Getting to the Point(s)

Worked on the 3-way turnout again today.  Took a few iterations to tune the points as the constraints are a bit fiddly.  Thankfully the opposite points help act as guardrails and pull the car down the correct path.

The points are "interesting" as they overlap and must be thrown in sequence to set the route:

Next up will be a mechanism to throw those points.

Building the 3-way turnout

A productive modeler once told me: "Try to work on your railroad every day, even if it is only for a few minutes."

Taking that to heart, I decided to embark on the something I had been putting off for a few months: building the 3-way switch for the China Basin ferry dock.

I started with a set of paper FastTracks templates (http://www.handlaidtrack.com/Fast-Tracks-Printable-Track-Templates-s/11.htm), cut them up, and taped them together to get a reasonable looking three-way switch:

Using my Xuron flush cutters, files, and FastTracks PointForm/StockAid tools, I spent a few evenings cutting, filing, fitting, and soldering rails. I used Cloverhouse PCB tie strips (http://cloverhouse.com/Store/product_info.php?cPath=35_36&products_id=67) and MicroEngineering Code 40 Rail. I built from the middle rails to  the outer rails, which is the opposite of my usual build order.

First Frogs (#12)

Center Route (Point rails)

Building the Righthand Route

During the build process, it is critically important to check the turnout dimensions using an NMRA Standards gage. A piece of Rolling stock and/or truck is also very helpful.

After a few nights, I managed to get the rest of the rails in place:

At this point, you are probably saying, "Why the 3#@k is he using such long PCB ties?"  Well, they say that a picture is often worth 1,000 words, so here you go:

Next steps will be to get that nested set of points to throw properly... more on that soon.

Building the Pilings

The next phase of the ferry dock was building the piling walls along the inside edges of the dock.

In a departure from the plastic construction I had been using to build the trestle sections, I decided to try my hand with using real wood to represent wood.

First, I stained 3/16" hardwood dowels using thinned Vallejo Model Color 70-822 German Black Brown:

After cutting an insane number of pilings, I got out some "dark wood" carpenter's glue (it dries brown instead of yellow) and started to assemble the wall.  Working from photos, I realized that the pilings needed to be spaced apart AND an extra layer of angled timbers were used to tie the wall together:

I really liked the look of the wood, but then I realized the next phase of the problem— I needed to paint the white plastic trestle sections.

As a test, I took the thin section of the dock, and painted it with Games Workshop Chaos Black primer, then began dry brushing Vallejo paints over the black.  I ended up dry brushing over the primed dock with the 70-822 German Black-Brown and 70-871 Leather Brown.

Here's a better look at the progress so far (with the barge for a reference):

It has been a while since the last post, so I thought I'd share an update on my China Basin project.

A few weeks ago, I had a few hours to play with the Epilog laser cutter at TechShop San Jose.  My first attempts at laser cutting after a year or two away from the machine served as an opportunity to re-learn the practical limits of laser board on the heavily used machines.

I tried cutting some of the superstructure and gears, but ended up with parts that were burned and fragile— I had forgotten to consider the thickness of the laser beam itself.

After tweaking the CAD a bit, I increased some of the dimensions, ran a few more cuts, and ended up with a pile of laserboard widgets to play with.  I had to head home, as my two hours of reserved time were over.

After playing with the parts, I had decided that there was no good way to build a "fold-up" model of the gantry crane.  I also had my doubts about the strength of the resulting construction, as this would eventually end up on a Free-moN module.

A few days later, resigned to the concept that I may need to abandon the laser, I started playing with Plastruct parts.

While the model was sturdy, it looked a bit too "beefy" for my taste— as I was starting to consider building the latticework on the front face, I stumbled upon another idea.  I had posted the work in progress to the Model Rail Radio Facebook group, and Jimmy Simmons said it looked good, but he'd stick to his laser.  Then it hit me— why not combine the two techniques.

As part of the earlier laser cutting attempts, I ended up with a few individual pieces that might work:

As a quick hack, I decided to glue up the laser cut faces to the plastic, and the results were quite pleasing to me:

I was psyched— a few weeks of the project sitting on the back shelf inspired me to get back into it.  The next step was to try out the gluing up multiple laser cut parts into the large pulleys used at the top of the gantry:

Some good progress on the difficult bits inspired me to get back to building more pilings, and the test fitting the works on the dock:

All in all, it was a productive Thanksgiving weekend— I hope to make more progress during Christmas break when I'll have more time to devote to the project again.

Ferry Slip Update

Had a chance to work on paper mock-ups for the "business end" of the ATSF slip.  Initial paper models were a bit too small, and didn't have enough clearance, but after working with the "full scale" drawings and my NMRA gauge, I think I have the right "look":

Spent some time learning how to vaporize laser board at the TechShop— it is going to take a few more hours to learn what I can get away with.  Here is a look at what happens when you try and cut things that are a bit too small:

Planning on going back for more learning/punishment next weekend to dial in the settings and tweak the CAD a bit.

Phone Booths

Added a quick coat of paint over the black primer to Robert's SLA phone booths:

Look forward to installing these line side next Friday.

More Car Float

Got a chance to add a few more layers of weathering, touched up some of the metallic details, and took a couple of shots before packing it in for the night.

I'm really happy with the way this is looking— next step will be detailing and adding the pilot house.

Car Float Progress

Had some time this weekend to do some painting!  I started by base coating the model with Citadel "Chaos Black":

I followed up with an uneven overspray of Tamiya Dull Red, and a few washes of Citadel colors to vary the tone:

Phone Booths

My buddy Robert gave me a few of his home-SLA printed HO Scale Southern Pacific Telephone booths.  They will find a home at Silicon Valley Lines.

Paper Layout

With some professional deadlines met, I had some time recently to get back to the China Basin project.  My challenge was to create a plan which would fit into my rather compact car.  This meant breaking up the design into sections no wider than 36", and 2'x3' would be best:

As soon as I had a design that I liked, it was time to print out a full-scale version to check things out:

One of the best things that doing a full size printout gets you is that you can "play test" using equipment and check to see if the track work will actually fit.  Part of the learning process was understanding how the CAD package representation of a switch played out with the actual FastTracks turnout templates I was planning on using— the photo below shows pretty clearly that I'm best sticking with very tightly trimmed #6 switches (I had hoped to "goose" #7 turnouts instead):

Another discovery of this experiment was that the fouling point of each yard track needed to be about 1" in from where the track became parallel.

The finalization realization was the need to construct 40+ #6 turnouts.  I'm telling myself I GET to build them.