How it all began.

Out of the box, couplings removed but no hoses yet added to the buffer beam.

The Dapol 08 Doctor will see you now....

 

Am I the first to dismember my 08 completely?

Being quite comfortable with taking things apart and not too fussed about warranty (once I had proven it basically works).

 

Contemplating fitting a Zimo 644D sound chip to my 08 last night led me to start removing screws to see if access could be made as simple as possible.

 

So, as others have found, the body and chassis can easily be separated with two small screws (one at each end of the chassis) , remembering to carefully

disconnect the wiring/plugs inside and gently threading the chassis out of the plastic items (vac pipes, rear crossbar, pipework plugged into chassis etc.).

 

We now have the two parts - I want to fit a crew, the Cice art ones are very nice and a good price too..

See here http://artcice.wixsite.com/cice

 

Body

Therefore I needed to gain access to the cab. Removing the two side by side screws below the cab allowed the whole assembly to lift vertically away from the bodyshell.

Again, take care that the wires to the cab and marker lights are threaded out as well. The wires are thin and easily snagged..

 

With the cab free, it is found to be made up of two parts, the control desk and floor separates from the outer cab body by very very gently easing the cab body outward starting with the control desk end and working round (note, it may be glued) to the back of the body where there are two very small clips in each corner of the rear cab inside wall.

 

Once free, the two parts separate to reveal a very nicely detailed cab - you can now add more gauges/detail and crew easily.

 

WARNING - be careful of the hinged doors, as the fine wire pin that secures them is liable to fall out... Best keep the cab body inverted to help keep the wire in.

 

The main body/nose assembly is also glued to the footplate (most probably to avoid a gap showing !) although there are two recessed screws if you are needing to separate things further. I chose not to, as access is now clear to easily mount a speaker behind the nice mesh radiator grille.

 

The Zimo dual chamber speaker is an easy fit with plenty of room available.

It can be secured with blu-tak or a small bracket.

 

Also plenty of room for a small smoke generator. <a project for another report later>

 

Many will have found that the centre lower marker light is not active (no led fitted). I plan to add one as there is some space - albeit tight...

With a Zimo decoder a separate funcrtion can be added to drive this if required (or wire it into working with one of the others)

 

Chassis

Turning to the chassis...

The small circuit board can easily be removed via the two small screws on top once the wires have been unsoldered (mine were rather untidy) - and I wanted to replace them with slightly thicker wire as I intend to make my loco dual mode with a DC - DCC switch inside.

 

Also allowing me to add my stored charge lighting circuit for when on DC use ;-) Keeps the shunting lights on for a long period when stopped.

 

The plastic support frame that holds the small plug board also acts as a motor retainer and is simply clipped out of the chassis  by gently prying with a small blade on each of the lower part of the four legs and the frame lifts away.

 

Now the motor can be lifted out from the flywheel end and the gearing examined for lubrication etc.

Actually the motor is not securely fitted, simply resting in the chassis casting cradle and secured with the plastic clip surround - this might be why some mechanisms are a bit noisy at higher speeds.

 

I also noticed a fair bit of sideplay in the main drive axle which may need attention later on, that plus the slop in the crank/connecting rods means a sloppy drive action.

But this is something that one of the machining fiends (like Isambard) will fix in his own inimitable style and we can all wait for a long treatise on how this is done.

Even thought he said in a previous post that he didn't plan to do any modifications - I know he will!!

 

Note the plastic sticky pad insulator on the base - again mine was not particularly square or ensuring a good insulator against the lower motor feed wire (Grey).

I have sleeved my motor wires separately for additional safety. The insulator is also a partial cushion against vibration but is somewhat poor at that task.

 

Replacing the pickup and motor connections with thicker wiring allows me to fit the DC/DCC changeover switch and rewire back to the PCB.

Plenty of room to route the wiring neatly alongside the inner frame.

 

Whilst on the subject of the connection PCB, I decided I did not like the DCC sound chip sitting at an angle and placing stress on the 21MTC connector.

 

Therefore I have performed the following modification

 

 

• Carefully unsolder and remove the two green inductors from the topside of the board.
• Refit on the underside in the same holes.
• The components are no polarity conscious so this is a simple job.
• It will be seen that they now will foul the plastic carrier  - so this is a simple task to gently carve/drill away just enough of the plastic frame to allow them to sit clear with the PCB level on top. The carrier strength is slightly reduced, but it is not supporting a lot of weight or force so all will be well.
• This now means the decoder will sit level. ;-))

 

Re-assembling everything is (in the best traditions of a Haynes manual) a reverse of the above procedure....

 

So I now have a DCC sound fitted 08 that is dual switchable to DC for use on other friends layouts, and has stored charge lighting for DC use (it lasts a number of minutes and tricks many people into thinking my layout is DCC... not!)

 

Comment welcome.

 

I plan to add more later - pictures of all this to follow soon.

Lodekka.

Some interesting innovations there Lodekka. Good luck with it! Ta for your help with the Zimo twin speakers - soldered mine up today and sound is very good with the MX644, particularly when you site the speakers hard agains the radiator etch.

John

O.K. Guys and Galls, here is the Video No 77A, of the weathering of the NSE 33, its about half an hour long, so sorry its so long.

7 minutes ago, Barnaby said:

Andy that back scene is very good and quickly done too, have you done a show /tell /how anywhere?

 

 

Best

 

 

Fraid I have, haha

It was inevitable with the schools being a reservoir, and I would not wish it on any one, but the wife and one of the kids has Covid- so I've locked them away in their bedrooms. This tactic worked really well when our first child got it, and hopefully fingers crossed I'll still be able to dodge it.

It does mean I have to provide room service but it also means I have some modelling time too!

I thought I would try and make a start on a small secure line side yard area beyond the stabling point. It might be an expensive way to do it, but I came across this modelling paste and thought i'd give it ago to help create puddles and tracks in the ground.

It went on ok and I left it to dry. I marked out the arch of the security gates and vehicle tracks, and where I want to create some puddles. I then painted it brown with artist acrylics. Time will tell if any of the undulations or tracks get lost when scatter is applied later. I'm really going to have to sort out the back scene in the future- Where it curves round, I'm sure the creases are getting worse!

I have been doing other bits too - but room service is being called for dinner!

Here’s the video 

Paul

Doing the trackplan for Giles' excellent article in the mag sent me cross-eyed several times over. It may help to give some context within this topic too.

What an enormous achievement!

Lastly today some photos at Morpeth.  The second and third photos were taken when trains were being divertyed over the Blyth and Tyne after the sleeping car train derailment.

Morpeth Class 45 up probably lime empties Aug 81 C5532

Morpeth 47433 Edinburgh to Newcastle mail and pass diverted via the Blyth and Tyne 24th June 84 C6550

Morpeth 474336 Edinburgh to Newcastle mail and pass diverted via the Blyth and Tyne 25th June 84 C6572

Morpeth up HST passsing Class 101 Alnmouth to Newcastle in up loop  18th April 85 C6825

Morpeth 47198 up Speedlink 25th July 85 C6990

David

4 hours ago, 1466 said:

I would welcome more on how you achieved this stunning effect . Brilliant 

Thanks so much! 

I started by applying some Winsor & Newton gloss varnish on with a wide flat brush. After this had a cured I added a wash of AK interactive's Stone Grey panel liner on the body sides - most was removed with a flat brush dipped in white spirit. Mig Dark Wash was added to the roof and, again, most was wiped off with a tissue.

With an airbrush, I mixed railmatch’s enamel frame dirt with a hint of their weathered black and applied this to the underframe and bufferbeams before then again using a brush with thinners to clean the bogie sides.

A blend of the weathered black, with a hint frame dirt and grey was then airbrushes onto the roof, axles boxes and body sides with most of this ‘cleaned’ off the sides using a brush - a wide flat one helps! I often gave it just a quick waft of the colour mix after ‘cleaning’ it to take off the harsher edges.

I added a bit of humbrol metalcote gunmetal to the mix and repeated the previous step before then applying almost pure matt black, with just a hint of grey, around the exhaust.

The finishing touches, after I left it to dry overnight, were some of wilder’s ‘old grease’ powder and wash in the axles boxes and some rustier powders added to the brake blocks. Oil and coolant leaks were added to the roof brush with a comb brush using wilder's 'old grease' wash with some humbrol gloss black in the mix. Lastly added some grease to the buffers with Matt black!

Hope this helps!