Click here to read the Mt. Vernon Non-Clinic Report for March 2020 .
Grab Iron Posts
Narrow Gauge on the “Isolation Circle Central” Route.
During this interesting time of following the “Stay Home, Stay Healthy” directive from the state, I am finding things a bit more challenging to avoid “honey-dos” since I’m in the house all the time. Sure this may be a great time to work on house projects but what fun is that.
So in order to get away from the world and especially chores for a while, I imagined a setup for my modules that could be used for testing and motivation to work on the real important home projects – model railroad stuff!
I am part of the Pacific Northwest On30 Modular Group and have six modules in my shop. Most of the time however the modules are stored in their transportation configuration and are only set up if I need to fix track or plant a structure. They share the shop with other vehicles and projects that usually get more attention and I normally don’t have a lot of time to work on them let alone set them up and run stuff on them.
Well the last few weeks have been a different story. Being in quarantine and working all day from my kitchen table “office” on the phone and on the computer, I am pretty much toast at the end of the work day and need to get out of the house. The only place I can go is the yard or the shop. While out organizing some stuff in the shop while I was bored, I found some birch plywood that could be possibly be used make a couple 22 inch radius curves. I thought, hey I’ve got four straight five foot modules that I could connect together and have an oval for continuous running. And so was born the idea for the “Isolation Circle Central”.
A few evenings of chopping wood and laying track resulted in a seemingly basic circle to run trains around on my finished and work-in-progress modules. There is no way my ol’ lady is going to negotiate that duckunder – so the “social distancing” part of the setup was an extreme success.
The layout is powered by a Digitrax Zephyr with a Digitrax PR3 to interface with a computer and run JMRI WiThrottles. This way I can run two (or six) locos at once on the cellphone Engine Driver app. I also modified one of my modules to provide a programming track for use with the PR3. Normally we program locos “off layout” on a test track but since I’m using the PR3 for the computer anyway, may as well upgrade capability and use the direct programming feature also. It is certainly much more convenient to program and test on the same track.
For our PNWOn30 Group we use JMRI Operations Pro to provide switchlists for our operations under TT&TO rules. My modules are already built up as locations with the appropriate spurs in the JMRI program for operations. All I had to do was create a modified route to only include my four modules and select cars from my inventory to be used for operations.
So, with little effort I had JMRI setup to run switchlists specifically for my setup. I designated one of the corners as a staging yard and run a route from staging to staging traversing all the modules and performing set outs and pick ups according to the JMRI generated switchlists. Between each module “location” I do a complete lap around the layout to get some distance before the next module stop. All told the “Circle Job” takes a little over an hour to complete. That’s the time for at least one cup of a refreshing beverage and certainly supports the “Stay Home, Stay Healthy” directive.
Have fun and Be Safe.
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Bremerton Northern April 2020 Flimsy
Click here to read the April 2020 issue of The Flimsy Board from the Bremerton Northern Model Railroad club.
Spring Meet moved to Summer (or Fall or ??)
Al Lowe
The 4th Division’s annual Spring Meet and home Layout Tour has been postponed this year due to Covid-19. We will set a date when we know more.
Stay safe!
Time Well Spent At Home
By Alex Brikoff
This time at home could very well be a blessing in disguise. While people might be concerned with the next COVID-19 closure or announcement, I’m happy to announce that my layout is a Coronavirus free zone and that work is continuing on various projects on the layout. Having said that, I’d like to share with you a couple of photos of a set of Accurail Refrigerator cars that I built up recently. They feature Kadee whisker spring couplers, Athearn metal wheels replacing the plastic ones that came with a kit. Also, all the car numbers are unique. I did have to change one of the car numbers using techniques that were presented in last month’s “Decaling” clinic by Nick Muff and Al Carter at the Eastside Get Together Clinic. Finally, the cars were weathered using Bragdon Weathering Powders applied using a dry brushing technique.
I hope you enjoy the photos and are encouraged to work on your modeling projects while spending your time at home. Stay safe, stay healthy!
Alex
Mt Vernon NMRA Clinic Special Interest Discussion Group
By Tom Buckingham
Jim Betz and Ted Becker have been discussing some kind of online activity during the current “lock down”. To that end, Jim has created a Special Interest Discussion Group called PNWRRModelers. It can be found at:
https://groups.io/g/PNWRRModelers/
PNW Railroad Modelers is a discussion group for model railroaders in the Pacific Northwest
The “host”, Groups.io is a “replacement” for yahoo groups if you are familiar with that. If you were a member of a yahoo group you have probably already learned how to use groups.io and are active in some groups. To gain access you will need to click the “Join The Group” button and then make a post to it to introduce yourself to the other members. The first post will go to Jim and he will approve it (this discourages scoundrels) and you will be live from then on.
The only thing you have to do is to choose which type of notice for posts you will get from the group. Most will choose “Digest” mode which means that you will get one or at most two digests a day that will collect all the posts for that time period. You will get that in an email. You can read and forget, read and reply, or just ignore/delete.
According to Jim it’s really easy to use.
Tom
Bob’s Resignation And Gratitude
4th Division Membership Chairman Bob Rorabaugh steps aside from the role:
I must express my appreciation for the privilege of representing the NMRA and, in particular, our 4th Division (PNR), as the “face” to the public. My resignation was official at the end of February. These last five or six years went quickly by. It’s time to pass the baton to someone with fresh enthusiasm and ideas. It’s past time for me to actually build a layout!
Note well: I’m willing to serve and support our next Membership Chairman as others have assisted me. I’ve prepped ahead promotion material, put some procedures in place, and can actually “stand in” on occasion, if needed. Call any of the Board members you know (or me) if you are interested in what the role entails. My cell # is 206-948-9511
Again, I’m grateful for friendships formed with members of the 4D Board, help from some of you, and for this way to express my love of/interest in people. The many of you I’ve met made representing you and our shared hobby a delight.
Respectfully,
Bob “Stumpy” Rorabaugh
Email Scam
Some of you may have received an email recently purporting to come on behalf of one of the 4D or PNR officers or board members. The email tries to persuade you to buy gift cards or send money electronically to help someone in distress. THESE ARE SCAMS. No one from the 4D Board or any PNR leader will be asking for money to be handled in a manner in which the funds cannot be traced.
Lots of folks at home right now, so these types of scam are common. Delete the email.
Russ Segner, 4D Superintendent
Scratch Building
By Russ Segner
Mark Hills is a long time local model builder focusing on D&RGW. He has weathered many of my collection of HO Rio Grande work equipment and cabooses. I saw this posted on Facebook and though it a great and complete article on scratch building. So, I am sharing it with his permission on the Grab Iron:
https://atlasrescueforum.proboards.com/thread/8014/building-rio-grande-covered-finished%C2%A0
Enjoy and post some of your model building now while we staying home.
Russ
Cabin Fever – Projects
By Russ Segner
“I haven’t got time!” I hear that a lot. But now, many of us have a lot more free time than we planned. So, I’m asking everyone who now has time to share with the rest of us some of your current model railroading projects. It can be a model, a wiring project, decoder install or some part of your layout.
Larry Sloan has answered my call to member to share your current projects with this, a new control panel for one of his HO modules. Larry is a member of our HO modular group, the Seattle Pacific & Eastern, headed by Mike Slease. Larry is also one of the leaders of the new HO Free-Mo modular group now joining the 4th Division. This is a group that was formerly located in the Tacoma Freight House, now the Amtrak station. They lost their permanent layout, so they went mobile.
Here is another shot of a demonstration Larry built to show at clinics which shows the various capabilities of DCC. He unveiled it at our recent Pacific Science Center Show.
Well done Larry. Let’s hope others will pitch in and share some of their work with the rest of us.
Russ