THE PILSENWERST RAILROAD.
Just a little back ground information first, my name is Tony and I have always been interested in railways and I have started quite a few ( but never finished any), but this time I'm more determined than ever to finish one ( is a railway ever finished?). I'm in my 40's and a loony as I'm sure you will find out as you read further.....
I have a small house in Northampton England (so far so good ), as its a small house the rooms are not really big enough for a large scale... (loony point number one coming up) so I have decided to use z gauge as the scale ( I know your thinking "ok that's not too bad but he must have good eye sight" ) and as I work with and interested in computers ( I part own the isp that hosts this site).
I decided that some for of computer control would be a good idea as I tend to run the railway on my own. One day I was looking around the web an found a site called www.z220.com on the site was a page about installing a Digitrax Decoder in a Z scale modern image locomotive ( ah ha I hear you cry second loony point nearing) yes you've guessed it I wanted to go that route...so off to the Digitrax home page I went and discovered an even smaller decoder that they had just launched.. on their page there was a list of dealers and low and behold there was a England based one so I contacted Sunningwell command control, and placed an order for a chief and some of the "new" dz121 decoders ... well that was in the January of 1999 ( fast work as I had only just started collecting Z in the December of 1998).
A few weeks passed no dz121 :( so I again contacted Ted Smale of SCC and he said that they were due soon... Feb passed March flew by as I designed the layout to be using winrail 4 (I had a lodger at that point and as he was in the room that I was going to use the layout was only in my head and the computer).
Ted and I spoke on a regular basis but still no dz121 in April Ted said he would return my deposit and would let me know when the little beasties were available . All through the summer the collection of z track and locos grew and ... grew ( I then told the lodger it was time that he should move out ),then out of the blue in October I got a call from Ted to say that he now had 3 dz121's and a chief if I was still interested well to say I was there fast I think it was only something like an hour and I was knocking on Ted's door so I departed Sunningwell with my shiny new chief and 2 dz121's ( he had promised the 3rd to Allie ( and as she is prettier than me I guess that's why she won)).
The next day I went on holiday ( yes I'm sad I took the manuals with me and read them cover to cover) during the week I was away Ted again rang me ( yes by this time he had my mobile number) say in more dz121's where in his possession ( a polite way of saying in his grubby mitts). I arranged to pick them up from a rail exhibition at the N.E.C. on the day after I came back from my holiday.
Then the Fun started I followed the instructions from the z220 page on how to fit a decoder in to a loco the first one took me about 3 hours the I set up an oval of track on the dining table ( yes the lodger was still in my railway room :( ) yes it worked and the control was fantastic I converted another 4 locos over the following week then sat back and pondered as what to do next.....
I rang Ted and said " I need more decoders and what's this Winlock thing like?" well a few weeks later I was on the road to Sunningwell again ( well its only about 50 miles from me) I picked up the ms100( computer interface}, winlok (a windows program), a ds54 and another 10 dz121's.
At the beginning of December 1999 the lodged moved out (Hooray :))) ) Sorry Grant didn't mean it if your reading this. A Phil Temple a good friend (and good at woodwork) was drafted in and we started work on the bench work for the layout, by Christmas all the bench work was completed, During the Christmas holidays I went to see Ted again ( I was now getting coffee and chocolate biscuits) the reason I went escapes me but my wallet knew id been to see him ( Ted loaned me a booster for my reversing section until the pm4's came out.... superb dealer support).
Over Jan and Feb the track was laid and temporary electrics were put in so I could test the track out ( so I wanted to play trains :)) ) over the next while progress has been steady but the spending has not... Living in the UK and the way the strong pound is I have been buying lots of z stuff from www.modellbahnecke.de as it between 30 and 45 % cheaper
At Easter yes u guessed it I was back at Ted's for another 5 ds54's and a pm4( he even took me to the pub:) ).
03/08/00