December 3
The last two weeks have seen a change in what I'm currently focusing on. I did fit two of the crosshead subassemblies to the widened cylinder block and the body of engine #3. I still need to finish trimming the cylinder rods to length. I'm waiting for sample saddles to show up so I can determine which to use and what size bolt/nut to pin the frame, cylinder, saddle and smoke box front together.
With the holiday decorations out, I find that I have access to the underside of the layout for about a month (that is without having to move the decorations out of the way). So, I've been running the bus wires and attaching bus feeders to them. I admit to some overkill - I'm using 14 gauge stranded wires for the buses and 18 gauge solid core sprinkler wire for drops. I uploaded the zone diagram as well as the block diagram that shows me my color coding of wiring. Right now, the drops are only wrapped around the bus wires - I'll solder them once everything is tested and verified as working. For those interested, I use zone color coded electrical tape to provide isolation between the points where drops attach to the bus. I've put in the cutoff switches for staging tracks in Forks - these are just simple DPST switches. For the Wyes, I'm using a DPDT switch
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