Відео

Thanks for the suggestion 👍. I’ll take a look at changing. If I get them too close to the edge I’ll probably be hitting them with arm or hand.

What old computer is that on your UA-cam page? I started programming IBM 360 with BAL with punched cards after college. I’m pretty sure it’s not IBM as they were always blue as I remember. Big Blue!

Thanks Robert 😀. I wanted hills, tunnels, and bridges on this version of my 6x16 garage layout. Previous version was just flat but had many industrial type buildings.

Funny 😀. It’s now my lucky 🍀caboose since no problems during the run. You still walking by my neighborhood? If so, call and see if I home if you want to stop.

Thanks Michael 😀.

Thanks Jonathan 😀. I’m planning to do a full over head video when I get a couple of troublesome turnouts fixed. The link below starting at 2:00 shows this on previous layout. ua-cam.com/video/Xhkp777UvjI/v-deo.htmlsi=Lzk3BTPDoCIHvx_O

Sounds like a ‘dog bone’ plan. You can do good size curves on the ends with 5’ space. Suggest you keep track at least 2” from the edge. When I started in 2017 with 4x8 I had hinged to the garage wall. I thought I might get a second car. It makes me laugh at myself now thinking that I could just reach across 4’ span. From the ends I could reach in far side but had to actually crawl onto the top to work in the middle of the far side. 😵‍💫 I eventually abandoned thought of second car and unhinged the layout from the wall. I put heavy duty cabinet casters on the four legs so I could roll it back and forth from the wall. Works well even with the heavy weight of the layout. There a many places to get ideas on what to plan for your layout. Pinterest has a lot of layout photos. Several sights offer free track plan ideas. I spent a lot of time before a finally locked in my original 4x8 plan. I just winged the next 4x8 add on as I didn’t really think I’d get so addicted to this hobby. You’re thinking right, plan it well at the beginning. You planning on videos to document your journey? Good luck.

@@FredE528 yeah dog bone is prolly best and will keep that in mind... I built my own tables before with 2x4's for a frame so that should not be too much of an issue. At very least I will take photos 😂

Thanks Denny 😀. Happy and Safe 2025 to you. I keep busy in the hobby all year around as I have layout in my garage in San Antonio when I ‘officially’ reside during ~7 months of the year. Our Son and his family are here. During to terrible hot summer I escape to southern New Hampshire and spend time where our Daughter lives. My layout here in TX is 6x16 and I work on learning more technology stuff. In NH I’ll work more on scenery now that all the benchwork and track is done. Well, mostly done….

@@FredE528 fred...boy, you got it pretty nice !!! what a weather change for you !! i live in western ny state 35 miles directly south of buffalo,ny and 2 1/2 weeks ago we got 3' of snow, then nothing for a day or so, then another foot the following day !! last week everything got melted away as it rained for 2 days !!! i am only 1/2 hour from the eastern shore of lake erie, so that gives us the "lake effect," which means snow if the wind is from the southwest. i really like your pike, and i will be working on mine today, painting fascia and starting basic scenery... i model the buffalo and pittsburgh rr, a division of the genesee railroad. well, have a great new year and i will tilt a cold beer for you this afternoon !!! denny springville,ny

I am a very fortunate guy to be able to split my time between my two kids and grandkids. It’s been a while but I remember dealing with a lot of snow. We lived in Maine from 1995-2002. Got 133” snow the first winter! Had to hire guys to snow blow driveway and then shovel snow off my roof. Got ice damns on roof later. Two years later, got huge ice storm, lost power for 4 days. Multiple pine trees down which I had to clean up in the spring. I was very happy to get back to Midwest. I’ll sub your channel and watch for pictures of your progress?

@@FredE528 hey, fred ! happy new year ! sounds like you have been down the pike with snow ! i currently have 2 heat trace lines, 120' each, to keep ice jams from happening and they are working great !! as far as pictures go, i do not have a channel... i am just an observer of other peoples layouts and work. if you send along your email address i will send some pictures to you when friends come over with the fancy phones ( i am still a flip-phone guy... i just am not into all the fancy electronic stuff !!) pretty weird for a industrial engineer with a degree in RX, huh ? thanks, fred ! denny springville,ny

Email is I50fwe@@aol.com. It’s the email’s silver anniversary - I set it up 25yrs ago when I was 50.

Sorry James but I don’t remember this detail. I do remember sending email to NCE support describing my issue and they told me how to change the dip switches to fix it. You might reach out to them. Just be patient, it will probably be 2025 until they respond. 😀. Have a happy and safe new year.

Hi London 😀. Good question. Yes, dust is a bit of a problem here in hot dry San Antonio, TX. Over time It slowly builds up on the top of my buildings. I call this ‘natural weathering’. I keep the garage door closed unless it’s a nice calm day or I need light for video. When I leave TX for the summer I cover entire layout with plastic sheet. I use a small vacuum occasionally to clean the track. My biggest problem is with my Peco turnouts failing to transfer power to the switch rail. Sometimes cleaning between the connection fixes it but a have 3 right now that refuse to work. It might be that my switch motors are not pushing the switch rail tight to the powered main rail. Most times my locos with ‘stay alive’ devices can speed over these turnouts with just slight hesitation. Turnouts are the most frustrating aspect of my TX layout.

@@FredE528 Thanks for that information. I had a very basic British model railway when I was young but that was over half a century ago. I am now 78 and these days all I can do is admire other people's skills in producing the amazing layouts that they do. Best wishes and a Happy New Year.

Thanks Peter. Be well in upcoming 2025 to you as well. I’m 75 and got into the hobby couple years after I retired. I love to visualize, plan, and build technical stuff. I was in Information Technology most of my career. Started programming with punched cards. Now I write programs to run my train and use iPad on wifi to control loco sound and turnouts. Big technology advancement in our lifetime. Like you I had a small simple DC train when I was young. Atlas track I’d put together and run on the floor. I remember running it under the bed (my improvised tunnel) and thinking how cool it was to see the light on the loco emerge from the dark. I watch my grandson play his video games. He has one that responds to is arm swing to play tennis. He plays the NFL Football game that surprises me with the realism. Model railroading can’t get young people excited compared to today tech games.

@@FredE528 Wow, you obviously have a great deal of technical knowledge and skill, the complete opposite of me. It would be difficult to find anyone with less technical ability than myself. It takes me all my time just to work my mobile phone and laptop. Back in the 50s and 60s I had Triang two rail track and models which many people considered superior to the Hornby Dublo three rail products of the period. My late brother was an engineer (not engineer/train driver) and made several non-powered model steam locomotives. We were both fans of real life steam locomotives. My late wife and I never had any children so I have no descendants who will ever be railway enthusiasts of any kind. My late wife and I visited the USA twice. On the first occasion we visited New York and Washington DC, and on the second occasion visited Boston and Fort Lauderdale, in all cases to stay with relatives of my wife. We travelled between New York and Washington by Amtrak. But all that was over thirty years ago.

Thanks for sharing some of your background. I’ve never been to England but my Son took his family there a few years ago. They were so impressed to see the history. Nothing like it in USA. How did you find your long Amtrak trip? I’ve watch people’s videos but I’ve only don’t short day trip on Downeaster from New Hampshire to Maine and back. Took our daughter,8, to beach. Her first time on train. After 30min she was bored the rest of trip.

Thanks! My prior layout on this benchwork was just flat. When I decided to replace it I wanted tunnels, bridges, and elevation.

@@FredE528 Awesome, what you have now is really cool!

Thanks Tony 😀

Thanks Frankie😀. This is one of my oldest video on the ‘young’ 4x8 layout. I see you looked at my latest video when the layout ‘grew up’ to 2nd version of the 6x16. Which layout do you like most?

Thanks for the kind words 😀!

Thanks 😀. I like the full moving view as well but I don’t like including parts of my garage in the frame. Moving around, keeping the train in focus, and avoiding garage stuff can be a challenge. I just wish I had run the train with WiThrottle on my iPad which I could have carry around. I wouldn’t have missed part of the run going back to the computer to change turnout on the top section. I did the fixed position videos with tripod as well a in past.

Thank you very much! 😀

Thank you 😀. My prior layout on this 6x16 benchwork was just flat. So when I decided to replace it I wanted tunnels, bridges, and elevation. I now have a lot of buildings from first layout in boxes.

Thank you 😀. It’s more interesting to run trains on this layout compared to my prior flat one. But a lot fewer industries for switching.

Oh you are so right. I’m not great at getting the track work perfect. I worked couple hours today fixing couple of my problem spots. I have two pretty bad kinks going into the switch coming out of the upper Coop siding to work on. My BLI locos always derail here but my Atheran or Atlas locos will handle the entrance into coal loader. Only my NS GP15-1 can exit the Coop. I also have some kinks in tunnel #2 where I set the auto reverser but seldom have derails here. My biggest frustration is my Peco turnouts. 🤬. I have 4 that can’t consistently get power to the switch rail.

Thanks Anthony 😀. Seems like I’m always struggling with track issues and dead turnouts. Spent couple hours this morning fixing problems that I had been procrastinating on. I need to have my track in good order so I can write a JMRI script program to run a train thru all areas of the track automatically. This would be very useful for running my track cleaning car on all parts of the track.

You have inspired me to get back to my layout also.👍

Good for you.

Good question. The benchwork is supported by 6 heavy duty cabinet casters. It rolls away from the wall very easily when I want to video or work on far side.

Thank you Randall 😀. My previous layout on same benchwork was just flat. I wanted to have tunnels, bridges and height on this new one.

Thanks John 😀. I felt lucky that there were no #$&@🤬 during the run. It actually did derail at very end but I cut that part out. 😬👍

Thanks! I'll take a look.

Thanks Lee 😀

Thanks James 😀

Thanks for feedback. On my New Hampshire layout I use my MCR Prodigy with 2 MRC district boosters. Each booster powers 3 blocks with circuit breakers on each block. The main station powers 1 block with separate circuit breaker. On my layout here I have a toggle switch that can change main track power and signal feed between the MRC and the Arduino. I haven’t researched how DCC-EX software could handle this. But initially I’m thinking I would need a DCC-EX Arduino to replace the MRC boosters. I don’t know how the software would be setup. I have vague memory of reading about this. But I can’t quite understand how I could switch between two systems. Seems like I would need toggle switches on each existing MRC booster. I don’t feel I can totally rely on JMRI & DCC-EX. Yesterday afternoon I couldn’t get JMRI to get past its splash screen. Tried all manner of reboots, etc. then shut down everything, walked away for a while, came back and it started. Odd. If I want to run JMRI on my entire NH layout the simple way is to upgrade my old Prodigy Advance to the newer Advance Squared station and use their USB cable to connect to JMRI on computer. I have this cable for my old station but it does always not work perfectly. I then have to find auxiliary devices to handle track detection, lights, signals, etc. That’s one reason I’m doing some research on Digitrax. But new Digitrax seems expensive. I could sell my MRC stuff and get used Digitrax replacement. In no hurry to change. Lots of scenery to work on in NH.

Yes, a minor miracle. 😀. At the end of the run the loco derailed on gap in between track. It happens occasionally so I haven’t fixed it. But will today. I thought 🤔 about ending the video with the derail and foghorn but decided against it. I was expecting a problem of some type during the run. When it finished the full run then derailed, I thought - nope. I’m publishing just the good part. Thank for comment Dave. Happy New Year Buddy.

Great layout. I’ve been away from this hobby for decades. My last experience was with DC cab control and blocks. How is track power polarity controlled for the reverse loop? It appeared automatic in the video.

Thanks George 😀. I got into the hobby in 2017 using really old DC locos and brass track from decades ago. If interested I’ll put a link in this response talking about my ‘journey’ in this hobby. ua-cam.com/play/PLPYeOPCFexrFa3prZhGFepK58YxdlJkKR.html&si=y58rC7tK7jaZTvXo Gotta go I’ll answer your question later today…

DCC is totally different from the DC environment. Commend station talks to individual locos thru the track. Locos have ‘decoders’ to interpret these codes and respond to just theirs. There are auto reversers under two sections of my track loops backs that change polarity. Lots of videos on UA-cam explaining DCC. This is the best way to get back into the hobby in my opinion and i testarted with DC

Thanks Carlos 😀. I cut the video off just before to Loco derailed 🤬. I’ve got this gap in the track just before a turnout that trips a loco about 25% of time. I’ve been procrastinating the repair but doing it tomorrow. 🤞

Yes, no #$&@🤬

Thanks Randy 😀 I had a bit of trouble getting video done but no #$&@🤬 with the actual train run.

What is your command station Heath? All my stuff is MRC but I’m starting to think about Digitrax for my NH layout. I’m thinking I’d have real difficult using multiple Arduinos across my 7 electrical blocks. I’ve seen a video on ‘how to’ but I doubt if I could actually get it working work.

@@FredE528 My command station is a YaMoRC YD7001 (Upgraded from a Digikeijs DR5000). I also have an ESU Programmer. I have a rotary switch with three sets of wires in and the output is the programming track. So far I have the Command Station on one set, the ESU programmer on the other. I am just debating if I should setup a third programming option. I have a Digitrax PR4 and a DCC-EX setup that are not doingmuch right now.

I’ve not heard of that new command station. I’ll check it out.

Thanks 😀. Original plan was to have 2 bridges split just out of the upper tunnel but just could find bridges that worked well.

Thanks Ron 😀. My video work wasn’t great but no $&#@🤬 .

Thanks Ed 😀. Did I get your name right?

@@FredE528 Yep that's me😁😁👍👍

Ok, one old guy calling me Mark is understandable. But I draw line at two. 😀.

No actual store, just items for sale. I’ll be adding more in coming weeks. Unlike someone I know, MARK, I realize I have too locos and cars. Need to refill the train money bank for the next layout. 🤑

ps. No shipping to foreign countries but you can come to NH and pick you some special stuff this summer.

@@FredE528 I like the sound of that!

Is it on your grease board list?

@ lol. Yes and my dry erase board list.

Still have your old chalk board with unfinished projects still listed?

@ Yes. ☹️

Ha ha 🤣

Thanks JD 😀

Thanks Mark 😀. I was disappointed to miss the train coming out of the tunnel. I had to hustle back to computer to change turnout. I thought I turn on video recording again but NO! 🤬 I can’t seen to do quick things in a row…. Senioritus.

Great to hear from you Grant 😀. Wishing you and your family a Merry Christmas and Happy New Year. My Son and his family are coming to our house for Christmas dinner. I’m doing the cooking. Carol is supervising and instructing. She fell about 6 weeks ago and broke her knee cap. She’s in a leg brace and uses a wheel chair to get around. Started physical therapy this week. They estimate 3-4 months to full recovery. She should be good by time we head back to NH.

@FredE528 Bloomin ekk! Send her are love. Cook Fred😃. I hope the day goes ok! We are at the inlaws eating drinking and playing Bingo 👍

Thank you😀. Happy Holiday to you as well! 🎄🍾

Thanks Randy 😀. Hope you’re having good holiday season.

Thanks Jason 😀. Happy Holidays to You and Yours. 🎄🍾

@FredE528 thank you! 🎄🎅☃️

Yep 🤬. Thanks Anthony. Merry Christmas to you and your family.🎄

Well, I had several problems getting these shots done. No surprise to anyone who follows me. Have a great holiday Mark😀

Thanks! 😀. Merry Christmas and Happy New Year to you as well.

Thanks Lee 😀. Happy Holidays 🎄🍾

Thanks Mike 😀. Merry Christmas to you as well 🎄

Thanks Mark 😀 Merry Christmas. 🎄

Thank you 😀. Happy Holidays 🎄🍾