Uninvited but Mr. Murphy Strikes Again!

Model Railroader General Discussion (Model Railroader)
1

Mr. Murphy and his Law that is…

Last week the wife had a few of her co-worker friends over at the house Friday night to celebrate our son’s 18th birthday and unannounced she invites them to see the train room. Uh oh, whut!!! [%-)] Being unprepared for the impromptu tour I head up to the room, turned on the lights and the power strips to all the lights and such. Sweat begins to well up on my brow… [|(]

So I am showing them around the train room point out some new scenery I just put in earlier in the day, and then the wife says…“Turn on the trains and run them around a bit…” Oh boy, I knew this would be trouble, I’m on the spot now! Then I power up the DCC system and plug in the wireless throttle and turn on the power to the track, and my NS loco with sound enabled decoder does not start up! Funny thing, because typically without even selecting it and when I turn on the track power the sound starts right up on the loco like the diesels are just getting revved up! Not this time! Enter Mr. Murphy! Only the front head light is on. I select the loco again and still nothing. I take the loco off the track and put it on another section of track, select it again and still nada! [banghead]

Oh well, so I run another loco and then it stops on some dirty track! Dang…Mr. Murphy again! Can you say the phrase “not prepared?”

[#oops]

Had I known that we were going to demonstrate the layout I would have cleaned the track and tested all the equipment before hand. Be Prepared from the old Boy Scout days would have come in handy right about then. Earlier in the day I was installing new scenery and such and did not clean track or run trains at all. Mr. Murphy you can go home now.

A couple days later I g

2

A couple years ago we were traveling across Pennsylvania for our summer vacation, and I took the family up to Horseshoe Curve for the first time. I was anticipating the usual great show of machine vs. gravity, and the typical parade of freights, helpers and so on.

It was a hot August day, so we got some sodas from the cooler, and headed for a shady spot to wait for the show to begin… My wife doesn’t mind when we stop to watch a train go by, so I was really looking forward to seeing her and the kids react to the “show” on the curve.

Well, 45 minutes went by, and the only train we saw was an eastbound that passed while we were waiting to buy our pass in the gift shop. Another half hour, and nothing. Finally, a high-rail pick up truck rode by on the westbound main. He amused us by tooting is horn and waving…

After another hour I realized, the real railroads are just like our models… when you bring someone out to watch them run, something always goes wrong. It turns out there was a heat kink in the track somewhere down the mountain, and all traffic was being held up in both directions.

If we could have stuck around for a while longer, I’m sure there was a heckuva show… but alas, we hadn’t planned on staying that long, and it was getting close to dinner time…

Oh well…

Lee

3

Hi Lee,

I’m a complete noob [:I] What’s a ‘heat kink’? Is it related to thermal expansion? Does this happen often on rails? Thanks for any info.

Doug

4

In a loud announcer voice

So the big moment is almost here…you can tell that big things are about to happen…you’re confident that all your ‘parts’ are in working order…then it happens…Train Dysfunction! If you suffer from TD, you’re not alone. Model railroaders across the world are also suffering from this sometimes embarrassing condition. All you need to do right now is call to order your bottle of Murphy Spray! Murphy spray is a potent, natural extract that wards off bad Murphy Mojo. Murphy spray keeps Mr. Murphy at bay!

I’ve had entirely too much coffee today!

5

Lee,

I had the exact same experience at Horseshoe Curve with my autistic son. A crowd had built up and when the truck came by and honked, my son said,

“I want my money back.” Not a yell, but just loud enough for the crowd to hear amongst the hushed disappointment.

Everyone laughed.

6

Ryan, I feel your pain. Your guess is as good as the next guys. Why didn’t it work? Because you had an audience? Why did it fix itself? No pressure? [:)] [?]

7

TD, huh? If you have an operating session that lasts more than 4 hours, should you consult your physician immediately?[:D]

(I think that line sells more little blue pills than anything else they say in the ad!)

Lee

8

Occurances like this is why I am a firm believer in “O’tooles Corollary on Murphy’s Law” .

Which is: “Murphy was an optimist” [:-^]

I mean face it, one of Model Railroading’s Basic Laws is nothing will go wrong ,“Until Visitors Come”.[;)]

9

Ah…you’ve forgotten the most important of all the Murphy’s Law’s Collaries for Model Railroads:

Things go wrong it direct proportion to the number of people present in the room.

And don’t forget the Model Railroad Law of Gravity:

The most expensive model hits the floor first.

Charles

10

Silver, I understand the situation completely. COMPLETELY. We had a show this past weekend and what do you know…an hour into the show our radio throttles just dropped off.

11

Charles;

I didn’t forget 'em. Just didn’t feel that they properly fit the situation.

And we mustn’t forget the mighty “Cole’s Law” either.[}:)]

12

Sorry, couldnt resist![;)][:-,]

I blame these guys:

Darn Gremlins!

Murphy WAS an optomist, coulda been alot worse…

The dog could have decided this was the perfect moment to chase the cat into your train room with both jumping onto the layout sending cars, buildings and scenery a flying every direction, all in front of your friends whos only comment is, “so…this is model railroading?”[:-^]

13

A couple days later I go up to the train room by my self just to check everything out and so I turn on everything, power up the DCC system and enable the track power and then select the sound enabled loco, and sure enough everything works fine. Even the other loco on the still “dirty” track runs like a charm! I cannot tell you what I did to make it work this time around, not even sure what made it not work on the night of the “demonstration”. In any case, I’m happy that everything is working now and not actually “broken”.

Ryan, this is not due to Murphy’s Law but rather a related one first described by Eric Fetridge. Fetridge’s Law states that, “Nothing good happens until it is no longer favorable for it to happen”. That’s why the knock in you car’s engine dissapears as soon as you drive into the repair shop.

Had a similar experience last week when a loco that was running beautifully (after I had fixed a short in the wiring it came with) decided to have the short come back just as soon as I was being inspected by Harold Russell for the NMRA Electrical Certificate… I came very close to throwing it across the room against the concrete wall, but just laughed and replaced the durn thing with one that ran beautifully. Harold roared and said that always happens at his layout as well and not to worry about it.

14

I had an experience similiar to wm3798’s at Gibbon, Nebraska three summers ago. I stood at trackside for an hour and forty five minutes - multiple-cameras at the ready. This is supposed to be one of the country’s railroading hot-spots with over one-hundred trains a day through the interlocking there. I was expecting eight or nine trains an hour to pass - I got four; one - an empty coal unit-train - came off the the Marysville Sub, a fast moving stack came through from the east, and the other two were mainifests that went down the Marysville Sub. It would be superfluous for me to say that I was just a little bit disappointed. My wife and I had been married just a little over a year and this was her first real train-watching expedition and I’m sure she was just a little amused that this day brought a measure of anti-climax.

As I found out some time later this happened to be a day or two after either Onion Specific or BNSF had grounded a coal drag up in the Powder River basin and had discovered that twenty years of coal dust and rain had cemented the ties into the the roadbed and they were experiencing considerable difficulties getting things sorted out; to me it screamed that Murphy’s Law was alive and well.

POTEET’S COROLLARY: reverse psychology does not apply to Murphy’s Law; if your are expecting things to go wrong your expectations will be achieved!

ANSWER TO FORUM MEMBER CORNBOY: although I don’t remember ever having encountered an exact term for the phenomena forum member wm3798 alludes to I suppose that heat kink describes it as well as any other.

In summertime as rail heats in the sun it has to expand; this expansion is supposed to be taken up by the gap between rail lengths. This doesn’t always happen, however, and sometimes this expansion forces the rail either sideways or upwards. Sometimes maintenance personnel will spot his but if they don’t it is Derailment Time at the OK Corral. Th

15

While there are dozens of correlations to Murphy’s Law, the primary model railroading one is:

“Problems occur in direct proportion to the number of observers.”

For “Problems”, you can insert, “derailments”, “short circuits”, “controller malfunctions”, and a host of others. Many have been discovered in the last 10 years or so, with the developmentr and widespread use of DCC.

Ah-h-h-h, Progress! [:D]

16

Do you have to get a pass and pay for it to look at the horseshoe curve?

Magnus

17

Mangus,

You have to pay around $5. there is a gift shop a little museum with lots of videos to watch and a tram takes you up to the Curve to railfan. They also have a couple fossilized engines to look at.

But for the ticket, you also get a pass to the Railroad Museum in Altoona, where they have exhibits (and a model railroad that was featured in MR) There are more fossils, PRR passenger cars, old steam, a CG1, etc all of which you can look through. The CG1 is pretty cool.

18

I’ve had that happen before, on a senior project. I practiced it and test ran it three times and it still didn’t work when I wanted it to. Murphy is dumb I agree.

19

Mr. Murphy makes regular appearances on the Yuba River Sub anytime someone comes over and stares into the garage.

Best one: Son is down with new wife. “Hey, you’ve got to see Dad’s train in the garage, it’s just AWESOME. Run the train for her, Dad.”

Five minutes later: “Uh, Dad, did you MEAN to leave the rest of the train there?”

“Where?”

“On that curve.”

“What curve?”

“The one right near the mine.”

“The MINE? That’s clear down–oh, $^@! Where’s the caboose?”

“Uh, down at the mine with the other fifteen cars.”

Grin. Grit teeth. “Let me back it up.”

“Uh, dad, I think the last car’s derailed–oh boy–WATCH IT–!!–uh, Jeez, the rest of it just–”

“Yah, son, I KNOW! Let’s go broil some burgers, okay?”

“Okay, you want a beer?”

“Try about FOUR!”

Son, bless him, smiles at new wife: “Actually, I used to be the one that screwed it up.” Looks at me, grins angelically. “Didn’t you outfit that one new car with Kadees like you said you were going to?”

I smile at new wife. “You’re not into Widow-hood quite yet, are you?”

Tom[banghead]

20

day heat, sunlight, will make rails expand, contract, why there were 39 foot sections for the expansion effects to be minimized. With welded rail I presume expansion problems have gotten solved or we’de see horrendous kinks.

I was riding the Cleveland Rapid transit years ago and they got a huge “kink” in their line, a serious quick S curve warped out on a dead straight portion. Slow order across it till fixed, but streetcars can manuever it.