U-G-L-Y quartering tool

It could hardly have been less beautiful or elegant, but the Polymorph seems to have put me back in action. Indeed, it was so quick and effective, I’m hard-pressed to see why anyone would quarter drivers any other way! Having learned that the spokes would stick to the Polymorph, I masked off the front drivers. […]

Polymorph experiments

Okay, so I’m still in the hobby. All I have to do is figure out how to transfer the exact quartering angle from the front wheels to the back. The trick is that there is almost no datum – no way to get a good handle on the centre of the axle. It – the […]

And now we are three!

One of the great joys of blogging is that occasionally a kindred spirit stumbles across your site and reaches out. In my case, these take the form of other modellers working on the Canada Atlantic Railway, or those working in Proto:87. Richard Guitar was the first to share some photos of his O-Gauge CAR layout […]

Disaster on the rolling road

I was about to declare victory. 622’s chassis was finally rolling reasonably smoothly, or at least more smoothly than #10, and I was giving it a fast run on the rolling road. Suddenly, the left rear crankpin screw unwound and the connecting rod flew off. The chassis dropped off the rollers, and when I went […]

How big are those holes anyway?

Before I go easing out the holes in the connecting rods, wouldn’t it be nice to know which one is the tightest, and ease that one first? To my eye, the fit of each crankpin is indistinguishable. So, in an attempt to get scientific about the question, I’ve created some pin gauges. Now after a […]

Edging closer to smooth

Now that 622 has a motor, I hooked up some alligator clips to see how it behaves. There is a hesitancy at the quarters, which makes me believe there is a slight quartering issue, despite my efforts to limit it. It’s unsurprising because I could feel some stiffness when rolling the chassis by hand. Really […]

Motor installed in 622

November is one of those months when life gets in the way of model railroading around here. Even though the weather is perfect for modelling, little gets done on the trains in this month. I had hoped to get 622 running in October, but when I first installed the motor, I found that the idler […]

Modelling at Vancouver Train Expo

With fall well and truly under way, it must be time for BC’s biggest model train show. I spent most of Sunday at the “Craftsman’s Corner,” demonstrating that some of us still make models, despite the chequebook appearance of the hobby. This year, I had the opportunity to share the table with Mike Barone and […]

Torque arm for 622

I puzzled until my puzzler was sore about how to affix a torque arm to the NWSL 28:1 gearbox. #10 taught me that we want the arm to be as beefy as possible. But these little 4-4-0s don’t allow us to be profligate with space. In particular, there is no extra space on top of […]

Pembroke Compositions

Mike Cougill’s excellent post about story influencing layout design brought back some thoughts I jotted down about composition, and that take on new significance as I think about the layout’s role in the room. Mike’s layout tells a completely different story from Pembroke, but perhaps we can both take some lessons from the art world […]