DutyDruid

Yes, LEDs can be dimmed; I have a total of 3 rooms with LED downlighters, all on dimmers. You can't achieve very low output levels because there is a "minimum" output level which you can't go below. If you are talking about the mini florescent bulbs that fit in ordinary BC/ES/SBC/SES connectors then the answer is "not possible". A traditional dimmer works by reducing the voltage supplied to an incandescent bulb. As I understand it, the LED dimmers work by messing with the "duty cycle" of the supply voltage sent to the light unit. This means that the light is on at full brightness but not all the time and the eye perceives this as being "dim" compared to the full brightness of an always 100% supply lit LED (if that makes sense). As a starting point, if you're talking about LV LEDs then take a look at the Bachmann Just Plug system. https://www.Bachmann.co.uk/category/scenery-landscape/woodland_scenics/just-plug-lighting-system?page=3 HTH

Yes, Can't say that "riding up" is a particular problem on Nictun Borrud; the problem we face with that layout is that the flangeways are not a consistent width and as a result propelling back through several of the formations - particularly the double slip - means that you can never guarantee exactly what angle a piece of rolling stock will be sitting on the track as it exits the formation and that makes coupling and uncoupling immediately past the formation a bit haphazard - but that's a topic for a track building thread I think...

Hi. Personal view: I have converted one of our Club exhibition layouts for Kadees and for the most part it works reasonably well, the only problems we have are, frankly, more associated with design of the layout and poor hand built track not suiting the siting of electromagnets where they would normally be. There is a thread on the use of Kadees here: with lots of useful discussion on fitting couplings to some of the more obscure UK prototypes - including several ways of dealing with Bachmann "stepped" couplers. Elliott

Hi @richscylla. Just watched your St Michael's Hill videos about this on YouTube (assuming that that is your channel). I'm fixing to do a similar upgrade job so have been looking through this thread for ideas of what to do. A question for you if I might: In the last one of your videos (number 5 I think) you made a comment about investigating a website for the parts to do the route blinds. Did you ever follow up and what did you find? At the moment that's the one bit that is defeating me. Thanks Elliott

If you listen to the stories, I think he had probably planned it all himself, including which stock would be used. If you think about it, the natural route to get to Oxfordshire and Blenheim Palace would be from Paddington. The story in the "State Ceremonial" world in my early days in the Mob was that Churchill had specified that if DeGaulle attended the funeral the train should take the scenic route and leave from Waterloo...

The OP speaks... Just to clarify, modern locos (and units for that matter) can be pigs to get apart. There are models that the guy who runs the model shop where I work part time is reluctant to chip because of the risk of damaging some detail parts, and I can attest to having difficulties myself while trying to crew a couple of Bachmann tank locos in the past. Now that I am looking more favourably at DCC because of the advantages it would offer with a largely hidden FY, my current pondering point is whether, is it time to think about consciously switching to buying DCC fitted rather than DCC ready stock. I'm giving the problem of retrofitting what I already have a stern ignoring in the hope of a reasonable lottery win before I need to do it. Thanks for that thought. Again, I'm no fan of sound having stood too often behind a layout at a show where one of the adjacent exhibits (a TMD) has had most of the 20 or so locos on it "burning and turning" for the entire weekend. However, I was mightily impressed by the Bachmann "special" of the sound fitted Blue Pullman that was released 18 months or so ago running on our Club test track. Again, cound fitting could be an option for me in the fullness of time.

nec habemus papam

Absolutely known to be fact David. The Relco (or other HF cleaner for that matter) sees the chip as a piece of dirt it needs to burn off the wheels or track and acts accordingly by giving it a massive HF spike which the chip can't deal with. I've seen it happen (see my post further up this thread, I had to deal with the fall out).

Hi Ian I'm waiting for some (house) paint to dry so picked up the laptop and did some searching back up this thread (easier for me because I knew what I was looking for). March 2019 was when this was last discussed and I think you will find most of what you are looking for in the first quote above. I used to flash up and down the M40 quite regularly in those days and I got the "bit" to convert the coupler head from a model shop in Brackley on one of those journeys (sorry, can't remember their name); the "universal cranked bit" that converts NEM 362 to 363 came from Gaugemaster. Elliott

Thanks Nigel, I have never heard that expression used before - and that includes spending nearly three years operating and DCC converting an N Gauge basement layout in the US in the 90s.

Thanks, and yes - I did know about that one. Club layout Nictun Borrud (as built) had a Relco and at one exhibition during some "down time" near the end of the first day a trader brought a loco over that a punter wanted see run before purchase, dropped in on the main line and tried to drive it from the controller hanging over the backscene. It stuttered and then died (can't remember if there was smoke and/or a smell of burning) . He was furious but at the end of the day neither of us were immediately at the layout at the time and he hadn't asked us if he could do it, if he had we would have told him about the hidden Relco (we already knew this was a problem). In the end we took the Relco out of the layout, partly to stop it happening again to unsuspecting Club members and partly it because seemed to be able to cause a heap of electrical interference in other electrical equipment on the same mains circuit (like the LED lighting)

OK folks, it's stupid question time... I have always said that I would never go DCC for a variety of reasons but having sat in on a home layout tour on Zoom a couple of evenings back I have started to question my original decision. So, I have a couple of questions, one of which I have asked in the Kadee Shuffle thread in this forum. The other one is about the advisability - going forward - of buying DCC fitted locomotives to run on my still analogue test track and Club layouts until I can get around to moving house and then building my "dream DCC home layout". I have trawled back through about 8 years of threads but failed to find anything that seems to answer the question so I've decided to start a new thread. What is the latest advice please? Is it safe to run DCC fitted locos on DC control? Is the answer related to which chips you use? I have heard two very distinct schools of thought over the years, one saying "no way" and the other saying "it's OK", but given that when DCC first got going there was an idea doing the rounds that you could safely put a DC loco on a DCC track and control it as "loco 0", and which I knew couldn't work from the outset, I've decided to "ask the audience" for their up-to-date opinions. TIA Elliott

There are 2 NEM standards, from memory NEM 362 which is the standard "swallow tail" we all know and love and NEM 363 which looks remarkably like the picture I have included from your original post. If you look back up this thread you will see a post from me about fitting a Kadee to a Bachmann 4MT tank that has a stepped coupling at the back. In that I have detailed how to do it and where that parts came from. Basically you drive the pin out at the back of the Kadee knuckle (don't lose the pin as you need it for the next bit) and remove the swallow tail (NEM 362) and then fit the NEM 363 "adapter" in its place; the NEM 363 adapter will fit into the dovetail piece you can see above. I'm a bit hamstrung at the moment for both time and access to my notes and bits box, otherwise I would find all the details and give you a fuller answer. I can say that I bought the NEM 363 adapters from - I think - a model shop in Brackley (just off the M40) as I passed by one day. HTH Elliott

Long story VERY short, I have always said that I would never go DCC but having sat in on a Zoom virtual home layout tour a couple of days ago I am starting to think that there might actually be some sense in biting the bullet. As a result I started to wander through the DCC forum and found this thread. By the way, I understand Kadee coupling use as I have fitted up at least two layouts to use them in the past and as well as for my own edification the guy whose layout we viewed is interested in using them and said he wants to look in detail at how we use them on the Club layout that I have fitted with uncoupling magnets. So, stupid question time... What on earth is the Kadee Shuffle? Is it just that little "dance" that you have to do to force an uncouple or is there more to it than that? If so, I have never heard it referred to as the "Shuffle" before. Reading the thread I get the impression that you can actually set up a DCC "function" that sequentially: sets the loco into shunt mode (rather than normal running with inertia) backs up a very short distance (millimeters) to do the uncouple over a burried magnet sets the loco forward again free of the train cancels shunt mode Am I reading that correctly? And then: In a couple of the posts here I came across talk of servo activation of Kadee couplings allowing the Trip Pin dropper to be clipped off. In all the posts that mention it I haven't seen a simple explanation of how it works, only that it is possible. Could someone kindly explain how that works please? Thanks Elliott

I was fortunate to have worked on exchange service with the USN some years back and I bought a heap before I left to come home. In recent years I have found a backdoor route to get any extras I have need - mainly to deal with my needs for NEM fitted stock which wasn't quite so common when I bought my original stock: I have an American friend who works permanently as a civilian for the US Military in Germany, she mail orders them for me to her AFPS (BFPO equivalent) address and we then find some way of couriering them to the UK (or more often collecting them when we see her). Elliott.

The one in your pic has no corridor connectors and a guard's compartment.

I don't know if I am mis-remembering something I heard years ago, but I thought that the only one of these with windows in the central set of doors was the one that was used as the hearse for Sir Winston and that this was a special conversion done for use in the funeral train. However, the era 4 one shown at the top of the thread in maroon also has windows in the central set of doors. Does anyone know if this was a late-life conversion on more than just the hearse wagon?

I think that may only be a part of the story...

Unfortunately. you and me both... I've had to dismantle my "study" ready to move house, the room is decorated and all the "stuff" transferred to what will be the joint hobby room in my late parent's house where it and my wife's craft bits are piled up in boxes.

Rather than an opportunity for Hornby to provide a layout that fits around a home office surely that's a cue for people who write for magazines to start producing articles describing how it it could be done? After all, all Hornby can do is to provide the wherewithal to enable layouts to be built, inspiration for the design is in the hands of the designer/builder. I did do a presentation for an exhibition a few years back on this very subject where I showed how a layout could be built round a room (what was my home office when I had to take medical retirement from the Navy and had aspirations of doing consultancy) using a 12" wide shelf that went around the room with a lift out section across the door and window. The handout is here: http://fareham-mrc.org.uk/wp-content/uploads/2018/02/Handout-for-Layout-Design-Presentation-Demonstration.pdf Clearly - to me at least - that's not something Hornby could sell.

That's exactly what happened when the credit crunch first hit back in the late naughties. In the shop I part time in there was a very definite "bounce" in trade once the recession was declared although as the depth of the mess the US banks had caused started to sink in it then dropped away again.

Basically agree Phil in principle, but the point I was making is that a lot of people just don't have the room. Take my lad (31) for example, he lives in a 2-bed flat over a shop in the New Forest and has gone away from model railways in favour of wargaming because he can display his works 2 x 2' square glass display cases sat in opposite corners of the room. Suggest to him that he has a 4' x 2' micro layout and he's asking which piece of furniture would we like to store until he can afford to buy a house. In that circumstance even a basic trackmat layout is a complete non-starter.

I recognise and agree with the sentiment, but we have to recognise one reality: space (or more correctly lack of it). In this froth-fest I have mentioned things like a 4CORs, 4CIGs and 5WES but the reality is a 4 car unit is 4 feet long, the 5WES a bit over 5 feet, a 5BEL about the same. I'm lucky, my Club has a couple of layouts and a test track that are able to cope with trains that long but most people don't have that luxury and putting a modern unit on a shunting plank or shelf layout - which, let's face it - is all most of us have space for is not a very fulfilling experience.

As it's New Years Eve and others are doing it, I want a model of one of my wife's ancestor's engine.

Quite agree, they were all over my particular part of the BR(S) Network and I would easily find an excuse to put one or two on the exhibition layouts I provide stock for - especially if they were to do a "Southern-ised" version with a 2P/2FA power classification on the cab sides. Here's hoping...