Fitting DCC chip to Hornby Black 5

[Darius43]

I have just been trying to fit a Hornby Black 5 Sound decoder into the (relatively) new Hornby Black 5.

 

I should state first that decoder fitting is apparently easier on locos produced more recently - at least the whole gubbins is in the tender, where there is some semblance of space for a chip and speaker plus wiring looms. In the old days there was usually an 8pin pug in the loco with no space for a decoder let alone a speaker - it was if the designer (numpty) assumed that the decoder existed in hyperspace.

 

Now there is space in the tender for the decoder and speaker, except:-

 

1. The feed wires from the tender wheel pickups enter the tender in the centre of the speaker enclosure so they foul the speaker and risk getting trapped between the speaker and the enclosure rim.

 

2. You have to untwine a load of fragile wires and feed them through the hole in the ballast weight.

 

3. The ballast weight is secured by three screws of different gauges (why make them all different)?

 

4. When you ultimately succeed in getting everything in place with no trapped wires, the speaker solder tabs ground against the metal weight when it is re-fixed in position. I thought I might have installed the speaker upside-down but it only fits this way up.

 

5. Because of the wires trapped beneath the speaker the ballast weight will not sit down properly and the tender body doesn’t fit back on properly - if you tighten the ballast weight screws too much the tender chassis bends and rocks on the wheels.

 

6. Discarding and replacing the weight isn’t an option as the tender body fixes back in place by clipping onto the ballast weight.

 

7. My proposed solution is to replace the Hornby round speaker with a smaller sugar cube speaker that doesn’t need to be trapped beneath the ballast weight.

 

Now this solution shouldn’t be necessary if the designer was competent.

 

As it is there is little evidence of said competence when it comes to decoder installation. You either have to unclip bodies with the very real risk of damage to fragile parts and disconnection of lighting connections or remove layers of components to get at the decoder plug point @ then figure out where to put the decoder etc. Then get the whole lot reassembled and hope everything still works.

 

Given that DCC is no longer a new thing why is decoder fitting still an afterthought with the designers? Why do they make the whole process like playing 3D chess? Why are they so incompetent in this area?

Why do model magazine reviews say stuff has been designed for decoder installation without ever trying to actually do it?

 

Rant over.

 

Darius

[Darius43]

After all that it turned out to be a duff chip - won’t respond to programming instructions. At least it wasn’t too expensive but I think that I will avoid Hornby chips in future - not worth the aggravation.

 

D

[RAF96]

It amazes me that in the same Hobby Group we find Scalextric cars with an external access slot for the digital chip but in the model railway world we still have to put up with major dismantling to install a decoder.

 

There is no reason why there could not be an easily accessible recess for a decoder and also for the speaker which had touch contacts at the interface. Remove external hatch and clip in a decoder and speaker, replace hatch if that is the design methodology - job done.

 

​Rob

[JSpencer]

When my black 5 was converted to DCC sound a good few years ago, I kept the chip in the loco, and put the speaker in the tender with 2 thin additional wires running between them (similar to what I did for the TTS sound fitting in a Bachmann A1 - see TTS steam sound thread for details).

 

There was space in the loco to fit chip, smoke, working headlight and firebox glow. Though I think the original 8 pin plate was removed.

 

This is easier than trying to work around the old electrical contact drawbar. In fact you will still have to fit 2 wires going between tender and loco. Except you then need to disconnect the wires on the motor and solder these on instead. All this Just to avoid having a chip in the loco. That I agree is a lot of extra work which I feel is not required having already got my black 5 converted to sound plus other DCC features.

 

Before the advent of the 4 pin devils plug, most RTR tender locos (Bachmann and Bachmann included) designed models for plain a DCC fitting but not sound. Both makes are gradually converting the tooling so that both chip and speaker go in the tender (though I would prefer chip in the loco with wires to the tender for a speaker, to allow me to fit other working DCC features).

 

From memory, I think the chip goes just behind the smokebox on the loco chipped black 5. Check there should be a space there.

Edited November 5, 2017 by JSpencer

[Izzy]

After all that it turned out to be a duff chip - won’t respond to programming instructions. At least it wasn’t too expensive but I think that I will avoid Hornby chips in future - not worth the aggravation.

 

D

 

If you haven't removed the decoder yet, just try turning the loco around on the track. It might be that it is one of those TTS decoders that only works/progs in one direction with certain DCC systems. At the very least you'd know.

 

Izzy

[JSpencer]

After all that it turned out to be a duff chip - won’t respond to programming instructions. At least it wasn’t too expensive but I think that I will avoid Hornby chips in future - not worth the aggravation.

D

I would test the chip in another 8 pin loco chassis - that has not been modified - first.

 

Default address is 003. I have fitted 3 such chips and they were all fine. I have another 3 locos on top that came pre-fitted, that are fine too.

 

Your conversion text makes no mention of running back additional wires to the locos motor which would be required to get it to work. The two contacts on the drawbar only link all the loco and tender pickups together. Remember Hornby and Bachmann. rTR models with all the chip and speaker gibbins in the tender, use 4 wires between loco and tender, 2 are to join the pickups, 2 go to the motor to control it.

[Darius43]

I would test the chip in another 8 pin loco chassis - that has not been modified - first.

Default address is 003. I have fitted 3 such chips and they were all fine. I have another 3 locos on top that came pre-fitted, that are fine too.

Your conversion text makes no mention of running back additional wires to the locos motor which would be required to get it to work. The two contacts on the drawbar only link all the loco and tender pickups together. Remember Hornby and Bachmann. rTR models with all the chip and speaker gibbins in the tender, use 4 wires between loco and tender, 2 are to join the pickups, 2 go to the motor to control it.

I did re-connect the loco before checking and tried the chip in another loco that I use for testing - no response to commands or programming enquiries in either alas. Thus is the Black 5 with a plug-in connection between the loco and tender.

 

Darius