Sunday, June 3, 2012

The South Fork Model Railroad Train Show & Craft Fair

First outing for the yard and return modules.
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Last night was a marathon to get just this plywood pacific running. I somehow borked the wiring and ended up with a short. Didn’t get a chance to test run on the unproven track. Also had plan to run two trains. However, thanks to the USPS detouring the package to Iowa……I couldn’t. Probably a good thing in the long run as I didn’t have time to prep for a 2 train setup. Went to bed around 3a and then work up at 5 to temporarily fix the borked wiring.

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Monday, November 21, 2011

Thompson’s Old Fashioned Train Show

Byron and I along with family friend Jacob attended the 2nd Thompson’s Old Fashioned Train show in Clemmons today. Lots of O and S. Some HO and N layouts. Then there was my Z scale one. Although massively incomplete, it was well received. Finally got a cheap old N scale boxcar to compare to one in Z and then people really appreciated the size more. Alright, enough talking, time for pictures:

Jacob working the control. Control is Arduino powered. The cheap powerpack is for the AC to the switch machines.
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Byron enjoying the show.
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The yard with all the stock I have….at the time. Picked up 2 more MTL intermodal units at the show.
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Closer view of the Engine House and Yard office.
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A view from the other end.
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Another view of the yard.
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Wednesday, September 7, 2011

Arduino controlled Z scale

An Arduino Duemilanove, 16×2 LCD, and Qik 2s9v1 motor control in a fairly simple circuit. I’m not much of a solderer, so the jumbled mess is a mess and the joints are blobs. But, hey! It works! Need to get the voltage readouts working, test using different PWM settings, and probably use a better (read alkaline) battery.

[flvmini url=”fp-content/attachs/2011-09-05_16-58-04_105.flv” width=420 height=180]Arudino Controlled Z Scale[/flvmini]