Follow along as I continue the build of my N scale model railroad. In this episode I show you the electronics that control my yard boards, including the block detectors, accessory decoders and power management. Be sure to view my Facebook page as I will be adding photos and updates to that as I build my new layout. Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/chicagosubnscaleInstagram: https://www.instagram.com/chicagosubnscale
LAYOUT UPDATE: Track laying on second staging lower yard board
Not much done on the layout this weekend as the weather was so nice, so plenty of garden time, but I did manage to start the track laying on board two of the lower staging yard. I’ve almost finished laying the track for the Metra yard. The Freight yard will have to wait as I am short of a few turnouts, so need to get those ordered. That will be next week’s project (assuming I can get turnouts as stock has been scarce lately!). Hoping to get another video edited and published this week, so keep an eye out for […]
LAYOUT UPDATE: Signalling
I’ve starting adding the two signals for the lower staging yard. The Metra yard does not really need one as that passenger service will be run automatically by Railroad & Co’s TrainController, but it’s nice to have anyway. I’m using SignaTrak’s SIGM20 signal controller for this as it has all the logic built in for automatic signals (as opposed to Digtrax’s SE8C which requires JMRI to provide the signal logic). These signals will protect movements up and down the helix, making sure there are no cornfield meets…as long as the engineers obey the signal indications! I will be adding another […]
LAYOUT UPDATE: Episode 11 – Track Planning & Track Laying
Follow along as I continue the build of my N scale model railroad. In this episode I finish off with the track planning and show you the track I have laid, along with a limitation I have found with the AnyRail track planning software.
LAYOUT UPDATE: DCC drawer complete
I have added a drawer underneath the lower staging yard to hold the Digitrax Command Station (DCS100) and it’s power supply, my RaspberryPi which runs JMRI , the Tam Valley Depot 5A Booster for the accessory power bus and the power strip for the BDL160 & DAC20 power supplies (with spare for others if needed). I got this idea from a few YouTube channels and thought it was a brilliant idea – provides a place for all the DCC equipment as well as making it easily acccessible by using a drawer.
LAYOUT UPDATE: Board 1 of lower staging yard is finished!
It’s official…the wiring for the first lower staging yard board is finished!
LAYOUT UPDATE: Track bus & droppers installed
Well, a few days later than planned, but only a few more droppers to connect to the track bus and all will be ready for testing on the first lower staging board. Both the track buses have been installed (one for the Metra yard, one for the freight yard), connected to a PSX-2 circuit breaker to create two separate power districts in case of shorts on either one, so it doesn’t shut both down. I’ve installed the DAC20 accessory decoder for the Seep switch motors, but still have to install 3 more motors before this installation is complete. All that […]
LAYOUT UPDATE: Track feeders, switch machines, block detection
Very productive Saturday! I’ve started adding the track feeders, switch machines and block detectors to the first staging yard board. So far I have added the feeders for the detected blocks (orange for the Freight yard, and yellow for the Metra yard), installed two Digitrax BDL168 block detectors (one for each yard) as well as a DCC Specialities PSX-2 circuit breaker (1 power district for each yard). As you can see I have used Seep solenoid switch machines – this is purely because I already have these and I have a Signatrak DAC20 accessory decoder already programmed up for these […]
LAYOUT UPDATE: Tracking laying on Board 1 almost finished
2nd evening of track laying, and I’ve almost finished laying the track on the first board of the lower staging yard. All the turnouts are laid, and I just have a few pieces of flex track to lay. I’ll lay these once I have re-installed the board on the wall brackets so that I can run the flex across the board joins, then will cut the track and add aligners on the outmost two tracks. Next step is to install the track feeders, track bus and wire it all up to the two block detectors (Digitrax BDL168’s) and PSX circuit […]
LAYOUT UPDATE: Track laying starts!
I’ve finally started laying track! Tonight I laid almost half the track for the lower freight siding – so almost one of the 6ft boards. Tomorrow I will lay the track for the Metra yard on this board, and then put the two layout boards together so I can run the rest of the track across the join. I will then install the track bus, feeders and block detector, followed by the switch motors and accessory decoders. Once that this all done and tested, I can start the track laying on the second half of the staging yard.