Hornby APT (2020 tooling)

[boxbrownie]

57 minutes ago, PaulRhB said:

Ok so taking the dimensions from my NDM I ordered a Zimo 630R as it seemed to fit. 
 

Well it doesn’t fit this way up!

 

Fortunately it just does with fractions of a mm to spare the other way up. 

I added some tape and a small square of foam tape to the recess on the decoder sleeve itself to get more contact area. 
 

 

It is incredibly tight. 

 

But it does still tilt!

 

You do need to leave a mm to clear the spigot for the screw or it will catch on that. 

I cannot remember what I fitted in mine, I’ll have a look later.

[boxbrownie]

Zimo MX600 fits easily with room to swing….or tilt a cat 

[E100]

3 minutes ago, boxbrownie said:

Zimo MX600 fits easily with room to swing….or tilt a cat 

Thank goodness - that's what I plan to use. I think the MX600 is a fair bit thinner. Some particularly tight locos have meant I've even cut away the plastic!

[PaulRhB]

1 hour ago, boxbrownie said:

Zimo MX600 fits easily with room to swing….or tilt a cat 

I could only find two 600’s so they are going in the driving trailers so I put the higher power ones in the NDM  nice to know they all fit though. 

[E100]

I believe R8249 (Hornby 8pin NEM 652) is rated at 0.5A continuous so I'd assume anything 0.7A continuous and above from anyone else should be fine.

[PaulRhB]

52 minutes ago, E100 said:

I believe R8249 (Hornby 8pin NEM 652) is rated at 0.5A continuous so I'd assume anything 0.7A continuous and above from anyone else should be fine.

Yes but I’ve not been particularly impressed with other Hornby decoders so I went with ones I know are reliable in performance. The 600’s are perfectly adequate on consumption but I was struggling to find anyone with 4 and I wanted the same decoder in both powercars. Plus the 600’s are a great price at £20 each. 

[E100]

12 minutes ago, PaulRhB said:

Yes but I’ve not been particularly impressed with other Hornby decoders so I went with ones I know are reliable in performance. The 600’s are perfectly adequate on consumption but I was struggling to find anyone with 4 and I wanted the same decoder in both powercars. Plus the 600’s are a great price at £20 each. 

Oh yeah, completely understand - it was more for others benefit that a 600 will work. I also would wholeheartedly agree on best practice is using the same chips for the same purpose as you have done to avoid unforeseen issues. I've standardized on using Zimo's budget decoders almost exclusively for anything not factory fitted and been thoroughly impressed. Based on some of the TTS chips I will never go for a Hornby chip!

 

Also forgot to say, but really appreciate the photos you have shared as they help people like myself who have not needed to get a separate NDM to understand the fitting process.

Edited January 11, 2022 by E100
added last sentence

[Widnes Model Centre]

Hi, Looking for advice re APT formation on a nine or eleven car unit. Certainly not an area I have a clue about.

Ideally giving the Hornby R numbers to make up the APT than actually ran on the West Coast Mainline.

TIA

[boxbrownie]

1 hour ago, E100 said:

I believe R8249 (Hornby 8pin NEM 652) is rated at 0.5A continuous so I'd assume anything 0.7A continuous and above from anyone else should be fine.

That’s what I thought, the Zimo’s have a good load capability for their size (let alone excellent motor control).

[stovepipe]

9 minutes ago, Widnes Model Centre said:

Hi, Looking for advice re APT formation on a nine or eleven car unit. Certainly not an area I have a clue about.

Ideally giving the Hornby R numbers to make up the APT than actually ran on the West Coast Mainline.

TIA

 

There were only a small number of occasions when an 11-car formation was used - in the spring of 1985 involving 370003 and 370007, with 49003 and 49006.  None of the other cars are known. Of the approx 200 observations I have collected, there are less than 10 that have complete car listings, and those are mostly my own observations. In all cases they are not matching sets of numbers.

 

There is only one 9-car working noted, but many 10 car-formations in the period of public service and BR staff useage from 1981-84. The driving trailers most often used were 370001/3/6/7, with 49001/3/6. I suspect that not all the cars were fitted with the Mk3 tilt pack (from late 1980), and it seems those that were not were rarely seen on test or in service from then on.

 

It also worth repeating that the 14-car formation were only ever seen in the period Aug 1980 to July 1981, and then never again.

[Mr_Tilt]

9 hours ago, lyneux said:

 

EDIT: Kit, I think you might need to explain to us how you can tell this to be the case and what it means... cheers!

 

 

OK, no problem.

 

You can tell the Driving Trailer and the following trailer car are tilting normally as the lower edge of the Driving Trailer is at an angle relative to the track surface. It's obviously on a left hand bend as it's tilting left, 'negative tilt' in E-Train parlance. 

 

The the third coach and the the Power Car are definitely not tilting as much as the two leading cars, you can tell because the stripes don't line up, and you can see much more of the front end of the third trailer sticking out behind the second trailer.

 

I think they're not tilting at all because the lower edge of both the trailing vehicles in the pic are about parallel with the track. P-Trains had a ratchet system in the bogies that could be engaged to lock the bodies parallel with the track if the tilt system had failed, although it wasn't used very often apparently. That mode was called 'tilt passive' because there was no power in the tilt system, either control power or hydraulic power. 

[Mr_Tilt]

1 hour ago, stovepipe said:

 

I suspect that not all the cars were fitted with the Mk3 tilt pack (from late 1980), and it seems those that were not were rarely seen on test or in service from then on.

 

 

What are you referring to as the 'Mk3 tilt pack' please?

 

In my world there were only two 'Mk 3s' and they were the ones we built for Lab 4 Hastings. All the P-Train Trailer Car tilt packs were 'Mk 5s', the underfloor packs, and the 'Mk 4s' were the big boxy ones fitted to the Power Cars.

 

The control systems and hydraulic systems on both 'Mk 4s' and 'Mk 5s' were exactly the same originally, just differently packaged.

[stovepipe]

Something I picked up from a contemporary Modern Railways magazine. I’d have to check the reference, but it was in an article talking about the delayed press run in June 1980. Perhaps the press man got his 3 and 5 mixed up in his notes?

[Mr_Tilt]

Wouldn't surprise me, the media, even the specialist railway media, weren't the largest fans of the APT project, and seemed to do everything possible to downplay the whole thing. 

 

Perhaps they were referring to various versions of the tilt control system then installed on the P-Trains? There were numerous different versions of the electronic controls, some differing radically from the original concept, the most famous being the later version which didn't fully compensate for the cant deficiency in order to reduce the effects of 'tilt sickness'. The hydraulics remained petty well the same right through the project though. 

 

The CM&EE would probably have wanted to stamp their own IDs on the systems without making too much connection to the original R&D Div generated IDs.  

 

Such was the political in-fighting of the period sadly.

 

 

[RedgateModels]

A question for those who have 1980 and 2020 versions - how close a match is the dark grey paint between the two releases?

[sandwich station]

On 12/01/2022 at 10:31, RedgateModels said:

A question for those who have 1980 and 2020 versions - how close a match is the dark grey paint between the two releases?

 

 

 

Edited July 7, 2023 by sandwich station
Repost Pic

[stonojnr]

On 10/01/2022 at 14:03, RyanN91 said:

Well it just looks like other than the points mentioned here.  Sets 370 001 and 370 002 are now the plain yellow fronts with the addition of the City of Derby NDM. and sets 370 003 and 370 004 are now the black window surrounds final APT-P logo. Hornby have certainly listened! I know it was suggested by some that in for 2020 Hornby's Centenary  that the two APT-P packs would be a one-off.  But I didn't think Hornby would invest tens of thousands of £s on new APT-P toolings. We may possible see the final sets in the future with the red stripe APT-P logo.  

 

but knowing whats on Hornbys mind reading the tea leaves sometimes feels like playing 4d chess with them, youd like to think their investment of money in a new tooling doesnt end in a one off run of something, but...you can never tell, so you commit to pre order which then convinces them if enough people do the same theres enough scope for a 2nd batch anyway.

 

the obvious question is will the next batch come with less obvious capacitors though ?

[WestRail642fan]

6 hours ago, sandwich station said:

 

 

is it weird that i sort of prefer to 1980's grey then the 2020 grey?

[RedgateModels]

7 hours ago, sandwich station said:

 

 

Thanks for that, looks like both greys would need to be changed if say, I were to get a dev coach for my 1980’s set.

[boxbrownie]

11 hours ago, sandwich station said:

 

 

I haven’t even put my new NDM next to my old set yet, looks like re-painting the new model will be on the cards, well gives me something to do 

[pava]

Does anyone know if a set ever ran with a black fronted dts at one end and a yellow fronted dts at the rear 

[wairoa]

Just got an email from Hornby that my 5 car set has been "dispatched." Looking forward to getting this. Hopefully within the next 3 weeks.

[BR(S)]

Broken down APT being assisted by a Class 47 (1:28):

 

 

[eagle50043]

For info purposes these are the sightings , and formations, i saw as a kid;

 

22/08/84    370006 + 007 ( Glasgow -Euston, 16:30 return)
        48106 48602 49003 49001 48607 48503 48303 48406 48201 48107
01/04/85    370003 + 007 ( Glasgow -Euston, 16:30 return)
        48103 48406 48604 49006 49003 48607 48503 48303 48201 48107
02/08/85    370001 + 003 (ecs to Crewe Electric)
        48101 48601 48204 49005 49002 48603 48404 48103 48103

Edited January 12, 2022 by eagle50043
details

[Mr_Tilt]

13 hours ago, BR(S) said:

 

 

 

Yet another example of the media lambasting British engineering. 

 

What's never mentioned by them is that the Treasury cut the development budget and still expected the same time scale to be followed. Ridiculous.