August Update

This month I was sick so many "in the armchair" activities for the first half of the month but there were some other activities that included: JMRI / Engine Driver Update, Two Ops Sessions, Car Card & Waybills, Pierre and Derek continue training and preparation for NMRA Convention.

JMRI Update

All my computers have been updated to version 4.8 (4.8+Rbe0ff15) and the 7" tablets and mobile phones updated to Engine Driver 2.14.2.

Don started experimenting with button labels and consisting and we have all learnt from his trials.

We can now easily get around the Roco maximum five consists of two locos.  We have consisted CV19 consists with each other and separate locos as well.  The only issue we have found is that the "total consist" cannot be edited - say to drop one loco - it has to be totally dissolved and rebuilt but hey the advantages far outweigh this!

Ops Sessions 21 & 28 August

Eight of us gathered on the 21st and only 6 on the 28th - but we practised and Derek was challenged!

A couple of short videos...

We has a few nibbles after the session - thanks guys for coming.

Barry, Don & Des

John Derek & Rosslyn

Rosslyn, Me and Barry

Card Card & Waybills

I am following the system used by Wayne that has the following:

• Freight Car Cards - White

• Coboose Cards - Red

• Locomotive Cards - Black

• Coach Cars - Green

• Railcar Cars - 1/2 Black & 1/2 Green

The cards are being laminated when complete.

Significant progress was made whilst I was sick....

Waybill Design

The waybills will be cut and folded to fit in the Car Card plastic envelope.  I have the Master document for "merging" but now need to develop all the card information.  This will need to be well thought out.

At the moment I have test data in a spreadsheet but may need to develop a database to get a balanced result through a systematic approach.

As I have eleven staging tracks if the process for most trains calls for one town to be a staging town the same cars will take a long elapsed time to go through a full cycle and this coupled with more waybills than cars there will be even more turnover which will help to ensure cyclic operations should only occur with my "unit trains".

Collecting data for the system has commenced using an Access database.

Quite a lot of info is required - below is the file relationships developed to date...

Car Card Boxes

I came up with a design based on information and bits and pieces Wayne had given / lent me.

loco card boxes 2 bays - freight card boxes 3 bays both 90mm wide and train boxes 100mm wide

Actual sizes and numbers required

1200 x 600 Sheet

900 x 600 Sheet

900 x 600 Sheet

Don & I cut the "90mm, 60mm & 25mm strips" - the last activity for this month - ready for the chop saw which probably will happen next month.

MTH PA's/PB

I have finally installed the new Mashima motors!

They have been speed matched on the bench so now to undertake testing on the layout.  I am hoping they will finally work well.

Maintenance at Wayne's

Major maintenance this month so I upgraded his JMRI (4.8), Java and Engine Driver (2.15) on all his tablets and we diagnoses a problem between the throttle LAN connection and the Lenz LIUSB -Wayne will address this.

Don then showed Wayne how to consist with JMRI - Now I can see I will get a steady stream of  Wayne's locos to put on the Bachrus Speedometer and speed match.

Pierre and Derek back in training

Thursday evenings continued and we were joined by Don and Chris in an attempt to "stress test" Derek as Controller / Tower man.

Derek is excelling and will soon be better than I am!  he is identifying issues in my paperwork.....

NMRA Convention - Adelaide

The Australian Region NMRA Convection is in Adelaide next month which - this fast approaching.  I have my operations team organised and we have a final practice run on 4th September ready for visitors as part of the layout tour on 17th September.

That's it for this month!

Till the end of September.....

-ooOOOoo-