Engineering Blog
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Still no operations. Still no Lewistown Yard control panels. But that's about all that didn't go well this quarter. The Middle Division is going gangbusters these days!
On the matrix controllers from Barrett Hill for the Lewistown Yard, I plan on cornering the vendor at the Railroad hobby Show in Springfield and again a week later at Timonium. This is holding up restoration of yard operations and is a hurdle for operating sessions. I have a holiday on January 16th and, on that day, plan to cut the panels themselves.
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The dispatching system on the PRR Middle Division has long been a Windows laptop with two HD (1920x1080) additional displays. Using extended desktop in Windows, I could stretch the JMRI/CATS dispatching panel across the two displays. Although no pixels are "missing" when doing this, the nagging two inch space of the display frames has always been undesirable.
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It's been a great quarter for the PRR Middle Division in HO scale. For starters, we have a new URL: https://prrmiddledivision.com. You can continue to use https://pennsyrr.com, but that will take you to the index page whereas the new URL goes straight to the model railroad page.
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In preparation for operations, I continue to test, test, test the mainlines and the trains thereon. I'm also converting all of my advanced consist addresses to best match the train symbol itself. Seems more logical than picking a random two digit number. For passenger trains, it is simply the train number. For freights, drop the prefix (e.g. "VL-9" becomes "9"). Believe it or not, there was only one conflict!
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Eastbound train #28, the Broadway Limited, powered by a pair of EMD E8's (class EP22), meets the westbound train M-9, powered by a brace of EMD GP-9's (class EFS17M), an intradivisional with a block for Lewistown, along Roundhouse Road on the west side of Lewistown.
It's been a very productive quarter on the Middle Division...
The greatest task at hand, which was largely underestimated, has been the installation of resistors on wheel sets to allow for detection. It's a multi-step process -- 1) removing two axles per car; 2) attaching the resistor with CA and allowing to dry; 3) painting both sides of the resistor with "wire paint" and allowing to dry overnight; 4) overcoating the wire paint with clear nail polish to harden and protect the connection; 5) reinstalling the wheelsets; and 6) testing each car.
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As 2021 comes to a close, there certainly was a lot of turmoil on the PRR Middle Division... a lightning strike, a hurricane's flood, a water heater replacement, and coronovirus (last week).
Despite the setbacks, the Middle Division is going to be better for it moving forward. Following the lightning strike, most electronics were refreshed to more current versions and wiring busses were cleaned up a bit. The only remaining task from that event are reconstruction of the local control panels, which was going to be done anyway. I am changing from glass panels to more traditional panels with Barrett Hill's cup toggles. I was having connectivity issues with the contacts behind the glass.
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When life serves you lemons, you have choices. I opted to make Lemonade... This past Tuesday morning I woke up to a broken water heater. The control board was definitely shot and the unit was 8-10 years old, so a replacement was in order.
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It's been another very productive quarter on the Middle Division. The "missing link" -- the scale track at Lewistown -- has been installed. The yard is now connected with the Lewistown Secondary and, subsequently, the Milroy Secondary.
The Mechanical Department has gotten back in the practice of posting news of new rolling stock acquisitions. The fleet has recently grown by nine tank cars. In addition, the Pennsylvania Midland has received three hopper cars.
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It's been a very productive quarter on the Middle Division. We are getting closer and closer to completing the missing link -- the scale track at Lewistown. Once completed and installed, the yard will connect with the branch and we can start looking forward to operations!