Wednesday Now

Yesterday I got home a bit earlier than usual, had a bit of time to set up the train room/garage for the evening visitors. A photo about here has them all recorded, fine looking bunch don't you think? (well except for PK) I enjoy having the guys over as it does encourage you to 'do a bit more' whether that be a modelling project or work on your layout.

I'd finished all the track work and wiring of the first module and was looking forward to some feedback from the guys. They tend to have a fairly balanced point of view which I welcome. Apart from a cable working loose, all appeared to work OK.

The test loco was not however, surging and generally running a bit poorly. Some further work required on this one. It did seem to run over the trackwork ok, but would not win any scale running competitions!

I did get out the 13 Class loco that I'm working on. I'm having a moment of indecision in regards to motor access. As the kit is built the motor is effectively built into the chassis with no way of removal once constructed. I would like to be able to remove the motor to check on binding along the way in construction, and also after completion for maintenance.

So after some discussion the idea of inserting a grub screw into a spacer was come upon. A photo now to show you what I mean. On the right hand side you can see the wide spacer that runs against the gear, this is where I intend to put in the grub screw. By doing this I won't need to have the gear fixed to the shaft thus allowing me to loosen the grub screw and remove the shaft and gears. Yes, to replace the gear, spacers and shaft will be fiddly but not impossible. Interestingly I posted a comment to the Aus Rail Yahoo group and the same suggestion was put up. I find it helpful having a wider modelling community to pose questions to.

I really would like to move forward with this project as the sound decoder is waiting patiently in the parts box. On that I've set up decoder pro on the train room computer and it does indeed make the job of programming these little buggers a lot more visual, which I like.

That's about it, have a good one. No doubt those of you with links to the RMCQ mag will have an completely different view of events of the Tuesday at Geoff's, we wait in anticipation.