philiprporter

Many thanks indeed Paul that's very helpful.

Does anyone know if these are the tanks that used to be seen at Kings Cross diesel stabling point in the 1970s/early 80s or would those have been TTAs? Thanks, Phil

Very strange - glad you managed to get hold of one though. Cheers, Phil.

That sounds odd - it was sold out at Heljan some time ago I understand (i.e. sold out in terms of pre-order supplies to retailers) and because of a large number of returns due to the locos shifting in the packaging and causing damage to buffer-beams and other delicate areas (the plinth spec was not what Heljan had specified to their factory apparently and securing bolts have been pulling through the plinth and allowing the loco to move in transit), the blue version is now sold out everywhere I have looked. This applies to the non-refurbished version (3105), not the refurbished version pictured

Thanks Trevor - I was just wondering if he air brushed it or if there was some other method - will drop a comment and see what comes back.

Thanks Trevor that's very useful indeed. I'm guessing this guy gloss varnished the tender and loco before applying decals?

That sounds even grimmer!!

That does sound grim!!!

Thanks guys - all very interesting indeed. Having never been inside an engine room I had no idea how this would all work. I shall look under the bonnet of my car with renewed interest now! No sunroof fortunately!

Sorry Phil that wasn't my intention.

As the title suggests, I'm wondering if this is the dumbest question ever posted here, but I'm going to risk public humiliation and ask it! On the roof of all diesel locos is a big twirly whirly ventilation fan which is located beneath a very large hole in the roof. How is rain water prevented from entering the gubbins below and/or prevented from ending up on the engine room floor and accumulating wherever it lands? Same question for cant rail grilles, body side grilles and vents on the front of locos (e.g. the vent on the top of class 47 cabs) - I can appreciate that

And now a short video with the body on - which makes it sound even better despite a small echo effect. Just need to figure out how to make it run smoother at low speed (I read somewhere about wiring the motors in series on Heljan O gauge locos to help this?), but that can wait - for now I'm just enjoying the Napier noise! So in sum total to get this sounding right it was a switch from NCE Powercab to MRC/Gaugemaster Prodigy Advanced 2 that reduced the weird high frequency noise (but didn't get rid of it completely), EM2 speaker at one end which muffles the high frequency noise even

Thanks Charlie and thanks also for your patience and support - great stuff.

Quick video clip. Gaugemaster Prodigy 2 with EM2 and large O gauge speaker. Foam over speaker mutes the high pitched noise even more without significantly impacting overall volume. OK the root cause of the issue hasn't been completely solved but this will do for me and in real life (as opposed to a mobile phone recording) it sounds great. Hope this is helpful to someone.

Partial success - hooked everything up to a Gaugemaster Prodigy Advance 2 and you can still hear the high-pitched whistle, but its a lot less obvious and doesn't drive you round the bend so much, as it doesn't cut through the usual DCC sound white noise so much. Then as a last test, having tried a grand total of 6 different O gauge speakers with the whistle still there on the NCC Powercab and the Prodigy , I hooked up an EM2 - no high-pitched whistle, just blissful Deltic noise! I can only assume that the extreme bass of the EM2 masks the high frequency of the high pitch whistle.