deepfat

Loving your work but sl-43 Peco lifts are impossible to get hold of, Not sure why Peco can't make things anymore even in lockdown 

Friends my first train set had the ubiquitous Hymek 1A20 with full yellow ends with containers.  My question is how realistic was this scheme was as I was thinking of getting a more realistic DCC enabled Heljan model and going back to my childhood, but with a more prototypical feel 

@Oldddudders

@RAF96,

DPDT switch working, thanks both, now I need to figure out some programming issues but that's a topic for another post

Brian they'll want to know which precise version of Windows 10 you are running - Go to setting (the gear shaped thing ). In that go to System and select about to display this

the OS build is what I was referring to under Windows specifications. Ping me if you get stuck.  I haven't ever heard of a problem like this so actually I'd be interested in what's going on but it's sounds like we are a long way apart!

@Brian77799 I apologise unreservedly as it was not my intention to be aggressive at all. I was just concerned like you are that well meaning  amateurs using things group policy will make things worse. So I won't be changing anything if help is needed, just getting diagnostics and feeding back to smarter folks than me as windows is not my field anymore

@brian777999 OK I'll take this as I work for Microsoft in the UK (I am afryer@microsoft.com) so what build number  are you on and have you actually asked us for help 

We might have them.  Lots of activity in darkest Surrey we have jays 3 x kinds of tits , green and lesser spotted woodpeckers, kites soaring on the thermals and a nuthatch 

DPDT Switch ordered-  let's see if |I can avoid frying my Hornby Elite

Also hello @RAF96 nice to see you here and how's lockdown in the sun?

I have a simple wiring problem I want to solve to enable my rolling road testbed

to function both to run engines and to program them rather than have two track one to program and one to test like I have now.  The Hornby Elite like many controllers has both track and programming inputs and I want to be able to switch the wiring to either track or programming with a simple switch. Has anyone does this and what sort of switch would I need in order not to fry the DCC Controller

Friends

1. use different passwords  for different sites - I know it's a pain, but then only one part of your world is affected when things go wrong

2. Expert advice from us (my day job is at Microsoft) is here and actually hasn't changed for a while.

Andrew 

tickets bought even though there's nothing I really want to win, but that's not really the point, plus I never win anyway, oh and and Happy St Georges day 

Hi,

I got the SR Grey crane for my birthday and I love it, however what would a typical era 3 train look like that this would be  part of - what pulled and what other wagons and coaching stock would have accompanied as it went from job to job.

Andrew

thanks for all the replies I think I am going to have a fight on my hand as a previous owner has soldered the cranks onto the wheels and glued rather than screwed the pistons onto the chassis so stripping this down to modify it is going to be a pain. BTW @34theletterbetweenB&D I didn't need to turn off the light to see her sparking on our club layout so I am beginning to regret buying it but I want a Baltic and this seemed the only option as there don't seem to be any unbuilt kits around

thanks both I may have to re-wheel anyway as I am have peco 75 track

Hi I have recently acquired a damaged Langley's Baltic Tank which has been quite well build but now needs some love.  However I'd like to renumber it as 333 Remembrance and I wondered if anyone knew where to get the brass plates lining etc. to do this or even if any of that exists.

Also is it easy or even possible to convert to DCC. Looking at the pickups they are on one side of the driving wheels which are insulated from the rest of the chassis. So am I right that I'd need to isolate the motor from the chassis in some way  and then route power from the chassis through the DCC decoder to the motor itself?

Any help appreciated

15 hours ago, Stubby47 said:

Interesting...

 

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/technology-47810367

so I actually work for Microsoft in the UK and while this is sad Microsoft don't own the intellectual property in those books either. What I can tell you is that if you put your stuff on our cloud then it's still your stuff.  If that wasn't the case no one would use it especially not the NHS or the other government departments I work with to pay for my trains.  so your stuff is safe with us though I don't think RMWeb runs in our data centres    

Puzzled I need to phone you to buy this - no paypal etc. etc.? but I am interested, as it's friendly in here, and you guys do have to pay the rent.

According to the service sheet (HSS 428 on the Hornby website -  https://www.Hornby.com/us-en/downloads/view/index/cat/34/?p=2 ) the missing part is probably item number X7189 - universal joint worm cover (the illustration shows a very small cardan shaft 

 

Jonathan

Jonathan you are a star - I didn't even know Hornby published service sheets

I go this supposedly new on Ebay and although new it's missing a connection between the flywheel and the worm drive. as you can see from the photo.

so any ideas on where to get the bit if the seller doesn't come through as I had fitted a TTS unit to the tender and then investigated what was wrong ( the motor spins beautifully but can never drive the wheel as it is). I also don't have too much faith in Hornby either, as this is clearly a manufacturing fault

I have to confess I got beaten by the heat too. Although my loft veluxes are north facing and there is no direct sunshine  the temperatures up there are too fierce at the moment and some of my track has moved and did jump out of the chairs on a curve.  This is because I did all my track work in winter and tried to get thngs nice and tigtht.  So I have removed the offending sections and actually I was able to repair them by sliding the sleepers out and refitting them. I then  just removed a sliver of rail and re-laid them during the hottest part of the day.  That way I know have minimum viable gaps, although I did need a long cold shower after that! 

My plywood base seems OK and I had gaps basically because I am not that good with wood plus I had the ply in the loft for some weeks before I laid it.  However I would have thought humidity was more of a factor than temperature with wood? 

Thanks all the fog has cleared let the soldering commence!

OK let me try and explain again.  in the DCC concepts instruction sheet for wiring the frog there are three wires running from the point marked 7 which go into the  controller red blue and green. 

I am not sure why the red and blue are needed given that will be the same as the power feed into the controller . However if I just connect the green frog wire to the middle port the frog is dead.  I am puzzled by this as well because I also have Cobalt DIP switches which do work and only required me to connect one wire from the frog to the motor to control polarity on the frog.

So please reply if you are actually using or have experience of DCC Concepts stuff as I am fine with general DCC wiring - my trains are rolling and my other point motors are all behaving themselves.

thanks in advance

Deepfat - new to trains but not entirely stupid 

Hi I have reread what Bill has posted and my question now is do I have to wire up the blue and red wired from, the controller to the frog switch as well as the green wire.  - It's not clear form the manual whether those diagrams apply to DCC AND DC or just DC.  Does that switch need power to it - and in that case surely I can just connect red and blue to my bus rather than needlessly apply solder to my points (soldering is not my strong suit!).  I am only using these point because I need surface e mounting, For the rest of my layout I am sing Cobalt DigitalP motors. They are super easy to setup and don't see to need these extra wires.

Thanks , I do have the long crossing fully insulated (so all 8 rails) and I do only have one power district so I'll get cracking on that 

Andrew

I want to know how to connect the frog diamonds on a Peco electrofrog long crossing (SL-E 194) to my Cobalt -SS  motors configured for DCC.  The relevant are of my layout is attached the motors are driving the two SL-E 188 points.

Thanks in advance and apologies if this is not the right place to post this - I am new here

@deepfat

Using Hornby e-link and RailMaster for DCC control