Install a track speedometer | December 2020 WHATS NEAT Model Railroad Hobbyist

mrhmag.com - Model Railroad Hobbyist roving reporter Ken Patterson's December's What's Neat show this month includes:
- Install a TCS track speedometer
- Gluing loose coal onto coal loads
- Gluing ground foam on trees
- Gluing down ballast
- And lots of great runbys
#mrhmag
▬▬▬▬▬▬▬▬▬▬▬▬▬▬▬▬▬▬▬▬▬▬▬▬▬▬▬▬▬▬▬▬▬▬▬▬
► See the full article and follow the discussion: mrhmag.com/magazine/mrh2020-1...
▬▬▬▬▬▬▬▬▬▬▬▬▬▬▬▬▬▬▬▬▬▬▬▬▬▬▬▬▬▬▬▬▬▬▬▬
► THERE’S LOTS MORE:
Get even more how-tos for model railroading on the Model Railroad Hobbyist website. This video is just part of the FREE December 2020 issue of Model Railroad Hobbyist magazine. mrhmag.com
▬▬▬▬▬▬▬▬▬▬▬▬▬▬▬▬▬▬
▼ CONNECT!
► Facebook: / mrhmag
► Twitter: / mr_hobbyist
► Instagram: / mrhobbyist

[@alexandersalomon8257]

I have learned so much from your shows. Love your dedication to the hobby.

[@bcardicoke]

Ken, I really enjoyed this video. Your instructions were step by step and easy to follow. Great looking addition!

[@raykloetstra8501]

Great show. Thanks for all the how-to's. They show tips and tools that are applicable to so many projects. Happy Saint Nicholas Day! Loved your trains around the Christmas tree!!!

[@richarddrum9970]

Great video Ken, very informative and classy installation techniques. I recall years ago that there were a series of articles in Model Railroader Mag. about determining train speed using a measured track distance and scale time to estimate train speeds but this gadget you installed is way easier. Thanks.

[@georgethomas7814]

Best looking modelling I have seen..... easy how to. Thank You.

[@kd5gsp]

WOW!!! The new ballast application demonstration was GREAT!!! Deluxe Materials can take my money NOW!!! I'm excited to use it make realistic coal and aggregate loads.

[@8ballphilc]

That Blackstone HOn3 shot in the snow is awesome! Good content as always!

[@ColumbusGardenRailwaySociety]

Another great video Ken! Thanks.

[@stephenrick6672]

Great how to. Appreciate the detail.

[@BaronvonBavert]

I wish you a Merry Christmas, greetings from Solingen/Germany

[@brucereed8591]

Thank you, very interesting, neat little device.

[@samueldenehytheoriginalhal6022]

Great episode Ken.

[@rjl110919581]

thank you for one other great detail video by share other love railroad people

[@Modelersguild]

Thanks Ken, you are re-inspiring me to find my hobby again. I'm drawing plans to build a steel mill where I work. I have a bunch of footage of both a BoF (basic oxygen furnace) and an EAF (Electric Arc Furnace) both I work directly in front of performing laser readings to apply my companies Aluminum embedded shotcrete to maintain it's perimeter. It's quite fun and very dangerous, perfect for a nutbar like me 🙃

[@cprtrain]

Super video.

[@michaell.maloney4026]

Just out of curiosity, I see you have two pairs of glasses when you were cleaning out the bottom foam for the sensors. I’m guessing the red pair are magnifying? Nice techniques!

[@SevenWelt]

Great the video👍

[@wamozart9573]

High Five, Ken!!!

[@Joe-td4pq]

What type of weathering was used on the hopper car and was it sealed with anything?

[@drewingram3347]

Thanks, Ken! Great vid as always! Do you have a specific article or vid you can direct us to for the installation of the plugs you use to connect the power to your modules?

[@jackoesterlejr.3454]

What a show! First of all i just love the steam engines under the Christmas Tree! I love the new products Ken showed us! The T.C.S. Speedometer is really neat & very accurate! This would be a great conversation piece added to your layout! I like how Ken added his special feature to turn the power off & on. That is neat! The ballast kit from..Deluxe Materials is error free & easy to do! I need to go to...Mark Twain Hobby in St. Charles,Mo. This is "The Best Hobby In The World" Till Next Time! MoPac Jack Happy Holidays To Everyone, The Staff@ Model Railroad Hobbyist,The Viewers & Commenters! "Model Railroading Is Fun" Please Be Safe...Always!

[@mistermeanial1690]

Mr. Patterson, I FINALLY have a place to start a model railroad. I had one when I was a teenager, but I have now been without a layout, longer than with one. I have decided to go HO scale and have been working on the track plan as I have time. What, in your opinion, is the next “most important thing to decide” item I should be focusing on? Not looking for hand holding, but I know a lot has changed since I did this last.

[@bobmartin3018]

What coal did you use?

[@dckmusic]

I found the Ballast Magic didn't work all that great with my Kato Unitrack ballast and left a somewhat sticky residue on some things. But I'll give it a try on some Super Trees.

[@richardsweat6734]

I like your videos, I get some good ideas, but I model in large scale. So I have a question problem. Since HO is, about 1/4 the size of large scale, do you think that if I take the HO distance of the sensors and multiply it times 4 it will give me a relatively close estimate of the speed of my trains.

[@InterCity134]

Cool. I’d have placed a thin red plexiglass rectangle over the 7 segment displays (so offset the electronics further into the foam) to get an easier to read display as it hides the non illuminated parts of the display. . Seems to me the speed trap design made it needlessly hard. Better would be to have the modeler install the IR sensors where they can , measure that distance precisely ( and here is where mm would be so much better than inches ) and the program that precise value into the module to tell it how far and the model then does the calculation based on that distance. Requiring the modeler to physically place something super precise is a bad approach.

[@goldenretriever6440]

Only thing we need now is a railway patrol officer to give you a speeding ticket

[@DavidHughesPiano]

Nice clean installation of the speedometer, Ken. Well done. Wouldn't it be nice if TCS included a fascia panel-mount plate? Most users are going to want to install this device in their fascia. You had to jump through a fair amount of hoops to make this happen. TCS should provide a decorative face plate bezel to cover an oversize hole (drilled by the layout owner) to make this neat, tidy, quick, and easy. Also, for a few bucks more they could provide a wall wart power supply and necessary connectors that you had to rummage for. Just my two cents. BTW, did the laundry dry okay? ;-)

[@motokid7770]

For what I do to measure speed is set my throttle a bit under half speed and time how long it takes to do one loop I then measure the track it cover so let’s say 40 second 20 feet and so you do 20 times 160 (n scale or 87 for ho etc) then I get 3200 feet and with that divide 40 by 3200 and you get 80 mph in scale speed

[@allenbarnes7202]

This will work on a dc layout right, the speedometer

[@DCoombs928]

Of course! Its a seperate component that uses the IR sensors to detect scale MPH speeds.

[@pras12100]

< Pedant Alert! > What exact scale is your railroad because I have heard that, in the US, you use 1:87.1 for HO scale whereas, in Europe, we use 1:87.0? In 1:87.0 scale 1/100th of a mile is 7.283 inches but in 1:87.1 scale it is 7.274 inches. < End Pedant Alert >

[@wixom01]

The math for the speedometer sensors is off. The NMRA defines HO scale as 1:87.0857142. So a hundredth of a mile in HO scale would be 5280/87.0857142 x 12/100 = 7.276 (rounded to the nearest 1 thousandth). I have no idea how the manufacturer got 7.283. But since your only off by about a tenth of a percent, it shouldn't matter.

[@robertkittredge823]

Ken, great video. However , I’m concerned that you apparently didn’t test out all circuit connections BEFORE you sealed them in the foam. If you DID ,I think you should have said so. IF you DIDN’T , we’ll that’s a big no no in my book. Been there , done that and paid the price 😬.

[@gdanyluk8374]

7.283" = 7 9/32" or 185 mm

[@SouthBrooklynRR]

Question? What is a Radio Shack?

[@gavinwilliamson681]

An Electronics retail outlet (shop) in America. For those of us old enough to remember, we used to have Tandy stores in Australia, that (I think) were connected to Radio Shack.

[@kmagnussen1052]

Am I the only one that wanted him to put the hopper on the track?

[@jpbassseniorbasssenior323]

Ken do a live chat with the crew ❤️😁

[@farmerdave7965]

You're getting your money's worth out of that hot wire foam cutter.

[@earlfreeman93]

Great video; you said in the video that the speedometer could be set up for measuring speed in kilometers; but you didn't show us how to do that. Do we set the sensors up at 1/100 of an H0 scale kilometer (about 114.8mm or 4.52 inches) or how do we do this. Because some of us like to model railroads from other parts of the world where kilometers are used.

[@Casenundra]

I do hope that you actually tested the module before you sealed up the wiring.

[@kevinjhonson5925]

Wot first

[@philiphickman5085]

Silicone is conductive, go with double sided tape.

[@MRhobbyist]

Normal silicone rubber is an electrical and thermal insulator. However, it can be made in conductive forms. As long as the silicone is the normal form it’s perfectly fine. Look it up.

[@fwrw]

Nice work, but honestly, please use metric measurements. Everything else is just ridiculous.

[@fiouable]

Sorry but you scare my children with two pairs of glasses. Get a haircut and wear lighter colour glasses. You look like a mad scientist. Don’t worry, we still love you.

[@MRhobbyist]

We know you're being cute, but seriously, there's a pandemic on, remember. It can be hard to get to a barbershop when they're all closed cuz cases are spiking. We're not priviledged like some of those in power who get one anyway even though the lockdown orders say not to. Oh well, nice to be a little guy, we guess ...

[@fiouable]

@@MRhobbyist and people voted that crazy man who thinks the virus doesn’t exists.