Things turn up when you least expect it!

Things turn up when you least expect it like out on a bike ride this morning when I came across this sign.

I am sure there the event is not as you might read from the sign but that is one strange sign. Must find out what it is all about.

Back in the reasonable safety of home, the last couple of days has seen the WMD HQ undergoing some deep tiding and cleaning which Mrs. Woody seems to be keen on having done and having done by me! Fair enough. The cats and me do make most of the mess whilst Mrs. W, safely watching, from the comfort of a sofa, some more murder mystery TV show, does not! I must admit that I do sometimes leave things lying about. The six pens, can of paint and some screw drivers (I wondered where they had gone!) in the kitchen are probably better placed elsewhere! 

Having got into the right frame of mind for this tiding and cleaning lark I took to my Man cave which was looking decidedly messy to bring about some sense of cleanliness. Whilst I was tiding things up I happened to open a box to see what was in there. I actually emptied it out to establish the contents and found this at the bottom.

It might just look like a plastic bag with a few bits of cardboard but as soon as I saw it I knew I had found them. I had found the missing coping stones and the brick pier to the viaduct that I talked about a couple of weeks ago. 

Brilliant! I knew that I had put them somewhere safe - in this case a very safe place! I also knew that the likelihood was that I would find them when I was least expecting it which I did. Anyway they are on my workbench ready to be glued into place. Now where did I put the glue?????

Brakes only slow you down!

Back in the days when I did cycle racing I can remember a fellow cyclist telling me not to worry about my brakes as 'they only slow you down'! Now that advice may have its merits when Woody was a younger cyclist hurtling down hills but as I have got older the life preservation button has been pressed and I like to be safe! To that end I needed to replace the front brake pads on one of my bikes. As you can see the old one on the right when compared to the new one on the left shows I was right in deciding to change them.

Having done that job I noticed the bike looking somewhat dirty. I do prefer to use the time I have for cycling to actually cycle and not clean bikes but I decided it was time for the clean!

I even went as far as cleaning the block which was somewhat oily and dirty.

An old sock was cut into strips and these were used to get between the cogs and clean the gunk out.

After 15 minutes or so it looked a lot better!

In fact with the rest of the bike cleaned it all looked a lot better and I can stop as well!

Just wish I could find something to give my old legs a bit more speed these days!

Wednesday at Rocks by Rail Museum?

 

It is Wednesday so I should not have been at the Rocks By Rail Museum today - but I was for various reasons that I won't go into! Despite the weather forecast showing rain all day apart from a few drops in the morning it was dry. So I was out mowing! All the front grass done and about a ten mile walk to do it. However I still had the legs to do my usual tour of the workshop where I did find Harriot the JCB slowly becoming a technicolour JCB as she gains all sorts of paint coverings. I am sure she will look good once finished but at the moment she looks somewhat like something out of Scrapheap Challenge!.

In the Exhibition Center the three Sentinels that the Museum relies on are getting continual maintenance. This time Graham is being looked at with regard to a charging problem for the battery.

The control console is in bits which means this is serious work.

Steve, Dan and Derek are working their magic in getting the alternator back in probably for the 96th time! Whether the problem will be fixed is still awaiting a proving test!

Meanwhile this Yorkshire loco had to be moved and shows just how attractive an industrial loco can look when looked after. A real credit to Paul the owner who has spent a great deal of time painting buffer beams, buffers, couplings and polishing the bodywork. The engine noise is just stunning too. Almost makes me want to own one! Now that would be something that would need some careful explaining to Mrs. Woody!

Waterproofing.

As I get closer to the point of ballasting the track on the removable section of baseboard on my 00 gauge Last Great Project I need to take account that the two viaducts are made of cardboard. Whilst I did paint the track-bed with some sealant I thought it would be best to take a few more precautions or I could end up with a mass of soggy cardboard when I glue the ballast down with watered down PVA glue.

Step one was to cut some very thin plastic card to size. As usual, WMD HQ Stores had the required item in stock so that was found and cut to size. Unfortunately the sheet was just 4cm too short so I had to glue a small extensions on to the main parts.

As the plastic card was bright white it was painted grey to avoid any bright patches if the ballast did not cover it all.

To try to further reduce the amount of diluted PVA that I would need to use I pre-ballasted the edges and middle of the track-bed.

Putting the two pre-ballasted track beds in place on the viaducts it looked like this.

 I thinking its looking good but whether it will still be that way after all the track is ballasted and glued down with dilute PVA remains a question to be answered!

Flat Earth!

Not that I have joined the Flat Earth Society but flat earth is the Vallejo colour that I am painting the sleepers and rails on my Last Great Project 00 gauge layout. This tones the sleepers down from their plastic dark brown and gives the sides of the rail a rusty look just as in real life. The photos below hopefully demonstrates the difference between unpainted and painted track.

I am airbrushing the track which uses a fair amount of paint but is certainly quicker then using a paint brush! All I have to do is use a track cleaning rubber to clean the top of the rail head so that locomotives can make electrical contact and run. As a lot of paint still needs to be used I had to get three more bottles of flat earth paint today just to make sure stocks at WMD HJQ are maintained!

Driver for a Fiver!

Driver for a fiver must be one of the best value activities in the railway museum World! Not sure how many museums offer such a thing but at the Rocks by Rail Museum a £5 drive gets visitors behind the controls of one of the Rolls Royce powered Sentinel diesel locomotives and under supervision allows them the experience of driving it to the end of the line and back. The whole experience takes about 10 leisurely minutes or so which means that participants do actually feel as though they are being focused on and not just being pushed through as quickly as possible.

From the feedback we get, the vast majority of visitors think that it is fantastic value. Even with the less then summery weather today about 30 of our many visitors today experienced the driving opportunity so that is hopefully a number of Bucket List items ticked off for many of them! I am sure most of their other Bucket List items will cost a lot more than £5 to fulfill!

Visitors awaiting their turn for Driver for a Fiver during a sunnier part of the day! Not even the rain could put them off!

A short video about Driver for a Fiver is on my YouTube channel.

Waiting for glue to dry!

Yes, it is that time when I have to wait for the glue to dry. The underlay to the track on the removable section on my Last Great Project 00 gauge layout has now been glued in place complete with the plywood pieces at the baseboard joins.

Ordinary PVA glue is just the job and spread over the whole surface to be glued should make a secure join.

I have poked the holes through the glued underlay where the wiring feeds through to the underside of the baseboard from the crossing complex.

 

All the underlay on the removable baseboard and the plywood sections at the joins have been glued in place. I need to think about weathering the track next. I will have plenty of time to think about that as I wait for the glue to dry!

Drilling times!

Today Mr. Drill came out today! 

Many holes were drilled to feed the various wires through and for the point motors. Amazingly, having fed the wires through and tested that the point motor holes were in the right place, the track actually fitted to the baseboard. Next step is to take it all up again and glue the underlay in place! Sometimes you have to do things many times to do the job properly - that is what I keep drilling into my mind anyway!

24 wires from crossing!

24 wires from crossing is perhaps a bad variation of that hit Gene Pitney song 24 hours from Tulsa! However that is what I have - 24 wires from the crossing. Following several hours of head scratching as to where wires would go and getting the right colour to the correct joint I finally finished the soldering without any swear jar contributions!

Next step is to place it on the baseboard and drill holes for the wires to go through and also holes for the point motors to be fitted. That will be a further testing time!

Once I have got to the stage when the crossing is permanently in place I will be using a mix of these connectors that arrived today.

The blue ones are the same as I used on Chalkdon and allow a number of wires to be joined to one feed. The white chocolate block connectors are a plug and socket type which will allow the power across board joints to be separated when needed. That is the plan at the moment but Woody's plans have a habit of changing as Mrs. Woody can testify!

Fine tuning!

Fine tuning might be taken that I have some form of musical instrument that I have spent some time tuning to optimum musical performance. Well there is a drum kit or two or WMD HQ much to the concern of Mrs. Woody. One is an acoustic kit that never sees the light of day these days due to noise considerations and whilst the other is a neighbour and wife friendly electric kit that only I can hear through headphones when I play it, neither has ever had me fine tune them. Instead the fine tuning I am currently involved in is related to my last great project 00 gauge layout.

As outlined back on Monday I am currently working on track joints at the baseboard joints and I had cut some plywood pieces that would be located at the baseboard joins to which copper clad sleepers would be attached to which the rail would be soldered. Well the plywood has been cut and painted. Giving it a coat of grey paint seals it against any moisture from the glue when I eventually ballast the track and will also ensure any parts not fully covered by ballast will not stand out as they would if I left the plywood in its natural state. 

Luckily Mrs. W had a recent Amazon delivery (not an unusual situation!) and I diverted the discarded packaging from the recycling bin in order to attach the plywood ready for painting.

It certainly made painting easier.

Now back to the fine tuning. To get the best from a model railway the track needs to be level and well laid. Whilst I have a general layout of track, non of it is fine tuned and it shows at some of the joints and the general alignment. Trains run but there are occasional issues which I want to avoid once the track is secured and ballasted. Using Set Track pieces to build a layout at least means that with the set sized pieces and the geometry used it should fit together reasonably well. Mix Set Track and flexitrack and you really have a bit of a nightmare in getting it all to fit properly. Now with my skills, or lack of them, getting track to fit is a challenge! However that fine tuning has to be so I have started.

First off is this crossing with four points and a diamond crossing. I have, for ease of doing things, taken it off the layout. Looks reasonable from a distance.

However, take a closer look at this joint. Whilst it is always useful to have some room for expansion that gap is just to big to give reliable and smooth running.

Taking a close look, I determined I needed to shorten the lower piece of track to close the gap so out came the rail cutters.

Having done that the situation was much improved.

The best way to check how straight the track is is to look down its length at a low level. Looks good to me.

Next job is to solder some power feed wires to the underside. Now that will be an interesting job. For this crossing there will be 24 wires! That should test my soldering skills and possibly fine tune my skills at adding to the swear jar!