dj_crisp

I'm liking the steps Rich which seems spot on to me I just noticed your rather nice "Reading" destination blinds. Are these of your making or available elsewhere? Cheers Will

Hi Jo It's not a bad idea though and worse case some masking tape might do the trick. I've previously tried some clear yellow glass paint to tone a few down in the past but these have always been a bit yellow. When I did my 66s I noticed that without their covering box they were really bright so I might try something similar Cheers Will

So I'm trying to not be defeated and so I'm now looking at illuminating 101 trailers. My original plan was to use the Bachmann circuit board and hotwire a decoder in.... but this seemed beyond me so I thought I'd try a light bar with function outputs instead. The lighting itself works well and with the capacitor provides a nice constant brightness - this is great as it doesn't require much effort! Pick ups are soldered to the Bachmann pickups on the bogies and with some extra weight in it seems to run quite nicely and doesn't appear to be missing the old circuit board with spung contacts. So onto the head/tail lights; Mixed success I suppose! The board is a copper clad sleeper that I've scraped away some copper to allow me to fit dual warm white/red LEDs. Surprisingly it works ok but on first go was too bright with a 1k resistor. Anyhow I thought no worries I'll tone it down with the decoder - and all i get is flickering. I think this is down to the type of resistance the decoder uses? I really don't know - anyhow I have them wiith 2 1k resistors in serial and while it's too bright the light seems constant. I guess i could just use higher resistors ?? I don't know if anyone has a preferred value of resistance? All of this has me thinking that maybe my 67 problems is due to using resistance in the decoder.... one to explore

I totally agree! I don't envy Andys job at all. In a strange way I don't mind advertising on this site as at least it's targeted at stuff I'm interested in and keeps me in the loop on whats going on... far better than the random stuff else where. Mind you the video ones and especially the digitrains one has probably had the opposite effect though ;)

Hi Andy I appreciate advertising is needed but the digitrains one is so invasive that it's hard to navigate the site on android mobile. Cheers Will

This is all rather excellent! Thanks for sharing! I think I'm going to have an experiment with the circuit board as you've done. I do like your set up and I'm experimenting with wires through corridor connectors like you've done. Although my efforts with a 150 so far aren't the best so for my heavyweights based off the Bachmann 117 have gone down the route of seperate decoders for each coach. This allows me to use hunt couplings which make life rather easy for setting up etc as the original coupling is hard work (especially on a 3 car). It does leave some space for some dummy vac pipe connectors... I might try something like P4 new street. What motor setup have you used to help clearance? (My 108 runs terribly so am tempted to try something different there.) Cheers for sharing Will

Thanks Rich I'm going to send a message to see if there are illuminated markers on that one as a seperate function... as that could work

There are days when I find it hard to enjoy this hobby.... well to be precise I'm more frustrated with my lack of ability in it. Today it's electronics... I'm attempting to wire up some lights for my class 67. All was going well... managed to wire in red lights and so went onto the top markers. Frustratingly it flickered a bit when illuminating the other end or tails... was bright when switched on. I can't see why but its a common problem I have and i cant see a stray wire or similar. Anyhow it gets worse as I now have the tails being illuminated ok then fading to nothing then won't illuminate. Arggghhhh! I'm suspecting I've killed the decoder. So I've decided I'm not up to this electronics malarkey. Anyone know someone who produces a warm white class 67 kit... with seperate markers, night, day and tail lights?

Yeah you're right. And then I think it has a connector to the trailer car and some clever gubbins to switch the head/tails depending on travel... but that's where I get lost on what goes on.

Hi Nigel Many thanks for taking the time to respond. Sorry I'm a bit thick when it comes to electronics so struggle with this side of the hobby emmensely hence my questions below ;) ; - Could I solder the decoder pick ups (red/black decorder wires) to the red circles? Or is it intercepting the circuit board where blue circles are? - I can't work out the common circuit (blue decoder wire)? As P1 & P2 and B+ go to the interior lights my guess is one of those is the common. - I think the head and tail lights are somewhere in yellow rectangle - I guess you're suggesting soldering the white or yellow DCC wire to these ends? I can't work out why there are 5 resistors (?) here and whether it's possible to have seperate functions wired up here? Thanks for your help! Will

Hi! Before I abandon Bachmanns class 101 circuit boards I just wondered if anyone has converted a trailer car to DCC? it doesn't look like the easiest circuit to hotwire a decoder into... so I'll probably end up doing something homemade. As I intend creating hybrid units I won't be using the power car. Thanks Will

In between traverser building I'm progressing a few DMU projects. I was proper annoyed with myself when I broke the exhaust on my NSE DMU. Sadly its not available as a spare so my only option was to attempt to repair. The repair involved creating a splint using 0.33mm brass wire, gluing it with superglue then adding back a bit of the curve using filler. A splash of silver paint hopefully hides the repair. Front glazing is next and I'm hopeful of some shawplan laserglaze in the near future. I've also been playing with my 121 DTS by adding bufferbeam details and starting to weather the roof (the body will be done when I apply transfers). Although I got a strange white streak effect from brush painting using acrylics so it'll have another coat soon. As I plan on running my bubblecar solo I've gone for screw link couplings. These weren't a great success when used with the hooks provided by Bachmann. So I've fitted a smiths hook and used the rest of Bachmann dummy coupling for aesthetic reasons on the bubble and a full smiths screw link on the DTS. This seems more reliable based on my tests and time will tell whether this is an acceptable solution. I'm quite pleased with how the 121 2 car DMU project is going. Cheers for reading!

Does the shape of the hopper mean they needed to put the arch in? It is a bit odd

Thanks Dave Hopefully there is something of interest for you. I haven't reinstated any of my old photos so if there's anything that'll help I'll see if I can find it on my PC.

It's a good question! I'm sure you want to save it for a future 115 project ;)

Cheers Rich. I tempted with your tip and I'm warming to only gloss where I need to! Its a fun project and I look forward to seeing yours! I prefer Bachmanns 117 which I think is ahead of the old lima one so well worth using that one. On the 101 i think its much closer. I like the Limby version and I think they've captured the side windows better than Bachmann. I think both benefit from a shawplan front window etch. I've also raided Bachmanns spares website for underframes which opens some opportunities! Will

I wonder if Accurascale will have the same wheel size challenges with the 50 ;) To scale or not to scale.

Hi Guy. It's a show I try to goto and always enjoy it. Hopefully on the Sunday provided I recover from my Saturday day out! Will definitely say hello if I make it.... (this one won't be finished but I might have a few items that could stretch their legs). Cheers Will

I've been slowly progressing Set L210 over the last month.... work just gets in the way of good modelling time! Anyhow I think they're both now ready for some gloss around areas where transfers will go. One change to the 116 is that I've added some MJT shell vents... one of the benefits of posting online is others spotting things wrong! It did mean stripping the roof, lots of filing etc. but while there i also improved the cab roof join. I'm also still trying to perfect the art of painting black window surrounds. These have had the following attempts; Painting freehand - Big no! I'm rubbish with a paint brush! Painting with a brush but masked - Again no luck there despite me applying the paint quite dry it seeps under the masking tape I've also ruled out acrylics as I can't fix my messups as easily as enamels Went crazy and used a halfords rattle can (while doing the roofs) - had seepage issues the final choice was masking up using an airbrush and only applying very light coats. This with some fixing afterwards will be my chosen approach from now on and the one i did on the 116 (not the 101 though ;) ) I've also had some fun achieving straight lines.... Hopefully any signs of the side air vent have gone..... This took a few coats of primer and several sanding sessions. I used Tamiya fine white primer (as recommended) and while it scared me when spraying it did dry very well and nice and flat with a tough finish. And it has an added benefit of looking to my eyes as white... rather like Bachmanns white.... ( i have sprayed more white on than needed to try and blend the finish. Removing the 117 guards handrails meant i needed to spray on some grey as i needed to sand bits flat and I think Railmatch NSE grey is a very good match. Final paint has been the NSE Blue which went better than expected. but again I wasn't happy with my ability to paint straight lines so it's been "straightened" in a few sections by touching in with an airbrush. I had planned on doing a 116 Blue/Grey DMBS but I'm proper fearful of messing that one up when removing the air vent grille (its the lining!!) So thats on hold and my research attempts at finding a 117 DMBS in Blue/Grey running as a hybrid haven't resulted in a single example so that project is on hold! Although I may just go for it in a mad moment. So it's onto my most feared step - gloss varnish. I haven't decided on varnishing the lot or just the areas for transfers. But that might be a while off as I'll wait for a dry day with some sun! Happy Modelling all!

Totally agree with this My day job is using laptops so (apart from reading rmweb!!) I rather enjoy looking at paper rather than on a screen. Traction has always been one of my fav mags... The articles about the real railway I've found rather interesting which dont tend to featured elsewhere. I've even contributed to the modelling section with articles that are probably fairly niche that the mainstream modelling probably wouldn't be interested in. Long may the mag continue!

I didn't like the cam either and ended up replacing. Not sure it's more elegant but the kadee is now mounted to the chassis with a 10ba bolt. Needs a hole drilling for this. Allows a full deflector to be used if you cut a hole in one Probably not the easiest solution out there but wasn't that difficult and I did my four all at the same time.

Yes I think you're right. The good or bad thing about this livery is I shows up all the curves and frames of the model ;)

I'm sure I had this problem using the wrong 21 pin chip. In any case I remember changing the wiring to link up to a 10 function decoder to allow seperate markers, night, day, tail and cab lights for each end

Keep up the good work Charlie! I'm liking all of the extra effort you're putting in on this model.... well worth it IMO.

I use Xuron cutters which are really good.