OCSMR-Ocean County Society of Model Railroaders Club Latest update 11/23/2024

It's been a bit chilly lately and our heater's been running.  On an excursion to the HO side, noticed that the passenger platform for the Manasquan station has developed some dihedral.  Hope it's not ready to "take off".

Dave making sure the grass stays put.

Tony (front) and Merrill (back, a defector from the HO side) team clean the residue from the track.

JohnBrandt's been busy.  More done on the mural.

JohnBrandt seems a bit concerned about painting in the dark.  Guess he doesn't want to use candles like the Masters of old.

Johnbrandt doesn't want all that soot to cover up his masterpiece like happened at the Sistine Chapel.  Michelangelo would have been horrified!

Defector from the HO side!  I guess you could call me a defector too!  Nice work everyone!

Wow, a picture of Tony laboring, sweating as well! Merrill has defected from the dark side to the bright side. Seems those HO are too small for him to play with. So, after further discussions, we accepted his job application as long as he curtails his singing.

I am amazed there is no pictures of me this time. I was there working with Dave spotchecking the scenery and filling in the gaps. 

LocoBudd posted:

It's been a bit chilly lately and our heater's been running.  On an excursion to the HO side, noticed that the passenger platform for the Manasquan station has developed some dihedral.  Hope it's not ready to "take off".

Dave making sure the grass stays put.

Tony (front) and Merrill (back, a defector from the HO side) team clean the residue from the track.

JohnBrandt's been busy.  More done on the mural.

JohnBrandt seems a bit concerned about painting in the dark.  Guess he doesn't want to use candles like the Masters of old.

 

Great photos, Bud!

JohnBrandt putting the finishing touches on the mural.

Signing his masterpiece.

Vince and his grandson Sabino visited the club.  About a month ago Vince visited with his granddaughter and Sabino's sister, Lil Liz.  Since all tracks had not been completely cleaned after ballasting, was able to run on only track 1.  Chose a conventional powered diesel.  However, Sabino wanted to run with the remote just like his sister did when she had visited.  Got out the ten-fingered crane and put the Legacy NYC steamer on the track.  Gave Sabino the remote and a few instructions, and off he went.  Couldn't have been happier.

Vince said that Sabino will be getting his own train to run along with his 1/43 race cars.

A few overall shots of the mural.

JohnBrandt captured an image of Sasquatch somewhere on the mural.  Don't know how he did it since there were no telltale footprints.  If you can't find him,  will post a pic later.

As of today, the mural for the layout is DONE!  I had applied the last item to the painting:  a hot air balloon with an OCSMR banner flying in the wind.

Below is a video clip of the entire mural from beginning to end. 

The mural looks great, John!!  Will something go in front of the gray sections in the city area?

Mark,

We have tall buildings or skyscraper flats with lighting to go there. Next project to work on.

Thank you Ted!  I thought it must be something like that!

Mark Boyce posted:

The mural looks great, John!!  Will something go in front of the gray sections in the city area?

Ted had answered the question.  But to answer your question directly, those gray and brown areas represent where the club will put building flats or add building parts on to.  What they want to make them look like I will leave it to them.

Thank you for watching, Mark.  I appreciate the comments.

John, Ted, and Bud, It is a fun project to see a group coming together with assorted talents to build a wonderful layout and share it with visitors!!

The mural looks great John! Well done.

Andy

Steamfan77 posted:

The mural looks great John! Well done.

Andy

Thank you, Andy.  Very much.

Friday nite was pretty active.  Members had to let off a little steam since the layout was down for a month or so for ballasting and scenery work.  All four loops were smoking with trains runnin'...until...one of our new members train stopped abruptly at one of the crossovers on track 2.  Then the fun began.  A short had mysteriously developed on track 2.  All the track was inspected for anything that might be shorting the rails.  A magnet mounted on a car was pushed around the track in case something had fallen off and was shorting the rails.  Tried various combinations for powering tracks 2 (we can use either the Z4K or TPCs thru a bypass switch) were tried.  Nada, zilch, nothing was determined to cause the short.  Our past President suggested connecting a sacrificial transformer to "burn" the short out.

Fast forward to late Saturday morning.  Ted arrives with two ancient sacrificial transformers (one is in serious need of a new cord - repairs tried to no avail - use the other one).  Main power disconnected from the terminal board for track 2 and the sacrificial transformer connected (has a lovely low level AC hum).  Placed a caboose on the track, turn power on and low and behold the caboose lights up.  Good to know that our efforts looking for a short in the track the previous night were worthless...but.. the track wiring is definitely good.  Connected the TPCs directly.  Short.  Bypassed the bypass switch (thinking the switch might be bad).  Short.  Z4K connected.  Short.  Tried a few other combinations but the short still persisted.  Finally, disconnected the TIU (we're using Passive TIU mode so only the output is connected to the track).  Bingo, the short disappears.  Few more checks, including reconnecting the TIU and insuring that the wire connecting the TIU is not shorted, confirms that the fixed output 2 of the TIU is shorted.  Ran an engine with no problems (oh, the caboose's light still lights).  Reconnected all the wiring to the terminal and connected variable output 2 to the track.  track is now operational.  Have yet to confirm if we can run an MTH PS2/3 engine with DCS (didn't have one with us).

The NYC Mohawk hauling a consist of Dennis' beer cars was run under Legacy to confirm there were no additional problems on track 2.

One of our members (an HO guy) brought in a lighthouse that his father had some thirty years ago.  McDonald's was replaced by the lighthouse in the corner.

Unfortunately, a sink hole developed under the lighthouse.

The corner piece will turn blue and a few boats will be added for the lighthouse to guide to a safe landing.

Alice thru the scenery.  A smaller tunnel portal has been located and will be used to enter the scenic mountain.

Apparently the heat is drying out the mural on the south wall and has caused some separation and loosening of the mural.  Thoughts are to hide the gap with the York hotel.  Mural will have to be reattached and gap filled.

An old 50 watt Lionel transformer proved that it was all OK and that the new fangled eqiupment has a shelf life no where as long as a 60 year old transformer. Yep, it took the current president to find the problem!

Next up is more scenery work to re- commence on Tuesday night so the layout will go into hibernation for a few weeks.

What a bummer on the TIU!  However, it is better knowing than still wondering what is causing the problem.

Few more checks, including reconnecting the TIU and insuring that the wire connecting the TIU is not shorted, confirms that the fixed output 2 of the TIU is shorted.  

We connected the TIU for track 2 to the variable output and all is fine. The fixed output does not work on output or track 2. 

Today, we assembled the S Gauge track loop on the north side, wired it up with an American Flyer transformer and ran a AF steamer. A little track tweaking was needed but all is good. Did some paint touch up work on various areas of the layout and re-installed the triangle pop up painted in water blue for our lighthouse scene.

Next project is to finally get the roundhouse in place so we can lay the trackwork there. OK Bud?

Pictures are coming as soon as the nutty professor aka Bud posts them here.

Here're pix of the S-gauge track with Ted's AF steamer resurrected by our AF aficionado Doug.  Gives those of us in the club with AF trains a chance to run them.

After helping to lay and fasten the AF track, junior member Sean takes a break.

Ah, the roundhouse area,  would help to have some additional track, especially since someone let it slip away.

The backdrop is awesome!

Ah, the roundhouse area,  would help to have some additional track, especially since someone let it slip away.

Hey nutty professor,

That track that slipped away is coming back on next Friday. We will more than enough to use so get the roundhouse where it needs to go or we will do it without you( or I will un-glue the wall and put it back on crooked with permanent non-removeable glue. LOL!

Farmer_Bill posted:

The backdrop is awesome!

 

Thanks, Farmer Bill!

Our future club president, Sean laying down on the job!

Yes, good training for presidential material.  Watch the progress, and let the old guys do the labor!  Me included as an old guy!  

The S-Gauge loop saw some activity.  Doug and Jim brought trains to run.  Both experienced minor problems with hook couplers and derailments.  Track needs to be tweaked and the trains resurrected after storage appear to need a bit of maintenance.

Doug keeps a watchful eye on his train's progress.

Just runnin' pix.

Brought my new steamer to the club.  Experienced problems with track gauge, and incompatibility with both the power and control systems.  Otherwise, runs great.

Thank you for the great photographs, Bud!  Looks like a monster is going to step on McDonalds restaurant.

I have seen those cut wooden engines on the internet!  Incompatibility... Hmmm...I think maybe so!

Placed the roundhouse in what was thought the final position and located four radials.  Something didn't seem quite right, especially since most of the radials needed to be curved.  Checked my drawing and got the dimension of the roundhouse from the turntable edge.  The roundhouse was a couple of inches farther away than scaled from the drawing.  Moved the roundhouse closer to the turntable and relocated the radials already positioned.  Surprise, surprise all the radials went straight into the roundhouse doors just like on my drawing (though only one radial is centered in the bay, all others are off to one side).  Felt a great disturbance in the Force.  This was one time when theory and practice converged.

Need to extend the track in four of the six bays in the roundhouse.  Planned on at least two more radials outside the roundhouse.  Looks like we can add more.  Can never have too many storage tracks.  We're a bit short on track.  Fortunately, Indiana Ted recovered the Lost Treasure of the Model Ferroequinologists.  Hopefully he'll locate it in that huge warehouse and deliver it to the club soon so track work can continue.

Even though the turntable radials are not fully fastened down, couldn't resist placing engines for a look see.  Unfortunately, they'll have to be moved for final fastening of the radials.  But, what the heck.  Got a bit carried away and knocked off one of the roundhouse doors and it'll have to be reattached, my bad.

The S-Gauge loop got a new look.  American Flyer rubber roadbed was installed.  Looks great.  Track still needs to be fully fastened down.

Wanted more power for the S-Gauge loop.  So, the 100 watt AF transformer was replaced with a Lionel KW.  Gonna have to watch the throttle position.  Now have a  max of 20 volts instead of 15 volts.  Fortunately none of the engines have a flux capacitor.

Bud, The turntable/roundhouse area looks great!  So I take it that even though all but one radial track is off center-line of each door, you won't have a clearance problem; or is that how the door got knocked off.  I'm certainly not critical at all.  I seldom get things lined up as planned!  I'm sure Indiana Ted will come through!!

The S-gauge track does look great as does the power shelf!  Thank you for posting!!

Wow, Bud, you did some nice work on the roundhouse placement and screwed up once. Knocking off the door that I re-glued the day before. The crew was there much earlier than you on Saturday getting the S Gauge track in place and soldering jumper wires to 2 areas of the track. The crew left as we can't wait around for the professor to show at the crack of noon plus an hour! Lol!

Once I get the track screwed in place, I"ll get Joe to make the bracket we need there. Roundhouse looks great with engines in their stalls.

As for the lost track, I recovered it all. Guess you want to screw up some more track?

Didn't take long for scenery to start growing around the roundhouse thanks to Bill.

Doug ran his pre-war American Flyer O-gauge Pacific with Vanderbilt tenders.

Very nice work. Love the round house, and turntable. I believe they are the center piece of any RR layout.

Hey, A few of your members look like some of our customers.  Let them know that the next time they stop in to the shop they have a 10% discount waiting for them.

Bill is planting the trees with the hopes that money will grow off of them! A wise investment Bill? Lol! Excellent job, Bill.

Bill Bresnan once was a prominent person on Wall Street writing books on financials, etc. and still has a weekly AM radio talk show. His full time job now is being our master in scenery work unlike Bud who is our master in layout planning and execution in trackwork!

Ted Bertiger posted:

Bill is planting the trees with the hopes that money will grow off of them! A wise investment Bill? Lol! Excellent job, Bill.

Bill Bresnan once was a prominent person on Wall Street writing books on financials, etc. and still has a weekly AM radio talk show. His full time job now is being our master in scenery work unlike Bud who is our master in layout planning and execution in trackwork!

Very interesting, Ted. Thanks for sharing that. It's another example of boys like to play with trains no matter what they did in their other life.

Added three more radials to the turntable area.  Started to locate some of the accessories.  Will probably lengthen the radial for the engine salvage accessory.  Need to do some scavenging to see what other accessories we have that will fit in the area.  Couldn't resist adding more locos.  Got a full roundhouse now.

Some Friday nite runnin' with my Pennsy S2 and Joe's Pennsy M1a.

The roundhouse area looks great!  

Carl,

Our club has 37 members and growing from all walks of life with folks that had careers in everything you can imagine. Way too many to list and most of us are retired now and really enjoying the camaderie we have amongst ourselves and with the hobby and sharing it with the public.

I agree with Mark, the roundhouse are looks terrific. Nice work guys.

Andy

Bill added more shrubbery to the other side of the roundhouse and darkened up the grass area with some black material so the roundhouse will look dirty! Also, added more shrubbery to one side of the elevated wall. Just hope my Big Boy does not sweep it all away on the curve!

More work to continue after this weekend's train show we are doing at the Brick Elks Lodge.

Ted - Wouldn't worry about the Big Boy clearing the scenery.  If it doesn't, we can always use the firewood and scrap metal in the junk yard.

Added two short radials to the roundhouse area.  Both are incidental.  One is used for the engine salvage accessory and the other is a catchall for short cars, engines, etc.  This completes installation of the radials.  Ballasting in front of the roundhouse will have to wait until the tracks in the roundhouse are lengthened.

We'll have to do some maintenance on the turntable bridge.  It's not sitting level and one end doesn't line up vertically with the tracks.  Moving wasn't kind to it and will have to do some straightening of items that got bent.  Haven't checked the drive motor and will have to get a compression spring to hold it against the drive wheel.

The new tracks are great, Bud!  That’s too bad the turntable needs some work