I observed that the maximum number of traditional sized cars seems to be
about 50. Pushing up to 59 caused problems starting the train and pulling
cars off on the inside of the curves. The slightly fewer cars did not seem
to have this problem. This will likely be a different number for Standard
O since each car is heavier and might stay on better. However, it could be
a function of the load and the wheels.
The crowds seemed quite heavy mid day both days, just to see the
layouts.
We also had what may not have been a ground problem with the plug in the
building. We eventually found a grounded outlet and was able to connect
with the clubs extension cords. TMCC really needs a good ground to work
correctly.
We had a bad hump at one of the switches into the yard on track 3. We
need to cut the carpet out from under this switch so it will sit on the board
and line up better with the other tracks. On a hard surface, the track and
switch are the same height , but with the on carpet, the tracks sink down into
it some and the switch does not. This seems to be getting worse over time
which would be expected as the tracks nestle down into the nap. This
should not take to long and would be a good thing to do at setup next
time. there is a knife in the tool box and the pattern is already on the
board to cut around, the remove three screws and slide out the carpet and
refasten the switch.
Buddy Burke (and wife) and Joe Maverick stopped by to see what we were
doing and how things looked. Also Tommy Shultz from Flatonia. We
handed out invitation to several promising people during the show. hope
some of them join us.
Any volunteers to write a summary of the Burnet Railfair?
Ed
Perhaps everyone could submit their
recollections on the event. Then Ed could mush 'em all together into an
article? Just a thought...
I'll start off:
We had a good turnout for setup.
Thanks to all who came. Ron, Adrian, Ira, Scott, Bob, Monk and I did
setup. Stevo was Fat Controller for setup. We had a few kinks in
the finished layout:
we accidentally hooked the s-curve up
wrong which caused the power for tracks 3 and 4 to be coupled! We
discover this friday night and fixed it. It was fairly easy to seperate
the S and reconnect it in the proper alignment. The two remaining bugs
were not discover until Saturday morning.
I accidentally had a 2nd TMCC command
base hooked to my sidings. This cause dual TMCC signals to be put onto
the rails. The engines didn't like 'em much! Simply turning off my
unit solved this problem.
we had a short in a jones plug that
caused the power for tracks 1 and 2 to cross. We found this one
by powering up track 1 and watching the voltage on track 2
(which was getting juice from track 1 due to the short),
and unplugging/replugging the jones plugs at each module until we saw
the voltage fall on track 2. Turns out there was a broken jones plug
that had a loose track 2 wire that was touching the track 1 pin!!! Scott took
this module home to fix it.
After these three bugs were worked out,
the layout ran pretty good!!! For future reference, both DCS and TMCC
engines should be run on all tracks after setup to find these bugs.
Also, ensure that there are no voltage crossovers should be done too. I
blame the Fat Controller. :-)
The crowd seemed to enjoy watching siding
manuvers. I certainly had fun doing them! At one point, I
had boxed my caboose in and needed help from one of the spectators on how to
get it back out at the end of the train. It was fun! Adrian's
transfer table worked great in both conventional and command mode.
Conventional is tricky, but once you understood what to do, it worked
great. One problem, though, is a conventional engine starts out in
forward...than can be tricky!
We had 2 wrecks which made for
excitement: ed accidently shot a coal car with his engine onto my
siding module. If it wasn't for some plexiglass adrian bolted to the end
of the siding, ed would be out one coal car and an engine! Scott had a
runaway that cause a nice crash too. I think both trains escaped
without any injuries. Perhaps we need a special page on our web site
with "crashes of the tinplate trackers" pics???
The air conditioning, again, was
marginal. We should really push ASTA next year to ensure that there is
adequate AC...
Teardown went smoothly, although everyone
was hot and tired. Ed, Rick, Ricky, Monk, Ryan, Adrian, Scott, and I all
helped tear down.
I think we made some good $$ on the
Raffle. Thanx to Lorraine for working the raffle table!