Daley Train Log
Page 94
I have just finished an operating session with my model trains. I would say that there were both positive and negative aspects to the session. The positive outweighed the negative, but I still need to work on a few aspects of this hobby before I can have a flawness operation. But first the positive. I tried wiring one switch to a separate power source and then operate it from an Atlas controller. This worked fine. That means that I will be able to set up a set of such controllers to handle all the switches in the Coaldale yard. Instead of manually throwing the switch, which is often awkward because of having to reach over other cars on the layout, I will control them from the side of the yard by simply sliding a controller switch that is mounted on the edge of the table. Still in the future, but nothing too difficult here. This also represents a reversal of an earlier decision where I had decided to use manual throws for all of the switches that were not on the main line. This is much too difficult when the switches are in a yard as they are often hard to reach with other cars or structures in the way. I continue to learn.
This was also the first time that I tried to form a consist from the rolling stock, wherever it happened to be in the yard. This was fun. I could really imagine myself doing this in real life. The logic of the various moves was straight forward. One question that I have about the prototype operation is: how does the engineer of the switcher know where the cars are in the yard when he begins his shift?
The consist was created by Ship It! and involved setting up 4 boxcars on one of the sidings in the Coaldale Yard. These 4 cars were initially scattered at different locations in the yard, usually in the middle of a string of rolling stock. Using magnets at the throat of each siding I was able to uncouple the strings at the appropriate spot and then push the cars into sidings such that cars that I was not going to use went on spare sidings and cars that were to be part of the consist were pushed onto a siding that was reserved for the new train.This was my first attempt at doing this and I was pleased with the result.
I did encounter 3 problems while performing these activities. Two related to two different boxcars that had not yet been reviewed for maintenance. In one case the couplers were too low and kept uncoupling in the middle of a switching maneuver. In the second case the trucks were too loose and the car had a tendency to tilt and then derail. Both of these problems are simple to correct, but they did detract from the activity. The third problem is more difficult to solve. The diesel locomotive would often stall, particularly when it was over a switch. The locomotive runs well when it has some speed, but it had a lot of difficulty running at slow speed over many of the switches in the yard. Part of the problem was caused by dirty track, but there were still problems after I had used the Bright Boy eraser on the track. I think the wheels on the locomotive are clean - I watched the fellow in Calgary clean them when he was installing the decoder last week. but there may be problems with some of the track connections as well as with the overall levelness of the track. I may also need to solder more connections from the main track bus to the switches to ensure a clear signal. This will involve much more work but is also not a problem. The fact that the locomotive runs well on mainline track suggests that the problem has something to do with the track connections in the yard.
Due to the number of interruptions I lost the overall rhythm of the operation and forgot to take any photos. I also forgot to keep track of each of the switching maneuvers, so am unable to provide a clear record of each step in the operation. Thus there is no web page outlining the steps from today's "running session".