Wagoning

As well as a bit of a walk, I managed to get a few things done over the weekend. First up, J wagon chassis wheeled up, attached to the tops and with some paint thrown round.


Next up, a new set of 2mm association arch bar bogies that I have eventually beaten into submission.

Compared to the MMW wagons these etches are straight from the 5th and 7th circles of hell (and possibly the 8th and 9th). They are a bit of a challenge to assemble (as I've said before). They would eb so much better if they had nice fold up tabs like the MMW ones. I also must do some research into how far items falling from the modeling table actually travel (under controlled conditions). I dropped more than the allotment of fold up axle boxes on the floor, and recovered none of them, which implies there is either a wormhole to another universe in the carpet ( with a stack of aliens sitting at the other end saying 'why do they send us these tiny metal things, we need more socks'), or the laws of physics don't apply down there and energy gets created as elastic (or 'ping') energy.

Finally, and off on that bush tram tangent...the first log bogie.


I just knocked this up by eye with a 'that looks about right' sort of mentality. Soldering small bits of solid brass is fun, especially when the piece that you have somehow been holding together with your fingers goes 'hissssss' when put on a wet sponge to cool down. In retrospect it looks a bit long and I may have to cut the frames back a bit. having said that, I have seen all sorts of shapes for these items so its pretty much anything goes.

Micro Module W?????.....

Cabbage questions...

MMW Micro Module W??.... What?


Maybe World, Wares, Wards or railWays

Herr Druff proposed the original idea which we (the mottly crew) thrashed around until we came to a workable (we hope) idea, based on the laser cut interlocking ends and a "standard" section of track.
The "hole" in the top of the module end is 16mm wide and 4mm above the baseline of the module end and is designed to fit Atlas set track

The standard parts of the design are:

• the laser cut end
• a short section of Atlas Code 55 set track

There is no standard length
There is no standard width

It would be nice if there was a standard for the track but maybe the head Druff can fill in the gaps here
I would say NRMA compliant, so not PECO.

MD comments

I'm in motion to purchase some Atlas code 55 set track to cut pieces up for each end plate. I'll then merrily distribute them with each set of end plates so that everyone gets the same (well, allowing for experimenter error). Other things we will sort out as we go, which will annoy some of the control freaks out there, but that is just how we tend to do things (IE its going to be an evolution thing rather than commit things to paper that might not work in real life). 2 wires between each module, possibly just by twisting them together. If we actually manage to get some interest rolling, then we can sort out a longer range DCC setup.

Just as an aside, do Parkside dundas wheels (which are not NMRA standard, but can be shuffled out on the axles to fit the standard) run on atlas code 55 rail without hitting stuff. May as well check out these things just in case its not going to work.

Ivor Biggun....

Am Fet angles off on a tangent.....

Although I hate to admit it, there are...."other" scales that people model in. It turns out that some of the guys at work are irrevocably attached to that odd scale where no one can quite decide on what scale ratio they are using and you need to mortgage off the wife and/or children to afford a locomotive. I am talking, of course, of G scale.

I made the mistake of going to a club night (again) and was talking idly about what I had got up to in laser cutting. As soon as I mentioned "...Oh, and a 1:24th scale La6 in styrene", Her Majesties Representative of the Armed Forces (Not the Sqn Ldr, the other one) said "Ooo, can I have one?".

Photos were duly dispatched to both him and our resident KiwiRail G scaler who we shall call "Gav" (mainly because, as a moniker, it seems to suit him; His personality somehow has a certain amount of "Gav-ness" to it, and possibly more importantly, its actually his name).

I was swiftly corralled in the tea room with no hope of an easy escape via that small gap between the coke fridge and the pot plant and asked "What else can you do?" "Ummm...what do you want?" was my witty reply. I then told him what I had the best drawings already Cad'ed for, namely the award winning J5 and Ug, both of which he had dribbled over at the convention. "Yes Please!", he squealed, almost fainting with delirious delight.

And so, I wandered into the den of Mr Laser yesterday and said "You know that Ug drawing? Can we multiply it by 5 and try it?"

Okay sure, its the Uga, but we couldn't get our hands on the Ug quickly. The top laminate is in 08mm ply and the bottom structure is 3.8mm Poplar. I have just done a side as a test as the drawing needs to be rejigged to cope with the 3.8/0.8 combination (previously the UGA consisted of two layers of 0.8).

So! Another little adventure starts. Drew wants some more La's for his planned garden empire, and Gav is keen to see the J5 done as well in 2mm. Both of these are on hold while we try and find some suitable material, we seem to be all out of the 1mm styrene for a start....how inconvenient!

Well, a happy ending to what was a crap week. Heres a word to the wise: If you hear an alarm going off in train control, WALK QUICKLY IN THE OTHER DIRECTION!!!

Simple Module Ideas

Am_Fet scribbles:

After the Head Druffs last post on Opua, the old grey matter has been shrugged into action.When we were first kicking around the idea behind these modules, the stated intention was for "Branch or Industrial Line" traffic to be represented. Looking at the dimensions we were pushing, I dont think they are really suited to 10 car express trains or large stations and depots. But thats not a bad thing....you can have as much fun as you need on a small module detailing the bejesus out of everything.

Personally, I'm a fan of the "in-between" bits.....those bits of line that form a backdrop to the trains but arent operationally packed wee pockets. Almost glorified photo dioramas, if you will.So...here are a couple of suggestions, both with a similar vein. First up, Nukuroa near Studholme in Sth Canterbury

This is really simple. Just the main line on an embankment, fields in the front and trees in behind. The picture was a winter special, so the trees might be a bit more of a challenge. 2 feet of this (or 600mm to all of you metric babies) would go nicely in a modular setup to space apart the stations and warehouses of other modelers.Of a similar bent is this scene beside SH1 at Hunterville:

Lots of leafy green trees in this one, plus some changes of level and slope for those handy with some foam and a hot wire.Sure, these may look like boring modules, but I can assure you any module built like this will always be one of the first ones used in any setup as the organisers try and space apart all the yards and industries.

As I've got nothing else thrilling to write about in the building stakes (still unable to hold or control a scalpel), I'll put together a few more suggestions from my own store of "places worth modelling" and show how they can be done using the new MMW modular standard.

Micro module plans

I've been thinking about possible track plans for the micro modules over the weekend, and last night I put pencil to paper to see how it would work out. The base for the plan is Opua wharf, with the picture that has inspired me here earlier.

So, sticking the paper down in the living room, and with the limit of a 600mm minimum radius, we get...

The whole thing is 4' long by 1' wide, which I thought was a bit too big, but turns out to work OK. I've used a Uk and 2 50' vans to visually measure stuff out.


Having sketched this out, I think I could fit a standard NZR station on 2 x 3' boards. Another option which I will have to explore on paper is Ngapara which I also think would make a cool model.

Sunday

This weekend just past I've been ruminating on a few things.

-Now we have a fool proof module end, where does it go from here? Do we go down the 'serious' NMRA standards only with code 55 track etc' or do we go with the Cheap and cheerfull be able to run all course scale models. I'm sort of leaning towards the latter.

There was some otherstuff, but at this point it was time to stop thinking and start modeling. Often solves a stack of problems.


3 more J sheep wagon underframes (sans wheels) which took me less than 90 minutes to do. Constrast this with the 2mm arch bar bogies which have taken the same amount of time for one bogie.

Only another 15 to go.....

Saturday morning

Well, RMweb seems to be down or not responding (which seems to be a moderately common occurrence lately for me at least), so I suppose I'll have to write something myself instead.

I've been doing some thinking about the freemo end plates that Cabbage has come up with in terms of what one can actually do on them. All good fun with a pencil and paper. We must have a chat about standards at some point, or maybe I'll just declare what they are. I fear getting bogged down again in a discussion where eventually nothing happens short of wasting a lot of time.

Its also come to my attention that there have been sod all photos on here in the last couple of weeks, so here we go to alter that with 'whats on my workbench/layout'

First up, cast W10 or W11 wagons on the J underframes. I've simply removed the headstock's (to be replaced at a later date) to allow for the longer top



Another 3 J tops waiting for me to solder up the under frames. Also the R1 waiting for new bogies, and the Ugas (having had weight added) waiting for new lids.

This of course is all going to be held up by a load of wood to stack and fishing later in the day.