Off to the racecourse.....at Caulfield.

There is a good reason why a fair bit of infrastructure work is going on Victoria Street at the moment. Victoria Street has been nominated and accepted to exhibit at the AMRA-Vic Branch August Exhibition, (23rd-24th August) at Caulfield Racecourse.

Doing the form.

 

So how would the layout read in a racing form guide, something like this....

 

"

VICTORIA STREET

 

A 5 year old tramway shelf layout out of Something Different (Carendt USA) & Some Bit Of Time.

 

Last Three Starts:

                             2012-Sunshine Model Railway Club Exhibition. Reconfigured Layout

                             2011-Sunshine Model Railway Club Exhibition. Extended Layout

                             2010-Sunshine Model Railway Club Exhibition. Original set up.

 

Gear Changes since last Start:

                             Fitted with NCE DCC Powercab/USB interface with JMRI Decoder Pro.

 

Form Analysis:

                             The removal of block wiring and the installation of DCC has improved the operational options of this layout, coming off a long spell (two years) from its last three runs at Sunshine, it finally gets a chance in town. Watch with interest.                                                       "

So there you go, you can wander into Caulfield with your smartphone loaded with either Wi Throttle (I phone) or Engine Driver (Android) app, say G'day and make yourself known, after which you may be invited to 'cut a notch' on Victoria Street.

In an effort to facilitate safer working for guest drivers, Perspex barriers have been install at the ends of the layout, so to prevent trams diving off and onto the floor, as momentum is sometimes a cruel mistress. Some reworking was required so the larger trams did not foul the terminus points. The Perspex was courtesy of one those gift boxed bottle of wine/dodgy port boxes.

 

 "It's like some sort of weird force field"

  

stealing millimetres, everyone counts

 

 

Those familiar with Caulfield, know that it can have some rather dim corners in the exhibition space, that is why the lighting side of Victoria Street is now a priority.

Studying the form from under wires.
Glenn




 

Happy Birthday 845

Today marks the 75th anniversary of SW5 845 entering service, the oldest tram currently still in revenue service, be it on the route 30 (Monday to Friday, Latrobe St Shuttle from Docklands to St Vincent's Plaza [City-Brunswick St]). 845 occasional fills in on City Circle duties from time to time.

 

The new and the reliable.

E 6003 & SW5 845 on Victoria Parade, East Melbourne.

(Photo courtesy of Tramsdownunder)

 

 

Something to ponder, just because it is 'experienced' does not mean it can no longer still earn its keep. 

 

 

From under the wires

Glenn

Taking a step back to go forwards.

Now that all the modules have now been rewired with the DCC bus, finer details are now being added to individual modules.

The railway station module, being the master module, from well before DCC had been fitted with lights and internal details, the challenge is to retrofit the other modules.  The Racecourse module has just had street/effect (tree) lights fitted, which is good because now I can run trams again, be it on a truncated layout.

 

The end of the line at the end of the day.
 

 

 

Victoria Street in its original profile.
 

 

 

Now I wonder if the substation can handle all of this.
 

 

 

Plug and Play

(DCC bus plugs and lighting [RCA] plugs)

The terminal strip will allow potential grounded rail/overhead running on DCC 

 

The LED lighting was starting to drive me mad, streetlights too bright, effect (tree) lights too dim, and I had enough of sampling/changing fixed value resistors for the look I was after, so I installed 1K ohm mini trimpots inline to each circuit, (yes, we now have dimmable mood lights!)  The feed into the trimpots has a 470 ohm resistor in series as safety in the event I bottom out the trimpots to zero ohms when adjusting brightness.
 

Now not to get too distracted from the other tasks.

 

From under the streetlights and the wires.

Glenn