Austin Jamboree Review

["Ron Fiebelkorn" <rwf49@hotmail.com>]

For those of you who couldn't make it, here's a quick review on last 
week-end's outing at the Austin Jamboree.

Ron Baker and I took the 4x8 layout and its equipment to Round Rock Friday 
night.  Despite the rain, we were able to set up the layout in the same room 
as last year without much trouble.  Once Adrian joined us (and gave us a 
quick lesson on why you need clean track if you want your trains to run 
properly) everything ran smoothly.

On Saturday, Rick, Ricky, Randall, and Ryan joined us.  Rick and Ricky 
displayed some of their UP engines (including the big boy) along with some 
MoPac and MKT freight cars.  They also brought a bulletin board and 
displayed pictures of our modular layout so visitors could see our larger 
layouts. Both displays drew a lot of interest.

It appeared to me that the show had a good turn-out and we had a steady 
stream of visitors in our area all day.  Several kids took turns running the 
trains and we were able to get the names of some possible future members.  
After the show, the 4x8 was returned to Ron Baker's house.

Everything ran without any problems on Saturday but we did start a list of 
improvements for the 4x8.  They included:
    1.  The legs need to be more sturdy. (may need to add some braces)
    2.  The wires for the accessories need to be improved.  The length of 
the wires were too short to easily connect an accessory and the spade 
connectors wouldn't work on some accessories.  (We may want to use some 
plugs or connectors.)
    3.  adding some sound reducing material to the layout. (Ron Baker will 
try adding some carpet)
    4.  one of the curve tracks need to be repaired/replaced (Ron Baker will 
try to fix or replace it.)
    5.  having a transformer with fixed voltage for the accessories (can we 
use one of the spare RW transformers in the trailer for this?)
    6.  a couple of more engines, cars, accessories, and an extension cord.  
(This would make the 4x8 display pretty much self contained.  Whomever 
wanted to use it in the future would not have bring anything.)

Later on this week I'll send out a list of items that are with the 4x8 
display and also a list of items that I think we could add to the display to 
make it look better.  I don't think it will take much.

Ron

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