February 17

Sunday February 17, 2008 6:40 am Lethbridge, Alberta

It is -6 C with a high forecast of 0 C. Sunrise 7:39 Sunset 17:52 Hours of daylight: 10:13

A. Morning Musings

First comes coffee. Mmmm.

Next Rumi. Very good.

Now for the day in front of me. The walks need shovelling. But this shouldn't take too long. There is only about an inch of fresh snow on the ground. Today will be cool, but then the temperatures will warm up for a few days. The days are getting longer and one can sense spring is coming. There are a few pussy willows appearing on the neighbours willow. I am looking forward to barbequeing - both salmon as well as a good steak.

The model trains are progressing. I now have a train of 4 cars ready to test. I want to be able to run the mainline routes without mishap. I will need to keep very detailed notes of every problem (derail of car: identification of car - front or back wheels, identification of turnout - ID#, direction of travel, speed) (uncoupling of car: location, two cars involved, direction of travel, speed) as well as my effort at correcting the problem. This is very similar to debugging a computer program. I will begin by running the route at a cab speed of 30, then if everything is fine, increasing it to 40 and then to 50.

Now that I have 4 cars operational, I want to begin reading more about the history of these cars. I am still trying to locate a set of four (?) books that give detailed background information. They have a red cover but my first attempt to locate them yesterday failed.

Learning Category	Planned Activities for Today	Time
Literature	Begin morning with a Rumi reading
Literature	Continue reading "Snow" by Orhan Pamuk	1 hr
Model Trains	Check operational running of a 4-car train on the mainline routes	5 hr

B. Actual Learning Activities

1:50 PM

train

The model train activities are continuing to show progress. I now have a 4-car train that runs smoothly on the west bound Transcontinental route #1. Both the track and the rolling stock work. Now that I have verified that the 4 cars run smoothly I can assume that if they derail on the remaining mainline track then the problem is likely to be with the track rather than the car. This is a major step forward. I will try to add a couple of more cars to my train. I am thinking of a refrigerator car, a stock car, and a tank car. These are all from the steam era.

4:10 PM

But my latest efforts with the model trains have set me back a bit. I ran into difficulties at turnout #18. I ran the two diesel units forward and backward over the turnout. The wheels on the trucks tended to lift while passing over the turnout. I finally decided that the turnout needed a short straight section of track before entering the turnout, otherwise the combination of the two turnouts makes a sharp S curve. But this then involves moving more track and eventually I end up with an impossible situation as I also have to fit the reversing loop in. I will have another look at this later. On the plus side, I located the red books that give additional historical information on freight cars.

8:20 PM

I continue to learn. The problem was the turnout itself. One of the sliding rails was too low and the wheels failed to contact it and thus failed to take the turn. I spent a couple of hours re-laying the track in the vicinity but I think that the change is still for the better. However I am short a couple of short pieces so will have to take a break until I can replace these.