Kato Passenger Locos And Lights

As I ease back into N scale, I'm learning more about installing DCC decoders in Kato locos. Kato takes sort of a middle-of-the-road approach to lighting functions in both N and HO -- it offers ditch lights, which some other manufacturers don't, but they're lit from a single light bar, so they can't be turned on and off separately from the headlight, and they won't flash alternately. You can fix this with extra work, but so far, I'm not inclined to do it.

Here's a TCS K0D8-A decoder that I recently installed in a Kato P42:

There are lots of ins and outs with Kato lighting, even with the simplified representation. I get a lot of inspiration for working in N from YouTube (and for those who make a standard lament that no young people are coming into the hobby, I would counter that a lot of middle school, high school, and college-age modelers and railfans post videos there). But one thing I note is that few guys install the headlight lenses and numberboards that come as "user installable" on Kato N P42s. They're easy to ignore, but they make a small difference:

One thing that's missing from the Kato N P42 is red tail lights that light up in reverse. However, based on what I see in prototype YouTube videos, their use varies. When P42s run in reverse on passenger trains, such as when there's a cab car. NPCU, or another loco on the front, the red tail lights are normally lit. However, this may depend on the particular rules in effect on the territory. Distributed power freight units on the rear of trains don't have tail lights, and what you normally see is the headlight facing rear on dim with no ditch lights -- this is a standard rule indicating the track is occupied.

I've seen P42s running on the rear of trains on YouTube with the headlight on dim facing rear and no red tail lights as well. I also see YouTube videos of prototype light engine moves on the CSX Boston line with the unit facing rear with both headlight dim and ditch lights lit, but no red tail lights. (This is also a reminder that light engine moves do happen on Amtrak and can add variety to model operation.) I programmed the TCS K0D8-A decoders on my Kato P42s to allow the headlights to dim in reverse:

Note also that DCC allows the headlight to be turned off completely on the trailing unit.

The slightly newer Kato N MP36 has headlights-ditch lights that light forward and red tail lights that light in reverse:

The MP36 also comes with numberboards and headlight lenses installed.

The Kato N Sumitomo cab cars have headlights-ditch lights that light when the car is running forward on analog DC and red tail lights that light up in reverse, again on DC. With DCC, both sets of lights are constantly lit.

Kato supplies a limited-function FL12 decoder that allows the headlights and tail lights to be controlled in DCC. I haven't installed one in the car above yet.

More P&LE

More than two years ago I posted on my then-new Bachmann P&LE GP7. After I worked with it for a while, I realized the Bachmann factory decoder had very limited features and a compulsory speed curve. (Some earlier Bachmann GP7s and 9s had factory decoders with NMRA plugs, but newer ones like the P&LE have boards with integral decoders). I gradually replaced the factory boards in several, but then I discovered the NCE BACH-DSL decoder that is specifically meant to replace Bachmann boards with integral decoders. This makes the job much easier and includes replacement LEDs.

After that post, I renumbered it from 5676 to 5682. As far as I can tell, P&LE freight units had Pacemaker green bodies with, in the 1950s, gray lightning stripes. Passenger units like 5682 had black bodies, so by renumbering to 5682 I solved two problems, avoiding the conflict with my Atlas 5676 and making the black body more prototypical:

Here's the new BACH-DSL board for 5682 in place:

With the new board in place, I speed matched Bachmann 5682 to Atlas 5676. I had to fiddle with the vMid CV6 to get it to run fast enough to match the Atlas, as well as increase the momentum values CV3 and 4 to match the freer-running Atlas unit. Now they run pretty well together -- wouldn't have happened without DCC:

Here's a Howard Fogg postcard of P&LE GP7s:

Here's a P&LE boxcar I found at the Simi Valley swap last Saturday:

Railfanning The San Joaquin Valley

I made a quick trip with my wife up to a favorite place in the San Joaquin Valley last week, and in the process I got to do some railfanning. The prime sites like Cajon, Tehachapi, Donner, the Coast, and so forth tend to overshadow some good spots in the Valley. Here's the recent Amtrak/CalDOT Bakersfield depot:

This replaced a primitive AmHut that I photographed in 1995:

The Amtrak/CDOT trains run on the BNSF line from Bakersfield until they get to the Bay Area, where they transfer to the ex-SP UP line to Oakland. It parallels California Route 43, which is much less intense than Route 99 (which parallels the UP). It's much easier to pull to the side of the road and photograph oncoming trains. In addition, since the line hosts 79 mph passenger trains, there's more variety, with interesting signals.

Here's a grab shot from the car window:

An interesting MOW scene at East Angiola:

An Amtrak/CalDOT southbound meeting a northbound BNSF. An ex-F40 NPCU leads

The train is made up of ex-NJT Jersey Arrow cars. Today it's being pushed by an Amtrak P42:

On the way home I caught new San Joaquin Valley Railroad power on the Bowerbank Local with my new phone:

Models And Early Railfan Days

By 1960, I was in my early teens and had begun to look more closely at trains, which fascinated me from early childhood. Over the next several years I was able to ride the PRR main from New Brunswick to Philadelphia, and then much more frequently from New York to Washington. One of the things that fascinated me was the PRR's hopper cars, and as I got more interested in modeling, I began to realize that the most common models, the Athearn bluebox quad hopper, the harder-to-find Varney twin, and the impossibly expensive and hard to locate Ulrich cars, didn't look like anything that ran on the PRR at the time.

In high school -- this would be 1965 -- I got a case of mono and spent several weeks in bed. By then I'd located diagrams of the PRR H36 and H39 hoppers, and with lots of time on my hands, I began to build models from cardboard using the dimensions in the diagrams. I eventually finished three of them. I still have the bodies, but the only available decals were Walthers, pretty bad. They were also flimsy and light, and I never was really able to operate them. Over the years I made various efforts to make them operable, but so far, still no success. Here's one in its current condition:

Almost 20 years later, I made a second try at mass producing the kind of PRR hoppers I saw in the early 1960s. This time I had access to a table saw, and I found some scrap lumber at a nearby construction site that I was able to cut roughly into PRR H39s. Here's an idea of what I did:

A finished one is behind it. Not long ago I found another one of the roughly half dozen I finished in the early 1980s, fixed it up a little and got it in running order, but I still have to touch up the paint:

If I can find where I packed the others away, I'll work on them, too.

But at the same time I worked on mass producing these, I decided to do what I could to upgrade the cardboard H36s I did in 1965. Here's one where I got a certain way with removing the cardboard sides and attaching them to a newly-built wood sub body:

The biggest obstacle to finishing these is finding either plastic or wood T-section shapes for the side ribs.

A Quick Railfan Trip Downtown

I got a new cell phone last week, which now has a video camera. I took a quick trip on Metrolink to test it out -- here are some results:

I also got some regular shots from a Metrolink train of the Amtrak facilities at 8th Street:

These are all an indication of how much I like passenger and commuter prototypes.

More On The Potential Of T-Trak

Before MRVP ran its series on T-Trak last year, I didn't even know what it was. But I'd had vague thoughts about ways to revive my interest in N scale -- in the 1970s and 80s, I built several small N layouts, but once I got the space for my current HO layout, my interest basically went dormant.

T-Trak allows domino-style layout design using manageably small modules and standard Unitrack components. The layout base can be inexpensive and easy-to-place folding tables. However, most T-Trak layouts are temporary, assembled at modular railroad meets. This is very limiting, and the limits are reflected in the T-Trak standards: the double-track ovals are to be wired for opposite-polarity opposite-directional DC operation. This means that the typical module meet layouts run large double-track circuits with the main lines running trains in opposite directions.

I guess this is fine for weekend type shows that have the object of maximum throughput for member trains. The roundy-roundy operation doesn't get old if you're just doing it for the weekend. But think of what's left out.

For instance, Unitrack has both single and double crossovers, but opposite-polarity wiring means you can't use them between main lines if you follow the T-trak standards. (If you could use them, you'd definitely have to have a dispatcher, though, which could make things impossibly complicated for a weekend show.)

But a home layout built to the physical T-Trak standards but without the limiting wiring requirements is a very different matter. In addition, the way David Popp built the MRVP T-Trak modules takes away a key advantage: he built them with a solid floor but filled the volume of the box with styrofoam. This leaves out the ability to place various electrical components under the layout surface:

This in turn lets you take advantage of additional DCC features like stationary decoders, which work very well with Unitrack. You can also start to add signals and at least rudimentary signal controls:

But I'm also noticing a school of modeling where guys aren't afraid to cross oceans and include Amtrak, TGVs, Shinkansens, and the like on one layout. Especially for T-Trak, this is appealing. The MRVP T-Trak modules followed prototypes from the Canadian rockies though the midwest down to coastal Florida, and somehow it all worked. No reason you can't add a little bit of France!

On a trip to France in 1995, I found some N scale French signals. French signals are miniature Eiffel towers and incredibly complex. Here are some prototype shots I got on that trip:

Here are two of the French N signal models I have:

I've added a blog called Quinntopia to my blogroll -- the guy has a similar philosophy to mine in N. My French signals will look great with TGVs!

Not Quite The End Of Rewiring

As I mentioned in my last post, one part of this project has been replacing nearly all the twin-coil switch machines from nearly 30 years ago. This has been a bigger issue because these were installed from the bottom up with a body almost 30 years younger, and the few that are left are pretty far back under the layout. No way I'm climbing back under there.

I had been thinking about what to do when the twin-coils finally gave out for quite a while. Eventually I decided the best thing would be to replace the switches themselves, early Walthers-Shinohara code 83, with Kato Unitrack HO powered #6s. These have the switch machines built into the roadbed, no need to get under the table at all, and just a two-wire hookup to a Digitrax DS52 for control. I decided that all I needed to do was clear out the cork roadbed, cut and carve out a space for the new Kato switch, and move the new one in. In fact, I could just get rid of the old Eshelman turnout link and leave the old twin-coil where it is.

My experience with Kato switches and DCC on my T-Trak layout convinced me this would work. Here's the sequence:

I discovered a spoon is a good tool for prying up cork ballast and dispersing old ballast clumps. A shop vac is then important for cleanup.

The Kato HO Unitrack switches are very robust and operate beautifully. The downside is the tie spacing is a lot wider than is common in the US. I airbrushed some Floquil Railroad Tie Brown over it to de-emphasize the ties.

Test run over the switch. Works great! This was about a 3-day project. One more like this to do, then two Tortoises to hook up to DS52s and a last twin-coil to repace with a Smail.