4mm Life in a Northern Town - back to back(scene)

Neil

Western Thunderer
Today I took the finished section of wall out to the garage to see how it looked in position; here are a few photos I took.

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The transition between 3D wall and the backscene won't be as stark as the images show; there's a grassy knoll and some trees to apply which should mask the join.
 

Neil

Western Thunderer
I think I've mentioned earlier on in this thread that I have a group of friends who live locally and meet up most Friday evenings to operate (play with) each others layouts. I'm atypical as the rest are wedded to the world of witchcraft that is dcc while I'm with the Luddite tendency. However my mates have a few dc locos that they bring to my layout and I have a few that are equipped with chips to run on 'foreign' metals. One such is this Patriot which I took to have a run out a week last Friday, but refused to budge when placed on the tracks. Yesterday I replaced the chip with a blanking plate and gave it a run out on my layout to check that it would go on dc. All is fine and I'm mightily tempted to leave it this way as I rather like the look of it; here it is on a parcels working off the midland region.

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John Rich

Active Member
I think I've mentioned earlier on in this thread that I have a group of friends who live locally and meet up most Friday evenings to operate (play with) each others layouts. I'm atypical as the rest are wedded to the world of witchcraft that is dcc while I'm with the Luddite tendency. However my mates have a few dc locos that they bring to my layout and I have a few that are equipped with chips to run on 'foreign' metals. One such is this Patriot which I took to have a run out a week last Friday, but refused to budge when placed on the tracks. Yesterday I replaced the chip with a blanking plate and gave it a run out on my layout to check that it would go on dc. All is fine and I'm mightily tempted to leave it this way as I rather like the look of it; here it is on a parcels working off the midland region.

View attachment 167426
Thank God I am not the only one left on the planet who can't be arsed with DCC
 

jonte

Western Thunderer
I’m currently building a Minories layout with Peco Streamline and medium radius electro frog points. It was wired for DC including isolated sections at the end of the three roads, and traditional Peco point switches.

Two wires, indeed, lead from the (Gaugemaster) controller to power the track; the AC from same controller powers the points of one board, a separate Gaugemaster AC transformer powering the uncouplers on the second.

Running with the Gaugemaster wasnt satisfactory, thus a separate controller - also DC (AC fed) - recommended by another British guy on a North American forum, was purchased (Black Cat?). It gives excellent running, especially with the mechanisms of older models, as the guy suggested.

However, I’d unintentionally purchased a DCC ready loco sometime ago, which prompted me to buy a Bachmann DCC controller (offered at a very reasonable price) to power it: some day, which never seemed to come.

Thus, having wired up the layout I bit the bullet and went for it (DCC), and with the help of a couple of benevolent forum members, it was soon up and running, and using the same wiring again, using only two wires.

I wrote in my thread, that I shall never look back. It really is that good!

I’ve no intentions of adopting an all singing, all dancing, fully computerised system: I like flicking switches, thus the method of point changing, and eventually signalling will remain in the Stone Age ;)

However, control of the trains will be forever more DCC at Monks, which requires no additional wiring to that of conventional DC as I’ve found, and with just its two wires.

jonte
 

Neil

Western Thunderer
Very happy with DC control, the true home of only two wires required.

All the best

John
.... Thus, having wired up the layout I bit the bullet and went for it (DCC), and with the help of a couple of benevolent forum members, it was soon up and running, and using the same wiring again, using only two wires.

I wrote in my thread, that I shall never look back. It really is that good! ....

Very much a personal choice, I couldn't honestly say that one was intrinsically better than the other. I trained as a sparky many years ago and I like that I can see and understand all the stuff that makes trains go and that fault finding has fewer components to worry about.
 

jonte

Western Thunderer
Very much a personal choice, I couldn't honestly say that one was intrinsically better than the other. I trained as a sparky many years ago and I like that I can see and understand all the stuff that makes trains go and that fault finding has fewer components to worry about.
Absolutely, Neil.

Whichever you feel more comfortable with :)

jonte
 

Neil

Western Thunderer
I've mentioned that friends come round roughly once a month to play with the layout. As they bring stuff with them we end up with a less focussed stock list. Here's an indication of what can happen.

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Now while this is all horrendously un-prototypical it does have the benefit that the layout gets a thorough run through with stock not tailored to the layout. It does throw up the odd fault, the most in need of attention being the microswitches used with the six points which are motored. Fortunately I have replacements and about three weeks to swap them before it's my turn to host another session.
 

Neil

Western Thunderer
Having finished the short section of Bar Walls the next candidate for the workbench is a laser cut kit of a shop. It's by Fair Price Models, who can be found here on e-bay. While not the most complete kit it does give you quite a leg up towards a finished model and at a very keen price. You can take the man out of Yorkshire etc. I got a bit of the way through the build before the camera came out, perhaps no bad thing as it gave me some time to work out what order I needed to put things together in.

The kit doesn't have brickwork or any finish for that matter, incised into the walls so I needed plasticard overlays, best marked out while the walls were flat. Also because it has solid ground and first floors I would need to get the windows and any interior gubbins in before assembly. In turn this demands that the window reveals are painted and therefore front and rear walls had to be clad. Here are some photos of how things stood this morning.

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I realise that this all sounds like a bit of a faff but in reality you would have to do all these things to bring a model to completion, it's just that in this case the order is critical and not quite what you might expect. My assessment? I'm enjoying the build and I have my eye on some of the other offerings depending on how the layout shapes up.
 

Yorkshire Dave

Western Thunderer
Now while this is all horrendously un-prototypical it does have the benefit that the layout gets a thorough run through with stock not tailored to the layout. It does throw up the odd fault, the most in need of attention being the microswitches used with the six points which are motored. Fortunately I have replacements and about three weeks to swap them before it's my turn to host another session.

And having fun playing trains.
 

michael mott

Western Thunderer
I've mentioned that friends come round roughly once a month to play with the layout. As they bring stuff with them we end up with a less focussed stock list. Here's an indication of what can happen.

View attachment 167736


View attachment 167737


View attachment 167738


View attachment 167739

Now while this is all horrendously un-prototypical it does have the benefit that the layout gets a thorough run through with stock not tailored to the layout. It does throw up the odd fault, the most in need of attention being the microswitches used with the six points which are motored. Fortunately I have replacements and about three weeks to swap them before it's my turn to host another session.
I am guessing that the suburban is just coasting along in between the sections without the electrified rails, or is it being pushed by something off screen;)

I to like simple DC or batteries with simple switches.

Michael
 

Neil

Western Thunderer
The shop build continues:

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The main shop window needed some semblance of an interior so I flung together this internal partition and shelf combo. As it's to be a grocers shop I painted a load of resin trays I cast years ago from 'use up' moulds when I was making rolling stock kits. The fruit and veg inserts are experimental castings in five minute epoxy from moulds made by pressing shapes into plasticine.

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The other windows needed less dressing, nets from tissue and curtains from coloured paper out of the Sunday paper (Observer) colour supplement.

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The interior decor (!) was v carried over from the internal partition to the matching side wall.

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The glazing has been sawn from a clear CD case. I expect that these will eventually be hard to find. If you look closely you might be able to discern the hammered glass finish to the top lights and door windows; the front of the case was clear, the rear textured. I have some coloured CD cases too, the transparent blue and amber ones may have uses as glazing.
 

Simon

Flying Squad
That is really effective! Looks great, and everything in pounds, shillings and once too(!)

Sorry....

But then there was Red Barrel, so not quite so good as all that!

Simon
 
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