James River Branch: News Archive

Website News Archive: July 2009

17 July 2009

Courtesy of the latest releases from Full Throttle, I shifted gears (again) to tackle a freight car upgrade project that's been on my round tuit list just waiting for this very day to come. Unexpectedly this turned into a serious effort that provided more than a few surprises along the way, but still had a happy ending. Then, the process of documenting everything resulted in a fairly massive article that needed its own space—which it now has, along with my other "feature-length" articles. On a related note, everyone is buzzing about the new Fox Valley Models replacement wheelsets, and some are wondering when I'll be getting mine. Actually, I probably won't be getting any—the new article explains why.

13 July 2009

Calming down somewhat after the disastrous weekend, I investigated the signal problem, and I suspect that the CL2M chip was fried, and was delivering destructive levels of current to the LEDs. I also hoped that the LEDs might have done what I've seen some do in the past, and that is somehow partially "heal" themselves after a "rest," becoming functional again, albeit for very brief periods of time—on the order of a few seconds—just long enough to photograph.

Using a new circuit with an additional protective resistor just to play it safe, I found that the red and green LEDs appear to have made a minor recovery; this was fortunate, since they would be the most-used aspects for photos. Alas, the yellow LED just flickered feebly before winking out for good, and while I'm still crushed by this turn of events, if I had to choose one of the LEDs to be totally dead, I would have chosen the yellow.

This helped buoy my spirits a bit and keep me from sinking into a non-productive funk, which would have been regrettable given that I'm on the verge of installing the city streets, which will give rise to a major rush of new accomplishments. Meanwhile, the signal became the subject of a macro-lens study—in which it did not need to be functional—in a new Gallery image. (Funny, I hadn't noticed until I took this photo that I'd reinstalled the door upside down after the station crash.)

11 July 2009

I am deeply despondent. Some time after taking the photograph at right, I made a crushing discovery: during the time I spent processing the image and writing an enthusiastic progress report about installing the layout's power supply and wiring up the signal, the green LED burned out. It was on for all of maybe thirty minutes, which is infinitely shorter than the lifetime of almost any LED. Worse, when I switched the circuit to the yellow LED to make sure it wasn't a bad connection, that LED burned out in about thirty seconds. WTF? This is the same current-limiting circuit I've used to power scads of other LEDs that still work fine—LEDs that, in theory, should last years.

Then, as if the weather could somehow sense and respond to my darkened mood, the previously brilliant, cloudless day was suddenly overcast and windy. Not that it mattered any more; one of the main reasons for doing the test photography was to see how the signal would photograph in sunlight. Now I knew without even going to the trouble: it would be dark.

It's not like I can just pull the bad LEDs out and pop in new ones; they are integrated into the signal structure in such a way that I would have to start over from the ground up. I couldn't even re-use the stanchion—the wires are permanently glued inside. I'm quite at a loss as to what to do. I can certainly "Photoshop" a working signal into any photo I take of it, but I really hate doing that, because it leaves the viewer with the question of, well, what else has he Photoshopped that doesn't really work? And "used to work" doesn't count.

10 July 2009

I've no real clue why it's taken so long for me to install the signal, but I can finally check that round tuit off of my list. The real treat will come after I've wired it up and flick the switch; that may come tomorrow. It would be nice if the weather was sunny, too, because I'd like to see how the signal photographs in sunlight: if it's not visible, I'll have to resort to Photoshop, which I'd prefer not doing.

7 July 2009

A really bad back has restricted my modeling activities for a while. I've been making storm drains for the city streets (right), a tediously repetitive job of cutting and assembling bits of brass. I'm only making ten of them, but it's such a labor-intensive scratchbuilding job that it feels more like I'm making a hundred.

I've also been diddling with the website. Some images of the city streets under construction have been added, along with an image of a new sky backdrop. And there's a new overall shot of the layout, complete with a "supersized" version so that people get to see the layout in greater detail.

2 July 2009

Sometimes you just need to trust your gut. When I made the Canal Street storm drain (right), I had a sense that it might have been a little on the large side—I just eyeballed it, without taking any measurements. Later, when Rolf's introduced their new urban accessories, I snapped up a whole bunch of storm drains. But when I received them, I thought they looked awfully small.

Well, now that I'm starting work on the streets of Naughtright, I decided to wander outside and measure a 1:1 storm drain (I didn't have to go far—there are two of them half a block from my driveway). Guess what? The one that I scratchbuilt is almost exactly the right size! A typical drain measures two by four feet, which means the Rolf's drains are less than half the size they should be (since they're European, I guess that means we just grow 'em bigger here in America). Now, this is where it gets a little weird... I was lamenting the money spent on three sets of drains that I can't use, when it suddenly dawned on me: at less than half the size for Z, they'd be just about right for T scale! Yikes, after having made 1:450 streetlights and crossing flashers, I'm in for a lot of fun with these itsy-bitsy drains...