ColinB

I hate to say it but even 2 days is too late, anyone that has tried to get software approved knows the issues and as for the Android version that wait is totally unacceptable. I think I will say no more about it. All I can say is it has totally put me off buying any I would rather pay the extra and get proven technology. When Hornby finally get their act together on Android I will reprogram the one device I have to see if it is any good. Now to the techy bit, so why is it that high frequency PWM upsets this device. According to one reviewer who had read the huge spec, there is a section that defines maximum PWM for the controller. Does the device confuse high frequency PWM with the DCC signal?

I think the original selling point was that it could be used with any DC supply, obviously not with the likes of Duette which we know uses raw rectification with no smoothing. I find it unusual that people are blaming Gaugemaster controls, these generally are of modern design so I would have thought these wouldn't be an issue, but I don't have one so I have never checked its output. Interesting about the Hornby haters, I suppose I must be one of them although I buy a substantial amount of locos off them in a year. Trouble is, there are some people that think they can do no wrong, when they make the most obvious mistakes. The lack of the Android app being one in question, they knew when they were going to release this product, so you just work back from your "job 1" date to work out when you need to make sure the app is ready. Any delays by Google approving the app should be included in that. Now we have the situation because of that you wonder is Sam right do they just blow up, then we have another saying they are perfect. I don't know, mine is still waiting for the app to appear. The other thing to note is look at one of the new decoders and compare it with the devices on a Zimo or LokSound decoder for size.

My view is, it was quite a novel idea but the practicality lets it down. First issue is it is Bluetooth, so it needs an aerial which then dictates the size of the pcb. I don't know if you could just surround the pcb with the aerial to make it smaller but for the moment it is large. Any model railwayer is going to have small tank engines so the decoders won't fit. In fact up until now fitting a DCC decoder was a challenge. So to use this system you are going to need a mix of this system and DCC. Then we have teething issue, the big one for me is that it doesn't work with Android. Yes I know it will eventually but for me I have had a decoder for nearly a month that I cannot use properly, that does not help with the device's credibility. The thing that does concern me is that TTS was very prone to overheating, if Sam is to be believed we may have the same issue with this device. So if it was meant as a toy for people to control a couple of Hornby trains, then it is ok but for the rest of us, DCC is still king. The ability to load you own sounds is good but as I have said previously you could have made that available anyway.

If it is a 42 year old loco then it is either tender driven or contains the X04 motor. As 96RAF says you need to know exactly which one to be able to do the conversion. The new Hornby sound decoders are according to the specification rated at 1 amp continuous so definitely they will run the motor as long as the motor doesn't have a magnetism issue.

I have got to admit I am usually hard on Hornby for getting things wrong. When I ordered them I assumed they would only be for NEM couplings because that is the modern standard. I have lots of older coaches that have a variety of different couplings I didn't expect them to design for them. I think as a guide you should assume they will only fit the latest super detailed coaches with NEM pockets with any new development.

Yes, I know that they pickup from the axles on the early ones, when I said pickups it was a term to refer to the pickup of power. I have fixed a great many, I was just trying to clarify why Hornby changed the polarity, perhaps I shouldn't have bothered. Everyone tells me that they work wonderfully, sadly that wasn't my experience and it appears from the Hornby program Simons didn't either. I spent many hours preventing them from sliding around the layout or stalling on bad bits of track or points. Eventually I sold the nice ones in boxes and converted the others to loco driven. If you want to connect loco to tender you can buy pairs of connectors ready wired from China via EBay or "Road and Rails". Incidentally Hornby also wire up the 4 way connector differently on different locos, I think the Brit is wired the opposite way round to a Duchess. So if as in my case, to test if you have a duff connector you connect a Duchess to a Brit tender you get a short.

Yes Topcat they did but there was a valid reason. They added pickups to both sets of wheels on the tender drive as opposed to the earlier ones which had a pickup for one side in the loco and the other side in the tender. It was virtually impossible for them to continue with the same system as it was difficult to insulate the pickups on one side of the tender, so that is why they swapped it. If you have ever tried to add extra pickups to a earlier ringfield tender you will see why.

Yes Fishmanoz you are probably right but on the pcb there are several surface mount component positions not populated so it could be in series. Similarly it could be for lights again because of the missing components I wouldn't have found a link to the pin on the DCC socket. I must admit L for lamp makes more sense.

I actually took my double tender tender driven limited edition Flying Scotsman that I bought during the 1980s/90s and converted it to loco drive. It still looks the same although it is now DCC ready (DCC fitted in my case). I took the opinion that these limited editions don't fetch much and I wanted to use it on my layout. It is probably worth more in bits, those separate water only tenders fetch more than the loco. I did sell some limited edition Hornby models from the 1980s , they didn't fetch much more than a standard ringfield tender driven loco.

No the other pin on the two pin connector didn't go to pin 4 on mine. Definitely got continuity on the other pin to pin 8. I must admit as it is my very expensive HD Sir Nigel Gresley I gave up at that point. I did notice that the tender pickups are hard wired to the board it might be that this connector was meant for the tender pickups but at the last minute they found out that there was a fault with the board so ditched it. There again I cannot think what L+ and L- stand for, L is normally short for inductor but I have no idea. Loudspeaker is normally SP so it is not that.

Funny I loaded the wrong app (not my fault QR Code pointed to wrong app initially), supposedly reprogrammed it but nothing happened. The decoder still works as a sound decoder, so could it be that something else is going wrong?

I will probably get some abuse but if you are talking Pannier tank loco then in most cases the latest offering from Hornby will be too big I am not even sure that they do it in 6 pin. If you don't mind paying for a decent sound decoder (about £124) then you will definitely find one that fits. If you go onto the YouChoos website or the Road and Rails one they have a range of small 6 pins decoders that will fit. Road and Rails also throw in a free speaker. These decoders work on a normal DCC system. The ANE LD101 looks ok, I must admit until you mentioned it I have never heard of it, if you find that it is limited then you can always upgrade later. By then there be an even better DCC controller at a reasonable price as the technology improves.

Actually Rallymatt I did read the instructions unusually and it gave me the wrong app via their QR Code. I gather that error has now been fixed, so it appears we can all make mistakes. I still can't get over a company releasing a product that relies on a software app, that is not available. Fortunately it is model trains, if had been a phone then the company would have been inundated with returns . I also watched the Sam's trains review and I don't remember there being an issue with not reading the instructions. If there was, it was insignificant against all the other things he found.

I suppose the big question is how does it work. We know from the times it takes to reprogram the decoder the sound file must be big. So does it copy the complete sound file to the host bluetooth device before it does a reprogram or does it copy the file chunk by chunk (so many bytes at a time). Interestingly a reprogram time or over 2 minutes used to get me worried when I did it as a job, I mean your phone to update itself only takes about a minute (well mine does). We know from Sams tests if if loses bluetooth communication, if it does recover it takes a long time, that is more than enough time for the reprogram to "time out". On one occasion it didn't recover at all, so imagine if it was loading a sound file and lost bluetooth communications at that point.

It will work with a modern Hornby controller, I have one out of a Pendulino set that regularly drives locos of that vintage. As someone said, probably just needs a clean.

They are your locos so you can do what you want. I must admit I like my locos to have lights but adding lights to a Hornby class 73 is virtually impossible. I have about 4 that were originally Lima models which I updated with the latest Hornby chassis and bogies. You can put a light behind the headcode but even then you get a lot of bleed even when you paint the inside matt black. All mine don't have lights, it was too difficult and I did try. Even one of my early Bachmann class 37s doesn't have lights, again when I looked to add them it was virtually impossible as where they would normally go is in the same place as the fitting for the body. Most of the newer models have lights but you pay a premium for them.

I must admit that is the way I am going, if I can get it with DCC sound then I pay the extra. Usually if it is already fitted it is slightly cheaper than doing it yourself. A lot of the Dapol locos I buy generally don't come with sound but they appreciate that most users want fitting of DCC to be easy, so that seems to be what they aim for. I ordered this loco in January 2021, I assumed it would have an 8 pin decoder. To give credit to Hornby they have tried but if you can't make it work then don't bother, leave it to the next retool. As I say I expect fitting of DCC to be easy, I definitely don't expect to start removing circuit boards. Sam would have a field day with this one.

Unfortunately Going Spare service sheet 436 refers to the old class 87 where you are absolutely right an 8 pin fits exactly where it says. I imagine the directive went out to accommodate the new style Bluetooth decoders, so I assume it wouldn't fit in the available space. So they positioned it where they did. I think if they had replaced it with a standard 21 pin DCC decoder it would have probably fitted in the original position but the new Bluetooth ones are higher so it probably didn't fit. To me not a real issue I used to work in micro electronics, I will just buy a Zimo one when they start making them again. From the company's point of view a dumb idea as it is so difficult to see what you are doing with it being upside down and stressing so many wires.

Well we will see. DCC was implemented by many manufacturers so by that action it ceases to be a gimmick. Yes if you are starting from scratch then yes this might be an option. I like the bit about the decoders getting smaller, 96RAF has already pointed out that it has to be a certain size for the bluetooth aerial. Then have you ever looked at the actual decoders, the surface mount components are miniscule, I sure it it isn't but some of it looks like thick film circuitry. The big issue is how is any modeller going to fit it to say a Hornby Terrier.

Now it seems like I am always moaning but this is amazing. I took delivery of a new class 87 City Of Glasgow. I check it DC and then decide to open it up to fit a DCC decoder. I look all over the PCB, can I find a PCB anywhere, no, so I look at the instructions. It is mounted on the underside of the PCB. So when we live in an age where manufacturers are making life easier to fit DCC, Hornby have made it a lot harder. So you lift off the PCB very gingerly because it is hardwired to a lot of very thin wires that are not really long enough and there on the underside is the DCC socket. Added to which my LaisDCC decoder won't fit unless I remove its heat shrink wrapping and possibly file the edges down. Good one Hornby. Yes I will have to buy a new decoder, obviously one not covered in heat shrink. Also it is not good engineering practice to have a PCB hanging upside down totally supported by its connector.

Fishmanoz, I don't have an eyesight problem, but if you read the original post the the contributor does. I must admit I find it a pain looking at small screens but a bigger issue is to hold the thing, you invariably accidentally press one on of the buttons you are not meant to. I must admit I like the security of a nice large screen, if I wanted to use a phone I can control my locos via wirelessly using the Itrains app. I choose not to. Then you have the more important issue, I have many locos all fitted with various sorts of decoders, many with sound, so why would I want to use Bluetooth. As I said it is good as a gimmick and loading sound files, but not much else. I must admit I keep looking at Android pads to put the ITrains app on, but I would rather spend the money on a new loco or decent sound decoder that fits.

Isn't this a duplicate of another thread. Yes in my old company the IT department preferred IOS, but when you realise that that hadn't written a line of code in their life but were just package configurators it doesn't mean much. The Android platform is the more popular platform for users, it is cheaper and because of that has more sales. If Hornby want this to be a success they have to port the App to Android no matter what their IT guys say. So I would say wait for the Android app and then buy a decent Android pad, which you will get for a fraction of the price of the equivalent Apple product. To be quite honest if you are worried about eyesight then buy an app which works on a Laptop which admittedly pushes you down the DCC route and just use the bluetooth features on your current phone for loading the sound profiles.

Isn't this thread exactly the same issue as "Installing sound apps HM7000", basically a download issue. More importantly the App not informing the user that the the data has loaded correctly or likewise failed. When I first got my HM7000 unbeknown to me via QR Code I had linked to the wrong App but whilst I was trying desperately to get it to work I decided to reprogram the device. It was a menu on the App as I now know as the HM DC one. According to the messages it programmed it correctly, but obviously it didn't because it was the completely wrong hardware. So I suspect the new installation (I have Android so I cannot try it) just pumps the data down with very little or no error correction. So if you are lucky it programs, if someone near you is downloading a movie you have issues.

Yes Moccasin I totally agree with you.

Yes the Zimo will handle the current, I checked when I fitted one to my West Country. I think the last time I measured the current it was about 120 milliamps it was just over the maximum output of TTS. The interesting part was I measured the current for a 1980s Hornby smoke generator and that was just under the 100 milliamps. Trouble is they were as measured on just two units, others may be higher. A smoke generator I doubt is going to make much effect to the motor current unless you are very near the limit especially as we are talking about a Zimo decoder. I take your point about the back emf though although I am not sure what effect it would actually have in reality. My suggestion was just away of avoiding extra wires to the tender. I must admit if it was me I would look up the cost of a LaisDCC decoder (last one I bought was £13.99) and use it as a function decoder in the loco itself. It is an A4 so there is plenty of room. NOrmally I avoid seuthe units like the plague as they distort loco bodies but in a HD case it is probably one of the few locos where it won't.