(F) Clyst Halt & Farm Shop -- APA

[John S]

Hi all,

Do like this idea, the more I've thought about it, over the last week the more I can see in the potential of the idea.

So first grateful thanks to my other half who unbeknown to me undertook the task of driving the 140 odd mile round trip to IKEA in Bristol, and upon my return home from late shift in the early hours of Monday morning, tripped over 6 (yep six of them) flat pack boxes of the now infamous IKEA APA storage box.

(Note...one of which is now residing in someone else’s front room!!!!)

As for the box itself, robust, well made, went together easily, built mine as per the instructions! Will have to change that, would be better with the white face of the board on the inside, and the smooth side on the inside as the bottom or as in our case the back. But me little grey cells went into over drive, would it be possible with a few modifications to adapt the APA to suit other combinations, will have a tinker, will post my findings.

As for what to put inside the box in the terms of this challenge, many ideas have been floated about in my mind, many choices to choose from.

In the end settled on a passing loop,and in keeping with a rural theme, Clyst Halt & Farm Shop seemed an appropriate choice.

Using Hornby points, more resilient than Peco Setrack ones, less prone to derailing stock. Keep with the dead frog, keeps the electric string scenario nice and simple.

Cobble together a manual point switching system with brass rod and chocolate blocks, enabling operation from front or rear.

Couple of buildings, wooden platform, should take care of the halt and farm shop, have a ponder on what to use to disguise the ends as a scenic block.

Happy times are here again..............

John

[John S]

Able to make some time today, made a start.

Using Hornby track and points the loop fitted, and just enough space either end to get a good fixing and to allow connecting to a bridging piece.

Question... which end is the male and female half of the connector block going to be?

Because I have the loop, the track feeds have to be from either end, with an isolating section between the two points, need to make a wiring loop for home use as well as being compatible to connect up to other modules.

Going to use point motors, all the wiring for these will be local to my module, no sense in complicating matters any further!:lol:

The timber risers are 18mm x 34mm topped first with 3mm MDF, followed by the track base of 6mm MDF, works out as close as a Gnats whisker to the 2" height. The small height difference allows greater scope for scenic treatment, and keeps the weight down.

Tinkered about with the cut out for through running, tried to keep a balance with what stock could be run plus being able to disguise the opening, still ongoing.........

Left hand end the packing from the APA box plus the timber offcuts being put to good use, recycling!!!





John

[John S]

Tad more progress, came to a halt whilst waiting for the bits for the electric string. Ordered items yesterday quoted 4 to 6 days delivery on second class post, shocked to find the Postman at the door with a parcel this morning with all the items.

Settled on this item for inter baseboard connecting, 12 Way 6 Amp Pluggable Terminal Strip (2 Pack) (CN179a)

Hunted around the DIY places for some coving, finally settled on the one from Homebase, smoother finish, better profile and larger wings to apply glue to to. Primed area on the back and sides of the APA box, along with the wings of the coving with PVA , left for twenty four hours. Reapplied another coating of PVA and stuck in place this morning, stayed put!.

Profile of coving an exact fit for the front edge, could claim superb design of internal construction, but as more often than not,was pure luck the coving fits like a glove, ready made embankment and wall all in one!

 

Off to play with the electric string, forgotten just what extra work is needed with DC after the simplicity of DCC!:lol:

John

[John S]

Some progress to report.......



Electric string, going by the info supplied from Bob.

Track feed connectors either end at the rear of the APA box, female connector RED to front rail and top of connector. Connected to the controller track two outlet enabling the hand held controller to be used.

Black box on top of the controller contains a CDU connected to a pair of Green wires to middle connector, for 16v AC for control of the Hornby point motors.

Three way connector, with Red, Black and Yellow to a single switch controlling both point motors, housed in an old redundant ADSL filter casing, stripped of its innards, new front of 80 thou plastic card.

Top middle connector from controller track one output to run a 12v DC light.

Shown the type of choc block connector used throughout, consisting of a plug and socket, no need to worry about getting to it with a screwdriver!

Front view image with the track layout, and a tentative start made on the scenery.



Same view, with the 12v DC daylight bulb fitted.



First available opportunity to see what the outcome would be in total darkness, using the 12v DC 11W Cool White Energy Saving Daylight bulb.

For the technical bit, 1W on this bulb equals 8W, 56 lumes per watt, has the same light equivalent of 5x9W luminance and a colour spectrum of 6400K, base type E27, voltage range DC10-13V, bulb is reverse polarity protected and a service life in excess of 6000H



To be continued...

John

[John S]

No underside view, but I presume there's some sort of emergency access to the point motors?

Hornby surface mounted point motors fitted, several precautionary steps were taken from the outset. Having fallen foul on a previous occasion with what can only be described in the most politest of terms, inadequate quality control in the factory where they are produced. Given the choice between these and the lacklustre mediocre performance of the surface mounted offering from Peco, Hornby wins hands down!

NOTE: This observation only applies to Peco surface mounted point motors, the other point motors in their range are superb....in terms of quality and reliability.

First step, dismantle the Hornby point motor, unsolder all three wires, or in most cases pull the wires off, chuck the three removed wires straight in the bin!. Replace wires from the superb specification and quality assured range that can be purchased from DCC Supplies.

Only on this occasion when I solder the replacement wires, which are all pre tinned, and all joints are made using Bakers Flux and a fluxed resin cored solder specifically designed for soldering electrical connections, not only are they longer, there are no dry joints!

Connections from point motors to main 16v AC supply and switch circuit is via solder tag strips, each single wire has one solder point apiece on the tag strip, no multiple ganging up of wires on my tag strips!, and a piece of plastic card is super glued between each tag, no flash over here!

Second, ensure the switch is of the highest specification available, eliminates flash over and burn outs.

Thirdly, installation of superior quality CDU, in my case one from Gaugemaster, belt and braces approach, works for me!

AND if after all that they still fail, unscrew the two screws holding the point motor down, lift motor gently up, exposing wiring access hole, unsolder joints, and start again!

John

[John S]

Happenings down the shed..................



John

[John S]

Whilst idling the time away waiting for the tree man, began some tentative steps into the mystic sphere of scenery! Earlier this morning after completing the daily domestic chores, nipped down to our local sand quarry and blagged a couple of take away containers of our local red sand.

Never have been a fan of mixing ballast with, washing up liquid and PVA , always struck me as exceedingly messy, floods of water and diluted PVA glue going into places it is not wanted.

Those of a certain age will remember woodworking lessons at school, for others a brief over view.

Urea Formaldehyde glue came into use just prior to World War II in the aircraft industry. It was used to laminate wood structures and fabrics in air-frame applications.

Borden's Cascamite is a waterproof glue and is probably the must effective glue of all. It is a white powder and is resin based. The dry form which I am using has a much longer shelf life than the liquid form. But, in all other respects, it is the same as the L-100 resin. It just lacks the water.

Urea formaldehyde mixtures cure completely in about four days at temperatures between 75 and 90 F. They can be heat cured very rapidly.

Please note, using synthetic glues can produce dermatitis, follow the procedures and guidelines that are supplied with the product.

Using a bag of Model Scenics Coarse Light Grey Ballast, mixed 1 part red sand with 1 part ballast and 1 part Cascamite.

The sand, first I wanted to keep my modules local in terms of their geographical layout and red sand abounds in my corner of Devon.

Second, sand when damp holds just enough water, that when the Cascamite is added the curing process starts immediately. Because the whole mix is basically dry, spreading onto the track and between sleepers is easy, it goes where you put it, and of greater value is as the mix is starting to cure, it stays put!

All that is required, when a length of track is completed with the ballast mix, is a light dusting of water from one of those atomiser sprayer things that women use, in the case of the piece of track shown, less than a thimble full of water was required.

No more bunged up hand sprayers, ballast shooting off in all directions because of the force of water hitting it, no floods , pools and rivulets of sticky PVA getting into places it shouldn’t!

Test piece of Hornby track, every other sleeper removed, gone over with a wire brush to dull the shiny plastic finish, ballast mixed applied.

 

This was taken within a few minutes of adding the mix to the test piece, notice the lack of water!

As the mix stays tacky, can be reshaped etc., had to hand some yellow flock which was randomly sprinkled over the top, added bonus the flock stayed put, no wastage and no surplus to hoover up!

The remainder of the mix in the container is as it was mixed, no added water, some of those pieces are already rock hard!

 

John