DaveyBfromG

Of the two that I have seen up close , both do not have working fans. One of them had directional lights working at one end only, although overheads did work. It seems a different colour to the previous issue, there IS a distinct break in colour shade at the front and end corners of the loco. I got to open one up.....There is no fan turning mechanism, just the fan sitting on top of the housing. It looks to me that this engine would have to come apart in order to install the band (not included) and buy the extra parts to get it operating, not something that I would be happy doing. Is this penny pinching or a coincidental factory mistake.....Please check your fans! Sorry, I've been looking forward to this one as I missed out on the earlier version. Dave.

The Hornby TTS Decoder has been installed into my Vitrains EWS class 37. As the decoder is already programmed to work with a five pole motor the operation is fine....That's if there's a five pole in the vitrains,if not, and there's a 3-pole,then that's a lucky coincidence. An in-cased 4 ohm speaker enhances the sound dramatically, better than the un-cased Hornby 8 ohm but you need to keep the sound cv's at a low level. If you don't mind removing the rear cab detail,the 28mm speaker sits very nicely on top of the rear drive block,with a little double sided tape, and the seaker will traverse with the turning of the bogey, after you have cut off the speaker retaining lugs. The only problem I found was with the diractional lighting....the flashing light gremlins were back and for some reason, the lighting was in reverse. So first, in Hornby's Cv guide it says that you can reverse the polarity. No matter what values I put into the setting, I could not get the Decoder to reverse it's polarity....maybe I'm doing something wrong and I'd appreciate help here. Anyhow, there is a solution to the flashing lights, and that's if you change the speed value to 128...mentioned in an earlier post by another member.....this worked for me. However I have a Guagemaster prodigy and you can take forever turning that control nob or pressing the speed button and I'm used to 28 speed steps anyways. I found that changing CV29 to 1 solved the flashing light problem and she still ran on 28 speed steps. Eventually I decided to simply solder the vitrains lighting circuit in reverse at each end of the chassis. Now, unfortunately the Banana is noiseless and is looking at me very sorry for itself....the trouble is. this damned colour scheme is beginning to grow on me, so I may sell back my de-chipped 37 as a part exchange for a new TTS banana. Cheers!

I replaced the 8 ohm speaker in my 'Banana' for a Esu 28mm round 4 ohm, there's plenty of space and the difference is amazing! Fully seal the speaker gaps with blu-tac or similar. Hornby have got a great sound program here.... well impressed. If you change over your speaker it is important that you reprogramme your main sound (f1) to setting number 1, and not the factory setting of 4....this is so that glass will remain in your's and your neighbour's windows!!!! I would not recommend changing your speaker if you don't have a controller that can re-set your CV's. Next, I plan on transferring the Decoder across to a Vitrains class 37, as this loco has lighting. Cheers.

Hi Mike, Didn't plan on yanking my cock's body off again quite yet...oo-er! But if I'm not too late back from work tomorrow night, I'll see what I can do. Probably somebody else will beat me to it with a picture as this X9108 virus appears to be spreading fast....mmm,another reason to make an appointment with my doctor... Dave.

Just as a footnote, when you use the new 'King' motor, CAREFULLY bend the motor bottom solder tab upwards so it won't short on the lower chassis. And, as noted previously, when putting the body back on make sure you don't bend/catch this part of the motor. Also just realised that the gaping chasm previously occupied by the flywheel may have enogh space to put the full-fat ESU sound decoder....then you can use the whole of the tender for the speaker......A later project. Dave.

Yes, the word sweet was chose deliberately....I only made these changes a few hours ago,so I want to 'run in' the new motor...but what I've seen so far I'm VERY HAPPY with. I'm sold on sound ....and I needed to do something about the gowd damn racket from that 3-pole before I put a full fat sound chip in.

Hi everyone, Took the body off of my own CotN....Then it struck me! A few minutes after regaining conciousness, I decided to take the ollowing action...REPLACE THE MOTOR. Not for the faint hearted but here's what I did.... Seperate the tender from the loco. Remove the strip of black tape holding the grey and black wires on the top of the chassis...they sit in a groove. just ease them away from the chassis. Unscrew the dcc 8 pin block setting aside the screws, ease the dcc plate up, DO NOT PULL THROUGH THE GREY AND BLACK WIRES THAT RUN DOWN TO THE BASE OF THE CHASSIS. Unscrew the top weight which also acts as the motor retainer above the gearing and worm screw, pull forward and gently lift, but don't seperate it from the chassis...this is only so you may access the motor. Remove the retaining plate at the back of the motor just in front of the flywheel. Now, ease the motor up and out including the attached worm gear and flywheel. De-solder the motor connections. Now solder on a X9108 Hornby King 5-pole motor. This motor comes with the same size wormgear and it simply locks down in place. NO FLYWHEEL NEEDED. Reverse fit all the steps previously taken......Test, then plonk the body back on......SWEET! I don't know whether this procedure would work with TTS as it's possible the Decoder was programmed with the 3-pole characteristics, but good luck for any-one prepared to try. And yes,I know it's a £20 motor, but perhaps it's what we should have got in the first place. Hope this helps,Dave.