Crosland

I've had two faulty Zimo Plux 22 decoders (albeit not rebadged Bachmann ones) recently and the supplier had experienced others. The 2nd was a replacement for the first. I needed a particular decoder type for testing, and the Plux22 was all that was available at the time. I replaced that 2nd one at my own cost with an 8-pin decoder, as I couldn't be 100% sure I wasn't doing something wrong. The supplier has now taken the 2nd Plux22 decoder back, which reminds me I must chase them up to see if I am due a refund for that one.

Definitely talk to the supplier.

On 29/03/2024 at 08:48, WIMorrison said:

I would place the operating button in the DCC input not in the DC output as this will ensure that the rectifier only operates and draws power when you want to use the uncoupler

It will also make the switch contacts last longer, if the electromagnet takes any appreciable current, as DCC is AC and any tendency to arc will be prevented every time the voltage crosses zero.

Did you set the JMRI connection preference to SPROG or SPROG Command Station? You need the former for programming on the programming track.

Use the firmware version tool in the SPROG menu of JMRI. Does it report the SPROG version? If so, that confirms the USB connection is good. If not, do you have the correct port selected ion the JMRI connection preferences?

What did you do to determine JMRI isn't sending any commands to the SPROG?

If you ask on the SPROG specific group https://groups.io/g/sprog-dcc/topics someone with direct experience may be able to help. I don't, unfortunately, have access to Mac hardware.

As Nigel says, it's best to state the specific issue, if there is one.

Andrew Crosland

sprog-dcc.co.uk

To send a moderately heavy small parcel from the UK is well into the teens of £s when you add tracking and, maybe, insurance. The £19 may be high, but it's not a total rip-off, depending on the size and weight of the parcel.

Its a USB interface, not just cable and passive components.

14 hours ago, WIMorrison said:

 

Just one knob and that is with a cord which means it doesn't really meet the original requirement for two knobs  or mobility either 🤣

So what doe the Radio on and radio status indicate?

The requirement for suppression is a basic requirement, not related to TV and, in any case, terrestrial digital TV still uses the same frequencies as analogue.

Most interference caused to TVs, at least in more recent times  is due to poor aerial installation and wiring.

What happened to soaking in coke (the liquid, drinking variety!) or scrubbing with Cif 😀

22 hours ago, BroadLeaves said:

I suspect that building an e-commerce web site is the easy part. There's plenty of ways to do that for a relatively small outlay.

Exactly! I may have an advantage in having a technical background including coding, but there are free open source solutions with plenty of help available on the web. Hosting doesn't cost an arm and a leg and the maintenance is very low effort, apart from infrequent major upgrades that can be more painful. There's plenty of help available on line on various forums.

22 hours ago, BroadLeaves said:

 

The bigger issues may be

• getting traffic to come to the site (major search engines can take months to index a new site) and for a lot of people, if you're not in the top three pages of a search for e.g. "white metal loco kit" you don't exist

That's not necessarily true. I added new products and they were indexed and ranking top three within a month. The ranking does probably depend on the search terms used and they are, admittedly, fairly niche products, so little competition.

22 hours ago, BroadLeaves said:

• given the transaction volumes, the merchant service charge for processing card payments takes a significant amount of the net margin

I guess that depends on the margins, but it's only a few percent of the sale price with PayPal, less with something like Stripe, even less if you have the volumes to get good rates on a merchant account. If you take card payments at shows or in your shop then it's not an issue as you are going to pay these fees anyway. Some customers pay by bank transfer which is free on both sides. A shop or show stand taking cash or cheques will may incur fees for paying in to the bank account.

22 hours ago, BroadLeaves said:

• integrating it with whatever "back office" setup the trader has now, so that stock levels are near real-time and so on.

That's true if you have show or shop sales. For a purely on-line presence a decent e-commerce package will manage stock levels in real time.

To avoid accusations of advertising I will leave off any signature. Those that matter know who I am :)

Have you looked in your spam folder?

Someone made an offer that was accepted?

12 hours ago, micklner said:

Postal address at the bottom of the page.

 

https://www.brassmasters.co.uk/how_to_buy.htm

Hmm. It's still there, despite saying it has been withdrawn.

Having read this page it seems you have to first e-mail your requirements. It may be they provide their full address in reply, before accepting the order, in which case they are probably compliant.

12 hours ago, micklner said:

 

Alan Gibson only use a P.O Box as well.

A PO Box is not sufficient. It must be a full geographic address.

As a small trader myself it irritates when others do not follow the legal requirements. I see it all too often. One fairly well-known supplier was claiming to be a Ltd company when they weren't. Again, that was illegal. I won't name them as I believe it's fixed now.

On 19/01/2024 at 21:01, robmanchester said:

It isn't unreasonable to have a contact address when you may be spending hunders or even thousands of pounds with them though.

It's not only unreasonable not to have a contact address, but most likely against the law.

On 19/01/2024 at 21:01, robmanchester said:

Suppliers that take credit cards as payment but don't accept Paypal sometimes worry me a bit - I understand the reason cited is that Paypal charge more in fees than CC companies.

I'm thinking of switching to Stripe, for this reason, but will probably offer both. A lot of payment processor require a sizeable volume before they beat PayPal (or at least did last time I checked).

On 19/01/2024 at 21:01, robmanchester said:

I know many people who don't like putting credit and debit card numbers directly into suppliers web-sites.

With a small hobby supplier you are most unlikely to be entering details into their website. The rules around security, etc., and the cost of developing the site, would be too onerous for a small cottage industry. I would be VERY worried if I wasn't redirected to one of the well-known payment processors. Even major on-line retailers often use the likes of World Pay, etc.

On 19/01/2024 at 22:04, Steamport Southport said:

An up to date price list is virtually the first thing you see on the website!

And that price list should have a contact address. The only way around this is if they provide the contact address before they take your order, which would be a bit of a faff with the required to-and-fro.

2 hours ago, Jol Wilkinson said:

 

Is their a difference between online selling and distance selling? Although Brassmasters have an online catalogue. you can't click and order from them in the same way you can from eBay or Amazon. I have just had a looklon eBay at an item I bought recently from a registered trader and couldn't find a postal address other than Middlesex, UK. 

On-line selling rules are in addition to distance selling rules, see https://www.gov.uk/online-and-distance-selling-for-businesses

I didn't realise you couldn't order online. How do you order? The distance selling rules still requite them to provide the address before you place the order.

Also, we are closing our PO Box with immediate effect and will therefore only be able to accept orders via email.

The law requires that any business selling on line provides a full geographic contact address. Their contact page now has nothing, not even a 'phone number.

A PO Box address was also in breach of the law.

I would just order a few. Distance selling rules allow for refunds if you just change your mind. You might lose the original postage, depending on the sellers Ts&Cs.

2D or 3D?

Do you want to draw things (like Sketchup) or "program" or "parameterise" them (like OpenSCAD)?

There are zillions of YouTube videos for all the popular packages.

11 hours ago, andyman7 said:

There's a reason why people who want to make serious money tend to steer clear of model railways 🙂

You can make a small fortune in model railways. If you start from a large one 😁

15 hours ago, WIMorrison said:

They range from 16v to 23v and 2.8A to 3.6A - strange values but there you go.

If they have a two pin power cord, then they are designed to be below 65 W. Anything above that almost always has an earth. Otherwise the filtering gets very difficult.

14 hours ago, peach james said:

remember that the decoder eats about 4v as a minimum due to H bridge ect.  

It's 2 V, tops, in the bridge rectifier in the decoder. The H-bridges in the booster/command station and decoder will both be MOSFET based these days and very low resistance. If the booster/command station can be powered by AC then there will be another bridge rectifier and another 2V max drop. Some systems allow the track voltage to be adjusted down.

The loss in the decoder will be a lot better than 4 V.

Picoscopes have DCC decode software, but they can be pricey (mine is an MSO and was a few £hundred). You may need to check if it works on the cheaper models https://www.picotech.com/library/oscilloscopes/digital-command-control-dcc-protocol-decoding

Decoders would normally go bang and maybe let out a puff of the "magic smoke". Anything more than that is probably internal wiring, maybe the varnish on the motor windings.

6 hours ago, Gareth Collier said:

Of course on occasion the "evidence" photo means a trip around the neighbours to see if you can find a front door the same colour as in the photo.

We get regular posts on our local facebook page of the "that's my parcel, but it's not my door" kind. Often they are in the next town/village.

Evri are a total s**tshow around here. They seem to take the satnav "you have reached your destination" as having reached the exact address, without realising a postcode can cover quite a number of properties.

7 hours ago, Daddyman said:

Well, RM collected today, but I had to book a new collection and will have to spend 30+ mins on the phone to get the original £3.99 back. 

Why did you need to book a new one if it was collected?

If the collection fails you can simply reschedule it at no extra cost (I've done this). It's only "no extra cost" whilst collection is free. If/when they start charging for collections you will lose the collection fee for failed collections.

If you longer want to post the item you can request a refund online. It takes a few days (again, done this).

I recommend creating an account on the RM website and logging when sending. The system remembers who you are (to populate the sender address) and you can easily see your previous transactions.