NMRA MetroNorth Regional Meeting 10/30

The NMRA division meeting is coming 10/30/10 in New Canaan

There will be two clinics as follows:

Bob Collett , and his Huntington & Hartford layout was one of the early layouts featured in MR and is a prime platform for demonstrating almost every aspect of DCC. Bob will address the first of a number of DCC clinics we will have over this coming year – the Capabilities of DCC. Quite frankly, Bob is one of the most knowledgeable people in the hobby and is renowned for sharing this knowledge with others. Bring a pen and paper and take notes. Bring your questions and receive answers. His layout is open for visitors after the meeting.

The second clinic on Water, Rivers, and Falls will be presented by an enthusiastic modeler in hot pursuit of his MMR, Robert Seckler. Almost all layouts have “water” somewhere, whether in a port setting, a river or stream or tumbling over rocks and boulders. If you ever asked, “how did you do that?” Robert will demo how it’s done. Here too, take notes and maybe a camera to take some pictures. And ask questions.

The Saturday, October 30 meeting starts at 9:30AM at the New Canaan Historical Society, 13 Oenoke Rd in NC. Look for MN sign. Tons of parking in back. After meeting activity includes a choice – an op session at Franklin Lang’s layout in Stamford, or an open house visit to Bob Collett’s Huntington & Harford RR in Huntington, CT.

All are welcome -

Building a DCC layout with Buzz Hollow

With the many confusing issues surrounding Digital Command Control (DCC), Buzz Hollow has established a great GET INTO DCC plan for starters. We offer introductory DCC systems starting as low as $65. These systems will replace your current power supply and run a standard DC (analog) engine just like any power supply. However, when you are ready, you can have Buzz Hollow install a decoder in one of your engines or buy one already to go, and now you're running two engines. Since one engine has a decoder you will be able to run both engines on the layout at the same time, with independent control over speed and direction.
If at any time you want to upgrade to a more expensive system, which may not support your DC engines, Buzz Hollow will give you a 70% credit on your first Buzz Hollow purchased system toward your choice of a more powerful system.
And with Buzz Hollow offering decoder equipped engines for less than other suppliers' engines without decoders, your empire is on its way.

Hank

Buzz Hollow Railroad website up - more products to come

Hi All - Well, if you're here by going through the website, you may notice that it has products, finally!!. You can now buy on Buzz Hollow and get a full invoice for your purchase including shipping. I will be adding more products as time permits, and will most certainly offer the full line of Kato N Scale Unitrack.
All the prices in inventory are full retail so I don't have to worry about Kato's minimum advertised price (MAP), but as a buyer, you can get a 25% discount on your order by entering the coupon code BH25. If your order is greater that $100 without shipping costs, enter BH30 and you will get 30%!!
Please let me know about problems and even pluses. I'll do my best to keep it up to date.
Thanks for your continued patronage over the last five years. Now that Buzz Hollow is starting it's sixth year, it can now offer online bargains in most of the items you want.

All the best -

Hank

DCC for beginners

Well, it's been a month since my last post so I was thinking about what would be of interest to my new model railroading friends when it hit me - Almost everyone who comes to my table during train shows to see how to get started in the world's greatest hobby asks "What is DCC". With all the hype and tech talk it can get pretty confusing. For the starting model railroader it should really be straight forward, so here goes.

Whether you're building a small tabletop layout or one that will fill a whole room, DCC (short for Digital Command Control) will make the experience more enjoyable. As I demonstrate in the shows I sell at, you can run three trains on an N scale layout in a small 2'x4' space with just two wires to the track. In fact, with the Command Station I use, you could run 10! But I'd be a nervous wreck trying to keep them all from running into one another on that 2'x4' N scale layout.

The many DCC books and manuals available today are designed to educate the hobbyist with the theory, technical details of how it works, and terminology of the science while we just want to set it up and use it. Not many of us know why a computer will do what we want, we just know how to make it do it. We don't care about the science since we don't plan on designing our own computer.

DCC is much easier than a computer. But, of course, it is a computer application and, in fact, you can hook most of the more sophisticated DCC systems up to a computer to do more fancy things.

Basically, DCC requires three things: A layout with decoder equipped engines; a command station to tell the engines what to do; and a power supply to drive it all. Fortunately, any layout that will run DC engines can run DCC engines as well. AND MUCH EASIER!!

With a DC layout and two engines on the track you must wire separate parts of the track for different speed controllers and switch the controllers to each isolated electrical block to the unit that you want to use for the engine in the block. It sounds complicated and the wire and operation ARE! The problem here is that the power supply can't differentiate between the two locos on the track, so the operator must switch the speed controls with toggle switches. Running trains this way has been the only way for many years with HO, and now N, scale trains. Without the blocks, fancy wiring and dual power supplies, both engines would run in the same direction at the same speed ALL THE TIME.

Just like your computer lets you use your inkjet printer for some printing and you then can select your laser printer for other printing, the command station can send commands to one engine and the others will ignore them. And that one engine will continue following its last command until you address that engine again and send a change.

When you installed those printers on your computer you assigned them a name. When you buy a new engine and place it on the track with DCC, you must assign it a numeric ID. As you might suspect, that ID must be different then the IDs you've assigned to your other engines and it must be compatible with your Command Station.

Once that engine has been assigned a unique ID it can run on the same track as all your other engines and be controlled completely and independently of all the others with just two wires powering the track from the Command Station.

Well, that's a start. How each command station controls the engines is a little different from one system to the next, but they all have a direction button, a speed control and the all important STOP.

Let's get a discussion started and I'll cover more ground in the next installment.

NMRA Regional Mtg Pleasantville * Turnouts in spotlight

February regional meet/Metro North Div - Turnouts in spotlight
Saturday, Feb. 6, 2010 10 a.m.
Mount Pleasant Public Library
350 Bedford Road
Pleasantville, N.Y.

PLEASANTVILLE, N.Y.—The Metro North Division of the NMRA will meet Feb. 6 at the Mount Pleasant Public Library. Two presentations will highlight the gathering, which marks the 14-year-old division’s third decade of meetings. Vin Gallogly will offer an overview of turnouts: should I purchase off the shelf or construct my own? Vin will look at some pluses and minuses of Atlas, Walthers and Peco DCC-“friendly” turnouts compared with handlaid turnouts using the Fast Tracks jigs.

Barry Abisch will take us to Adult Rail Camp on the Nevada Northern Railway, where learning railroading is a hands-on experience. Barry will discuss his experiences there and then offer a picture tour of the Nevada Northern. He will focus on the modeling opportunities offered by an operating railroad that retains the look, feel—and rolling stock—of an early 20th century standard-gauge short line. If you enjoy scratchbuilding or you’re looking for something different in an operating scenario, the Nevada Northern probably has something to offer.

General Interest
Members are invited to bring in and display models of “My favorite box car.” The membership will express itself with a popular vote. In addition, bring a model to share, paticularly if you acquired it at the Amherst Show, Jan. 30-31 in West Springfield, Mass.

Our swap table will also be open for those looking to cast off or acquire railroading gear.
After a break for lunch, members will have the afternoon to visit two nearby HO layouts.
In Armonk, John Stamatov is scheduled to welcome visitors to his Muscoot Valley RR while in Port Chester, Anthony Maida is expected to show members the latest additions to his ever-growing basement empire. Directions to both layouts will be available at the meeting.

To reach the library, just visit www.mountpleasantlibrary.org/ to obtain customized, door-to-door directions.

Westchester Show and MTL NH RPO

WOW what a great show Sunday at the County Center in White Plains. Thanks to the regional paper, that gave the show a cover story on their weekend edition (Lionel diesel in color on the cover with a $450 price tag), the promotors said they had a record crowd with over 3000 coming by in the one-day six-hour show. I know I met and made many N scale model railroaders and turned many others to Kato Unitrack.

Speaking of Unitrack, which I'm sure you all know I love, check out the current (March 2010) issue of Model Railroader. The third installment of their new 4x9 N scale model railroad project details the laying of N Scale Unitrack using the new superelevated dual main track. Mentions of ease of assemble and reliability understate their choice.

Finally, I found some MicroTrains NYNH&H RPO's which are out of production. I have one left I've listed on ebay and it's sure to draw a crowd for my New Haven fans. Isn't it a beauty!
For Westchester fans, the NMRA Metro North division is meeting this Saturday in the Pleasantville Library at 10AM.

Here's the location -

350 Bedford Rd Pleasantville, NY
10570-3015

Email me for meeting details. There's usually 2 seminars and 2 layouts to visit.

Westchester County Center Toy & Train Show

Well, the largest train show in the northeast comes to White Plains, NY tomorrow. With hours running from 9AM to 3PM you have SIX hours to enjoy model trains and other toys. Since they have a snack bar, you can make a day of it and keep warm, a consideration with weekend temps well below 30 degrees.
If you attend, do stop by my Buzz Hollow Railroad booth and say hi. More info is available here:

http://www.westchestergov.com/calendar/ccorgcalquery.asp

If you have trouble finding the place, call me at the show at 914-309-2395.

N Scale Starter Sets

Due to the size relationship, N scale takes up one fourth the tabletop area required for HO - that's a lot! A 4x8 layout in N (32 sq ft) would have to be 8x16 (128 sq ft) in HO to have the same modeling space. With today’s dwindling space, N scale provides a lot of railroading in a small space without breaking the budget.

With all things considered (engine quality, detail desired, layout size, reliability, etc) I believe track reliability is key. Over the years I’ve met many model railroaders who lost interest because their trains wouldn’t run. This was almost always do to poor track or poor track laying. I always recommend Kato N Scale Unitrack (which comes with roadbed so it can be setup on a carpet) to start and you’ll never have track problems. It is sectional track, so it is very easy for the chief engineer of any age to redesign his layout as inspiration dictates. Further, with Kato’s range of radii in curved track, the designer can produce almost any serpentine curves envisioned. The March 2010 issue of Model Railroader magazine (the current issue on stands now) describes their 4x9 N scale layout track laying step and clearly explains the editor’s decision to use Unitrack.

Therefore, I prefer the Kato sets because I like their Unitrack. They have sets with just track or complete sets with track, an engine, cars and power supply. As noted in above posts, if the track isn't the best, your trains won't run. No fun in that, regardless of the quality of the locos. Unfortunately, as sets go, the Kato sets are expensive.

Therefore, when I set up a newcomer with a set, I put it together from parts in inventory. I recommend a Unitrack layout (since it's sectional track, they can easily compliment the set with sections to make it as big as they have room for) and then offer engines and cars with a whole range of prices and quality. This approach provides a starter “set” that has great track and, with lower priced rolling stock, can start as low as $60 with a power supply, an engine and a few cars.

Another plus for N scale is that all the engines, freight cars and passenger cars come in storable, stackable jewel cases. Until you have a real train room where you can keep the collection on display, you can establish a habit of putting the trains away when you disassemble the layout and store the rolling stock in their original boxes. Many used collections on the market come with the cars still stored in those boxes. This definitely helps the collection retain its value.

And, as can be seen by my previous post, even boys 6 to 10 can handle the smaller size.

Although there are some great bargains with track from other manufacturers, if you start with Kato Unitrack, you’ll have more fun running trains. And regardless of the cost of the engines you add, your trains will always run.

As a last note, many NTrak modules come with Kato Unitrack sections to be used between the modules so they can be reconnected at a show and provide electrical reliability.

Well, it's on to White Plains and the Westchester County Center for their big Toy and Train Show this Sunday. I have my largest inventory of N Scale Unitrack ever and have a layout book with plans. Come pick out a starter set and start a new model railroader on the way to building an empire.
It's not called The World's Greatest Hobby for nothing.

Railroad Club Meeting

Well, here it is again! The third Thursday of the month. And the Northern Westchester Model Railroad Club is meeting at its usual place - the Community Room of the Apple Bank in the Rosehill Shopping Center in Thornwood, NY. The meeting begins by 8PM and usually breaks up about 10PM.
Come join the group and share stories, model building and just plain railroading.
You can see our layout in my last blog about the Cub Scouts. It runs pretty well for a portable setup.
If you'd like more info or better directions, do call 914-309-2395.
Hope to see new faces tomorrow.

Hank

Cub Scouts and Model Railroading

Tonight we entertained the regular meeting of a local Cub Scouts Troop with members in the first through fifth grades.
After a brief business and awards agenda, David Dykstra, a member of the local MetroNorth Railroad organization, introduced the president of The Northern Westchester Model Railroad Club, Joseph Pelzner. Mr Pelzner gave a brief history of railroads and then touched on model railroading and the many scales, track gauges and electronic powering systems.
After the talk, the Scouts had a chance to have hands-on on several layouts provided by the club. Included were the clubs N Scale layout built on a Terrain-4-Trains High Sierra module, a simple back-N-forth trolley setup and ovals of Lionel and MTH O gauge trains. Dave Dysktra also brought a very small Z scale Japanese passenger train.
One surprize was the youngsters obvious ability to rerail the small N Scale engines. I had always assumed that the concentration and dexterity required to get the small wheels back on the track would make it difficult for young people, but they managed to rerail the tiny cars as quickly as any adults.
Be sure to look us up if you know of a local club that would like a demonstration of model railroading. We are always looking for a reason to "Play with trains".
BTW - The next club meeting will be held on January 21 in the community room of the Rosehill Shopping Center in Thornwood. The meeting starts by 8:00PM.
There will also be a Train and Toy show at the Westchester County Center in White Plains the last Sunday of this month, January 31st.