njee20

I have a phone or tablet welded to my hand virtually all of the time, being a young Millennial and that, yet I really wanted something with physical buttons for DCC, for the simple reason that it's easier to use without looking at the screen. Likewise I find my car stereo annyoing, being touch screen, as I have to look at it to do most things (those that can't be done via the physical buttons on the steering wheel at least). It's not a fear of, or reticence toward, touch screen devices, just what I personally think is best suited to the purpose. I use JMRI with my SmartControl and have WiThrottle, so it's an option should I want additional control, but I certainly like the tactility of real buttons and knobs. Matron.

Has it? Weren’t they the same price as the ‘normal’ crowdfunded ones? I genuinely can’t remember! Given it was fixed priced, I’d suggest it’s not an indicator of future value at all, although it seems there’s demand!

Judging by shots of the CabControl and the Mobile Control 2 (which is exactly the same hardware, just ‘tethered’ to an ECoS) I’d say virtually nothing! The UI looks identical. Only thing that I’ve found (very slightly) inconvenient is that you can’t choose icons for the locos as you can with an ECoS (and have them display on a MC2). But no idea if the CabControl will be different, I’d hazard a guess it’ll work like the Smart Control rather than the ECoS.

If you can reach both long edges why have a well at all?

Piko SmartControl? Impressed with mine.

You’d almost certainly twist my arm into purchasing another rake if you did re-run them!

Agreed, I’m toying with the idea of Rugby for a new layout if we move house and I’ve got space, sadly it’ll be nowhere near the standard of Dallam or Euston, and it’ll be the post-2008 layout

I was going to post those, my only caveat is that inherently lots of the photos may be in stations where the contact wire may be lower due to station roofs etc(?).

Which, to refer back to Ben's photograph on the previous page means the head of the pantograph needs to be basically at the height of the 'hinge' between the upper and lower arms, which is really pretty low!

I think prototypical pantograph heights are far lower than many people set them to anyway - perhaps because sprung items like those on the 350 recalibrate our expectation to expect a near obtuse angle between the arms. If you look at photos of most Brecknell-Willis pantographs, including on Pendolinos, the angle is really quite acute, probably 30 degrees or so. Using the Dapol masts as a guide seems reasonable, certainly they looked the part on HF at Warley.

Yep, agreed, quite a nice feature to have someone hanging out of the door of a loco parked in a depot or something, but utterly pointless on something like this. Likewise (for me) DCC opening doors too. It's all just gimmicks.

But again... why? So you can poke it and say “look, it opens!”. You’re not going to be running with the door open, and if it’s sprung then it’ll only stay open with some sort of grossly overscale finger involvement.

That would of course be breathtakingly pedantic though, because every manufacturer of anything ever has products they have discontinued!

If they call it a new tooling on the strength of filling ten 0.5mm holes in the pantograph well I’d say that’s verging on false advertising... I wondered if they’ve sorted electrical connectivity between coaches, which would eradicate the need for 3 decoders. But then the TPE 350 is a new livery, not new tooling. Yes, I know. Hence saying We were ‘conditioned’ to low prices, not that prices have risen since they released it. Thank you for the patronising lesson though, and a gold star for getting in a ‘my era’s better than your’s and they should done more diesel transition models because they’re amazing’ comment

158s good, 450 is cool, interested to see the pricing given the 00 one is rather pricey, and we’ve become conditioned to 350s being very cheap. I can’t see a £300 450 being popular. Also intrigued they’re saying it’s a new tooling, surely it’s just a new livery and the removal of the pantograph.

A great fact, but completely untrue apparently. Sharks don't get cancer.

Is anyone saying that? The issue isn't so much with variance between peak/off-peak (although the difference is often colossal), rather the consistent increases against a backdrop of apparent degradation in quality of service.

Far too many variants on the parts required, N Brass portals are good, well priced, and don't require huge amounts of time/skill to assemble. You then get into whether you have wires, which mean everything else needs to be overbuilt to deal with the added stresses. I do wonder about 3D printing registration arms, but suspect they'd be too brittle. But we digress...

Depends what you define as "near enough", IMO not really. Dapol masts and N-Brass portals are your best low (but not 0) effort option I'd say.

The short circuit protection is certainly very ‘keen’ on the Smart Control. I had mine trip yesterday for no apparent reason, and wouldn’t restart. I ended up leaving it, on powering up today it was still like it, I plugged my old ZTC in as that emits a loud buzz in the region of the short (presumably due to greater output?) for a couple of seconds, which makes fault finding easier. It didn’t find one, I plugged the Smart Control back in and all was well. Bit weird. It seems to only need the tiniest provocation to trip, perhaps you have some peculiar momentary short somewhere which doesn’t affect the eLink? Seems unlikely... I like the controller I must say. Having some issues with the conversion of my points to DCC which is hampering further exploration of what it’ll do! FWIW I bought from Germany for £391 delivered, I sold the sound fitted loco for £130, so I’m already below the cost of the controller itself before the coaches and track have gone.

I’d be stunned if that was the motivation for more than 10 people frankly, it’s hardly common. Makes for a good story though.

Season tickets just dont represent good value for money. I’ve commuted into London for 7 years and never bought one, by the time you factor in annual leave, days off, working from home, the inflexibility means it doesn’t stack up for me. A ‘carnet’ type ticket would be fantastic, I’d definitely support that. I know Southern tested it, but it didn’t work out.

Report it to eBay, it’s not as advertised. Get refund. Done.

A year on I’m hopeful he’s sorted.

I agree, but I said no “real” nutritional value, ie it contributes nothing to that balanced diet, sweets, for example. We don’t need them. We derive nothing from them of any real use. You also said there are no unhealthy foods, thats totally different to saying a MacDonalds amongst a varied diet will do you no harm. Unhealthy is very subjective though.