Sir TophamHatt

Oh, sorry (although did pre-warn it might not be factual). I mis-understood. Perhaps it's that Gaugemaster will accept it back for repair but PowerCab maker won't?

May also want to give this a read:

Wow, 8 years later... @woodenhead - how did it all go? I was going to suggest looking at recent videos from @NewJunction where Richard seals his garage and plans what he's going to do but I guess after so long, you've already done it? Would be great to see some pics.

But if they're selling like hot cakes, best get some more in. We'll never know the financial arrangements but perhaps the first batch would have paid off everything leaving them net zero, but produce more and see the money roll in. But this is the question: Improve things but perhaps annoy early adopters or keep everything the same and know you're producing a substandard model from the aspirations and cause a lot of work through returns, swaps and perhaps ultimately unsatisfied customers. Without a doubt, I suspect more will be for sale during 2021 (although perhaps very late 2021). I for one am happy to wait and see if they solve the issues before re-buying the livery I wanted.

Now eBay have severed their ties with PayPal for getting paid and paying sellers, I am starting to see less and less use for PayPal. I bought a questionable item (for £40) before Christmas but decided as it wasn't really compatible with my phone, I would send it back. Bought through PayPal so thought it would be fairly easy to get my money back. Seller requested for me to send it back (to India!). £15.75 in return postage, £15 of which I can claim back from PayPal (who actually outsource this to another company!). 75p loss there. This is a tactic from sellers. They get dispatched from a UK address but ask for it to go half way round the world, I guess hoping buyers won't want to bother. While posting it back, I used the original envelope, which still had the original customs label on it. It declared the value of the goods to be much cheaper than I paid, so (and perhaps pettiness?), I valued the goods as what I paid for them. Went through and uploaded tracking. The parcel spent about a week at customs and now has been rejected by the seller. Apparently it's on it's way back to the UK but there's no return address so not sure where it will end up or what will happen, or whether I can claim it and if I'd have to pay. But now PayPal are dragging their heels with it all. They've asked for a photo of the package label (well, the wording says "could be a photo...), so I've sent them a photo of the receipts showing the address details and noted the seller has refused the parcel. I hope this will be enough for them to decide in my favour. But I keep thinking that if I'd paid by credit card or debit card, it's likely I could have instigated a chargeback. Even worse is that as I used funds in my PayPal account, I am completely in their hands for a refund. If it had to take money from my bank, the chargeback could be possible. The reason I used to use PayPal is that it meant the retailer didn't then have my bank details but with banks being cautious these days, I am starting to think there is little point to PayPal and what value it really brings to anything anymore.

Anyone replace their ISP router with their own? Or at least put the ISP one in modem mode? Our Virgin Media 3 hub has been fine for ages but I get next to no signal in the model railway room. To be fair, the router is in the worst position - behind a 47" TV, about half a metre off the floor. While I already know this isn't the best place, UK homes just aren't wired for it to be anywhere else. Especially as the internet comes in to the house in that corner as well as a freesat link, so the TV, a PC and Hive Hub all plug in to the router in that area. I've used the 4th network socket for a powerline, which works fine running internet down the bottom of the house (the plug at the far end also provides wifi but it appears very poorly - 4Mb when I checked). I have considered buying another powerline that provides WiFi in the model railway room but finding a socket will prove difficult. There is a chimney in the way and I have started thinking the roof of the model railway room (which is an extension) is made of something that stops signals. So I went out and bought a new all singing all dancing router for about £50. Plugged it in and again, to be fair, sat it on a subwoofer, which is on the floor next to the PC. Did I notice a speed difference? Completely. Before, I was getting 40Mb out of 100Mb over WiFi but now I had the whole shebang. Did it reach the model railway room? No. Took it all away and went back to using the Virgin supplied router. Speed test showed getting the full 100Mb down over WiFi but this seems to swap and change with the wind. Moved the router to the windowsill and the signal to the model railway has improved but earlier today it cut out all together (even wired to the back of the house) and while it wouldn't have made a difference, I'm thinking perhaps I should reinstall the new router. Problem is, I already have 6 plugs behind the TV, which means the Powerline may have to go through one of those plug socket extension things, unless I get an 8-way extension. But that corner is crowded enough already and I can't really move anything out of the area as there's a whacking great chimney in the way. There's also additional costs involved with running yet another electrical item. So my story ended up being longer than I thought but interested to hear from others whether you replaced your ISP issued router with something else and why.

Yet another boring day. I wonder how many passengers have travelled on the rail network today. The motorways were practically deserted. Been looking at model railway expenditure this afternoon and working out whether it's worth selling some locos to fund other things and even my PA2 (to part fund an ECoS). But not sure yet. However, I have found many a useful 3D print files for things so that will all be added to the queue of things to print for the first 4 months of this year! however, marginally more excited to have hunted out my old fountain pen I bought 20+ years ago. Fresh ink, works fine. Will give it a go and see if I enjoy writing with it.

Thought of another question (yes, I know a year later and I still haven't bought one!). Can you set the F numbers to be latching / not latching? And can these change on a per loco basis?

However... I have a loco that I've tried doing this at both ends but somewhere along the way, I have confused some wiring. In the FWD position, the lights show white at one end, dimmed white at the other. In the REV position, the lights show full white at one end and red at the other :S

And yet you offer no facts of why this is, so I'd say that's just opinion @lwnameplates When I was researching, it depended on stupid things like handset layout rather than anything else. Here's three threads I read before deciding on my controller of choice: From what I remember (but may not be factually correct), the plus points for the PA2 for me were the lifetime guarantee and it comes with more power out of the box. I think someone suggested the NCE required a power booster if you wanted to run more than a few (sound) locos at once. The PA2 doesn't require this. I may be open to selling mine but not sure yet. This thread may also be useful: I've linked straight to @Art Dent's reply to my post (directly above it). Muchos respect for this guy - they knows what they're talking about and have helped me with many aspects of model railwaying.

While I don't particularly want to drag this up from a few pages down, I'm not sure what Barclays has to offer people these days. Along with HSBC, unless you pay for their "Advance" type accounts (I suspect many do but don't use the features), their simple bank account offers no interest and no real incentive to hold an account with them. It's almost like both banks are more interested in business banking, which obviously nets them more money and possibly less hassle (less customers). Which makes me wonder why a bank hasn't specifically launched a new bank purely for business banking only? I guess some of this "but I've always had a Barclays account" thing is more about habit rather than worth. Been open to switching to them many times but every time I look, there's nothing that is of interest - don't get me started with their "Blue Rewards" thing. I understood that to be like Lloyds Bank and their cashback offers - you have to select them before using, it's not an automatic thing.

Returning to work after a few days off for Christmas. We have a nice tradition of a present to open on New Years Day too - those are stored IN the Christmas Tree. Bought Mrs TH some hand creams as she really enjoys them. Had ti pick up an emergency cola though as my head was raging with a headache, even after some Anadin. Gone now though, whether that was the pills or the cola, not sure! Happy New Year everyone.

Ordered something from Kent either yesterday or very late the day before. Arrived today, here in the Midlands. It seems any current delays are very localised.

Why would that be amazing? Statistically that's pretty good! Shame no RR/CT version (yet?!), but completely understandable with the Pacer units.

The other question to consider is are the sounds over zealous for what most users require? I get the chips can hold that many sounds, but if there were less sounds for less price, I'd think these would be more popular. I just hope the cost of providing 17 sounds (plus however many announcements) instead of just 5-10 isn't passed on to the customer.

It's not a life of death need like bread or milk but it is a need. But then not so desperate that I could buy a brand new one from Amazon. Difficult to quantify.

But what happens if it's something you could do with, but has supposedly been lost in the post? I ordered something early December. Have been given a refund but not sure if the seller did actually post the item. I don't need two of them but don't want to spend the money (more money as the first was a good deal) on a second item if the first will turn up in the next 30 days.

Morning everyone. Did our "big" Christmas shop yesterday. I thought the supermarket would be a lot busier than it was. Only thing we couldn't get was baked beans!

Which is why discount codes are stupid. None of the sellers most buy from (usually Jimmy from his bedroom or whatever) are valid. Is ebay a shop or a marketplace? They seem to not know which.

I don't feel a personal benefit so my taxes. I feel the benefits in line with everyone else, but paying extra to be good and send my green waste to composting instead of landfill isn't my idea of a benefit. At the end of the day, there are jobs all over that perform the same, or near same function. People CHOOSE to work in London and CHOOSE to catch the train to get there - nobody forces them to do either and thus it's a choice.

One of the best, even if it is a bit old with dodgy CGI these days! Back at work for three days this week. Busy week ahead though with shopping today, picking up a few last minute bits that I didn't want to freeze on Wednesday and remembering to do everything else on Tuesday. However I had great success with the 3D printer yesterday. Printed a lid for a storage box for a board game. Didn't come out that well, not sure why not. However, adjusted some settings and BOOM - it's light night and day. Not absolutely commercially perfect but not far off at all. Have also discovered there's a 3D section here AND have a few other railway 3D things I can look at printing. But todays task, if possible, is to swap some wires around to make some LEDs work properly. A fairly complex build so not that easy to simply swap around.

To be fair though, the quoted OP has a point. There are many experiences I have had over the past few months that companies are just blaming Covid for. I'm not saying Covid doesn't exist or the threat of it isn't real but it's been around for nearly a year now. My question is why haven't businesses responded better (you can't tell me all have been the best they can be)? Or are we saying this is the best they'll get? If so, that means they're not really going to change and this is how their new normal is now. I think we both know there are many companies that are still floundering and many don't know what to do for the long run. Our Postman is great and he too has told me that Amazon have dumped a load of their stuff on them very recently, but I've usually sent my returns back via them so not sure what that meant (unless he means deliveries, which strangely enough, I have had one package via Royal Mail, which is unusual these days). But at the same time, aren't letters automatically sorted (until the last mile so to speak)? And thus yes, I expect a week ago, something to get within the same county that shares the same sorting office to get there before Christmas. Perhaps population density has a part to play too? More to the question, does the lack of deliveries have a legal obligation with their "expected times" advertised? If they haven't changed, I would say that's delibverately mis-leading as we've been in this Covid mess with slower deliveries for months now. Or if you pay for Next Day specifically (Special Delivery) and it doesn't get there, is there a claim? It's not about getting money back but it is about paying for a particular service and getting it. Don't offer it if you can't deliver it. If you pay for a pint and get half, you wouldn't be happy.

Well, don't feel like I've achieved much today. But then a day of general rest is good. Tomorrow Mrs and Master STH will be heading out so will allow me an opportunity to get on 3D printing some stuff I'll probably never use and fixing up a loco that needs DCC / LED conversion - LEDs being the dual red/white ones so not as easy as some others! Night all.

I wonder if that's regional though. If I'm sending second class to someone in the same county, I'd expect it to get there before Christmas. Bought something less than 5 days ago from ebay, that arrived today, 2nd class.

Does anyone have an STL file that they could send me of a CD motor bracket for Hornby or lima models?