bluex5

I've seen your Youtube videos Phil, excellent stuff, especially the Hydraulics Quick question - does the Howes 40 project respond better to acceleration / decelaration?? One of the things I don't like on the original sound file is that the revs don't die back to idle quickly if you kill the power from about speed step 4, so you end up with a stationary loco revving it's crackers off for several seconds.

Thank Phil, excellent info! Might have to look into a reblow then.

Phil, Can you advise how the Howes reblow has improved the sound over the original files? This is my first DCC sound loco and I'm quite pleased with it but I'm interested to know how a reblow could make it better. Thanks!

Received my D211 today, have wanted to dip my toe into sound for a while and couldn't resist with Rails latest deal. Lovely model and the sounds seem fine to me. However the standard decoder settings are crap! Was coggy as hell on the first couple of speed steps. An hours fiddling with CV2 / 52 / 53 and 54 had it running pretty smoothly low down. I've had the odd anomaly with it being unable to move with the sound running,, yet cancel the sound and it moves fine??? Nevertheless the issue went away and hasn't come back. Problem is it opens the Pandora's box of wanting more sound chips!

Not sure I understand? Is this down to cost?

It's expensive but if it's any good I'll buy one. Sure the £150 English pounds going to stop people buying one on impulse but I'm confident that if it's a good model then I think UK buyers will pay that. The salad days of bargain high quality UK outline are long gone I'm afraid.

The final "X" variant of the N15 please, as it looks like Hornby are not going to do it.

Certainly looks like the bogie wheels are from the B17 bits box. There was something else glaringly wrong with the picture of the model in the display case, above and beyond the bent footplate, and I now see what it is. Can't believe the same firm gave us the Thompson 01 and L1 not so long back.

After the above post re prototypical motor failure I ran mine for about 90 minutes on the rolling road (no layout or chip to hand at moment), actually felt a bit tight to start but settled down ok, didn't get hot. I think if it's going to go pop then you'll see it happen quickly.

Received mine today, great model of an ugly yet intricate prototype. The grab handles on the end of the long bonnet are rather impressive especially. Also mention must be made of the rather nice (and concentric!) spoked wheel sets, really give the loco a unique feel.

Looks superb Mike!

I had one a few years back which I modified the valances / buffer beam on, did some cursory detailing and painted green / SYP. It looked OK if you pretended you couldn't see the poor bogies and undersized wheel sets.

I know it has a large-ish flywheel, I'm not sure on the winding spec of the motor but I can assure you that the slow speed running is absolutely fantastic.

I'm tempted to do a BR Green late crest using a railroad one as well! Pure "what the hell" purchase but we all need the odd one of those...

Can never have enough 2-8-0's All I need now is Mousa to release their 04/8 body and I'm awash with the bl**dy things!

Try another one. My Hornby one is flawless in it's running (as are my two new Bachmann ones). It's RTR, there are always a few Friday afternoon specials around - hence why in the past month I've returned a Hornby A3 and a brand spanking new Bachmann V2 (I bought two of these - one runs perfectly, the other waddled badly and sounded like a sack of spanners).

I DCC'd mine last night, very very impressed, although the new Bachmann ones run just as well. Don't like the packaging though - left a polished mark on top of the boiler from one of the sponge pads and the edge of the part of the vacform bent the whistle, luckily easily sorted but I'm loathe to put it back in the original box.

Well I received my "Sir Harold" today and I'm quite impressed. Still prefer the underpinnings of the retooled Bachmann attempt (the driving wheels in particular look a lot heavier than the Hornby one) but the overall finesse of detail, plus a chassis that seems to run almost as well as Bachmann's means I'm chuffed. Had the pricing always been this way I would of standardised on the Hornby one probably.

I had standardised on the Bachmann one for my layout, but at this price I've taken a punt on the Hornby one just to see if I like it within the context of my layout. Also chucked a cheapy weathered 8F into the cart .

Many thanks for this. I have pre-ordered one just this minute. Now need to put another cheapo 04 to one side in readiness!

I bought one even though it's on the edge of suitability for my layout. Lovely model.

It just looks "right" to me, very impressed. I like the brake gear and jumper cables on the bogie especially.

They were certainly not bad machines, although there were shortcomings that resulted from using the 04 underpinnings (coupling rods that were never designed to work with Walscherts (sp?) valve gear being one thart springs to mind. As Simon correctly says, it was a good way to get extra life out of the 04 platform at minimal cost, the state of decreptitude of the donor loco being a factor in the choice of rebuild (01 for those with dead cylinders or 04/8 for those just needing a fresh boiler). They had loads of the bloody things so it would of been impractical to just scrap them and build new.