The crew lounge was a little more comfortable for the operators this past Sunday. I’ve had my eye on a futon at Wal-Mart for a while and when it went on sale I put it on layaway. I picked it up last week in time for the next op session on the BS&T.

It wasn’t to difficult to assemble, but I made a few errors and to had to assemble parts of it twice. Anyway, it’s quite comfortable and can be used as a bed when out of town operators visit.

The thing I liked about it the most was the lift up side tables attached to the arms.  They fold down when they are not needed.  A decent coffee table will complete the picture.

Kim bought some great pillows for it on Sunday. I’ll have to get pictures of those. They are quite appropriate.

Scott

The layout gets pretty untidy looking the weeks before an operating session. Every time I need something for Kim’s craft stuff, or decide to work on something “railroady” I open drawers and cupboards and rarely close them. I’ll only have to open them again when I need to get something else, so why bother. Ha!

Then when I bring stuff back down I just set it inside in a convenient spot where I can get at it quickly later on.

So, after three weeks of doing that it really does get quite untidy. These pictures sort of show what I mean. It really is quite tame this time, not sure why. It has been a lot messier.

I try to start tidying a day or two before an operating session. Most times I’m putting stuff away as the guys are arriving. There’s always last minute stuff to do, especially when you leave things ’til the last minute! Ha!

Scott

Welcome!  What do you think of the new header?

Scott

I was searching the internet the other evening trying to finds sites with tips and techniques for model railroad scenery. The search was coming up empty when I stumbled across the Haggis List Model Railroading FAQ.

I had discovered the list years ago but had forgotten about it. It contains hundreds of reader tips and solutions for doing just about anything on a model railroad – from layout design to scenery.

The only complaint I have is that it does not have pictures illustrating the ideas.

It looks like a great source of ideas. I’ve bookmarked it for future reference – so hopefully I won’t forget about it again.

So, back to hunting for scenery tips and techniques. Anyone care to suggest web sites or blogs? Please leave a link in the comments section.

Scott

I am making some progress with the tidying up chores around the layout room. Remember this picture taken a while back?
It was taken just after I “reorganized” the multi-purpose room. Sure looks organized, doesn’t it?

I call it the multi-purpose room, because it serves many functions. It’s obviously home to the staging yard. I call it Wholinthall – a variation of “hole in the wall”. It is the location of the Lenz stuff – command station, XPA/phone connections, programming track and computer for JMRI. It is a storage area for stuff that there is no space for under the layout. And, it is the paint room. Someday the room will also serve as dispatcher’s office. Like we’ll ever have enough operators to either need a dispatcher, or to be able to afford a dispatcher.
Anyway, I got the desk cleaned up a little more and have great plans for better organization in the future. Better organized? Ha! You always have to strive for something!!!

Later,

Scott

I received an email a couple weeks ago from Joe Grubba at Factory Direct Trains offering to send a sound equipped Blueline loco for my club (the Half Nutters) to have a look at. He’d pay the shipping. If anyone in the group was interested they could purchase it at a discounted price. If not then we could send it back to him at his expense. He’d pay the shipping for future orders from club members.

Well, I could not resist the offer! Since I’d been half heartedly looking for an inexpensive steam loco with sound I chose the PRR M1. When I discovered the loco didn’t come with a DCC decoder (the sound decoder works for DC out of the box), Joe offered to throw in a Lenz Silver decoder at no charge. So I told him to send me the loco and decoder post-haste. I couldn’t wait to try it out!

The decoder install was a breeze – definitely one of the simplest installs I’ve ever done. According to the instructions I had to move the wiring for the headlight from one plug to another, remove the small circuit board from the 8 pin NMRA plug, and insert the plug for the Lenz decoder.

Boom! On to the layout to try it on address 3. Wow! It was loud! But it worked wonderfully.

Back to the programming track to set the address. Oh, oh. I had read about problems programming decoders in Blueline locos, but had forgotten. After a few failed attempts programming the address of the sound decoder I started scouring the internet trying to find a solution.

Because there are two decoders, one for motor and one for sound, you have to lock one while you program the other. You can’t program anything on the sound decoder using a Lenz system on the programming track. It has to be done using PoM (Programming on the Main), or Ops Mode Programming. But, you cannot set a decoder’s address with Lenz using Ops Mode. I could set the sound volume, at least.

Joe did send me some information that I will try when I get a chance and post the results here. He’s been very good with responding to email queries.

Anyway, the loco runs wonderfully, but seems to be a little less forgiving about poor trackwork than any of my diesel locos. Not that I have a lot of bad track, but I do have a few spots that cause problems every once in a while. The M1 will derail at these spots every time. I’ll have to get busy and get those areas repaired.

I’m no audiophile, and no expert about prototypically correct locomotive sounds, but to me the sound from this loco is great! The only complaint I have is that you can hear a bit of a background noise (hiss) when the loco is stopped. During an operating session or a train show this shouldn’t be a problem.

The M1 in Bayside Yard at the head
of the BS&T excursion train

If I can get the necessary track repairs done, the BS&T may just have new power for a new passenger extra – an excursion train from Bayside to Tidewater and back.

Scott

For many, many years (at least 10) operators on the SVR and BS&T have had to use the post at the bottom of the stairs to hang their coats and jackets. This was workable, and cheap, but if the first guy in was also the first guy to leave he’d have to dig through all the coats to find his own.

The other evening we were operating at Brian’s NeverDone Railway and when we were leaving he asked if I could use some scrap wood for burning. He and Susan had just finished renovating their bathroom (a great job they did too!) and had some scraps left over. Always looking for free heat in the shed during the winter I said “Sure!”. So we started piling the 2 or 3 armloads in my trunk and I discovered a piece with 4 coat hooks. “Are you sure you don’t want this?”, I asked. “Nope.” was the reply.

Since this past Sunday had the BS&T on the op schedule I quickly put it up. Finally, a proper place to hang coats and jackets.

A lounge, coat hooks, what else will I do to keep operators happy? Kim’s cooking sure helps! More on that later.

Scott

Wow,! After years of waiting patiently, struggling through endless hours of changing diapers, feeding, cleaning, helping with homework, calming sibling rivalry, prom, graduation I finally have a crew lounge!! Well, not a dedicated crew lounge, but we’ll be able to use it on operating nights – yippee!

Granted, it doesn’t look much like a crew lounge right now (I have to question my son’s taste in paint colour), but in my mind it will look like the inside of an old train station. There will probably be some influx of reality as I compete with the desires of my wife and “still living at home son” (who really wants a poker/movie room), but hopefully it will be close.

Does anyone have suggestions for the interior design of the train station crew lounge?

Later!

Scott

Is there such a thing as suitable weather for model railroading? I think so. Model railroading weather is when it is too chilly or wet to be outside doing other things. It certainly felt like model railroading weather this morning when I left for work! I could see my breath!

Anyway, on with the BS&T update…

I have no photos to show today. Sorry. I’ll have some next week.

Since returning from the UMG RailFest I haven’t done much on the layout other than put things away and tidy up a bit.

I thought I’d take advantage of having some things out of the “Control Room” and do some cleaning and rearranging. It looks a whole lot bigger now, especially since some of the stuff that was stored there got moved to the new “Crew Lounge” that I inherited after Kristopher moved out to go to university. I’d like to get a better storage solution for the supplies that I have stored on a shelf at the moment – something that takes up less space.

RailFest made me realize that I really must get busy making more trees. The ones I used on my modules were now gracing the BS&T layout and I didn’t have the heart to pull them all out. So I had no trees for the modules at RailFest. My plan is to make a bunch before the Truro show in October, use them for the show, and then put them on the BS&T when I get back. Then I’ll make more new ones for the spring show in Moncton, which will also end up on the BS&T. This way I have an incentive to make lots of trees.

I’ll get pictures of the “cleaned up” control room, “Crew Lounge”, and trees to show you next week.

Later!

Scott