The last two months has seen activities that included: MTH PA/PB's continuing problems, Arduino bits, 2017 Australian Narrow Gauge Convention, The Bellarine Railway, Visit to Traralgon, Stanvac Gates, Four Ops Sessions, Sound Module Prototype and Arduino Course.
MTH PA's/PB
I think these are the most troublesome locos I have ever bought....
Following installation of the Loksound decoders unstable motor performance has been experienced with every model. I gave them to our Guru Don who took them home inspected my work and tested them. The motors would work normally for a while then start drawing heavy current from 120mA up to 800mA per motor.
We finally decided these motors had to go so I ordered Mashima replacements which the supplier duly shipped and the postal service has "lost the parcel"...
It seems finishing these locos is doomed......
Gearing up for Arduino Projects
After many small purchases from eBay, Aliexpress, Banggood, Goodluckbuy and a few others my stocks for projects are now mainly on hand.
2017 Australian Narrow Gauge Convention
On Easter Thursday Rosslyn and I drove to Geelong in Victoria where we joined Peter from Traralgon who had come by regional train via Melbourne and we stayed in a cabin park before departing on Tuesday morning.
After a "heavy night" on Thursday we were slow to rise on Friday so had an easy day before attending the conference venue in the evening for registration and the first look at exhibitors and suppliers who were finalising there setup.
We had a great weekend attending many clinics and wandering throughout the venue a number of times visiting the layouts, the contest area and suppliers booths. All of us opened our wallets and a few good buys were had.
It was nice to meet people that I talk with on Model Rail Radio and/or Facebook and to name a few: Dan Pickard, Rod Hutchinson, Gerry Hopkins, Murray Scholz, Prof Klyzlr & John Garaty.
Here is a link to the 500 odd photos posted on the 2017 Australian Narrow Gauge Convention public site.
Below is a photo (by Dan Pickard) of the Corrimal Colliery Incline constructed by John Garaty & Guy Gadsden.
Below is a video taken of the Corrimal Colliery Incline towards the end of the "setup" process.
Murray Scholz's clinic...
 |
| Peter, me and Ros in the Static Grass clinic (front row left of the "leaning one" |
The Bellarine Railway
Attendees of the 2017 Australian Narrow Gauge Convention had the opportunity when booking to ride a special train chartered for 100 attendees on The Bellarine Railway. I invited Gavin & Natalie who are close friends and live in Geelong. Unfortunately Gavin was in New Zealand for work so Lenny an ex Geelong Signalman "was Gavin" for a day. Lenny related "old railway stories from his days in the Geelong Signal Cabin" during the day some of these were funny and others interesting.
I must mention the lunch provided on the platform at Queenscliff - it was exceptional - well done!
Below are a few videos put together from the day.
The scheduled service arriving and departing Queensciff.
Our train being shunted to platform after the scheduled service departed Queenscliff.
The obligatory "run by"
Lakers Siding Workshops
The preservationists at The Bellarine Railway attempted to get the steam crane going but some technical difficulties were encountered - we appreciated what they tried to achieve for us.
It was a relatively long day but we all had fun.
Visit to Peter's
On Tuesday we drove for about three hours to Traralgon for a week of "Playing with Arduino's", enjoying each others company and eating nice food accompanied by exceptional red wines...
We did spend an hour or two in the shed where Peter gave some Amtrak locos "a run".
One of the first projects was to build Peter a circuit to turn some background lights on when he walks into his dark study. This will allow him to sit down and switch on his desk light whilst not being in total darkness. We adjusted the "detection range" for the ultrasonic sensor placed on one side of the entrance to be less than the distance to the door and this was used for activation. After prototyping using a UNO R3 we loaded the program to a Arduino Nano.
 |
| We used an ultrasonic detector and a Arduino Nano to switch a few LED's and a relay used to activate a light strip |
 |
| Relay, light strip and ultrasonic sensor |
My project was to write the code for Stanvac Gates - see next story below.
We also played with temperature/humidity sensors, 7 segment displays, LCD Display, 8 x 8 LED Matrixs and shift registers.
I left Peter's and headed for home the following Wednesday getting home in the late afternoon of 26th April which did not leave enough time to do an April Blog Update hence this one covering two months.
Stanvac Gates
Last time I mentioned the visit to Seth Newman's (video link) where I liked the operating gates and simulated derail at his Water Treatment Plant. I am working on a version for the entrance to Stanvac - my Oil Refinery.
I mounted the servo motors and started programming a Sketch for the Arduino controller.
At Peter's we refined the code including angles and speed of rotation for the gates and speed and length of movement of the derail. I decided to add a "Blue protection" track light, a flashing red light to be installed next to the moving gates and a green indicator light on the control panel for when gates opening. This was done using a UNO and finally transferred to a Pro Mini for the final installation using the Rx Tx connections.
Here is a video of part of the development.
I have 18V AC accessory power at all control panels so I built a 12V Regulated DC circuit and used a DC to DC adjustable power board to get the 5V Regulated DC required to run the project.
I installed the project on my layout and the results are shown in the video below - the masking tape simulates the gates which I will build and fit later along with the chain wire fence..
Here is the link to the Arduino.ino Sketch.
My Ops Session
Don, Des, Chris, Rossco, Pierre, Wayne and Pete joined me for a pleasant three hour session on 1st May. Pete came back and he showed his operating capabilities again. Everyone undertook something different during this op session with the exception of Don who wanted to repeat his previous undertaking with advanced operation utilising command station consisting and de-consisting. I again received some positive constructive feedback.
The broad running schedule was.
Ops Sessions at Wayne's
Wayne has two groups of operators that come to operate his layout and he has four "operating sessions" to complete "a cycle of operations". Each session has an average of about 22 train movements which has been steadily refined based on "operating experiences" over the last 18 months and the whole scheme is no quite stable. A unintended consequence of two groups and four sessions is that each group only see sessions 1 & 3 or 2 & 4. A strategy has been struck for our Monday night round robin group to do an "extra session" so Derek and Ross who are still working will now get to operate on Wayne's layout twice a year.
April
Chris, Barry, Rosslyn & I had a fun session at Wayne's and things ran pretty smooth and every movement card was used.
The fast clock was only stopped once in the session and the new configuration of Lowood Crossing continues to meet requirements just soooo much better than the previous - well worth the effort Wayne!
Most of us are starting to get a better handle on the layout now and I am sure that we are getting a lot closer to understanding the rules and operating regime.
May
Chris, Barry, Rosslyn, Don, Des, Peter S, Peter Jackson & I had a fun session at Wayne's and things ran pretty smooth and we had a great 2 1/2 hour running session. There was a number of derailment and power issues at the approach to Dunkley Towers yard. I undertook to resolve the problems.
After a maintenance session I was able to successfully pull and push a set of coaches through the industrial yard tracks which should be Ok for shorter freight cars.
We look forward to our next visit in June where we are undertaking the first night time run of the layout.
Ops Sessions at Ross's
Chris, Barry, Rosslyn, Derek, Pierre & I had a fun session at Ross's. We operated with the two Yards at each end of the point to point layout assembling trains and the operator at the line stations driving them so trains were passed from crew to crew around the layout meaning we stayed at a location for the session while Ross directed operations!
The mode of operation proved itself and we did not have any "trying to pass in narrow aisles" issues.
My thoughts are that we can extend this to include some local shunting along the line - maybe 1 or 2 cars on and off at each line station - just food for thought!
 |
| Ross our host |
 | |
|
 |
| Chris & Barry |
I was sick and missed the Ops session at Chris's in May......
Sound Module Prototyping
Peter Jackson the owner of the Eureka Valley Narrow Gauge Railroad On3 layout is interested in adding sound to three of his scenes. I have been playing around with sensors to switch the sound modules off and on.
 |
| Three ultrasonic detectors which can be adjusted independently within the sketch on the Arduino UNO |
 |
| 3 x ultrasonic sensors, 1 x UNO, 3 x Relays & 1 x Sound Module |
 |
| one dual and a single 5V relays |
Here is the link to the Arduino.ino Sketch
Arduino Course
Wayne, Derek and I are attending a local library Arduino course (for adults) which is a 3 x 1 1/2hr session course. We are hoping to learn a few things which will be useful in our exploits.
My first project was a traffic light simulation.
Here is the link to Arduino.ino Sketch using the delay() function.
Here is the link to the Arduino.ino Sketch NOT using delay() function.
Till the end of June.....
-ooOOOoo-
