ColinB

Ok, yelrow it appears every time I put a post I upset you. It is my opinion that I consider them not to be as safe as a modern double insulated controller and I am sure most people will agree. I won't go on about how I know because people on this site get upset. I also said they were designed for Horny Dublo trains which is what you run, if you tried running an Oxford built loco you would probably be reaching for the fire extinguisher. Ok, so you got them tested all that means usually, is it passed a standard test, I doubt they opened it up and studied it in detail. You cannot dismiss the fact that they are housed in a metal case and that the transformer that does the mains, has nowhere near the standard of insulation to today's standards. Take a look at a modern controller, generally the mains is in a separate box, this is so it is easier to obtain the all important CE rating. All I am saying is if you want to run modern locos or let your children play with them get yourself a modern controller. I have a number of Wrenn locos and I used a pwm controller to control them which incidentally worked much better than the H & M controller I have. You have an H & M controller you are happy with, so lets just leave it at that.

Surprisingly the controller I got with my Pendolino is great. Ok it is PWM so the locos buzz a bit, but it seems to drive all the locos properly. My H & M Duette failed about 6 months ago, I was amazed when I took it apart it took me back to the sixties and physics classes at the time. Wire wound rheostats, very little insulation around the mains components, as I have said in my earlier posts I can understand why a modern manufacturer wouldn't want it near their product. Then there is that nice metal case, great if you get a mains insulation fault and your earth wire has fell off. Oh I forgot, on mine it doesn't even a cut out button, oh and then there are are all those switches for half wave rectification etc. I am still trying to figure what they are for and do they make a difference. The only thing I like about it is the control, turn it one way it goes forward turn it the other it goes backwards. These things were really meant for Hornby Dublo, Triang and Wrenn locos. With mine if I ever get round to it I will replace the insides with a modern power supply, and make up a circuit that can emulate that really nice feature of going backwards and forwards.

Surprisingly I have this loco, I just recently converted it to DCC and added a 5 pole motor, I think originally it came in a set. I bought it second hand. Yes, it is the same shape as the Mallard and I think about the time they made this, they made the Seagull which looks exactly the same except for the numbers. At the time I think Mallard was BR Green without skirts. I just recently sold mine on EBay. Surprisingly you can get more spares for this one than the new ones.

Yes, I did read that, but later he was on about pushing coaches so assumed he had coaches with hooks. I assumed he just had the bogies without the clipon coupling. I didn't even realise they clipped on until one of mine fell off while I was sorting out the pickups.

This is what you are missing https://www.petersspares.com/hornby-s9695-class-43-hst-125-coupling-tank-pk2.ir

I did wonder, but I thought I would let it go. I will stick to my iphone 8 ohm ones. The iphone is a "horn" type speaker so it lacks bass, but given the amount of room available generally there isn't enough room to put a decent bass speaker with a decent enclosure in.

In that case why don't you buy some of that PCB repair paint if they still sell it and paint the relevant part of the frog. That originally is why Hornby 0-6-0 locos had one axle sprung, for that very reason. On the new Hornby 0-6-0 locos they removed it, I don't know whether it was a "cost save" or it gave improved traction. I notice Dapol on their new Mogul have come to the same conclusion, as their centre axle is sprung. As I say there are two ways of curing it.

That is the very reason why people use electrofrog points. Stay alive certainly makes it better and less of an issue.

Mine was ok, well as far as I can see it is. This afternoon I retrieved it from its safe place to have a look at it and found the box had disintegrated. All the glued joints have fell apart. It hasn't been man handled, none of my other loco's boxes stored in the same place have fell apart. I suppose I had better glue it back together. Any idea what glue they use?

The majority of the speakers than Richard Croft sells are 8 ohm. Generally as with a lot of the 4 ohm speakers, he does a package which is two 8 ohms in parallel, YouChoos do the same. The only true 4 ohm I have seen was rectangular one that comes with the Loksound sound decoder, it was fitted to a Bachmann loco I bought secondhand. All the iphone ones are 8 ohm, as are virtually all the sugar cube ones. Generally you can tell anyway if the speaker is rated at more than 1 watt then they are 4 ohm. The 4 ohm speaker that I have seen on Richards Croft's EBay account wouldn't fit anyway, they are too big. I must admit I fit iphone speakers where ever I can, the sound quality is excellent, they are super thin and very easy to insulate. Other than the two connections there is nothing metal to touch, unlike a sugar cube speaker. That photo is exactly how Hornby expect you to fit the speaker, that looks like a Duchess setup. It was like that in my factory fitted one. The thing that annoys me is if you analyse the tender weight, it is under stress, it should fit horizontally, but because it doesn't fit properly it is putting stress on the screws that hold it down.

The easy solution is buy a different speaker. I use the small "iphone" speakers that a guy on EBay sells, they are incredibly thin and seem to fit in most locos. Alternatively, use a small "Sugar Cube" speaker that will definitely fit. I hate to see people hack the plastic around to make stuff fit, it generally weakens the model. The wire I use I think is 7/0.1 wire or something near it. It is small enough too fit and reasonably flexible. I bought some wide clear heat shrink to put the decoder in, but I don't shrink it. With these decoders heat is an issue, so they need a free passage of air across them. The top side is more critical than the underneath. Gaffer tape is not a good idea, even Sellotape which Hornby recommend doesn't seem that great either.

Thanks Andy_Mac that explains a lot, that makes a lot of sense. Not a particularly good way to run a company, but then I suppose they know best. Imagine what it must be like for their Dealers, losing all that Customer goodwill. Where I used to work that was one of their biggest worries, we were frequently lectured on it. Perhaps they should have left it with Rails, I am pretty sure that they would have made enough. The guy that runs, that didn't get rich by being stupid, I remember dealing with him in the 80s/90s when it was him and his mum running it, which I suppose is why I always liked dealing with them.

By coincidence I was fixing my 1980's HST yesterday. The coupling is special with no hook and it clips onto the front of the bogie. So it looks like in your case someone has unclipped them and lost them.

The only reason you would want a DCC to CBUS is if you were trying to interface the system with something like Railtrack. I don't use Railtrack, but I assume when Railtrack asks for a point change it will issue a DCC Accessory command. That is the only reason.

@Eddielaw that is terrible. It appears Hornby decide how many they are going to make before they count the Dealer orders. I swear they do it to make them more desirable, so you preorder the next one earlier.

Yes, I looked at their site. They have lots of hardware but it appears you have to be a member to buy it. It appears reading the data on the web page that they use 125 kBaud for the speed which is what we used to use in the vehicles for the low speed bus ( most vehicles have two buses) and I have a ton of tools that can read it. Looking at the hardware they have made it all looks really good. I don't know if they have aready done it but if you had a DCC to CAN interface board, then the system would work with all existing tools. So the accessory command in DCC calls up the relevant point via CAN.

Unfortunately, this is not the first time it has happened. It is also a sure way to upset your customer.

If it is like any of the others that appear on EBay, it will go for silly money. It would help if Hornby on their site would say either "Out of Stock, waiting for new deliveries" or "Out of Stock, item will not be renewed" or something like that. Then we would know where we stand. If you know that they are not going to make anymore for a while, then you would have to save your pennies and buy an expensive one.

Did anyone else get a mail from a well known Hornby dealer saying that their order for these products has been reduced? I ordered two, which seemed about right for the rocket, but I have been told that due to supply issues I will only be receiving one. And no I wasn't going to sell the second one on that popular auction site.

I assume like a lot of the others, they are out of stock.

@Flashbang when I mentioned CAN bus I didn't know it already exists in model railway form. I saw a lot of German manufacturers talking about it. The only issue would be interfacing with existing tools. The CAN system is ideal for this because not only can you set solenoids etc, you also have the ability to read back data. Now I know devices exist, I will start digging a little deeper. In my case it would save a ton of wiring. I didn't want to mention this, but I was going to use one of those DigiKeijs units. You get 16 channels, their disadvantage is the output seems to be be switched 5 volts. but if you are going to use a relay board then no issue. They are sustantially cheaper than the Hornby alternative.

I assume this is a 3 pole motor. Have you checked you have a resistance measurement between adjacent segments on the commutator, indicating that all the coils of the motor are connected. I found with the Hornby ringfield motor it is critical that the circular magnet is in the right position. If it is not in the right position the motor doesn't run evenly backwards and forwards.

I don't honestly know, but I would assume it would as it is a more modern motor. That would explain why your TTS is still working ok, forgetting the judder and you got it to work on a Hornby decoder. My ringfield based loco fried the Hornby decoder, the first time it stalled on a point, I now fit Zimo decoders. I tried a few of my really old ringfield based motors and they were drawing current awfulling near the TTS maximum value. That stilll doesn't explain the judder. I am wondering it is something to do with the back emf generated by the motor. There is an awful lot of undocumented issues with TTS. I wonder if the TTS has an issue with your motor and basically is jumping in and out of current limit, but unfortunately their current limit strategy is not documented in any of the documentation. It just says you mustn't exceed the maximum current but not what happens if you do.

Of course it does, it is what it does when they are exceeded which the leaflet doesn't explain. Does it blow up. fold back and retry? I read a lot of the current limit data as I was thinking of fitting one to a Lima loco, when I noticed that the maximum current for the Lima was in excess of that for TTS. If it is folding back that would explain the jerky behaviour.

The D parameter makes it unstable if you don't know what you are doing, so I can see why they would not allow you to change it. If there is no D then it is just a PI loop, not PID. I spent hours years ago, setting 3 of them up on a "two stroke" Ford Fiesta. Anyway, I think there is something more fundamentally wrong with his setup, I have used TTS in my HST and I don't remember it being jerky and I didn't change cv150, mind you I was using a 5 pole ringfield motor so I suppose that helped a lot. TTS use in Ringfield motors is a bit dodgy anyway, a TTS max average current is 500 milli Amp whereas a Ringfield can consume 600 milli Amp, so if he is using a 3 pole ringfield then that may well be the issue, it is hitting the current limit ( I assume TTS has one). Funny thing is I have just fitted a TTS decoder to a brand new Bachmann class 66 and I didn't have to change cv150, which I normally have to.