Earlier this year, I took this blog offline for a variety of reasons – lack of time was one of them, and the cost factor also played a role. I wasn’t sure whether it would come back, but I kept a backup either way. But in the meantime, some good progress was made on the build, and a few other things happened which both warrant articles to examine them in detail, and made me feel like I want to write about them.
Here’s a quick summary, more detailed articles will be forthcoming.
There have been new additions to the fleet – an Auscision B Class locomotive, a second X200 from IDR, and a beautiful set of Deutsche Reichsbahn Y/B passenger cars. The X200s have been given an upgrade in the form of a keepalive, which makes them run beautifully.
There have been departures also – Zebra was passed on to someone who had more use for it than we did. Ditto for the Lima RoA carriages – there are better rolling stock options for use with the intended locos.
There has been work on a Mk II of the Programming Box, the results of which I am very happy with.
Lastly, and most importantly, the track on the base layer of the new layout has been laid, bedded and wired up. While there is still a lot more track work to be done, including an elevated layer and a shadow staging layer, we can now actually run trains! The below video shows a preview. Ignore the fact that NR52 is pulling Queensland rolling stock – it was a spur-of-the-moment setup.
There will be more soon – stay tuned!