Chris M

Why does it have to be seen a challenger? There are many ways of controlling trains and we are all entitled to use what works for us without being told we we are not using the correct method or that our layout is no more than "a circle of track on the carpet". Our choice should be respected by others. I choose dc because it suits my needs best. I came to this conclusion after investigation and carrying out a business analysis of what I needed and what each method of control provides. The person who helps run my layouts at exhibitions and has two dcc layouts at home has said that he thinks dc is the best for my layouts; from his use of dcc he believes that my layouts would be harder to operate at exhibitions if they were dcc. I think dcc is best for what he wants at home and so we are both happy that we have made different but correct choices. I converted one 00 loco to BPRC just out of interest and am very pleased with it. I might convert another loco sometime in the future or I might not as I don't really run 00 gauge. It certainly is viable in certain circumstances and has advantages that could be important to some people. There could be an interesting future though. We know the automotive industry is investing billions in improving battery technology and word is that they are nearly there. Somewhere around 2021/3 we should have a reasonably priced electric car which can run 400 miles and then fully recharge in about ten minutes. Some years after this you can be sure the technology will have worked its way into all batteries which may or may not make BPRC more mainstream. It sounds like the OP should go for dcc primarily because his layout builder is most familiar with dcc and may struggle with anything else but he should be aware that there are other choices which may suit his needs.

So I'm not allowed to have a different opinion to you. I respect others views and would ask for the same courtesy. I don't like the suggestion that my layouts are nothing more than a circle of track on a carpet. In fact one of them is end to end and not a circle at all

Batteries obviously take up a lot of space. A receiver costs £40 (this is an 18 volt 3 amp spec) and batteries cost £15 to £20. It is well worth it for the wonderful running that you get when the loco has its own power source on board. Absolutely no chance of stallling on points no matter how slow you go and zero problems due to dirty track or dirty wheels. Will run anywhere whether there is a power supply or not. No need for a power bus or to worry about conductivity of fishplates. If it was adopted by the likes of Bachmann or Hornby the costs would come down and battery housing would be incorporated into the chassis design. There are many cheap,small battery radio control cars around so the technology is there for OO but probably not for N. The main manufacturers won’t go in this direction because they kind of like being able to sell all the expensive controllers etc required for dcc.

This layout is the benchmark for compact N gauge layouts. Always impressed when with the thought that went into the whole layout in order to achieve the required effect. It may well be an inspiration for my next layout. If so I will happily declare where the ideas came from.

I just don’t see that dcc provides a near prototypical running experience any more than dc and yes I have tried both. There is no right or wrong, just what works for you. On my garden railway and one OO loco I have installed battery powered radio control and I rate this as absolutely brilliant. No wires at all for track, no track cleaning and no stalling on points; you really are driving the loco and not the track. I really think this is by far the best system but as yet it is not suitable for N. It is great for older 00 diesels where there is plenty of room in the body for batteries. It’s a shame that the likes of Bachmann and Hornby have no interest in BPRC because I think it would be a great step forwards. I just use NIMH batteries and they run for a long time between charges. The only down side I have found is that locos don’t stop when they come off the track...

The best thing is to try both, think about what is important to you and speak with the builder. Although you can see I prefer dc it really is horses for courses. It’s what you want that is best for you.

I also have sound on my dc layout. I have edited some sound files to suit my layout and trigger them to a Bluetooth speaker from my phone. I prefer this because I get the whole train passing sound and I get a much richer sound than possible from a speaker in an N gauge loco. If I use my big Bluetooth speaker I can make the floor vibrate as the trains pass but for some reason the wife doesn’t appear to be keen on me doing this. Haven’t asked the neighbours what they think!

My experience of MERG point control at the club has been disastrous. Although being a relatively cheap system it has cost a lot more than traditional push button and solenoid control. The plastic servo mounts are flimsy. Older Farish locos cause the points to change all by themselves. So far the only cure found is to install a new capacitor in every offending loco. This ain’t going to happen. Unless a cure is found in the next few months the MERG system will be stripped out. Yes the number of wires is greatly reduced compared to the traditional way but it is just too flaky.

When I restarted building model railways in 2013 I looked carefully into both systems and chose dc because it suits my needs better. For me the best thing about dc is that when you change a point you automatically have control of the loco on the selected track; this feature alone makes dc the choice for me. I model in N gauge but if I was doing O gauge my choice may have been different. I do hope my layouts are seen as being sort of realistic! Some say you can’t double head with dc but I have no problem. Even banking is possible.

50 049 coming soon as limited edition through class 50 fund

Dapol Foxcote Manor and Hinton Manor Dapol pannier 5764 Western Courier Farish Warship Onslaught

Farish 2MT 46443 and 46521. Farish pannier 6412 Farish 8F 48773 coming soon

And the tea will be reasonably priced.

The material cost for a cup of tea or coffee is less than 10p. If you have volunteers manning the refreshments in a room that is part of your premises and use mugs that volunteers will wash then everything else is profit. If you have to pay staff, disposable cups, run a van to move your stand to venues and pay the venue for being there your costs will be considerably higher. At the show I recently organised we sold tea at £1 and probably made more profit per cup than the people selling tea at the BRM show. At the model railway club I am a member of tea and coffee is completely free, or if you like included in the price of membership.

If you go to any event with a captive audience you will pay through the nose for food. Everyone knows this and you have three choices - accept that is the price of convenience, bring your own or go without. Same applies to sports events, theme parks etc etc. As for the admission prices to big shows - well just think how much it costs to go to other entertainment events. Model railway exhibitions are extremely cheap entertainment compared to most events. This is because most of those involved in the show have given up many hours of their free time for the paying visitors. I don't know about the BRM shows but I guess even the paid staff put in unpaid time to organise the show. Comments such as "blatent capitalism" are an insult to all of us who do put so many hours work in to these shows whether as organiser or exhibitor. Yes the venues are business which need to make a return on their investment ( which seems fair) but the people exhibiting certainly aren't.

Love planning, hate ballasting, love seeing a layout coming together. I particularly enjoy working my way through all the issues that arise as you go from plan to reality. For me the best bit is running a train or three through a scene that I have created.

RRP for Farish Hawksworth coaches is £39.95 while RRP for Dapol Collett coaches is £23.40. So an eight coach rake at RRP would be £319 for Farish or £187 for Dapol. While the Farish coaches are exquisite the Dapol ones are ok and I would say affordable whereas the Farish aren't. I fancied a few Hawksworth maroon coaches but they are not sufficiently important to me to pay out the sort of cash required. Likewise the Autocoach - Farish RRP only just gone up a bit to £39.95 while the Dapol RRP is only £16.96. I have one of each. Again the Farish is an exquisite model and is great to get up close to and admire, but, when they are a few feet away on my layout, there isn't much between them.

Thats a whopping increase in percentage terms yet again. I could understand a one off big increase to get things to where they need to be but there does seem to be a massive increase every year now. I reckon they may well have gone too far and could will struggle to sell in reasonable quantities. Fezza could be right in that it will be bad for the future of N gauge. Look on the bright side - all your current stock is now worth more on Ebay!

Thanks to Colin and the Stafford team for an enjoyable weekend. It was a well run and friendly exhibition as always. The attendance looked very good. I was back home with the layout by 18:00 but the layout is still in the car this morning.

Good to see the forum back up. Nice and dry at the showground this afternoon with no trace of snow. It was somewhat chilly though. My car earlier today, packed and raring to go.

I always park pointing slightly down hill if I can and with driving wheels as close as possible to the hard stuff. Never had a problem. My brother on the other hand....

Yes they do. USA Trains cannot do new runs of most of their locos due to a tooling dispute relating to a forced factory move. I believe they can't get the tooling released even though it was paid for and they have been told by the original factory that they will no longer produce USAT items. Another version of this story is that some of the tools have been "lost" in transit. Whatever the cause new production is proving to be impossible at the moment due to a lack of availability of existing tooling. There was also the famous Newquida LGB rip off. This is where blatant copies of LGB items suddenly appeared at very low prices. They were inferior in terms of the plastics used and the wheels etc but it did appear they were using the moulds from LGB China produced items. LGB enthusiasts were appalled and even made a video of a public burning of at least one item. Complaints were made to trading standards in the UK forcing one retailer to remove these items from sale. In the end it turned out that the use of these moulds was legitimate and they are still in production today. Whether LGB sold the rights for the models or the sets of tooling or just didn't pay debts (they were going bust at the time) is not clear. What is for sure is that cheap copies of LGB models that are made from the original or identical tooling are perfectly legally in production today. Aristocraft ceased trading and apparently left some unpaid bills in China as they closed. Kadar made some if not all of their locos and rolling stock. One railcar and the motor blocks for some locos have since been re-released by Bachmann USA so they are making use of tooling commissioned by another company. Again this production will be completely legal.

Not blaming them for anything, just saying their normal business practice isn't the same as what we are used to in the Western world. This has caught out many businesses, including some big ones.

I'm going to guess that the volumes for pretty much any N gauge British outline loco are so small that Chinese factories aren't too bothered whether they do a run or not. The revenue from UK locos is going to be nit sh*t compared to the total turnover of these factories and so the work will always be low priority to them. Probably looked upon as a fill in job when things are quiet. We have to be realistic about the size of our hobby and the size of everything else in the world. This probably explains why the class 17 didn't happen. I think there is a danger with the King in that Dave will have negotiated with the current Chinese factory in good faith based on orders made but will now be losing face (which is incredibly important in Asia) because he has not delivered the order for tooling when he expected to. This in itself could kill the project and whatever else is said the problem is down to a significant number of modellers not putting their money where their mouth is.