Countdown to the Fair

The Gandy Dancer The Official Publication of the Alameda County Central Railroad Society

February 2006

Next Public Operation Session:

The Alameda County Fair

Club News

Farewell to Ken Christman

By now, most of you have heard that Ken Christman has died of complications from that nasty cold that has been making the rounds. Cathy asks that we keep them both in our prayers. Cathy, you have our sympathy, and you'll always be welcome at the ACCRS.

Vest Order Looms

Dean Lewis is putting together an order for club vests. For you newcomers, you may have noticed that the ACCRS likes to have members wear 'club' vests during shows. It gives us a little bit of a 'uniform' and makes it easy to determine if the person leaning over the rail to touch a piece of equipment is a member or not. A variety of colors are available, and you can have your name and logo of your favorite railroad stitched on the front. For more information, please visit the vendors site. Total cost to members is $25; the ACCRS picks up shipping and the cost of embroidering the 'ACCRS' across the back. See Dean with your order (specifically size, color and what logo and name you want on it), and he'll send it in with the rest.

Rodent Traps Deployed

Due to recent structure damage and animal dropping discoveries, several large spring-type rat and mouse traps have been distributed around the layout room. The O Scale gang has also placed DeCon trays in a couple of tunnel portals. Most traps are well marked with signs at eye-level, but even so, use caution when reaching or stepping into areas that you have not visually scanned first. Even if you avoid the traps, you may find that a rodent has taken up residence or expired in your path. Bob Johnson has latex gloves available for dealing with the aftermath of a successful trap or poison tray, and there is additional peanut butter in the fridge if anyone feels the urge to rebait the mechanical traps.

Please do your part in discouraging the rodents by policing up your snacks, coffee cups and soda cans, and carrying food-related trash out to the dumpster before you leave. Besides, it's common courtesy.

Too, remember that we have been seeing a number of small visitors lately; keep an eye out for loose kids so they don't wind up tripping a trap, being bitten by a rodent, or snacking on stale food or DeCon. By and large, parents seem to do their part, but kids are curious and very fast. A little attention by the rest of us is cheap and easy insurance against a tragedy.

Also, history shows that our layouts need careful attention to track cleaning in order to operate well during times of rodent infestation, so expect to spend a few minutes with the abrasive blocks before you run. Removing valuable locomotives and rolling stock from the rails between operations may be a wise move.

Visit Scheduled to Antioch Club

The ACCRS has been invited to visit and run on the Black Diamond Lines layout in Antioch at 10 AM on May 13, 2006. A pizza feed is planned, and we are encouraged to bring our own HO motive power and cabeese. The BDL is an analog only railroad, so bear that in mind when selecting your engines.

Parking May Be Troublesome In May

Bob Johnson's sharp eyes noticed that the RV show, scheduled for mid-May, will be presented by the same organization that put on the one in January. This may mean that our access for layout projects and pre-fair cooler tune-up and other work may be severely restricted, as the RV group seems to be quite willing to put a fence around the layout room and lock it to control access. We will be afflicted with the same group again in late summer and in the fall, but not during business meetings.

Recently the top ACCRS brass (President Gary Lewis and VP Henry Chandler) had a meeting with the Alameda County Fair parking people. Some solutions to the parking troubles were discussed, including a designated parking area for the ACCRS, realignment of the fences during RV shows, and some sort of parking pass for ACCRS vehicles. The May RV show will be the first chance we get to see how well they work. Please do your part by bringing your fair badge and cooperating with the parking attendants. The people in the trenches are just trying to do their jobs; yelling at them accomplishes nothing except generating ill will toward the ACCRS. If you have troubles with parking, please bring it to the attention of Gary or Henry so that the people commanding the parking squad can hear about it at an appropriate time.

Upcoming Events

May

Business meeting:
May 5th.
Charcoal smoke will be once again wafting through the spring air. Won't you bring your favotite treat and join us in our feast? Maybe this time it'll actually feel like spring?!?
Visit to the Black Diamond Lines in Antioch on Saturday, May 13. Directions, etc. will be posted upstairs. Plan to take your favorite HO analog locomotives.

June

Business Meeting:
June 2nd, 2006
This will be the last business meeting until after the Fair. Parking passes and other Fair information will probably be distributed on the 2nd, so please plan to attend.
And since you'll be there anyway, why not take the afternoon off, bring something to grill and hang out with the gang?
Alameda county Fair: June 23rd to July 9th.

July

No business meeting scheduled, due to Fair.
Alameda County Fair: Until July 9th.

Unofficial Minutes for April 7, 2006 business meeting:

Call to order 20:07- Gary Lewis, approx 15 members attending.

Ken Chrisman died of complications of cold or flu. He was just 50. Cathy asks us to keep her and Ken in our prayers. Bob Johnson has a card if you wish to sign it.

Paul Newhouse presented the Treasurer's report, which was provided electronically under before the meeting. Jere Ingraham made a motion to split the proceeds of the March shows 50%/50% betweend the scales. Dan Espinosa seconded. Motion passed by unanimous voice vote.

Secretary Dan Espinosa presented the correspondence of the month; The Black Diamond Lines proposed a visit date (May 13) for us to visit and a date for their return visit to us. (August 12) Both dates were accepted unanimously. Dan will relay our accepance to the BDL. (Maps and other information will be posted by the Donations desk.)

Gary Lewis and Henry Chandler lead a recapitulation and discussion of their recent meeting with the Fair Board and Fair Parking.

Parking during shows was a big discussion item for the ACCRS representitives. We may be required to have "mirror hangers" on vehicles parked near the clubroom, and there will be an effort to keep the fence in a more rational location during the RV shows in particular. Also, we may be asked to park over by the blacksmith shop in the maintenence crew parking lot during shows and enter through the gate on that side via our own padlock. If that location gains acceptance, we may be able to park there during all shows, which would be a relief for some of our less mobile members.

We have been given the phone number for the guard shack at Gate 12. It will be posted in the upstairs room, or you can ask one of the club officers for it. We are requested to inform the guards when the last model railroader has left, which can be as simple as stopping by the shack on the way out.

We may have a formal written 'lease' with the Fair in the future, which will include the obligations of both parties and might include a few new wrinkles; the appropriate thing to do seems to be wait and worry about the wrinkles when they show up. The "new" building may be one of those wrinkles, and the latest gossip on the subject was presented. . . not much has changed; the Fair board is commissioning another marketing study to determine what size to build.

Dick Stark made a motion to buy a second memorial plaque, as we have run out of room on the current one. Henry Chandler seconded. Motion passed by unanimous voice vote.

There being no further business, a move to adjourn was made by Dan Espinosa. Dean Lewis seconded and the motion carried at 20:32. A Moment of Silence was observed for Ken Christman.

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HO Scale News:

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From the HO scale Trainmasters

The winter season is over and we have the first three shows of 2006 behind us. To those who helped with the shows, thanks again. To those otherwise occupied:

The layout has performed well overall for the recent shows but operations have exposed some infrastructure issues related to DCC. It seems that running trains with high power requirements, such as lighted passenger trains, is taxing the current configuration of boosters and power districts. The symptoms of the problem manifest themselves in the form of multiple trains running slower when they are in the same power district as the passenger train. There have also been a couple of instances where trains have stopped running without a short circuit. This item was on the agenda for the April meeting and there was discussion. The consensus of opinion at the meeting seemed to be to look into purchasing additional NCE boosters to reduce the number of blocks powered by individual boosters.
As far as analog is concerned, we did not seem to experience the "slow down" syndrome mentioned above. We operate one train per power supply in analog mode, so this problem seems isolated to DCC. That said we have been experiencing some power "drop outs" when operating trains with a single short wheelbase locomotive. The issue of checking for and installing additional drops needs to be revisited.

The new bridges at the front of the layout seem to have settled in well, so ballasting and detail painting will occur in the near future.

The following comments are as a result of observing the progress on the project, as well as from the report given at the April HO meeting. The scenery behind the mainline bridge, along the wall, seems to be coming along well. The lighthouse near the ship channel looks great. The towers for the lift bridge are in the process of being constructed, off layout. The approaches for the Bascule Bridge are in and track work is progressing.The hardware building has a neat animated Sherwin Williams paint sign on the roof. Research on the container ship is well along. The current phase of the project is looking good. Check it out the next time you are down at the club.

When you are down at the club you may notice a UP DD40 parked with the track cleaning cars. This locomotive was a donation to the club about a month ago. Three members have combined their skills to bring this locomotive up to operational status. Carl Klenk worked on the mechanism, Scott McGhee installed and painted a set of hand rails along with detailing the number boards and Bob Johnson installed a dummy rotary beacon and air horn casting. The front truck has had a NWSL wheel transplant and the rear truck will have its wheels changed out when the parts arrive from the vendor. There was a voting sheet posted on the board relating to purchase of hand rails and wheels for the DD. The proposal passed without a single no vote. The DD40 will be used to power the track cleaning train.
The club Amtrak train has had some issues with the three Atlas locomotives assigned to it. It seems that the factory installed decoder boards in the locos left a lot to be desired and this resulted in rather poor performance. The other evening it was discovered that we still had a supply of NCE decoders on hand. One of the NCE decoders was installed in Amtrak 506, by Seth, and its performance was much improved. The other two Atlas Amtrak locomotives will have NCE decoders installed as a demonstration project at a DCC clinic. This is a good example of using existing club resources to address a problem.

Ideas relating to a memorial to the memory of Ken Chrisman were discussed. Among the ideas were a welding supply company and another idea was to install an arch over one of the roads in the city, similar to the arch over main street in Pleasanton.

The 2006 edition of the County Fair is fast approaching. The start date is Friday, June 23. Needless to say the date is not that far off. We need to begin looking at what needs attention on the layout so we can put things into good shape for the Fair.

It seems that we have the usual problem of clutter and trash accumulating around the area, under the layout and upstairs. The upstairs room is getting bad. We have accumulated a variety of items upstairs; two boxes of American Flyer track, several N scale items (track and misc. things), someone's old jacket (or is it a sweat shirt?), miscellaneous junk, swamp cooler parts. The boxes are piling up and so is the junk. The work table is about half buried in stuff. . .Leg room under the table is at a premium. The test track shelf is now home to a variety of small to medium boxes. The carpet is covered with dirt and debris. If you belong to any of this stuff, please remove it or you may lose it. The dumpster is getting hungry. . . Can we get a clean up? Cobweb removal in the layout room is needed as well.

The results of the poll are in, the members have spoken, and the words are "we want clinics". OK, the next item is who has a technique for doing something that they wish to share with others? If you are interested, contact Seth or Bob and participate in lighting the fires of knowledge. Several clinic topics for DCC have been proposed and were mentioned at the April meeting.

Bob Johnson,

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O Scale News:

From the O Scale Trainmaster:

Hey gang-
It's time to schedule some facility work days so we can be in good shape for Fair. I proposed Saturday, April 29th, at the last meeting, which diidn't seem to alarm anyone. The goal is to tackle the lighting, heating and cooling.

I'd also like to put in a day or two (in addition to the Friday evenings so far allocated-- look for an e-mail on the subject) on the trolley extention and other trackwork; we've some frogs that need attention on the main, a couple of balky switch machines, and the railing on the south-eastern trestle/girder bridge needs replacement. For those who are keeping track, that is the same bridge that I patched two years ago. I don't think there's enough good material in the railing to repair again. (gotta wash that flux off!) During the OSH show I managed to talk a vendor into donating a sample of a liquid flux for Nickel Silver; it's supposed to be water soluble so we can clean it up with a damp rag. If anyone wants to try their hand at scratchbuilding and/or structural soldering, that railing could be a good project.

As such, let's try another work day in LATE May, with the goal of finishing up the trackwork projects. In early June, I'd like to dust everything we can get our hands on (including the throttle electronics bays), and maybe get rid of some of the accumulated kruft under the layout.

In more disturbing news, 'A' cab has developed a glitch in its radio throttle. The symptoms are poor performance and uncommanded operation of the radio reversing circuit for that cab; The problem is that the top 5% of the Variac's travel seems to have burned up (again). The interim solution is to run the radio throttle with the variac at the 80% mark or so. The longer-term solution is to rethink and rewire the throttles so that we're not loading the variacs so hard. Those of us with some electronics background should put our heads together at the May business meeting and see if a simple, effective solution is at hand. I have an idea that should be user transparent, but will require some upgraded switches and a extended fiddle with the wiring; if someone else can come up with a better way, I'm open to the suggestion. We could also modify that big 12 volt linear power supply that Steve Colby found for us. . .

I'm announcing an 'adopt-a-locomotive' program, wherein each club locomotive would have a 'crew chief' whose responsibilities would entail regular checkups and preventative maintenence-- nothing more complicated than 'oiling around' and cleaning wheels with a visual inspection and load test once a month or so. A 'crew chief' would be free to tackle (or contract for) more extensive repairs if they wished, but would, at a minimum, make sure that me or one of the other gearheads know about any serious problems.

As an example, The Atlas SW-series engines really do yeoman service for us, but our fleet is ageing and needs a little TLC. Some of them still have the Atlas plated wheels on them, which have to be really clean to run well. Others are beginning to have gearbox and drive shaft complaints, and several of us have undertaken to repair them. I recently purchased a bunch of spare parts for the fleet as a whole, to be distributed at need. See me or the Chandlers for details. In any event, if you'd like to adopt an engine, a sheet will be forthcoming.

Here comes the Fair- Let's REALLY be ready this year!

-Dan

O Scale Trainmaster

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More Modeling Madness

The 3rd Annual Bay Area Prototype Modelers Meet - BAPM 2006
Sunday April 30, 2006, 10:00 am - 5:00 pm
Fremont Marriott, 46100 Landing Pkwy, Fremont, CA 94538
For more information, see: the Bay Area Protoype Modelers' website.

PCR Convention to be held in Sacramento

The 62nd Annual NMRA Pacific Coast Region convention is scheduled for May 3rd through 7th at the Sacramento Doubletree Hotel. A small brochure is available on the raffle desk in the clubroom; for a listing of events and more information, see: The convention website or email Ed Pultz at epultz at juno.com.

Winterail Report

One of the highlights of Winterail 2006 that a few of our members got to see, was a PBS "sneak preview" of a video titled Dome Car Magic, by Rick Luckin. This feature chronicles the history of the dome cars from Burlington's first car, Silver Dome, to today's modern full-length domes that operate in Alaska and Canada. The video got a lot of ooooooh's and ahhhhh's from the viewing crowd. We were told that the full version of this video would be shown sometime in late spring or early summer on a PBS station. It is definately one you Dome Car lovers will want to tape.

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The Gandy Dancer, a monthly publication of the Alameda County Central Railroad Society.
Last updatedApril 22, 2006.

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Copyright © 2004 - 2009 Alameda County Central Railroad Society. All Rights Reserved.
For more information, email Dan Espinosa at:
steelnomad2002 at yahoo dot com.