Was just browsing one of my local hardware stores, and they had everything in the case marked down as a closeout. So, I found the manager, made her an offer for the whole thing. She looked it all over, added stuff up for a while, then countered with a reasonable price. I offered $100 and she countered with 150. Sold. Moral of the story, keep an eye open for good deals everywhere!
The steam locomotive was like Pancho: "Pancho wore his gun outside his pants, for all the honest world to feel."* Like Lefty, the railroads tried to 'blend in' for awhile, by streamlining the locomotives. But nevertheless, they and their financiers eventually killed the steam locomotive. *Pancho and Lefty song by Merle Haggard and Willie Nelson Songwriters: Townes Van Zandt Pancho and Lefty lyrics © Wixen Music Publishing
I also spent some time tinning a new tip on the workbench soldering iron. That ought to help. I figure to warm up and get some decoder install done, as well as getting back to the Yellowstone. Part of the weekend got blown away with the Wife's uncles funeral and attending to moving some of his stuff afterwards. Had to make an emergency run to Billings to rescue a family member. His pickup tranny failed just at Miles City, so we rolled there, pulled the trailer to Billings, unloaded that, brought the trailer back to Miles, loaded up the pickup, with another family member hauling the trailer with pickup back to Billings. At the 2:30 am end of the 22+ hour day, we were exhausted. So Sunday was just a recovery day. With grandkids here, too. Here's a shot as we waited for the funeral procession, Missing the Uncle, but enjoying the train view. Bittersweet.
Family doing what family does best, taking care of each other. Good on 'ya, and enjoy the well-earned rest.
Back to RRing! Just had fun with this guy, and found a spot that threw three of these cars to the ground! Ouch! Fixed that track up.....
Got the 4-4-0 together, ran it a bit, but it needs some 'tweaking' to get things finished right. Wasn't too bad to re assemble, the hardest part being the connection rods to the crossheads. It wasn't too hard to fit it in. Will have to add an extended coal box to the sides to hide the decoder, New headlight LED and a firebox LED, that doesn't work, yet. Almost all together, And the first run video, Also had a derailment that put these three on the floor, what a mess. Lost some coupler pieces...
Yeah, I guess I need to solve that problem. The knuckles from the couplers are lost in that never-never land on the floor. Spent some time hunting with a bright flashlight, no joy. Must mean it is time to hunt up MT replacements.
Yup, but I found those. Also, took the decoder out last night, and have it packaged for shipment back to the vendor for a free replacement. ESU is really good at that. After the removal, I did a current check on the motor, 0.3amps, which is well within spec for the Nano. Crazy, but interesting. So, I guess we will see what goes next....
Had a bit of fun today out in the Trainshed, Just ran a train and tested the motor from the 4-4-0, The motor appears to draw ok amperage for it's type. However, the max in the Nano is 500 mA, Hmmm
Got the swap done, it now has an NCE Z14SR decoder and runs good. More programming to do to get it setup for the lighting effects I want and decent speeds. And a test run!
So, two videos today, one a short train, And then a talk at ya about why do I do model trains? And why are trains so fascinating? At least in my thinking about it. One of my grandkids asked me last weekend, and some of the others have asked me previously, so here's at least a partial explanation.
