The Randall Museum in San Francisco hosts a large HO-scale model model railroad. Created by the Golden Gate Model Railroad Club starting in 1961, the layout was donated to the Museum in 2015. Since then I have started automatizing trains running on the layout. I am also the model railroad maintainer. This blog describes various updates on the Randall project and I maintain a separate blog for all my electronics not directly related to Randall.
2021-01-18 - Pending Work on the Layout
Category RandallI started a project list one year ago and it’s time to look at what has been accomplished, and what’s left to do. Note that this is basically a snapshot of the same task list which is available in the layout presentation document here.
Task |
Impact |
Work Load |
|
Stockton Station dedicated Circuit Breaker [done] |
Need |
Medium |
Low |
DCC Mainline turnouts for Napa yard approach [done] |
Need |
High |
Medium |
DCC Mainline turnout for Bridgeport yard [done] |
Need |
High |
Low |
Grade crossing lights at Fairfield Station [done] |
Need |
High |
Medium |
Napa yard clean & usable by operators [done] |
Need |
High |
Very High |
Bridgeport yard clean & usable by operators [done] |
Need |
High |
Very High |
Fixing dead spot at Sultan |
Need |
Medium |
Medium |
Fix the Fairfield-Lodi approach Status: Replacing turnout motor for T905 |
Need |
Medium |
Medium |
Layout “cab ride” Cameras & Display for Public |
Want |
High |
High |
Computer monitoring of all Circuit Breakers |
Want |
Medium |
High |
Finish DCC control Mountain Turnout Panel |
Need |
Low |
High |
DCC control Stockton Passenger panel |
Need |
Low |
High |
DCC block detection on Valley panels 1 & 2 |
Need |
Low |
High |
DCC block detection on Mountain panel 1 |
Need |
Low |
High |
Automation of Fairfield area |
Want |
High |
Very High |
Automation software “Conductor” v2 Status: Experiment on-going. |
Want |
High |
Very High |
Notation: The “need” vs “want” column is highly subjective based on what I believe needs to be done here. “Impact” is from the perspective of the Saturday Operators and/or the Automation from a public point of view, e.g. would visitors/operators notice this work has been done. Low impact does not mean the task is not important -- it’s the “behind the scene” stuff that enables more to be done later. Ironically low impact often equates to a higher amount of work. |
|||
There are two new tasks added in this list. It’s satisfying to be able to mark six tasks as being fully done, and some serious progress has been done on six other tasks.
For contrast, back in 2019, I managed to accomplish zero tasks, as the whole year was all about maintenance to keep the automation and the operators running. Of course 2020 was different since there was no such running.
A very important difference is that I was able to allocate almost two solid weeks at the end of December to work on projects -- which I had been unable to do the year before since the museum was open and automation had to be running at all times.