Chessie System-Athens Subdivision....

[CandO7430]

This is the Logan Yard panel. Again, nothing fancy more functional than anything.

[CandO7430]

Finally this is the Athens-Armitage staging extension project that I talked about in earlier posts. These tracks curve back underneath the stairs and terminate into the backdrop of the Monday Creek Branch. Before this I had to back all trains into the yard but I added an engine escape track to solve that problem. Originally I had planned on connecting the PC track and running along the front of the existing benchwork which would have required me to add a narrow strip of plywood the the front. Then as I was looking at it, it occured to me that I could just simply connect the stub end track that I planned to remove and presto, no narrow strip required. Plus I think this looks a lot better than it would have. The turnouts in the back are difficult to reach at best so they are both remote. The disconnected PC main to the left will remain so although I will probably extend it parallel with the staging yard at some point. Well folks, that's all I have for now and I will try my best to not let it be three months before I post anything again. Thank you and enjoy.

Tyler

[eightyeightfan1]

Glad to see you're back.
Layouts coming along nice.

[CandO7430]

Thanks Doc! I'm getting there slowly but surely.

[Trucklover]

Looking good, and some nice progress going on there

I like the placement of that overpass, looks neat

[CandO7430]

Thanks for the kind words. I'm getting ready to head down to the basement and finish wiring up my control panels.

[jefelectric]

Keep the pictures coming, progress on a layout takes time. My grandson has that same power pack on his layout. We haven't worked on his since the nice weather hit.

Been instead.

[CandO7430]

Thanks John. I coach soccer in the spring and having two teams doesn't leave much time for anything else. Now that it's warmer I spend a lot more time outside. As far as progress goes, I got all the control panels wired up today. I wish I could say that all is well but I had numerous electrical problems which I'm working through. The one that baffles me the most is in the yard. I have the pack powered up but the throttle is at zero. When I move the button on the selector to cab A, the locomotive takes off at full throttle until I move the selector to cab B then it stops. I can't for the life of me figure out why. It's funny how I labeled all the wires when I removed them from the old control panels and I swear that I reconnected all the wires correctly but something is different. I'm figuring it out little by little. I also think that I have a bad power pack so I'll be using an old one until I can get something better. That's all for now, I'll be sure to let everyone know when I get all the bugs worked out. Take care all.

Tyler

[Russ Bellinis]

Most of the better dc throttles have an variable set of dc connections that operate off the knob, a set of connections that are a steady 12-15 volts dc, and finally a set of connections marked 18 volt ac. The first set of connections is for the track and the last 2 sets for accessories. This may seem obvious, but you might have accidentally hooked the tracks up to a set of 15 volt steady dc connections instead of the variable dc. I think in the case of most likely failures of a throttle, whatever the throttle uses to vary the power is most likely to burn open and give you no power to the track at all rather than shorting out to give full power to the track all of the time.

[CandO7430]

Thanks Russ. I'm gonna head down to the basement later tonight and try some things out. I'll let you know how it goes.

Tyler

[CandO7430]

Morning all,
After a few days of staring at the schematic for my layout and scratching my head and testing things of come to the conclusion that I have two bad powerpacks. The Tech II pack at Logan yard has a bad something in it's innards which was causing the power to be wide open. When I set the block to the main control panel (Cab A) I had no problems but when I set the block to the yard cab the engine would take off like a shot until I shut down the block. I hooked up an old pack to test my wiring and the problem went away and it works fine.
The second pack is on the Armitage/Lancaster staging control panel. For some reason the power just drops off. I have two automatic turnouts wired up to it and I can throw them about two or three times and then the motors just buzz and won't throw. The locomotives also slow to a stop at full throttle. Puzzling at the very least but again I wired up an old powerpack and it works just fine. I'm at a loss with those two packs but at least I know that I wired the layout correctly. My knees weren't looking forward to crawling around on concrete to check wires. I'll just use the old packs for now until I can replace them sometime in the future.
I'm taking the main out of service just north of the PC crossing for some emergency track replacement. I have two pieces of flextrack coming together in the middle of a curve and you all know how problematic that can be. I'm going to splice in a couple curve sections which should fix it. Once that's done I'm going back over the whole layout and glueing down all the track that I have been fiddling with during this process. That's about all I've got for now as far as an update. One of these days I'll get some more scenery done so I can post some pics. Take care all until next time.

Tyler

[LiveSteamer]

The progress on your layout is great. I like the view from the tracks looking up towards the highway bridge.

[CandO7430]

Thanks Steamer! That bridge scene was inspired by Rick Rideout's (Rix Products) L&N layout. I was looking through his picks as I was ordering some building kits and I came across a pic of a train making it's way through a deep cut with a bridge in the middle. I thought it was a cool scene so I'm modeling mine based on it.

[jefelectric]

I'm taking the main out of service just north of the PC crossing for some emergency track replacement. I have two pieces of flextrack coming together in the middle of a curve and you all know how problematic that can be. I'm going to splice in a couple curve sections which should fix it. Once that's done I'm going back over the whole layout and glueing down all the track that I have been fiddling with during this process. That's about all I've got for now as far as an update. One of these days I'll get some more scenery done so I can post some pics. Take care all until next time.

Tyler

Tyler, I guess it's to late but as advised on another tread on this forum, my grandson and I soldered his track together into 6' sections prior to bending around the curves and it worked great.

[CandO7430]

Good afternoon all. I spent the majority of the day in the basement today and wanted to share what I have accomplished. First off I have decided to focus my efforts on completing the Sullivan Wood Products industrial area as it is the most accessable area on the layout and will be the subject of the following pictures.
First up is the updated overall view of the industrial area. As you can see I've added some roads and started some scenery. I used WS "Smooth-it" for the roads and I must say it works very well. Once the roads were dry I sanded them smooth and painted them. Lines on the road will probably be one of the last things added.