Coupled Up and Started

-

RMCQ Show 2024

I wasn't aware of the RCMQ annual event and by chance received a random email from the local club as I had visited a couple times and put my name down on the email list. Still being new to the hobby and the community, it was nice to get an inclusive and engaging email. The event was hosted at the below location:

Sat-Sun 7-8 December 2024 – 9:00am – 4:00pm
South Pine Sports Complex
Cribb Rd, Brendale Qld 4500

It was extremely hot weekend this date, I visited in the later part of the day, but it was still very hot at the venue. The organisers did their best to keep the air flow going at the venue. I will admit I only stayed for about an hour, hopping from fan-to-fan location and did not take any pictures at the time, Westgate did a magnificent job capturing the event and I encourage you to check out the blog Westgate - South Western Rail: 2024 Pine Rivers Model Train & Hobby Exhibition. 

An Early Christmas Present

My local model rail hobby shop was at RCMQ Show and I told him I would pop down before Christmas closure to check-in and have a chat. When I popped down he gave me an update on the NCE Power Cab order and told me it would be arriving late January 2025 and apologised for the delay. I told him that was all good, but I wanted to make full payment on QR 1461, so we got the paperwork and payment out of the way and pulled it out of the box to check everything was in working and spent a while or two learning the settings.



SDS Models QR 1461
Centennial Late Scheme 1980 - 1990's
with my first scratch build.
Top View shot of QR 1461
lining up my tank wagon

PowerCab

In the new year I received a notification the orders had arrived and are being dispatched and to pop into the shop the following week to pick up my order. I finally got down to the shop on the last day of January and made payment and thanked the owner for arranging the order. There are a lot of reviews on NCE PowerCab on how to get started but things are pretty simple to connect up. I didn't like taking things in and out and reconnecting from the original box. We had a few wine boxes laying around from gifts, so I decided to repurpose one for my PowerCab, below are couple pictures of the end result which should keep things simple when I need to use it.



NCE PowerCab Panel
plus wiring installed into wine Box
My custom box connected to
 track on kitchen bench
operating 1461 above.

Forward Plans

This completes my Getting Started Series, I'm a couple $000 in now with a lot of bits and pieces and nothing to really show. It's been a fascinating entry into the hobby, and I have let a little personal discipline slip with my original scratch building ambition and need to get some structure into play. In order to bring some tangible results, my future plan is to focus on the following: 

  • Layout Planning
  • Track Planning
  • Baseboard Building
  • Wiring
  • Scratch Building
I would like to share some lessons for anyone that may decide to get into this hobby, the key lessons but not limited to would be:
  • Be prepared to spend some serious money on commercial products
  • Be prepared to break things, make mistakes and learn from them
  • Always add to the bucket and preferably the bucket others are adding to
  • It's your model rail journey and have fun and enjoy the hobby
  • Ask questions, you'll be surprised what you may find and learn.
Thanks for reading, until next time.

Little Shunter

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Bits and Bobs

-
Image
Order Sent! After having a go at scratch building with styrene I thought I would up my game and buy a kit from Caintode, so I jumped back on the website and placed an order for a 3 Dome Tanker kit and some more Bar Frame, 5Ft 2Ft 2In bogies for my own model builds. You got mail! My first call for assistance Where do i go now was with PGC Scale Models, after a couple months I received an email from the gentleman who advised he had been busy and been able to produce a range of tank wagon kits and wanted to know if he can organise for them to be delivered to my premises.  A few emails back and forth and the gentleman was kind enough to invite me to their property, so we schedule a time that was convenient and what I thought would be a small visit turned into a couple hours of conversation over a cuppa with some insightful advice and walk through into their processes to get items ready for keen customers. It was such an enjoyable visit that I almost forgot to pay and pick up my 3 and ...
Read more

Let's try another approach

-
Image
Little Shunters Second Scratch Build   What did I learn from my first scratch build 🤓 Body frame was not square Tanks supports were inconsistent  Styrene welding was poor Styrene cuts not square Superglue and thin styrene don't like each other Thin styrene is going to warp Taking these above lessons learnt into consideration, my goal was to improve the quality of the next model. Jig 2.0 I popped down to Bunnings and bought some dressed pine and balsa wood and decided to come up with an idea of reusing the length but committed to a standard width for my scratch built rollingstock, plus added a working space as my last build I kept losing my styrene pieces on the floor. I also decided to cut an aluminum key for the coupler sections which was a guess as I had not bought any couplers at this stage. Model Output and learnings Using my lessons learnt above, things were improving, this styrene build was stronger, like it was one piece, so that was a positive. It started to look a l...
Read more

Prototype Research

-
Knock, knock Australia Post My order from Caintode Flats Products turned up and I will be honest, this was a blind purchase as I had never seen the products in real life. I was not disappointed at all by the level of quality, it was amazing. Unfortunately, I did not take any photos but would recommend checking out the website. I added to my inventory the following:  Bogies Bar Frame, 5Ft 2Ft 2In Brake Cylinders, Combined Air Tank Bogie Screws, #1 X 3/8 In Self Tappers Handbrake Assembly Complete Brass Etch Flex Track Purchase Excited by the purchase I headed down to my local hobby shop and took a bogie to show of my new purchase and explained to the owner I needed some track. He reached behind the cabinet pulled out a thick product catalogue and showed me the limited product range and suggested I think about my layout before purchasing too much product. As I wanted to get my scratch build models onto some simple track, I purchased a couple pieces  Flex track ( PECO SL-1400)...
Read more