Return to Model Railways

Now there’s a slightly more definite track plan, I’ve started work on point motors. I read up on some stuff, including this nice article on the N Gauge Society website. I pondered things a bit, and here’s the decision I came to.

Point motors

Going with Seep, as they can mostly hide under the baseboard, they’re very low profile, and they’re simple. Peco’s motors require hacking great big holes in the board, whilst the Seep motors need a tiny hole for the armature.

Wiring

Colour coded, naturally. I found some stuff in Maplin which looks like it’ll do the job.

Power

I’ve got an old controller in the loft (I think it’s a Gaugemaster, or something) which has an accessory supply, so I’ll bring that down and use that for now. Or at least, until I look into DCC. I’ve also got a Gaugemaster Capacitor Discharge Unit (CDU) which will help fire the motors. For the scissor crossings I’m planning on making up a couple of push-button diode matrices, with relays switching the electrofrogs, but I’ll do that after I’ve got the basic points working.

Connections

I pondered this for a while. The above article mentioned using terminal blocks, which is a nice idea, but I’m not a great fan of them. I pondered some more, then realised I already knew of a perfectly great connector. The Molex Hard Disk connector! They can take the amperage, and the wattage I need, so they’re quite suitable. Plus, pretty easy to fit (crimp on pins), and it all just pushes together. If I want to remove something, I just pull the connector out. For bigger connections I can use the motherboard connectors, or multiples of these.

I’ve made up eight point motors so far with the female Molex connector on (technically, it’s back to front to how it goes in a PC, but I’m not fussy), and they look pretty good.

The screws I bought to fix them on are just the right length – they’re a bit long actually, but with the thickness of the point motor’s PCB, it should almost fit without sticking out the stop. So what if it does though, it’ll all be hidden under scenery!

I might have a bash at screwing one of them in and testing it out. Once I’m happy with all the point motors I’ll move onto the other electrics.

I’ve been laying some track this afternoon. I spent a while fiddling with the curves, and laying things out.

I started at the back, and slowly worked around to the front on the longer sections. Laying the curves wasn’t too bad, but they’ve taken on more of a ‘D’ shape than the original plan.

Not really a big issue, as it means a more sweeping curve, and not only that, it lines things up a bit more nicely for the scissor points.

Notice the slight bodge on the end of the curve though:

I should have started with two lengths from either end, and trimmed them down. Then I would have had a nice join the middle. But no mind. I’ve run some wagons over them, and they go over fine. Due to the fact I’ve pulled the baseboard out and sat it on the bed, it’s a little inclined. I was having great fun sending a little wagon round the full length just by pushing it hard at one end, and letting it make its own way round under its own momentum. I figured if it was binding anywhere, or likely to derail, it’d definitely do it then, and it went round fine each time, even crossing the points when I set them to crazy things, so I’m reasonably happy it’s OK.

There’s a light pencil line which marks a 275mm diameter curve; my curves are a bit more than that, so I’m well within tolerances I think.

Unfortunately I need to wire up the electrofrogs before I can actually get anything running around. I think I also need to look into point motors and their fitment before I go crazy sticking down track. The curve is nailed down, but only because I have no plans in ballasting or doing anything with it (you can’t see it anyway). Long term that might change if it moved to a location where you can see it. The fiddle yard at the back has also been nailed down.

I’m quite pleased with the high difference between the code 80 and code 55 track. I don’t envision it causing a problem as is, but if required I’ll file it to fit. So far, so good though. I might lay a bit more track today. At least my little Woolies Dremel-alike drill is coming in useful for cutting the track.

I had a go at making one of the buildings from Scalescenes today. I got myself some card, PVA glue, a Pritt stick, and a new knife and cutting board and set about making it. The result isn’t too bad.

Yeah OK, it’s not great. It took me about four hours to put it together, but I was speeding up a lot once I got a feel for how the kit worked, and I was stopping now and then to do other things. One thing I learned was I need to pick up some sort of proper glue spreader/spatula. I was just squeezing out a blob of glue on my finger and smearing it about a bit. Ahh the wonders of PVA!

I intend trying to make some of the bridges in future though. I’ll do a MUCH better job on those.