CoffeeShop XXXVII-5/1/2013


And of course this begs the question: what's wrong with 4 digit addresses? Every locomotive I have has the cab number as the address.

I use 4 digit addressing for individual locomotives, and two digits for consists. MRC Prodigy system is essentially limited to two digit addresses. When a three digit road number is involved, I add a leading zero to the number (0602). Normally, I have no more than two consists running at a time, so I find it easy to track them.

If one is operating more than several consists at a time it could get complicated, I guess.

Joe
 
Good Morning

Well, we found 2" of snow on our lawn this morning...now pretty much melted off..thankfully...going to a high of 44F later on...

Doing the work from home thing this morning..then off to meetings this afternoon...project managing is so much fun....

Mayhaps may get some train time in later on...I do have an operating session planned for Wednesday...heeheehee

Have a great day peoples!!
 
Good morning folks

It was 45 F as I hit the bright and sunny highways this morning. Our high is supposed to be a chilly 57 F.

It was a busy weekend. My son had a camping trip with his Jamboree Troop. They got wet during as they experienced thunderstorms and heavy downpours on Friday night and Saturday. My son’s Philmont experience came to play this weekend as he was the only scout to get the camp fire going with the soaked wood they had on hand. He learned how to do that on the various training backpacking trips he took before going to Philmont. As he explained you figured out how to do if wanted something hot to eat and be warm. He had a very good time.

My daughter had her Junior Prom Saturday night. She had a great time although she had to spend most of the day getting beautiful. The prom was supposed to be outside but due to the thunderstorms and rain they moved into the gym. My daughter actually liked that since it meant no steps to walk up and down in courtyard where the prom was originally planned to be. The one drawback was the gym is not air-conditioned.

Mothers’ Day was nice. My wife did her traditional planting of the flowers. We had a quiet dinner at one of our favorite Chinese restaurants.

Club volleyball is done. My daughter missed her team’s last tournament this weekend due to the conflict with her prom. She has about a month off and then her high school team is supposed to play in a summer league. Also at the end of June she has a college prospect camp to attend.

Tonight my son has a Boy Scout troop meeting. Tomorrow my daughter receives recognition from the School Board for coming in third place for 11th graders at the Central League Creative Writing Contest.

I hope everybody has a good day.
 
Good morning. It's 68° with 43% humidity. It'll be sunny with a high of 82°.
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Plans for today include going into town. I have to go to the bank then to the pharmacy. Other than that I'll be doing some more cleanup on the layout. A bit at a time, a piece here and a piece there.

The word for today is yági. That can be needle, fork, nail. One word, three uses.

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Jeffery- So, if I'm told ,"yagi you!", I have to figure out if I've been needled, forked or nailed?
Too much strain on my brain!
 
Jeffery- So, if I'm told ,"yagi you!", I have to figure out if I've been needled, forked or nailed?
Too much strain on my brain!
It depends on the context in which it's used. When you're eating a yági would be a fork unless the conversion is about sewing in which case it could be a needle. If the conversation is about carpentry it could mean nail unless the person saying it is asking for a fork. On the other hand someone could be looking to nail you for having the gall to needle them about dropping their fork.:D
 
Just in case anybody is wondering, it was Monday here today.
All day.
Someday maybe I'll write a book titled "When Mondays Attack!":rolleyes:
 
Just in case anybody is wondering, it was Monday here today.
All day.
Glory be! It was here too. Felt like it too.

*

Got my business in town taken care of today. The bank business was just a $30 deposit but when you're as poor as I am that's a lot of money. Went to the pharmacy and got refills on the meds I needed. Didn't get much done on the layout today. I tore down the two new (rebuilds) GP40's and put them back together just to make sure I did it right in the first place and for the fun of it. Later I got wrapped up in a movie about Ernie Pyle. If you don't know the name look it up. He's well worth reading about. Tonight I'm watching something from 1949 called 'Canadian Pacific' starring Randolph Scott.

Time for me to call it a night. See y'all tomorrow.

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Good Evening:

Most of my time was consumed with yard work. I elected to grill burgers and dogs for our dinner. Once the sun left the patio, and with the wind out of the NW, it was cold. I turned the first two burgers into crispy critters. Losing my touch as a "Grillmaster" The replacements + the hot dogs turned out much better.

Well, it was Monday, all day....

Joe
 
Good Evening:

...I elected to grill burgers and dogs for our dinner. Once the sun left the patio, and with the wind out of the NW, it was cold. I turned the first two burgers into crispy critters. Losing my touch as a "Grillmaster" The replacements + the hot dogs turned out much better.

Well, it was Monday, all day....

Joe

Hey Joe! What a coincidence! First yes, it was Monday all day here too;). I had my IGG treatment today, and this one was rough. These things make me feel like I've been beat with a baseball bat, and today was worse than others. The air was just cool enough to make me cold all day due to the IGG temperature, (from the fridge). It got to 70` at my house and I had to wear a jacket to try to keep warm. Then the wife woke up, she's been working nights the past two weeks, and she wanted some burgers as well.

I made up the burgers, putting some shredded cheese and bacon bits in them, and smoked them in the smoker for almost 2 hours. Even I have to admit, that as bad as I felt, they were worth the pain! Talk about melting in your mouth!

I had finished basically rebuliding two Rivarossi Allegheny's for a customer down in South Alabama, and when we put them on his layout they ran flawlessly. The Tsunamis I installed in them were in top form and they performed fabulously as well. The customer was so satisfied, he didn't even blink an eye at the bill, and even gave me a substantial tip.:D

The locos had been at another repair shop for over 18 months, and that guy had been unable to get started on them, other than to destroy a early Tsunami in one of them and remove the wiring from both of them. He was just supposed to replace the front engine on one of them, and install a Tsunami in the other. Why he stripped the wiring out of them, IDK. Instead when they were shipped to me, I got two Alleghenys in parts, and another that was broken to be used to supply parts to repair both of them. Both of the locomotives were missing a lot of detail parts from them, but I was able to find most of the missing parts scattered in the boxes the locos came in. The eccentric cranks on one were totally shattered, and being plastic, there was no way to replace just those. It took an entire set of axles, wheels and valve gear from the parts queen to repair it.

I also had to totally rewire them, replacing the lights with LEDs, and using some Circuitron mini connectors to repair one with. I had to rewire them without any kind of diagram. I tested wire ends with a meter separating all the wires so I could attach the wires where they were supposed to go. the guy has also removed some components from the circuit boards inside the loco and tenders, so this turned into a true hard wire install of the Tsunamis.

There were supposed to be also two numbers, 1631 and 1633. Instead there was only two 1633's and no extra cabs in the boxes. I had to repaint one of the cabs and renumber it, and had discovered that the lower boiler shell had been broken, and I replaced it with the lower boiler shell from the broken parts queen. It had been heavily weathered and I had to paint the lower section of it as well. The paint didn't quite match, but it did turn out well, and the customer said it added character to the loco.

Overall I discovered that I no longer wanted one of these from Rivarossi, and I will definitely keep my 1964 brass Akane!
 
Good morning, and happy Tuesday.
Yesterday was the Monday from hell. Usually I can handle Mondays, but this time it seemed like several of them ganged up on me at once.
I hope today will be better. Among the chores for today is to consider what to do about a new $80,000 travel trailer an employee burned up all the wiring in yesterday.
 
Good morning. Geez, my Monday wasn't good [what Monday ever is when your working?] but I suppose it wasn't as bad as it was for some of you. I was told that a strategy I had planned to follow to keep one of my group's legacy databases running would not be possible because the technology isn't 'mainstream' enough. So I can look forward to begging management for the funds to buy new hardware and new software licenses.:rolleyes:

At least when I got home I found the some resistors I needed for my new B&O dwarf signals had arrived in the mail. I was thrilled to finally see one of them light up. So my Monday began to slowly morph into Tuesday.
 
Good Morning:

It's a sunny day in Central Jersey, and the temperature is headed into the mid 60s. It is also Tuesday now, so things gotta get better, right guys?

The weed n feed is down, so I am finished with the yard work for now.

Maybe, I'll turn my focus to the layout later, I need to finish entering data into the new database, and now that I know what runs and what doesn't, make some determination as to my focus for the summer.

Have a good, no, make that a better day, today!

Joe
 
Good morning. It's 72° with 43% humidity. It'll be sunny with a high of 85°.
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I'm not feeling good this morning so I'm getting a slow start. My balance is off by quite a bit so the room seems to tilt this way and that. Think I'll stay inside today. I probably won't be doing much of anything on the layout.

Today's word is dokualela. It's something any model railroader is familiar with. It translates to 'locomotive'.

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Nuttin wrong with Monday!!!!
Work was fine; no disasters. Got paid for a Tsunami install I did Sunday. Wifey still thinks I'm sexy! Life is good!!!!
 
Carey,

I can confirm the customer was happy with the engines. I should get to see them run in July.

I can't believe you were soooooo close on an ops Sat. and didn't come by!

Glenn
 
Among the chores for today is to consider what to do about a new $80,000 travel trailer an employee burned up all the wiring in yesterday.
I would like to suggest a warranty claim or have them drag it outside and finish the job for the insurance company.:D

My Monday was no walk in the park but I sure dont envy you for yours.
 
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I would like to suggest a warranty claim or have them drag it outside and finish the job for the insurance company.:D

My Monday was no walk in the park but I sure dont envy you for yours.

He somehow managed to connect 240 volts to the 12 volt system. For those of you that don't know, many newer RVs have 50 amp, 240 volt service. This was not one of those RVs.
I will be taking a trip to the factory in a couple of weeks, I'll see if I can get any suggestions on repairing the damage. So far, every 12 volt item that was on when it was connected is burned up, and many of the wires going to those items are burned, melted, and fused.

On a happier note, the IT guy managed to repair my computer at work. I was kind of hoping for a new one, since the one I have was originally equipped with Windows ME, then upgraded to XP, and now Windows 7. To say it is slow and underpowered would be like saying Katrina was a summer rain storm.
 



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