Said a lot of times in the Skills section of the site. And no doubt raised a smile a few times as modellers struggle to carry out some of the mundane jobs of modifying stock to fit the new purpose or layout scenario.

My own little cameo in hacking models about is a common one, the conversion of old ringfield tender drives to DCC. There a lot of stuff on the net about this, most of it horrible and unwatchable. And none appeared to fit my first case, a King Class unit, with electrical connection on DC achieved by using the motor chassis to carry power, with only a single cable from the tender connection to one of the brush holders. Still, not that difficult. This type are supposed to be aided by using nylon screws to break the power connection from clip via screw into the block, however in this case the screws were far too large, and had a very fine thread, so that even to cut a new profile by screwing into the threaded block was impossible.

So I decided to ask the audience and posted a query on Modelling skills and tips. I waited and waited and waited, and eventually a poster name of Armand supplied the answer, good man, he has been helpful to me before. Solder the red wire from the decoder onto the gear retaining clip. So simple and yet I have never come across this suggestion anywhere; at first I thought it wouldnt work, thinking that the clip fitting over the gear stubs wasnt tight enough for eletrical contact, but overlooking that at its apex the clip makes a firm contact with the block in two places. So the next stage was easy; cut the tag off the black cable and solder to the black lead from the decoder; solder the grey and orange leads and solder to each brush retaining clip, and the red as mentioned to the gear retaining clip. Two minutes the lot.

So back to the problem of isolating the brush retainers while employing the original screws. The internet says to make some plastic isolating washers, which I did; now one of the screws was no longer long enough, and further, there was a possible connection where the screw passed through the U-shaped hole in the retainer. Again, never seen this mentioned as an issue. With nothing to replace the screws, the only option I could see was to enlarge the U so the screw would pass through easily without touching, which needed a 5mm drill. I though the retainers might break at this point but they didnt, and using a single plastic washer between the screw head and retainer, I was able to fit everything together and it passed the continuity test - wowser.

So I just taped up the black to black open joint and all the remaining leads, which may one day get to control an uncoupler.

So now the decoder is in position, the tender moulding fitted easily over the top on test but its left open until I can put it on the programming track in a week or so. One down, ten to go. And so far, side by side, they are all different in some degree. Will be interesting to see if the technique works universally.

Photos show the finished conversion, soldering decoder to retainign clip (poor), use of plastic 'washers' for insulation, and the retaining clip with red soldered lead in place. Juts the pic of the blown decoder to come