Quoting Scot:

"Maine 2-footers..
converting On30 models, that are based on Maine 2-footers (like the Forney, and "maine style" rolling stock) to On2."

Dear Scot,

How hard are these conversions to do?  Does Bachmann (or any other On30 manufacturer) anticipate such a conversion by making it any easier for you to do?

Sincerely,

Joe Satnik

Dear All,

This might be preaching to the choir, but I'll do it anyway. 

Hey, you guys missed a real important reason to have more pickups in the tender:

It makes more sense to have the DCC receiver close to the most pickups, and close to the motor.  Anyone with common sense would put the DCC receiver in the locomotive, not the tender. 

Guess where they end up?  In the tender, of course. 

Say you have 5 axels of pickup on the loco, and only 2 on the tender (4 half axels).  Those five wheels worth of loco pickup are combined and sent out a connector and across one of two fragile wires to the DCC socket in the tender.  If either wire breaks (usually at the plug), you've lost 5 of your 7 pickups on that side.

If the DCC socket were in the loco, you would only lose 2 of the 7 wheels with a broken wire in the track power umbilical.

Let's put 4 axels worth of pickup in the tender along with 5 in the loco.  Break an umbilical wire and you only have 5 of the 9 wheels dead on that side, with 4 still alive.  Four wheels alive is much better than two.

Hope this helps. 

Sincerely,

Joe Satnik 

Edit: changed "two fragile wires" to "one of two fragile wires" in Paragraph 5 above.  

Dear Jim,

Hmm.  Hand laid track and turnouts.  Looks like someone has been bit by the On30 bug pretty hard.

I assume that you have seen Mink's thread and link to his article on tie length:

http://www.bachmanntrains.com/home-usa/board/index.php/topic,5666.0.html

If you wanted the proper illusion, I guess your tie length would depend on the prototype's actual gauge, 36", 30" or 24".

I'm not sure that it makes too much difference, but the math works out that HO standard gauge track is about 31.1" gauge in O scale, a bit bigger than 30".   

Your dogs deserve extra tummy scratching for their diligent efforts to protect your empire from feline influence (or would that be "outfluence").

Sincerely,

Joe Satnik

Dear ME,

Here is Bachmann's:

http://www.bachmanntrains.com/home-usa/products.php?act=viewProd&productId=1086

You could also Google "conductive lube" or "conductive lube hobby" or "Bachmann 99981"

Hope this helps.

Dear All,

Does anyone have a favorite source for Bachmann Conductive Lube # 99981 ?  Thanks.

Sincerely,

Joe Satnik

Awesome.  Congrats to you and WoundedSheBear.

Sincerely,

Joe Satnik 

Dear All,

Think about it.  When we pull up in our vehicles to lowered bars and flashing lights and watch a train pass in front of us, where are we? 

Are we at a railroad crossover or a railroad crossing?

I've seen this thread for 10 days now and have just caught this. 

One of the most powerful things about Google is that it recognizes and corrects spelling errors, and in some cases word errors.

Caffeine drip, please.

Sincerely,

Joe Satnik

Dear Jack,

Your welcome.  When things pop into my brain I have to make a (fuzzy logic) decision... is this interesting/useful enough (and not too whacked out) to post? 

(interesting enough+useful enough)&not(too whacked out)=post

Sincerely,

Joe Satnik

Dear GovB,

I believe the advertisers are saving copy space by omitting numbers on like items with different paint. 

They get in the ball park with the "generic" item number, then zero in on it when you specify the railway or paint scheme.

Hope this helps.

Sincerely,

Joe Satnik   

Jim,

If there are any cats around, kitty litter for ballast is not a good idea.

SF,

American HO is 1:87.1 scale, O is 1:48. 

87.1 divided by 48 is 1.81. 

So your O scale buildings and scenery have to be 1.81 times as large as your HO buildings and scenery.  To enlarge your HO scale building plans (drawings) to O scale, set your photocopier to 181 %.

The reason things work out (ie, locos end up being about the same length) is that the On30 prototypes are much smaller than the HO prototypes.

Some plastics deteriorate in the sun.  Outdoor track (and anything else left outdoors) would have to be UV ray resistant, waterproof, and withstand extremes of temperature.  I suppose a coat of exterior paint would help the plastic ties and roadbed.     

I'm not sure if anyone specifically makes HO or On30 track for outdoors.

Your rails would need cleaning/light oiling more often than indoors.  You would need to solder feeder wires to every section of track, as dirt, oxidation, expansion and flexing would quickly render slip on rail connectors useless for conducting electricity.     

Only 2 rules apply to layout size:

1.  Any place on your board must be reachable. 

For most humans this is around 2.5 feet, or 30 inches from the edge.   Double that (= 5 feet) for width if accessable from both sides.  Larger layouts have "pop-up" holes cut out for access.  (Crawling under the table "gets old" as you get older.)   

2.  If you want more than 22" radius (circles or ovals), you will need a board wider than 4 feet. 

5 feet width will give you 28" max radius in HO/On30.  So the magic number seems to be 5 ft. width.   A ping-pong table is 5 feet wide.  Get a used one cheap in the classified ads.  Another way is to use your carpentry skills to join sheets of plywood or blue/pink insulation together (with smooth and level joints) to get 5 feet width. 

Hope this helps.

Sincerely,

Joe Satnik       

Dear Johnd,

I'm slow, 2 others beat me to the punch.  I'll post anyway.

Roughly speaking, on a numbered turnout the divergent track moves sideways 1 unit of length for every # units of length down the straight route. 

So, a #4 turnout diverges 1 inch sideways for every 4 inches down the straight route. 

A higher # turnout is naturally longer than a lower # turnout. 

The regular Bachamann N turnout is not numbered.  Its divergent route is curved as a "drop in" replacement for a common radius curve section. 

If you want close sidings with the regular N turnout, you will have start cutting the divergent route...not a pretty sight.  You would have to be careful to cut the curved portion square and plumb. 

In addition to square and plumb, its "return to parallel" curve would have to be cut exactly the length needed to get the siding back paralell to the main route.  A bit of a challenge...   

IIRC, the regular N turnout has a power routed diverging route. 

Hopefully someone from the N Scale board will jump in to confirm or refute. 

Sincerely,

Joe Satnik

Dear Jack,

Noted and corrected.  Thanks.

Hope my reference brought a smile...

Emily Litella: I'm here tonight to speak out against busting schoolchildren. Busting schoolchildren is a terrible, terrible thing. ...

Good ol' Gilda Radner.  Gene must miss her.   

I figured out why my brain went to "the leafy variety" of plants.... Garden (Large Scale) Railroading.....

Sincerely,

Joe Satnik

My condolences.   You were blessed to have known her.

Sincerely,

Joe Satnik

Dear Far,

I'm gonna guess this is a DCC ready engine running on a DC power pack.

Does it have a socket in the tender?

Try putting it on a layout with a DCC controller (analog channel) to see if it is bright enough.

There is a resistor somewhere in your engine or tender that limits the current through your LED.  The resistor may have to have its value lowered to be bright enough at normal speeds on a DC power pack.

Hope this helps.

Sincerely,

Joe Satnik   

Dear Waz,

Sounds to me like the "vertical curve" at the top of your hill is too abrupt. 

I'm guessing that the first unit is lifting the second unit's wheels off the tracks. 

I suppose one way to test that theory would be to uncouple the two engines and temporarily "tow strap" them together.  (Bread tie?) 

If this corrects the problem, you will need to make a more gentle transition from slope to flat at the top of the hill. 

Do you still have lights when the lockup occurs?

Hope this helps.

Sincerely,

Joe Satnik 

Dear Jay,

You need to have an Ohm-meter for these tests. 

Turn your crossover over on the bench.  Unplug the two frog wires.  Flip it over again with the pigtails of the frog wires sticking out from underneath.

Using an Ohm-meter, probe from one pigtail to the frog on that side.  There should be a low Ohms connection (less than 1 ohm). 

Keep one probe on the wire pigtail, then probe all the rails on the crossover and the other frog.  There should be no connection to any other rail or the other frog.  (High Ohms.)

Repeat with the frog wire pigtail on the other side.

I have heard of rail segements sliding down the turnout and touching (shorting to) the frog.

Hope this helps.

Sincerely,

Joe Satnik