Theo

Does anyone know where I can purchase a couple of 800-6000 Tortoise point motors? They seem to be in very short supply at the moment. Alternatively, are there any other similar motors that will run from a Switch8 board? Thanks in advance. Theo

I have an Airfix/Dapol railbus with a Hollywood Foundry (I think) chassis, but it needs a new drive belt. Anyone got any ideas where I could find some new ones?

To centralise Seep point motors I insert offcuts of plasticard in the point blades, and a homemade wire clip to centralise the point motor. Its then easy to insert the operating wire from underneath and attach the motor to the baseboard. (See attached photos). I've always used double-side foam tape successfully, which can be removed easily if the motor proves faulty.

A Pibgorn!

I was told a couple of weeks for the sound versions.

Digitrains in Lincoln sold me a new cable after exactly the same fault. It is any cable's weak point.

I have a problem with directional lighting with my Bachmann 2-car DMU. The power car has a Zimo MX648R which does the sound, and switches the front lights from white to red depending which direction is set by the handset (NCE PowerCab). The trailer car has a Lais 8xx00nn non-sound decoder just to operate the lights. When I fitted this about a year ago, all worked well, then recently I noticed that the red lights stayed on irrespective of direction. I've linked up JMRI to the test track and tried to modify the decoder settings there, but it seem to give no changes when I reset the 'function on running forward' and 'function on running reverse' options, I can't get the lights to switch over when I change direction on the handset. Both chips have the same address, and have done since originally fitted. Any ideas? Thanks in advance! Theo

I made up a wire thingy to centralise the operating pin when fitting seep point motors, ( see pic) which helps, but I agree with the erratic performance of the inbuilt switch. Most of my points are now tortoise, and the remaining seep ones are fitted with microswitches for drop power, and a second one for led indicayion

I'll second the use of a graphite stick!

Here's my take on Parkend's Marsh Sidings. I omitted the Sawmills siding for reasons of space (the fiddle yard is behind). There's some good photos and maps in Ralph Anstis's book 'The Story of Parkend' ISBN 9781899889044, including maps from 1859, 1878 and 1922. Neil Parkhouse's book is wonderful, and he's very approachable, met him at Warley last year.

Great books

Thank you all for your responses. I'll contact Hornby, as I've now managed to break the pivot pin between the connecting rod and crosshead. Such is life....

Oops, wrong picture. This shows what I've done to try to repair the pickups. Here's a picture of the broken ones

Theyve all snapped at the right angle bend.

Two just fell off, one broke when cleaning. Unlike Bachmann pickups, which appear to be phosphor bronze, the Hornby ones seem to be very thin (not) spring steel, and theyv