The New Northern Central

[Ed Kapuscinski]

You need to model this!

It's hot, but it's at the far south end of the NC.

This will have to do.

[ Guests cannot view attachments ]

[chuck geiger]

JRMFTOTWITS

[Jbub]

JRMFTOTWITS

I know JRMFT but what is OTWITS?

[chuck geiger]

ON TRACK WORK IN THE STREET

[Ed Kapuscinski]

I present to you all the Turnout Chastity Belt Mk I:



I am really loving the "product development" aspect of this. I already see plenty of potential for improvements and optimization, but the concept is being well proven out so far.

I'd love to get some feedback/info on my questions about diodes here: https://www.therailwire.net/forum/index.php?topic=52492.msg722764#msg722764

I realized that I was right about the short that'd be created when the door is open and the switch is normalized. I believe I need a diode in there, like this, correct?



If that's the case, what do I need to know about diodes? I need to make sure that it's not creating a load when current is flowing through it because that'll trip the detection. That's possible, right?

[Ed Kapuscinski]

Making the MA&PA look even more decrepit, because simply using Code 40 wasn't enough.



Why go back to 55 after the short stretch? Well, because it'll be hidden and Code 40 flex doesn't grow on trees!

[C855B]

Wow! How did you convert a Roku remote to a wireless throttle?

[Ed Kapuscinski]

Wow! How did you convert a Roku remote to a wireless throttle?

I just throw it at things when they don't work.

[Ed Kapuscinski]

Did some painting last night. I wanted something under the tracks and since the MA&PA and poorhouse yard were both ready, it was time.



And once those were down and wired up, you know what time it was?

That's right. Time to JFRTM!

I decided to run the MA&PA job.

So here we go, using a leased ex EL NW2.

I pulled the two car train out of staging. Did the interchange swap, and ran back in. Not too complicated, but TrainCrew made it a bit more interesting (air tests, handbrakes, etc...).

Here we are waiting for "clearance from the dispatcher" to open up the switches and come out onto Conrail.



It took a minute since she had to wake up first.



Obviously so, so much more to do, but it's exciting to be able to do something after all the time and money sunk into it so far.

[Ed Kapuscinski]

Last weekend I painted York to represent the general terrain it'll represent.


This week I've been fighting with Loconet (I wasn't seeing reports from one of my BXP88s), soldering up a turnout frog that was being a pain in the a$$ (see https://www.therailwire.net/forum/index.php?topic=52832.0), and got the track cut for the Duke St yard.

Here's a little bit of the Duke St yard scene.



One of the things I'm looking forward to: I tell someone "you're today's helpers". Then they show up at their power and see this:





And one last unposted photo from CP York.

[mu26aeh]

Or instead of that on the helper track, show up and you got these

[Ed Kapuscinski]

I f'ing fixed it!

@Philip H 's visit helped me sort out a problem I had been having with my second BXP88 occupancy detector since the day after I installed it.

It had seemed to have just stopped reporting over loconet. The sensors were working, but JMRI wasn't seeing anything.

Phil's JFRTM was triggering occupancy in blocks that it shouldn't have been. The lightbulb went on!

It turns out that somehow its ID had been reset back to "1" from "2". I reprogrammed it back to 2 and everything was back up and running.



Success!

[wm3798]

That's looking pretty good.  Looking forward to visiting and not remembering how a DCC throttle works again!
Lee

[Ed Kapuscinski]

That's looking pretty good.  Looking forward to visiting and not remembering how a DCC throttle works again!
Lee

It's ok, I have a cheat sheet.

[Ed Kapuscinski]

Ugh. My nemesis is back.



Progress has been going slow because I hate soldering.

Turns out I think I figured out why. I was murdering my iron tips by submerging them in flux for cleaning. Turns out you should never do that. Oh well! Problem solved.

But some things have been happening nonetheless.

The most exciting thing has been that the end of track has now been extended to beyond CP GEORGE, where the NCR and Frederick Secondary split and the beginning of the double track through downtown York.



Lots still to do behind the frontier: get switch control working, tie feeders into busses, connect tortoises and really get the CP functioning, etc... but it's nice to be able to run trains a little further.

Here's a quick grab of running the train back to the yard through CP YORK, just because I like this spot.