ColinB

Actually it is not, they have to produce sub assemblies to make the locos, how do you think the car industry works. I know a car is much bigger, but in China someone makes the valve gear, someone makes the wheels and so on, then it goes to production to put them together, So no difference whether it is Margate or China. The bigger reason is they probably don't want the hassle of organising it and more importantly they would have to catalogue them and store them. That costs extra money. Given their previous management, it was a cost they probably didn't want to cover, if you saw the James May program they didn't even want to store the tooling. As I said in my earlier post, if it was an older model, it would not be cost effective to make new spares, but if it is a current model then no issue.

It is not going to quadruple between 9v and 14 volts, but I will measure it. Looking at the web, it is as I thought it just follows ohms law. So measuring at 9 volts all you do is interpolate using the real voltage. As long as you are using DC then the resistance is the same as the impedance at stall and can be used to calculate stall current. Torque is proportional to current. Current is equal to (applied Voltage - back EMF)/resistance. As back EMF is proportional to RPM then when the motor is stationary I=V/R

Thank you for the advice, the Zimo ones are much higher current so I will probably go for one of those.

Measured the stall current and it is 400 mAmps at 9v, so at 12 volts that should be less than 600 mAmps, so it looks like a normal Hornby DCC chip is OK.. I didn't realise, this must be a late ringfield model, it has pickups on all wheels. There is also lots of room inside.

I did the same when heatshrinking a couple of fixed DCC wires on my unrebuilt Battle of Britain loco. I had to buy a very expensive one off EBay. I now use tin foil around the body when I do heatshrinking.

I did send an email to Hornby about 3 to 4 months ago when I was looking for Rebuilt Merchant Navy Valve gear. All I got was an email asking me to enquire in a months time. I assume standard answer, for not knowing when, if ever they were going to supply them. Even if they manage to turn around the company, I suspect it will be another 3 or 4 years before they are back to normal. It really needs one of their big retailers to give them grief over it, because eventually it will hit sales.

According to a post I read yes they did use mazak as did Amal on carburetors for motorcycles. The post I read said that it was prone to cracking. On the Rebuilt Merchant Navy Class the sliders are metal, and on the early ones mazak, I don't know what they use now.

Does anyone have an ear at Hornby, that can find out if they intend supplying spare parts for their newer locos. I read on this site and from experience that it is impossible to get spare parts for a lot of their locos, even their current ones. To make things worse, you seem to be able to get parts for their older models but not the new ones. I have a couple of older Brittanias and I want to add DCC sound, on their newer locos they put it in the tender, so I thought if I could buy a latest level tender bottom, I could do that ( I know I have to change the connector). It saves the risk of breaking the valve gear when trying to squeeze the electronics in the loco. Surprise, surprise, I can buy the old tender bottom as a spare part, but not the new one. It is not just that, you cannot get valve gear for certain models, pony trucks for Schools class. Do what the car industry does, charge a premium for the parts, but at least supply them or long term, you lose business. I know the die hards on this site like the challenge, and yes I have successfully fitted it in the loco, but it makes maintenance a pain when I want to fix anything. If a loco costs £50.00 you fill a bit bad if you have to throw it away, if a loco cost £200.00 you feel robbed if you have to throw it away.

Nop, don't run around with hands in the air when things don't work, just normally get down to fix it. It just annoys me when I see rubbish software, where they seem to make things overly complicated, where they do not need to. My nephew is a plumber and he says the same about bad plumbing installations.

I know the feeling, I tried everywhere to replace mine. In the end I had to buy a second hand set + wheels off EBay. Hornby are a discrace, I recently had to get some spare parts for a 30 year old Bachmann loco which Bachmann supplied without issue. So why is it Hornby cannot supply spare parts, mind you I have not checked to see if Bachmann do spare parts for their current models. I even tried to repair mine with parts from some other scrap valve gear, but it didn't work. On mine it was the piston slider that broke, while trying to fit a DCC chip, it appears they were originally made of marzan (not sure of spelling) which is really brittle. Joke of it is they still produce this model, so why no spares?

If space is tight I use 6 pin Decoders. Zimo do a really small one, although it is expensive. They also do a budjet one which I have used. In an old Replica Terrier I used the super small one as it was the only one that fitted in the available space.

Yes, I have ordered a gaugemaster. Usually height is an issue with this one, but it looks like height is not an issue in this case. Sounds like a gaugemaster will fit.

I did think of that, but there are components near the edge, but never good idea on a PCB could crack a track while you were doing it. The issue is it offset, if they had put the connector in the middle of the board it would be ok. Its alright, it fitted in my Brighton Belle, so I didn't waste my money. I am pretty sure a gaugemaster should fit, if not I will modify it to take a six pin, which are much smaller.

It appears Hattons are wrong it is 0.5 mm too wide on one side. I will try a gaugemaster.

I think we have chinese whispers here, there was no way I was going to use a 400mA decoder. I just asked if anyone knew of a suitable decoder that would drive a ringfield motor. I could go through all the process of measuring stall currents and running currents, but all I wanted to know if someone had some practicle experience of using a particular type and found it worked well. Yes, I know I can measure all the currents, but there is no substitution for information from someone who has done it. What I was saying was when I converted my Mainline locos, I used 6 pin DCC concepts decoders, and managed to fry two of them, replaced with right angle Bachmann ones and they worked perfectly. I read the DCC data that came with the decoder, and I was well within their published specifications for currents, so obviously there is something about a Mainline motor that a DCC concepts decoder doesn't like. When I get round to it I will ask them.

Actually I think startup current is higher, but thank you for info.

Has anyone retro fitted a DCC decoder into a Hornby class 85 loco? I am wondering if I need to go for a high current version or is a normal Hornby decoder good enough? I know I should go and measure the current load, but given by experiences with Mainline locos ( I measured 400 mA, but the start up load must have been higher), I thought it would be easier to see if anyone else has done it.

Because I used to work with computers, and it was always a pain setting things up. Things like the paper is too thick for the printer, getting the margins right, but then I suppose I was always trying to get them to do things they are not meant to do, I used to write Windows programs in c sharp, so yes I am no dummy. I used to spend hours getting excel spreadsheets printing onto one piece of paper and not 4 separate ones, it is no joke when you have a 30 page document that decides to make itself 120 pages. So yes I quite surprised it worked first time, even making them the right size. I suppose by PnP you mean plug and play, see how many times your computer fails to see a USB connection when you plug it in, or better still change the printer on your PC from wireless to USB and then try and delete the old one.

I know, I went on holiday and couldn't remember which ones were converted and which ones had sound (it is mainly the non DCC ready ones I converted). I also found a supplier of sticky backed A4 plain paper. I must admit I didn't think it would be that easy.

I eventually got round to printing my own, and yes you were right it is easy. Made a table in word, coloured each cell in red with white writing and bought some sticky backed paper for the printer. I made them the same size as the blue DCC label on Hornby boxes, so I can put them there. I can now tell instantly, what ones I have left to chip.I also added DCC Sound so I know which ones I added sound to.

Great, thank you. I didn't know Hattons did those. I have ordered one.

Does anyone know a suitable DCC decoder to fit one of these. There does not look to be much room, so will a Hornby one fit?

.Reading all these posts I started looking at converting my old Hornby Ringfield based models. I tried out my green BR Mallard, bought sometime in the eighties, and was amazed how much current it used. According to my multimeter it was drawing up to 0.8 of an amp, now I don't know if this is normal, but given my experience with Mainline models that draw about 0.4 amp, I would suggest that selection of the decoder is critical. On the Mainline model conversion I found some of the decoders could not source the current and subsequently burnt out. I finally got my Mainline models to work with the Bachmann right agle 6 pin device. They definitely did not like the DCC Concepts 6 pin offering.

I must admit mine runs perfectly over all my points, curved and straight They are all Peco Electrofrog, I don't know if that makes a difference.

I found on some of my ringfield motors one of the motor connections was connected to the track via a screw, there is a post on this site about it. In my case I took the screw out tapped it with a m2.0 tap and fitted a nylon bolt. I did it with both brush holders so there was no issue mixing them up. Unfortunately, nylon screws don't seem to come smaller than 2.0 mm thread. I am slowly converting all my old locos and I must admit the only issue I have is finding room for the decoder. I have done 7 Bachmann A4 locos and two Bachmann 0-6-0 locos. What I do is use a 6 pin connector as it is the smallest, and 6 pin decoders, again as they are the smallest. I would have thought a Hornby Diesel should be relatively easy, lots of room to fit the decoder and the supply comes off separate bogies. I also found the LaisDCC modules off EBay are the best for old models at least to test them out, as you don't lose much if you blow them up.