Ivan Locksmith's (A good friend of Lord Kernow of Brent, aka Cap't Kernow) Zeiss Super Ikonta peers through Sweet's bridge at 82005 which was recently recently transfered from the deepest Wales to Wadebridge. Its train slowly gliding over Polbrock's open crossing with a Wadebridge bound service on a sultry summer's day in 1961.
Having just penned the final part of Polbrock for Model Rail, I've very much enjoyed taking some snaps of the 'finished' layout. Of course a layout is never finished, but for this little project I've had to draw the line from a writing point of view. This is one of several views taken, this one in warm black and white having quite a nice feel. Most will know that I often add a wisp of smoke, not enough to fool people, but just a hint, a suggestion, the sort of thing that maybe the brain imagines when watching a model railway loco in full flight. This time I used some real smoke pinched from Clan Line last week speeding past in the pouring rain commemorating 45 years of the end of Southern Region steam. The shot was a disaster, I was concentrating on the loco so much I totally mis-cropped it and lost the back of the train - oh well!
Looking forward to the next layout project I'm thinking of something very different, and working on some ideas for a present day scenario based on a real location with DCC on a whopping 12 feet of baseboard. It's always good to try something new, and whilst modern day isn't (Cement Quay) new to me, DCC is, so there'll be lots of new things to learn. The 12 feet of layout will be on 3 baseboards, but I don't want the backscene to have joins, so that's another aspect I'll be working on along with ways to make it easy to transport around and take up minimal space when not being used. All this but without compromising the presentation, for most people know that my one of bet hates are layouts with 3 inch high damaged backscenes and a tatty old drape on the front hanging off drawing pins. I also want to develop some other aspects like loading loose minerals along with some DCC sound and a mostly hands free operation. Watch this space!
About Me
- Chris Nevard Model Railways & Photography
- Professional Photographer, Model Maker, Writer & Pretend Musician
Showing posts with label DCC. Show all posts
Showing posts with label DCC. Show all posts
16 July 2012
22 June 2012
‘Lenz 100’ a make of East German taxi?
When it comes to model trains whilst the day jobs of photography and broadcast telly embrace the latest in technology, I have in contrast never been happy with model railway ‘tech’, having a fear of wires, controllers and all the bits underneath the baseboard that make these models of ours move to some kind of order. I am a Luddite, in fact I am the father of Luddite, being even more tech-sceptical than the most Luddite of Luddites when it comes to toy chuffers.
Given the choice, I am far happier with a paintbrush that a soldering iron, if only for the fact that if I get paint on clothes it may well wash out, but a soldering iron will painfully burn me and make holes in my attire. It does similar things to carpets, so much so that the spare room has a strategically placed rug to hide that molten burn created by me dropping a soldering iron into the cheap synthetic carpets left by the previous owners.
What’s all this got to do with DCC? Well to be honest DCC has never really interested me, certainly not enough to make me want to splash out on such. But because one of my jobs is to visit people with wonderful trainsets, my pals at the magazine have been slowly slipping me bits of DCC stuff to me to try to motivate me into understanding a little more about some of the modellers I visit who increasingly have ‘gone DCC’.
Looking back, this all started off with the loan a ‘Lenz 100’, which I must admit has been sat in my loft since we moved a couple of years ago, the Lenz sounding more like a make of East German taxi than something to do with toy chuffers.
Then the day before yesterday, having all but totally forgotten about that box, I was given a Bachmann Class 24 with built in sound for ‘familiarization purposes’, the thought I think being that ‘it will help me bond with the readers and understand their needs’.
Moving on 24 hours, I’m sat there looking like a small child on Christmas Day with a length of track, a shiny loco, various electronic bits that look like the immobiliser from that East German taxi, and some rather drab wordy looking manuals which look like they’re aimed at software developers rather than Luddite man.
My wife tends to operate the Sky + box at home, for to me it’s a reminder of much of the second rate TV programming I tend to get involved with when not behind a camera. She saw me baffled by Lenz 100 East German Taxi immobiliser instructions, and because woman actually read the instructions she got the loco running to and fro along the yard of track with the same dexterity seen when she flicks between Eastenders and Big Brother whilst recording Big Fat Gypsy Weddings all at the same time.
There was still the problem of the sound, the loco sounding no different to any other loco I’ve played with in the last 30 or so years. The Lenz instructions were a little vague in this area, so they were put back in the box as my wife was engrossed in CSI New York. Next I did ‘the Google thing’, but nothing there was really of much use, though I did find out a little about Soviet Army infrared low light lens technology from 1981 suggesting I’d used the wrong keywords.
Because some of this DCC thing is about getting to know our readers a little better, as well as hopefully having a little more insight as to why I don’t like running trains, what better than ask one of these fine souls who for some reason want to ‘like’ my smoke and mirrors approach to model railways? Some time ago I set up a Facebook page to share my modelling activities and to see other model maker’s work, so Thursday evening posted words to the effect of ‘help I haven’t a clue’. Within a few minutes I was in possession of just the numbers required to punch in to get the loco horn to “mee-marr” and the sound of that Sulzer chortle so familiar of this class. Marvelous - thank you!
As a photographer it might be thought that there’s little advantage of DCC, but of course it allows loco lights to be lit without the loco moving as the above photo demonstrates. In the past I’d have slowly increased the power until the lights glowed, a fine balance to which anyone will know who runs DC is just as the loco starts to move. Gone are blurred locos which moved during the exposure or some obstacle just out of frame to stop the loco moving.
As for the sound, I wish I’d had it years ago when we shared walls with that family from hell, I could have blocked out their trashy 4am music, or tooted the loco horn several times just as I thought they’d finally nodded off at 8am. Moving on and leaving evil thoughts well behind, I wonder what a SDJR 7F would sound like with a sound chip?
Given the choice, I am far happier with a paintbrush that a soldering iron, if only for the fact that if I get paint on clothes it may well wash out, but a soldering iron will painfully burn me and make holes in my attire. It does similar things to carpets, so much so that the spare room has a strategically placed rug to hide that molten burn created by me dropping a soldering iron into the cheap synthetic carpets left by the previous owners.
What’s all this got to do with DCC? Well to be honest DCC has never really interested me, certainly not enough to make me want to splash out on such. But because one of my jobs is to visit people with wonderful trainsets, my pals at the magazine have been slowly slipping me bits of DCC stuff to me to try to motivate me into understanding a little more about some of the modellers I visit who increasingly have ‘gone DCC’.
Looking back, this all started off with the loan a ‘Lenz 100’, which I must admit has been sat in my loft since we moved a couple of years ago, the Lenz sounding more like a make of East German taxi than something to do with toy chuffers.
Then the day before yesterday, having all but totally forgotten about that box, I was given a Bachmann Class 24 with built in sound for ‘familiarization purposes’, the thought I think being that ‘it will help me bond with the readers and understand their needs’.
Moving on 24 hours, I’m sat there looking like a small child on Christmas Day with a length of track, a shiny loco, various electronic bits that look like the immobiliser from that East German taxi, and some rather drab wordy looking manuals which look like they’re aimed at software developers rather than Luddite man.
My wife tends to operate the Sky + box at home, for to me it’s a reminder of much of the second rate TV programming I tend to get involved with when not behind a camera. She saw me baffled by Lenz 100 East German Taxi immobiliser instructions, and because woman actually read the instructions she got the loco running to and fro along the yard of track with the same dexterity seen when she flicks between Eastenders and Big Brother whilst recording Big Fat Gypsy Weddings all at the same time.
There was still the problem of the sound, the loco sounding no different to any other loco I’ve played with in the last 30 or so years. The Lenz instructions were a little vague in this area, so they were put back in the box as my wife was engrossed in CSI New York. Next I did ‘the Google thing’, but nothing there was really of much use, though I did find out a little about Soviet Army infrared low light lens technology from 1981 suggesting I’d used the wrong keywords.
Because some of this DCC thing is about getting to know our readers a little better, as well as hopefully having a little more insight as to why I don’t like running trains, what better than ask one of these fine souls who for some reason want to ‘like’ my smoke and mirrors approach to model railways? Some time ago I set up a Facebook page to share my modelling activities and to see other model maker’s work, so Thursday evening posted words to the effect of ‘help I haven’t a clue’. Within a few minutes I was in possession of just the numbers required to punch in to get the loco horn to “mee-marr” and the sound of that Sulzer chortle so familiar of this class. Marvelous - thank you!
As a photographer it might be thought that there’s little advantage of DCC, but of course it allows loco lights to be lit without the loco moving as the above photo demonstrates. In the past I’d have slowly increased the power until the lights glowed, a fine balance to which anyone will know who runs DC is just as the loco starts to move. Gone are blurred locos which moved during the exposure or some obstacle just out of frame to stop the loco moving.
As for the sound, I wish I’d had it years ago when we shared walls with that family from hell, I could have blocked out their trashy 4am music, or tooted the loco horn several times just as I thought they’d finally nodded off at 8am. Moving on and leaving evil thoughts well behind, I wonder what a SDJR 7F would sound like with a sound chip?
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