the Sentinel and Class 08 to check on the decoder types and size needed. PK was at the club today and picked up some different types to bring to work for me to see and decided which ones to purchase.
The Brisbane Model Railway Show is on this upcoming weekend, but I am not sure if I will be going along. Saturday is now footy day for Lachlan, and he was also wanting to go to the Lions vs Swans game at the Gabba as well that night. We'll see! Sunday I was supposed to be working (very rare thing for me to work on the weekend) but I have been able to move a few things around in the project to do before and after the weekend, however the family was invited yesterday to my niece's birthday, so it looks like any chance of going along is now very slim!
Now the BIG Decision explanation. Back in February I applied to a job ad Queensland Rail had advertised, for Trainee Network Controller positions (the guys and gals on the boards!). I was successful in getting through the first two rounds of psychometric testing, when in fact I thought I had stuffed up the second one. I was then invited along to the Group Assessment just before Easter, which involved seven applicants working as a team in managing a situation. I think I was the second oldest there. Most were young guys and one girl. All very eager. I thought I had duded this as I wasn't the most enthusiastic in the group. But I did get through and was invited to undertake more psychometric testing this week. Between the last two invitations I did some research on the pay and conditions based on some info that the HR person mentioned at the Group test. I was prepared to to make up the shortfall in pay for a short time. However based on an incorrect assumption on the progression through the base pay levels, it would have taken longer than I had planned for, and thus would have been financially unsustainable. Along with very unsociable working hours, working in a windowless room, and the fact that my sons are really needing me to be about home for them, and not being fair on the missus and the family income I decided on Sunday night to decline further testing and pull my application.However it was very nice to have had the opportunity to progress so far through the testing. If only I was twenty years younger!
I will just have to be a controller on model railways ;-)
Well not much happened modelling wise over the weekend. Other things got in the way! Also still no closer to getting my hobby table back into the hobby/rumpus room as the missus was busy entertaining kids last week during the school holidays and didn't get any time to finish the painting in that room.
The afternoon of Good Friday though I took Matthew down to the Club so that (a) he was out of Mum's hair, (b) he could run some of his DC trains, and (c) I could test the Pi on the new layout by taking all my bits and bobs down and hopefully not be disturbed by other members. The Club was empty so full steam ahead! After what seemed ages getting Matthew's DC trains running on the old permanent layout which seems to have missed a bit of cleaning of late (members are running on the DCC new layout at the moment!), I was able to connect up the Pi. Within a couple of minutes the Pi was broadcasting it's wifi IP address and once connected to my smartphone, Engine Driver app was able to see JMRI being broadcasted as well. Connection made. I was then able to run a NSWGR 44 with some wagons effortlessly around the layout. Sure was good not to be tethered via the NCE throttle. Even Matthew was able to walk around and follow the train, blasting away on the horn!
I'm now researching what size motion decoders to put in the Bachmann Class 08 and Dapol Sentinel shunters that I bought last year. I don't think I will do sound on these as not much space in them.
Unfortunately the missus decided that the hobby (now rumpus as well) room needed to be further freshened up after the recent painting so she has been busy painting trims and doors which I thank her for, but the hobby table has had to stay in the shed to give her room to do her painting. She is hoping to have this finished by the Easter weekend, so maybe I can move back in then.
My old PC which has all the PIC programming applications on runs on XP so I am currently reluctant to connect it to the internet to do any app upgrades etc before moving onto Mr Mackie's project. I could still do this in isolation but if I need to go out into the big wide world it might be an issue now that XP is no longer supported by Microsoft. Decisions, decisions..
The Club layout is now operational on DCC with a number of NCE UTP panels about the layout so that it can be shared. I took the VR Walker railmotor down for a spin and it was a bit stuttery (is there such a word? Is now!). At first I though it might have been dirty tracks and dirty wheels. The track was cleaned and I cleaned the main traction wheels, as the end bogies are purely for pickup purposes. But it was still stuttery. So maybe a good clean all round and check the gears for any rubbish or greasing issues was suggested by another member. Hopefully I didn't pickup any loose ballast as it was later discovered the stuff was magnetic.
Apart from that, just idling along.
A quick update as no modelling has been happening due to the house renos starting last week and proceeding through this week. As a result the study/hobbby room is chockers full of furniture being stored out of the way!
On the day of the last posting, the Ebay purchase of the Hornby transformer arrived in the mail. Still pretty good working quality but the variable speed is a bit skittish, so might have to look into that. Might just need a potentiometer replacement?
Mr Mackie was elated that the IR transceivers had finally arrived from China and is now questioning when his crossing detector will be made. All in good time!
Last week two of the three Hattons orders from the UK arrived with the Metcalfe kits and a few little other scenery items, but one bow still yet to arrive. Maybe this week.
No rush as I have no where to build them anyway.
On that note, I have decided to sort out that 73 Class once and for all when the hobby room is back to being used.
After a quick chat to Mr Mackie through the week, I investigated the switch that I had used on Lachlan's layout for the lighting. It looked OK and no apparent loose wire/s making a short circuit. So I did the time honoured act of tapping it on something hard in case there was something amiss inside, rewired it and bingo the light went on and the power controller behaved like it should. I must say the Gaugemaster controller is a little beauty for power output on the track. I cut down some timber strips to act as a holder as the controller didn't have any onboard screw holes unfortunately. Lachlan is quite excited about his layout at the moment. I might have to do more things like putting in a simple manual signal that he (or Matthew) can just turn on or off when they want to.
With respect to the motive power depot backscene, I did some further investigation and measurements throught the week and discovered I had sufficient room for some low relief buildings along the backboard as well as some full relief buildings to service the sidings, from the Metcalfe Model range of cardboard kits. So an order was placed with Hattons of Liverpool as the were the cheapest (including the postage from the UK). These should fill in the space nicely and allow me to keep the momentum up on modelling this side of the layout.
Not forgetting the Kensington Hill side of the layout, I glued up a Ratio line side hut kit that came with a Railway Modeller magazine and spray painted it over the weekend with car undercoat spray. I will then hand paint the features some time soon.
I have also dug out the Dapol pub that I want on this side as well for glueing up.
No closer to the 73 class' wiring up and I will have to pack this away again as I have tradies coming in next week to start two weeks of renos in the house. So it might be best to wait until all work in the hobby room/study/kids TV room is finished before getting stuck into finishing this off.
This week I am hoping to receive the Hornby controller I picked up on Ebay, maybe those IR transceivers might come in, and maybe the Hattons orders will get here as well. Time will tell.
