rpjallan

I have had a look at your photos & they are unreadable (blurry/out of focus) so unable to help at all…

That’s not always true either! I had my pre-order of all 9 LMS Coronation Scot coaches cancelled by Hattons at the last minute. I would not buy from them again. I was a long time customer & even though I live in Australia had actually visited their store on two occasions…

WOW! I only just found out about this. What a shock. This forum will certainly be all the poorer without him. RIP Chris…

Also, settings such as start voltage aren’t adjustable on the Hornby decoder…

Here is a link to an interesting discussion on bus wire size (among other bus discussions) on DCC Concepts Focus Forum for anyone who is interested. This is a recent discussion and they have given me permission to link to it on here: https://www.dccconceptsforum.com/post/cobalt-ips-losechange-address-12297737?&trail=15

You say you have a large layout so I would be going for something bigger than 32/0.2 if I was you. Better to build in a bit of redundancy (for want of a better word). I also agree about soldering droppers to fishplates. That is a last resort. Having said that, we all have to make compromises sometimes…

Do you have a part number for that motor by any chance?

I live in Adelaide, South Australia but my first wife grew up in Rainhill. I've been there, Prescot, St Helens etc. many times. It's a nice part of England and very historical railway wise...

Thanks again. I’ll play around tomorrow & see what I can find out.

Thanks for the info Chrissaf. If the early version of R8215 has either no paint or white paint on the MCU chip & the later version has red, what colour does the the R8249 have? Do the two decoders even look the same?

Hi Everyone. I have just come across a box of half a dozen locos that has been stored away for about 10 years or so. I know all of these are fitted with Hornby decoders - a mix of R8249 and the older R8215. I want to replace the older decoders. What is the easiest way to find out which locos are fitted with the R8215? I have an Elite with the latest firmware. Thanks in advance for any help.

I have just started building a ScaleScenes Boxfile layout So have just acquired an R3640 PO, Willans and Robinson, Peckett W4 Class, 0-4-0ST, 882 'Niclausse'. Just need to sort through my wagons now to find a few appropriate ones to run with it.

I have two locos, a Hornby M7 & a Class 71 that require decoders but have little space to fit them. I have two DCC Concepts direct plug decoders, a Black & a Blue. So, just about to discover which one is the best fit for each loco.

Excellent...

Thanks guys. I just thought it would be a useful resource to have all that great information easily available in one location.

Hi Everyone. I was asked a question last night by a very experienced DC modeller, who has just started to build a DCC layout, about using (and making his own) stay alives. I said I would send him some links from this forum as there were many discussions with some very good diagrams here. Having said that, all the diagrams I was referring to seem to have gone missing during the recent forum upgrade. As far as I remember it was Chrissaf who provided most of these. I think it would be very useful if a new topic could be started that includes all this information if it is still available and made a "sticky" even. It's a pity a bit more care with this sort of thing wasn't taken when the forum upgrade was done. Anyway, thanks in advance if any of this can be achieved.

One thing that hasn't been mentioned that I would try is opening up the loco and removing any capacitors that are across the motor. Bachmann Branchline locos seem to usually have a number of these. You can choose to de-solder them or just cut them off. These never improve the running of the loco but can and do cause running issues. The only Bachmann loco that I own that has a Bachmann branded decoder fitted was a terrible runner until I removed the capacitors and now it runs beautifully with no other adjustments.

I have just purchased my first Zimo sound decoder. What ABC modules are you using?

The catalogue section of the new website is terrible. I have better things to do than spend days correcting Hornby's mistakes. They need to start employing someone who knows what they are doing...

Thanks for the link, GrooteMan. I might have to get myself one of those!

I disagree with this. I think that adding a socket to a loco that doesn't already have one is just over-complicating matters. In fact, I am sometimes inclined to remove sockets from locos. I have had a number that had a built in short ciruit.

I would expect that loco to run fine over PECO insulfrog points so, as atom3624 said, I'd be checking the pickups first of all.

Hornby R3715 LMS 6224 Princess Alexandra to pull the nine LMS Coronation Scot coaches I have on pre-order. Also, obviously not for this loco, Scale Scenes LY01 Industrial Boxfile Layout: https://scalescenes.com/product/ly01-industrial-boxfile-layout/

You need to look for Stanier Period III coaches. Unfortunately there doesn't seem to be too many about at the moment...

That definitely looks to me like the drive for the Caprotti valve gear. I have no idea why it would be disconnected. I can't lay my hands on my P2 just at the moment.