ColinB

Actually Bulliedboy that is a bit unfair, do you know exactly how long it takes to make things from design to production. It is Hornby's fault they announce new models generally before they have done the donkey work to work out how to make them. I worked on a two stroke Fiesta many years ago, it never made production but Ford never announced it would be making it. If they had they would have announced it when they were about to make it.

Actually 96RAF it is not, it just switches the steam off and on. The steam is a function of the algorithm within the decoder. So on Friday to clear the loco of water I basically had to drive the loco to generate steam to empty it. What I was talking about was a function to bypass the algorithm to just generate steam with the loco stationary just to empty the water.

Actually for once I am with Hornby. I was really surprised at how quickly it got released considering how long it takes to release a normal model. I was even more surprised that it works well. They could have perhaps told us that F24 switches the steam on or off, but I wonder if that was an afterthought. There again F24 is a long way up the function list so I suppose less people would have seen it and if they had defaulted it to off, then we would have had lots of posts on how do I get it to work. The original P2 without smoke was released ages ago so there was no wait for the model, in fact I now have two of them one with smoke I bought ages ago and this one. The only thing that concerns me is running it dry to put it back in the box, I am wondering if they could have included a function which basically keeps it smoking to get rid of the water.

I keep reading about Loconet and Xpressnet commands. I assume there is global set of commands defined for each, although I appreciate that individual implementation may be different. Is there a web page that lists the commands and format?

You have probably been lucky, if it had blown you would smell it plus it is guaranteed for a year. If you were into electronics there are ways you could make it work but the simple solution is just get the right equipment. You need to activate F1 to get it to smoke which you can't do on DC plus the amount of smoke is dependent on loco speed etc. so you need a computer (in this case the decoder) to work out how much smoke. If you have a "smart phone" then the decent power supply is the cheapest option. To be honest it doesn't matter whether it is half wave or full wave when you are talking about nasty spikes.

You are absolutely right Going Spare, that is exactly how I got into DCC, bought a Hornby loco with sound that would only work on DCC. In my case it wasn't so bad, I already had an Elite that I had picked up cheap because it needed fixing.

Yes it was under the "First SS loco to be released" thread. Supposedly it can be run dry but to be safe F24 toggles it on or off, and it does work I tried it, unfortunately no in the supplied user instructions.

There are two ways to do this. You can either go the Hornby App route which means you have to buy a proper approved power supply, I know from personal experience that powering with the Duette is a "no,no" I blew up a decoder with one of those. I assume an HM 2000 is the same. So if you have a smart phone just buy an approved power supply off Hornby and load the App on your Smart Phone. If you don't have a Smart Phone then an easy solution is to buy a Hornby Select controller which will just do DCC, but will run your new loco quite happily. You could buy an Elite but they are super expensive. There are lots of DCC controllers around but probably the Select is the cheapest and easiest, there are some on EBay for about £80.

Yes I think you do, to switch it on you need to enable the F1 function. If you have a "smart phone" the Hornby app is the easiest solution.

I don't think Dapol never stopped doing it. They seemed to have always had that facility. If you ever go round a heritage railway their souvenir wagons always seem to be made in the UK by Dapol. I suppose they can do small runs at reasonably short notice.

Great thanks 96RAF, that is really useful information. Why does the Quick Start Guide not say that? It just lists F24 as Aux4 (HF06).

Perhaps what Hornby should have done is had the steam generator on a separate function so you could turn it off without turning off the sound. Currently both are operated by the F1 function. As I imagine this is controllable from the software perhaps someone should suggest it as an upgrade for a future release, then there would be no issue with running out of water.

I received mine today and I have to admit it was worth the wait.

That is interesting, DPD finally took delivery of my loco yesterday (Wednesday), probably out for delivery today. So it took longer to send to Essex, UK than the USA. I suspect there must have been some issue in Hornby's despatch department.

Has anyone else had issues with delivery of this item? Get two mails on Saturday of Shipment notification. When you click on the link, DPD are saying that they are still waiting for the parcel, so obviously not made it out of Hornby yet. Last time this happened I phoned up Customer Service and they sorted it, but before I do that I just wanted to see if it is a global issue.

I converted all my Bachmann split chassis to DCC. Admittedly in the case of the A4s it involved a lot of machining around the motor mounts to insulate the motor but other than that no issues. The Mainline ones were a different issue because the wheels turned in the axles putting the quartering out but in the end I bought Bachmann chassis and did the necessary split chassis conversion. The only real issue I had with the DCC was finding enough room for a socket, in the end I used 6 pin ones and Zimo direct fit 6 pin decoders.

F0 should switch on the lights, I have an Elite and that function always works. Best idea is do what I do with models where I don't know the lighting functions (it even happens on a lot of new models where they forget to tell you) basically go through each function and see which one does the lights. Generally Bachmann locos have forward and reverse lighting on F0 and cab lighting on another function. Check the underside of your loco to see if there are any switches to switch them off. It is a 21 pin decoder so you cannot get the fitting wrong, the only other issue might be a wire not connected inside the loco. It might be that the body is not on correctly sometimes the lights connect via spring loaded pins that if the body is not on properly don't connect. Forget options 1 and 2, I doubt they effect you. I use a lot of Zimo sound decoders, unfortunately not on my class 37s but then it sounds like it isn't one programmed by YouChoos.

You could do what I do buy an old Lima diesel (because they are cheap) fit it with a DCC decoder and "stay alive" (Powerpack as the diesel will run without power for about 20 seconds) so it runs over the dirty track then buy an old Hornby track cleaning wagon or a Dapol one.

As I said previously, just buy one of those very thin ones from Road and Rails. To be honest again as I said before, this loco has so many pickups you don't really need it.

So China is following Germany in the Hotel California model. I must admit I never realised this happened. I know that to make anything in China you must have a Chinese Company as a sponsor.

96RAF is the best person to answer this. They don't take PayPal which is a bit unusual. You are right, the prices look very suspicious.

On my phone it takes about 25 minutes, it has been pretty consistent over all the downloads I have made. I did say early on that I thought it was excessive, compared with the systems I worked on, but it is what it is. A lot is determined by the piece of reprogramming software you put on the module when you made it (called the bootloader). Unfortunately this piece of software cannot usually be changed so you are stuck with it, so I doubt you can speed it up much.

I know I didn't use them for that same reason for a long while. In the last 6 months they have done some pretty reasonable offers many where the difference between them and another Retailer is more than £50, which is why I have bought off them. I definitely wouldn't preorder off them. Things have changed a lot since those times, Hornby ditched their tier system I imagine because it is really difficult to shift non essential retail items. I suspect Jadlam have done the same. Should the good times return who knows whether they might do it again but at the moment I just don't think many companies can get away with it, except one that has been mentioned in this Forum. That one in particular causes warnings by the Administrator on RMWeb whenever their name is mentioned.

Just had notification that they want the money. My credit card has changed since I first ordered it, so it needed updating.

I did think that, but it is worth checking that connector just in case it is not that good a connection. If you can read a CV it means the decoder is working, generally if the motor drive dies so does the decoder. Perhaps it is just a mix up on the loco id. The Duke of Gloucester has a cheap 3 pole motor as fitted in a lot of the Railroad models, I upgraded mine to a 5 pole one. Unless of course the motor is stuck, on one of my 5 pole ones the magnetic poles clip fell out and jammed the motor.