Airfix Class 31

[DIRTY DIESEL]

After many months of putting it off, I finally took the plunge.

How easy a job and runs perfect without any CV adjustments, very smooth running at slow speed and I dont mind the sound it makes either.

Never even soldered before how chuffed was I when put on test DC test track and it moved without buzzing and then on to Prog Track to progamme it.

My layout runs on terminal blocks that might change from now on :icon_lol:

[pudzyp]

My one and only attempt to hardwire a chip was with an old Traing 31, never again. As the advice says if it aint a good runner on DC it wont be on DCC.

 

Is there many differences between the Airfix and Triang 31?

[Ravenser]

Lots . I did an old Airfix 31 a little while back:

 

Airfix 31 DCC'd

 

I still have to sort out the squeak though

[Ravenser]

Blatent bump - my screen at work can't seem to cope with the pop up box for the weblink but I've now added the old RMWeb thread link

[DIRTY DIESEL]

I should have added I used a Bachmann 3F decoder,

for a Loco that I bought second hand 25 years ago the paint work does n't look out of place next to its younger cousins.

[mossdp]

An Airfix 31 had a mention in the Guiness Book of Records for hauling 105 coaches. Seem to remember this from a late 1970s or early 1980s edition. Some of these models were were very quiet, others very noisy. They are always good performers. To me, they capture the look of a real 31 better than any of the other three 31s that have been producd in 00 (Tri-ang, Lima, Hornby).

[Dagworth]

In my experience of Airfix 31s being noisy I found that it was the tape around the armature hitting the pole pieces of the magnet. If you bend the pole pieces out a fraction, not much, just enough so that the armature turns freely, they run much quieter.

 

Andi

[34theletterbetweenB&D]

An Airfix 31 had a mention in the Guiness Book of Records for hauling 105 coaches. ...

Bear in mind it had traction tyres. But with the metal wheels from the idle bogie substituted on the power bogie it would still manage a realistic load. A pair of these power bogies in a single chassis on the metal wheels, outhauls any of the centre motor types I own, including some significantly heavier models. Rather more noisily than the centre motor models I might add.

To me, they capture the look of a real 31 better than any of the other three 31s that have been produced in 00 (Tri-ang, Lima, Hornby).

Quite so, and it is remarkable that the original Triang model is better then the current Hornby for appearance, on which the failure to render the recessed side cab windows correctly, means that it fails to capture the character of the prototype. Don't think there is anything else amongst Hornby's introductions over the past decade of which that can be said...

 

The ideal marriage is the Airfix body (for topsides appearance) on the new Hornby chassis (for accurate bogie appearance and performance); especially as Hornby have not offered an all over green production run class 30 with headcode box, only the pilot scheme 'skinhead'.

[mossdp]

A good model and plenty available very cheaply. Plastic wheels replaced with metal ones and double power bogie would give something very good indeed.

[34theletterbetweenB&D]

There were two problems with the two power bogie version. It took a lot of tweakery to make reasonably quiet runners out of them independently, and then achieve adequate speed matching; running at even slightly different speeds the noise returns... Even once well set up accelerations were apt to induce noisy moments. And secondly, the current consumption was too much for most OO controllers - an H&M clipper or duette would trip out within a minute for example. It was happiest on a 2A output variable transformer controller.