Sunday 23 August 2020

Signal install continues and loco facilities.

 Is planting signals a thing?

This weekend the weather is yuck, we are still in Covid19 2.0 and Melbourne stage 4 lockdown, so back into the RR room to install more signals. This weekend I completed the install in Whitehall and started on Port Henry before I hit a road block. More on the roadblock in a sec.

Whitehall has 16 signals in total including a bunch of dwarfs. I probably went over the top on the number of dwarf's but, why not..

The clearance on the signals between the tracks is tight but it works.






I also started on the signal mast and dwarfs in Port Henry.


The road block I hit is related to the dual mast signals when connected to the SE8C. All other locations where dual mast signals are used are connected to other driver boards like the TC64, SRC16 and LocoHDL boards. All these use a common positive for both masts on top of the dual mast units and all the common pins on the LED are connected to the main structure of the mast. The problem is, that the SE8C uses 2 different connons when the 2 masts are connected to the same 10pin wire from the SE8C port. So my dual mast units just wont work correctly. If I was to separate the commons on the 2 masts on top of the signal bridge, then this changes the whole design of the signal mast and not really doable and definitely not a thing that can be done on masts already made. Fortunately, I have a few spare LocoHDL boards, so I will make new adapter boards for the LocoHDL for the 4 masts that I was going to connect to the SE8C's under Plattsburgh and Port Henry. This will slow me a bit, but I have all the parts, so all good. Back to the work bench to get soldering.

This weekend I also assembled a fuel filling point and a dual track sanding tower from Stuart products. With a few modifications, I managed to get them to fit in the space I have. As part of the install, the product comes with a very small cast pin in the base. I removed the pin on both items and installed a rod to ensure that they can be removed easily.





More progress to follow once I get the adapter boards built for the LocoHDL's.


4 comments:

  1. Great progress as usual. I tried to use one of those Sand towers however it was always in the way of operators hands so deleted it very quickly.

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    1. Thanks Rod. Yes they are a bit of a hazard so time will tell. I can always move it to the next track over and closer to the shed. Im going to have a similar issue with some signals. So may need to get some perspex to add to the front of the layout.

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  2. You'll have a fully operational & completed scenery layout the way you're going Brendan. Great work as usual, looking forward to seeing it in person when we're out of lockdown...

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    Replies
    1. Very much looking forward to the end of lock down and life getting back to the new normal.

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