In order to get more operating time, and to give my old bones a break (metaphorically speaking), I am building a modest size indoor 1:24 scale layout. I considered functional power poles on my outdoor layout but the hazards of maintaining them on a ground level layout were obvious. Indoors, however, with no critters of the four-legged or grandkid kinds wandering around on the layout, it seems a better idea for lighting up my structures and lineside equipment. A huge bonus is not having to fold m...

  In my Protothrottle research, I've been playing with Airwire quite a bit.  Since I don't get out much, I didn't know you could still get your hands on these little receivers, but it seems they are plentiful.  A quick solder job and connection to my DCC amp and there ya go.  Five Amps of DCC battery power. Not bad.  If I go for less current, I can remove the heatsink and probably fit this in some pretty small little locos. Those Soundtraxx 2A decoders are pretty smal...

East Broad Top #1 was the original engine bought to lay the track in the 1880s. It survived, and was given a new boiler when The Big Cheese bought a Business Car (#20, Orbisonia.) It spent its final days pulling him around the railroad.     This is my modified Aster JNR 8550 that I built from a kit. I managed to lose some parts - notably the gasket set, but I soldiered on to get a steam-tight model.     It has a new stack, but I haven't done any painting yet to get ...

I wanted to enlist you electronics wizards, so I'm posting this - you may not bother to read the Live Steam forum. http://www.largescalecentral.com/forums/topic/29381/servo-throws-over-90-degrees   Here's a bit of research I did on making servos go the distance. " The standard servo . . . is a 485, which if you look at the specs is a 90 degree servo when supplied the standard pulse range of 1 to 2 msec. The specs also state the 485 can rotate 180 degrees with a pulse range of 0.6 to 2.4...