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Blue / Grey and Chocolate and Cream varieties have arrived along with the RMBs and the Thompson BGs. Just the Mk2F s to arrive.

…and now looking a bit neater……and over exposed photo so that you can see what’s what. Decoder at the rear, speaker under the PCB and Ribband cable.

The sound decoder has been fitted, it was a bit more of a struggle than I expected but it all fits….and after a CV change to match the decoder to the motor it’s all up and running….and very nice too.

Well I managed to shoehorn everything in. Decoder is secured and the speaker too….and off we went with a stutter. The decoder instructions say that Cv54 can be altered to suit the motor by changing the value to zero then press F1. Whilst changing the CV was fine, pressing F1 only changed the CV value from 0 to 1. After several goes…and some muttering from me….I put the power car back on the fiddle yard and off it shot a short distance as per the instructions. The power car now runs fine. job done.

The sound decoder arrived today, not sure what I was expecting as I’m still a newbie with DCC. So the decoder seems to be a Next18 with a flat harness to a six pin plug. Speaker casing is oblong so I will need to remove some of the internal chassis moulding as the speaker fittings are round in the 4CEP. The spare wires I guess I can just cut back to avoid anything touching each other. The flat ribbon harness will be a bit of a pain as it’s not long enough to run along the top of the PCB and fold under. I thought it would have to twist over the side to go underneath the PCB….but a way out. there’s a cut out in the PCB just wide enough to take the cable through. It’ll look a bit neater once it’s finished.

The sound decoder has been ordered. Only one at the moment. I will probably make a start on weathering it this Saturday at the NGS Yorkshire area group meeting.

Not much done to the layout this week, I have got all the buildings back on and a fair number of road vehicles too. There has been some progress on my T-Trax modules. PECO security fencing being added, a road overbridge is under construction. More tanks and pipes to add. I’ll get some photos at Saturdays NGS York area meeting. In other news I’ve ordered the sound decoder and speaker for the 6B…….watch this space….or maybe it should be listen?

http://www.1s76.com/1S76 1984.htm https://zenfolio.page.link/AEX9e 50029 at Leeds on 1O86 the 1400 to Brighton, loco came off at New St.

Many thanks, I’ll have to check the maximum size for the speaker too.

Is it possible to have your class 201/2/3 sounds put on to a six pin chip? This would be for my N gauge class 203 / 6B. It’s powered using the Farish 4CEP chassis and motorblock. It has no lighting as headcode blinds were not very visible in daylight.

It’s crying out for two…..but I suspect one for the time being. Just awaiting a reply from Legomanbiffo as their class 201/2/3 sound is not available on 6pin.

Yes….or use a class 101 or 108 DMU chassis…..wrong bogies of course.

The 6B had a good run on the T Trax modules at the weekend. I have temporarily popped a Dapol decoder in to run it on Olympia but will get a Bachmann one at work tomorrow….prior to getting it sound fitted.

I realised I hadn’t taken any photos of what the powered coach looks like. The motorblock just fits width wise, the PCB didn’t need any trimming. The motorblock is glued in place with some contact adhesive. I will add some plasticard to the rear bogie pickups to hold them down better on the chassis. There is plenty of room for a speaker once I manage to source the 6pin sound decoder.

Like much of the country it’s a bit of a wet day here in York…..so I’ve made good progress re-cladding the RKH/Bristol cars showroom. The photos show how badly the brick paper has faded. Once finished the brickwork will be painted and fresh facia signs made.

The Brighton Centre show was originally organised and run by SAMRC the Sussex Association of Model Railway Clubs, prior to using the Brighton Centre it had been in the Corn Exchange and the former ice rink in Queens Sq. The council over the years took more control and it morphed into Modelworld to try and halt the drop in attendance………and I think towards the end the SAMRC organisers effectively went to work for the council. SAMRC no longer exists. Found a link on Google which gives the reasons for Modelworlds demise. HERE Shameless plug….the Brighton MRC show is in its 43rd year and on in November….I’m still one of the organisers despite living in York and will be at the show, because there aren’t enough people to assist for the whole weekend…….and I can get some Harvey’s Beer!

The 6B stretched its legs today at the YAG meeting, with a long run around the T-Track modules. Propelling there appears to be a rotational issue with the TSO next to the powered car. The bogie adjacent to the power car derailed on every curve……it doesn’t happen on Olympia, so it might be the top of the bogie catching the body, much larger radius on Olympia of course. With the power car leading no issues. My modules have finally been ballasted and sprayed so I took them along too. Lots more to add to the module. I made some walls up to go around the tanks as bund walls. These need weathering and then cutting to length. Its currently 92F in the layout room.

Some running repairs to the layout as the hot weather has closed up some joints on the fiddle yard causing a couple of issues……so out with the mini drill and cutting disc. A test run to check if everything was OK showed up a point motor rod was foul when the class 25 passed. Not anymore. It’s a Yorkshire area NGS meeting tomorrow so the 6B will get some final attention and hopefully a long run.

The 6B…well 5B had its first test run…..being propelled at a decent speed by a class 25 with an RMB added in. No issues which was good. Later on the power car was added. The motorblock and pickups are all held together with double sided tape, but it did run, if a bit spluttery to start with. Once fitted permanently I’m sure it’ll be fine. The original plan was to fit an interior but other than to the TFK this isn’t going to happen…..you can barely see in so it won’t notice.

The 6B power car finally got a run yesterday, a slightly spluttering start, it’s largely held together with double sided tape, but it completed several circuits of the layout. I’ll now fix everything permanently and add some weight to it. The rest of the coaches can now be attached to their chassis permanently. I was going to fit an interior to them but as you can barely see in that’s not going to happen apart from to the TFK as the compartments will be visible.

I guess it’s only like numbering locos differently on one side to the other.

Once the power car is up and running it will be back to buildings! The Hotel / Bristol cars showroom building needs some TLC so I’m going to take the opportunity to clad it in brick plasticard. The temporary stand in building at the south end of the layout will get replaced with something similar but larger.

Kensington Olympia is now back in its room, all bolted up and powered up without any issues. The five unpowered cars of the 6B got a run to see if any coaches fouled each other on curves. A RMB was also added with traction supplied by a class 25 propelling it at decent speeds around the layout, without issue.

Yesterday saw the last run of the season for the Scarborough Spa Express. I managed to capture it on its return to Carnforth with Galatea / Sierra Leone / Alberta up front as usual.

…….so instead we went to food festival at Malton and then across to Gilling for the Mainline running weekend.