Pointless? Well, not anymore! The point motors that I started preparing the other day are now fitted to the baseboard and just need the wires connecting to the central connector.
So far I am surprised at just how uneventful this wiring job has been - not at all a usual Woody experience! No doubt things will get back to their chaotic normality before too long!
Well, a week today the Rocks By Rail Museum opens with brake van rides which will hopefully be on the newly laid track that I have posted about over the last few weeks. For reasons far beyond me, I have ended up dealing with the advertising banners for the past few years. To save money on new banners each year I have taken to keeping the old banners going by amending dates on them. Luckily, the events follow a similar pattern each year which makes altering them relatively simple. However, with some uncertainty as to quite what will be finished on site and the effect that will have on events I had to amend the banners a little more this time. However, they get the message out there that the Museum will be open! Well, they do now as I dragged Mrs. Woody out with me and we made the grand tour to put all six sets of banners out. It was six months ago that I last did this to bring them back in at the end of the season but I will now be out every two to three weeks doing the same run changing the banners as the years events progress. Just call me The Banner Man!
Still getting over the shock of having managed to connect up all the track power feeds without any issues (so far!) on the baseboard that I am working on from My Last Project 00 gauge layout, I am now dealing with the point motors. I pre-prepared them by fitting an extension pin to the activating rod.
That done I also attached the Peco mounting plate which makes fastening the motor to the baseboard much easier.
The view I got of the platform area at the Rocks By Rail Museum as I went to sign in for the day may not have looked that different to last week but there has been a lot of work going on.
Richard and Martyn were busy leveling the track by the platform ready to be fully ballasted.
I was also trying to make the place look nice and clean with further mower work. This time I was cutting the quarry area of which this was the first cut of the year so was hard going but it looked a lot better afterwards.
The nice part about working up in the quarry area is that after all that hard work over the Winter, I can now take a few minutes rest in the quarry viewing area and take in that mix of industrial heritage and nature!
Miraculously, the wiring of the power feeds on the baseboard from my My Last Great Project 00 gauge layout is complete! Whether it all works remains to be seen but I have a level of confidence in my work although I am not sure how low on the scale that level is!
Time to start on the wiring of another baseboard on my Last Great Project Layout. Two have been completed leaving two to do so I guess I could claim to be half way through but it doesn't feel like it! at least when I laid the track I did solder on the wires to it and fed them under the baseboard ready to be sorted out at a later date - something I am too good at!
First thing to do was to clear all the trains off the baseboard.
With that done the remaining tracks that ran over the baseboard joint were cut through and it was time to lift it up and see the underside!
That is going to take a lot of sorting! I think I will be busy for the next few days/weeks!
Some years ago, whilst attending the Newark Toy and Train Fair, I found a stall selling pre-used USA outline rolling stock at really good prices. In addition to the price being attractive, the wagons were also fitted with Kadee couplers which on their own are about £5 a pair to buy. The wagons worked out at just under £5 each so I came away with several! The only thing about them was that the previous owner had obviously fitted them as an after market modification and rather than using the proper Kadee mounting box a paper envelope had been created. The problem with this is that the coupling itself pulls out with any load on it. You cannot glue it or it will not uncouple. Having bought some of the proper mountings at the Bingham Model railway Show I decided to investigate how they fitted. I decided to trial with this caboose.
Leaving the Bingham model rail exhibition, my arms were hardly stressed by the weight of purchases much to Mrs. Woody's relief! I did get some interesting things though including some more 3D prints from Eddie at 3D Printing for Charity where profits go to the Lincs. and Notts Air Ambulance so I feel that my purchases do have a benefit to others as well.
Firstly though. I did find a trader with some Kaydee couplers in stock so these two items were purchased which will deal with some issues with some of the stock on my USA switching layout.
Moving onto the 3D prints, there was this rather nice generic workshop type building that should paint up well.
I have seen this print of the old Atkinson Boarder truck on the stand before always thinking I must get that one. Eddie had two left, the display one and a kit. As he was not going to print it again I somehow ended up with both!
On a smaller size I stocked up on some more electrical cabinets - always useful and a fraction of the price of those made by the major manufacturers.
There was also this nice small signal box that I have in mind for a future project but don't tell Mrs. Woody!
The parts build into this.
As I posted yesterday there were a couple of layouts that stood out to me and Mrs. Woody at the Bingham model rail exhibition 2025.
The first is 'The Hot Track' which is a small model but depicting part of a real railway built to transport molten steel four miles from Redcar Blast Furnace to the steel plant at Lackenby ehere it became the famous Teeside steel.
Having previously visited the Bingham Model Railway Show back in March to only find I had the wrong date in my calendar, todays visit to that show was carefully checked on the website prior to setting off. Mrs. Woody accompanied me in the interests of keeping a rein on my spending but more so just to make sure my checking on the date was indeed accurate this time! It was, and there was a show and I did get into it, it was good and my spending was modest!
The Bingham show is one of those that is regarded as being at the smaller end of the size scale but I do like this type of show. So much easier to get around and you actually get to see everything.
There were some themes running through the show. Firstly, there was an unusually high number of n gauge layouts which bucks the trend of recent years. Secondly, Steel and Scotland seemed to have a high level of representation as well!
One layout that ticked both trends was this n gauge layout called Glenellen. It shows that in a modest space n can really allow scenic development as well as allowing longish trains to run.
