For the 5 1/2 hours of the show Hitsu ran almost perfectly. The viewing public were very taken with it indeed. There were cries of "Oh my!" and "Look at that!" every time someone passed by and a train ran though the scenery.
Some people knew it was T gauge and others thought it was Z (so I had to put them right) Everyone was amazed at the small size.
I also had a dismantled power car to show interested parties just how the trains were powered. Once again there were cries of amazement as I explained the workings.
The organiser of the train show does a great job with his publicity and he had made a couple of appearances on local radio publicising the show and the appearance of T gauge. People who stopped by told me that they had heard about T gauge from the radio. To that end I even made an appearance on one these stations being interviewed about the layout. Then later in the afternoon people came up to me and said. "I heard you on the radio"
Much of my time was spent dispelling myths about T.
Myths such as "I bet the trains are difficult to get on the track." I lost count of the times I explained that because of the magnetic wheels re railing was actually quite easy. Many folks were convinced that you needed a magnifier for everything. While I agree that a magnifier is helpful in some aspects. I pointed out that I always have a magnifier on hand whatever scale I work in and I then pointed out that the trees were made without the use of any viewing aids.
Of course people wanted photographs and I posed my finger in shots of the train many times.
What was great is that the running of the trains was wonderful. They ran without fault the entire time. I went to great lengths to keep the track and wheels clean, cleaning the entire loop of track hourly and the wheels of the cars after every session of running.
One thing is very clear. the more powered cars you have in a train, the better the running is. At one point I ran 4 powered cars together and the running was excellent.
I learned a lot from showing Hitsu and there will be some changes before I exhibit it again. Changes that will necessitate a rebuild. The layout will still be Hitsu, just Hitsu version 2.0.
What was wrong? Firstly, and I knew this one anyway. I had at a couple of points laid the track too close to the edge of the baseboard and when on the very odd occasion that a car fell off the rails it fell on to the table below. But it would have been oh so easy for it to fall onto the floor.
Secondly, for this show I had added overhead catenary poles to the running line. because I thought it looked rather good. But this made cleaning the track rather awkward and I actually bent and broke several of the catenary masts and overhead arms. I bent one arm so badly I didn't see it snag on the pantograph of one of the cars and it pulled the car off the track, also pulling the coupler out of the coupler pocket. (This was the coupling between the two powered cars so the one that snagged on the overhead arm stopped whereas the other kept on going.) As the track work had to be cleaned hourly getting around the catenary was awkward.
Still overall I'm very happy with Hitsu and T gauge as a whole. The layout certainly proved in no uncertain terms that it was very capable of standing up to a busy exhibition. Now I'll take a rest for a while and come up with a new concept for Hitsu 2.0
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