eBay score
Finding N scale Civil War engines and rolling stock is difficult enough. Finding structures, especially the Micro-Trains Line laser kits, are downright impossible. Well, that's what I thought. Out of the blue I saw several Civil War era pieces for sale on eBay, including the MTL Civil War Era Loco Shed and, an awesome bonus, two packs of Sibley Tents!
Other items for sale that day were what looked to be 3D printed passenger cars, but I wasn't going to spend that kind of money to win those at the moment. What I definitely was going to do: win the shed and tents. They arrived and I couldn't be happier. I'm about 1/3 of the way through the shed, and I punched the tents and firewood out of the frames. I'll post an update on this when I'm done. Frankly, I don't know where I will fit the engine shed, as I didn't set up any kind of siding or yard to accommodate it. The Sibley Tents should fit nicely almost anywhere.
DCC++
About three months ago, I read about DCC++ and it piqued my interest. For about $50 I could make my own DCC system? Yes, please. I've been itching to get familiar with DCC so that in a few months, I can start actually building a new layout with DCC from the start. This would be an awesome way to get the ball rolling.
So I got to work on ordering supplies and carving out some time to work on it. The two best tutorials I found were by DIY & Digital Railroad and Cobo in HO.
After some false starts, I got the thing to power the Gen. Haupt. But the program track was makeshift and poorly connected. So I got to work building a nice program track that would offer stability and connectivity.
I used a piece of composite wood, some code 80 Atlas flex track, and two siding bumpers. But what I was really anxious about was soldering for the first time. Yes, I've never soldered before.
Fast forward about an hour. The tracks are cut to size, cleaned, and fitted with new rail joiners.
Things worked out well, even if the soldering job wasn't very aesthetic. I cleaned it up a little with a file after it was done. The wires ran through the board. The track caulked down tight. And the locomotives wouldn't run off the end of the earth. Testing out the DCC++ system was made much better using this later that day.
I get the engine running, but can't seem to read or do anything to the decoder. For three days, I'm trying to figure out what I'm doing wrong. It has to be something, right? The engine runs ok, even if a little rough. But JMRI keeps giving me an error message: "No acknowledge from locomotive (308)"
Turns out the answer was right in front of me the whole time... the wires! I had them in the main and not the program. How stupid of me. Once I did that, restarted the locomotive entry in DecoderPro and hit the read button, holy moly it worked.
But there's another problem. The Haupt is running very poorly, considering how wonderful everyone says DCC can be for slow speeds. It starts out running at what appears to be in the 15mph zone, and when it does run, it has a bad lurching gait to it. I'm hopeful that it's just a matter of adjusting the settings in the decoder, and not a bad engine.
Update: After consulting with decoder guru Steve Fields, I've made some adjustments to the CVs and, well, just look at how beautifully it runs!After some false starts, I got the thing to power the Gen. Haupt. But the program track was makeshift and poorly connected. So I got to work building a nice program track that would offer stability and connectivity.
I used a piece of composite wood, some code 80 Atlas flex track, and two siding bumpers. But what I was really anxious about was soldering for the first time. Yes, I've never soldered before.
Fast forward about an hour. The tracks are cut to size, cleaned, and fitted with new rail joiners.
Things worked out well, even if the soldering job wasn't very aesthetic. I cleaned it up a little with a file after it was done. The wires ran through the board. The track caulked down tight. And the locomotives wouldn't run off the end of the earth. Testing out the DCC++ system was made much better using this later that day.
Turns out the answer was right in front of me the whole time... the wires! I had them in the main and not the program. How stupid of me. Once I did that, restarted the locomotive entry in DecoderPro and hit the read button, holy moly it worked.
But there's another problem. The Haupt is running very poorly, considering how wonderful everyone says DCC can be for slow speeds. It starts out running at what appears to be in the 15mph zone, and when it does run, it has a bad lurching gait to it. I'm hopeful that it's just a matter of adjusting the settings in the decoder, and not a bad engine.
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