First Avenue - Modern OO Freightliner - Now with sound

[Dad-1]

Hi Rammy,

C'mon .... where are you hiding ?? you must have done something since the middle of March !!

Geoff T.

[Rammy]

Hi Geoff

I'm still here!
I have spent the last few weeks working on a few bits, but nothing worth posting updates for. The main job has been the construction of the scalescenes concrete bridge. This seems to be taking me forever and is still work in progress.
I have started ballasting the 2nd board, but have tried a slightly different approach after the problems I had with cracking on the 1st board. This time I have put down a base coat of PVA glue onto the board between the various lines and sprinkled some ballast onto this which has stuck nicely and created a good base onto which I will add more ballast up to the correct height and in between the tracks. Hopefully this will help, as I wondered if the 50/50 PVA/water mix had soaked into the baseboard too quickly. Only time will tell.
I have been undecided on the best way to create the concrete areas around the shed and pit. Originally I was going to use card and cover with some scalescenes concrete paper, but I was concerned that this wouldn't be hard wearing enough and it would be difficult to cut the card to the required shape. Today I have been experimenting on a small test board with an alternative. I have laid 2 small tracks and have filled in between with some filler with PVA added. I will let this dry and let you know the result.
Hopefully some pics next time if there is anything worth looking at!

Dave

[Rammy]

A few pics of my latest progress:

Test board to experiment with creating the concrete areas by using filler. I am quite happy with the results and have now sent the board to my brother for painting and weathering before I start on the actual layout


6mm exterior plywood boards now fitted around the layout. All of this out of one 8' x 4' sheet costing £19 and all accurately cut by B&Q for free! I also have one large 2.4m piece out of the sheet that will be the front facia.



Its nice to finally have a productive weekend!

Dave

[Kevuk3]

Looking good Dave , interested to see how the concrete area comes out. I need to decide how to do the floor area of my dock ....... looking for idea'a

Kev

[Rammy]

As it was my birthday last week and my family all gave me money, I decided to take the plunge and treat myself to a sound decoder! I managed to pick up one off ebay for my hornby 08 for a bargain price of £67. Tonight I have had a little play by removing the chassis and plugging it straight in and I am quite impressed. But now for the difficult part - trying to get it back together with it in there. What a nightmare !!! The speaker is too big and I can't really work out where the decoder will fit properly. I have therefore spent all night reading articles on the web about it. In the end I have just ordered a 16x25mm 4 ohm speaker off coastaldcc.co.uk and am hoping for a quick delivery so I can crack on with it. I also think I may have to machine part of the chassis off above the motor, remove the dcc plug and hard wire instead, in order for the decoder to be low enough fr the top to fit back on.
Maybe I should have stuck to a decoder for one of the class 66s? oh well, at least they will seem easy in comparison!

Dave

[howling0]

I have been following for a while, and am pleased to see it is taking shape nicely,
I do especially like the soil and grass section between the tracks with the fence posts in.

Kev, I had a go with filler but without diluting it after i had first cut sheet wax to size and lined the inside edges of the tracks, and the results were poor to say the least, so u used the filler as a base then then covered that in a runny mix of fine plaster of Paris which self leveled, and produced an effect I'm quite happy with and would recommend.

Apologies for high-jacking the thread.

Keep up the good work!
Al.

[Rammy]

No need to apologise Al, I appreciate your comments and advice. I have seen some fine filler at Toolstation, so may give that a try.

Good news on the sound front. CoastalDCC posted the speaker next day. Speaker replaced, part of the chassis around the motor cut off to allow the decoder to fit in, front plastic behind the grille machined off using the dremel and then the body finally fitted back on. The 08 has had a good running in session tonight on a loop I set up as it was very jerky. Seems to be running a bit better now, certainly when the sound is off. Still a little jerky when sound is switched on. Maybe this could be the pickups or a lack of power from the Hornby Select?
Has anybody got any ideas?
Might try and upload a video this weekend if I can get it running better.

Dave

[Rammy]

Today I have had all of my modern stock out of the loft and given them a run in on a simple loop. The problem with building layouts for so long is that your locos end up just sitting there gathering dust. Once they were all running again I couldn't resist putting them onto First Avenue to make a quick video.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-lmFsUv1 ... ata_player

[live-frog]

Hi
I think Southampton Maritime is an excellent choice of venue and I think there's enough activity to make a very interesting layout.
Here are a few not too great shots from a visit I made in 2011.To give you a feel of activity , I was only there for about 20 minutes plus about 30 minutes on Redbridge station.

http://i288.photobucket.com/albums/ll171/ronetval/P1070644.jpg 66s aroundthe fuelling point
http://i288.photobucket.com/albums/ll171/ronetval/P1070646.jpg 66955 shunts by the SouthWest Main Line as an SWT 158 Salisbury-Romsey circular comes into view.
http://i288.photobucket.com/albums/ll171/ronetval/P1070649.jpg 08624 on the fuelling point
http://i288.photobucket.com/albums/ll171/ronetval/P1070653.jpg 08531 shunts empties through the shed.
http://i288.photobucket.com/albums/ll171/ronetval/P1070670.jpg Looking back along the reception sidings from Redbridge station , a class 70 arrives at Maritime alongside a 66.

If you wanted to expand in the future , you could add a great deal of operational interest by including the 2 track SouthWest Main Line.
Traffic passing includes EWS 66s plus Freightliner Heavy Haul as well as SWT & FGW 158s and SWT EMUs 444s & 450s.
http://i288.photobucket.com/albums/ll171/ronetval/P1070665.jpg 158885 at Redbridge station
http://i288.photobucket.com/albums/ll171/ronetval/P1070664.jpg 66207 light engine through Redbridge
http://i288.photobucket.com/albums/ll171/ronetval/P1070662.jpg 66529 Heavy Haul on coal hoppers
http://i288.photobucket.com/albums/ll171/ronetval/P1070661.jpg 158957 on FGW Cardiff - Portsmouth Harbour turn.
http://i288.photobucket.com/albums/ll171/ronetval/P1070658.jpg 444030 on Weymouth-Waterloo service as 444001 comes in from Suthamnpton for Poole

I realise that these may not be currently available but I think they will be in due course.

Nice work to date ... good luck
Ron

[Rammy]

Thanks for the pics Ron. Very useful for some of the smaller details I will want to add later. I have a spare phone box, so will be painting it red for Maritime.
I had thought about including the 2 main lines originally but it would have made the board too wide for where I work on it and storage. I haven't ruled out future expansion though with a thin board that could be bolted onto the front for this.
Thanks for your interest

Dave

[live-frog]

Hi Dave , I thought I'd corrected the links but I noticed that 2 were wrong.I've now put them right !
I think you'll find the 4th item down of interest as it shows a view of one end of the shed

[Rammy]

After all the fun of the sound loco last week, I thought I had better crack on with something productive this weekend so I have completed the scalescenes concrete bridge that I started quite a while ago. I have sprayed the end panel under the bridge in a matt black and I just need to glue the bridge in place and add the expansion joints between the separate road panels to finish it off.
Apologies for the poor photo, but it was 11.00pm in the shed with my phone!

[thebritfarmer]

Nice job on the bridge, Looks really good.

[HARRYMALLARD]

I loved this layout from the start I especially like the weathering ans ballasting, good job on the bridge too

[BIG DUNC]

Super picture that you have taken, had to look twice to see if it was real.

Duncan...

BIG DUNC