ColinB

I think I know what you might have got wrong, you have got the green wire in the wrong place. I only use Peco point motors but they are are all roughly the same. The motor is two coils, of which one end of each coil is connected together or they should be, the green goes to this commoned bit. If by chance you put the black or red to the commoned part and green to the other end, then only one coil would operate. The other thing is you don't say which points you are using. With Peco point motors you have to connect the two common ends of the coil yourself, I don't know if Hornby points have this connection made already, if not this may also be an issue. If you got any documentation with the point, find out which are the right connections. Green should be common, red is power one way, black is the other way. As I say I haven't checked lately but the middle connection is not always the common one. Hope that helps. Sometimes it is useful to use a 12 volt bulb or led with a resistor. A multimer is not always that good as sometimes the filtering within the instrument will not show a quick voltage change, with a bulb you should see it flicker. If if isn't attached to the point, check the motor works on its own, then at least you know it works. Then if it doesn't work when attached to the point it is probably an alignment issue. The other issue is if you are using a capacitor discharge system, wait a bit of time before you flick the point one way then the other. Sometimes it takes a bit of time for the capacitor to charge up. Hope this helps.

When I said more I meant more of the ones that have run out. I am assuming that they are digital technology, so I would have thought the hardware is the same. All they do is put the signature in the ROM, probably Flash these days. Perhaps they rely on the Supplier to do this, hence the issue. I am pretty sure that is what the rest do, because whenever I have bought an expensive one they say we just have to program it. I could understand it with railway stuff that requires investment in moldings, but digital is generally always the same, just the digitised waveforms that are different. They already have these, I saw the guy on James May's program collecting them.

I don't know why they don't do more. Compared to the other sound decoders, they are a bargain. OK, not as good as the expensive ones, but good enough. Probably add class 67 to the list.

Class 37 and 47.

This is probably too late. What I use is short "stick on" LED strips off a popular auction site. The cheapest ones come from China. They come with the resistor wired in and just a black and red wire. They use SMD LED's so they small but bright. I think they will take 9 to 15 volts input. I also used them in carriages. In resin buildings I found I had to paint the insides matt black to stop the light shining through the resin. If you are not into wring they are the easiest option.

if someone sensible made them Like this? https://www.dccconcepts.com/product/cobalt-tiebar-labels-12-pack/ Unfortunately, these don't have the holes preformed, that is the difficult part.

You could, but it would cost you a fortune. I hate to say it, but there is no comparison with buying a couple of preformed plastic pieces with building a complete layout. I have over 60 points, and yes I have made card inserts for each one, if there was a preformed piece it would be a lot easier. I suppose you make your own points from fuse wire. Sorry, I was trying to make the creation of a layout a bit easier, there is enough to do just doing the scenery and all the wiring, I am just fed up with stupid answers. I know I can make them out of card, I said that in the original post. Actually, I was talking to someone today that didn't think it was such a stupid idea, using 3d printing he could possibly make them for 40 p each.

Already done that, it is just a pain lining up the holes and cutting the slot for the pin. Life is too short to make everything, plus given todays technology, if someone sensible made them (rather than the certain firm I was complaining about) they would be only about 50p each. I can get a relay board off Ebay cheaper than I can buy the bits. I mean if you want to waste your time scrabbling under your baseboard lining up point motors then so be it.

I have one of these, has anyone converted it to pickup from all the wheels? As with all locos of this vintage the front bogue picks up one supply, the other bogie the other. I know when I converted my railroad Tornedo, this site pointed me to actual Hornby spare parts that would fit. Incidently, when I converted my Ringfield motor on the Stowe, it had the "Shorting Screw". I removed it and tapped the hole to be the same thread as the other brush holder (I think it was 2.5 mm). I then used nylon 2.5mm, screws for both, this stops you accidently getting them mixed up if you take it apart again. If you are using DCC and you don't insulate the brush holders, you can damage the DCC chip. This has actually happened to me on a DCC ready loco, that had a short between motor and pickup from new, which you would not notice on analogue.

Ok, I am confused, why would a power supply kill a loco motor, unless it was giving out a voltage higher than that required by the motor. Half wave rectification, just means that the whole signal is not being used, and generally the motor should filter it, so it should be a lower voltage, unless I am missing something. In electronic power supplies, we use full wave rectification as you don't need such a large smoothing capacitor. From my experience of model railways, other than the advent of better motors and DCC, the basic electrical stuff from the major suppliers doesn't seem to have moved on a lot. Peco still sell a slider switch that fits under a point motor, that puts extra load on the motor, and when they do redesign it to a supposedly better one, it is too large and falls apart if you look at it. The joke of it is, the basic Peco point motor is brilliant, it is simple when fitted under the point, and because it is direct, works well, the thing that they got wrong, is not selling a piece of card to fit below the point so you don't see the gap or better making an adapter where the motor fits below the point, which the point fits on top of. There miniture microswitches on EBay that are much better and more reliable. The biggest issue with old controllers seems to be their overload protection, if the tracks short out, there is no visible indication. At least with the ready old Hornby ones a button used to pop out. I would imagime the cost of a large transformer is the reason they are not made any more.

Does anyone know if anyone make stickers that I can put on my boxes with "DDC fitted" on them? I know I could write on the boxes, but that defaces them, I would just like a quick way to know which ones have been converted. It is also useful (dare I say it) if something happens to me, and someone has to sort out the locos.

I fitted one of these to my Bachman EMU and found it worked perfectly. The only issue I had was initially installing it, but that was more to do with the 21 pin arrangement, I am more used to 8. I am using an Elite. I did have issues with fitting one in a Hornby Schools, where I didn't think it had sufficient drive to power the motor, but I think that it was more an issue with the loco.