Richard-358946

Thanks Matt, i do hope the video helps people out, at the very least ive shown how to get inside the coaches 😁, the Mk3's look blue tinged in the video but i think that is just the light bouncing off the blue interior and playing tricks on the camera, in person they are warm white light emitted through the windows. Simply just warm white led stripes cut down and put in the roof area 👍 no hidden trickery👍

Anyone fancy improving the wiring diagram but improving it to make it simpler for us mere mortals? If possible? Would love to see what you guys can come up with, could you maybe use a 7805 after a full bridge rectifier? Some zener diodes maybe? I used 510 ohm because "This Way Worked" 🤣, joke joke...i went a little higher and my lights began to dim so 510ohm was the sweet spot for my setup. Genuinely though please take the time to post a better wiring diagram if you can think of a way to get Anti-Flicker circuitry in our coaches in a simple DIY way we can all follow because it would help us all out, even better yet a video would be fantastic to follow.

Here is the ammended diagram. It does not matter if the 1/4W 510 ohm resistor is on the negative or positive side of the LED. The resistor needs to go after the rectifier though.. the resistor is to slow the current to the led from the capacitor, You generally get a 0.6v voltage drop over silicon diodes.. theres two in the rectifier so assume the volt drop here is 1.2v.. no one really cares though. That 510ohm resistor can be 510ohm or go to 1k and the LEDs will actually start to dim on a 12v and 17v track. Out of all the components you may want a bigger capacitor or just more of the same 220uf in parallel would work well. The lights will stay on longer with more capacitance. The fade will take longer and overall brightness will be less the higher the resistor value is.. Ive actually made these and theres always a better way to make something, you can get a Bridge rectifier chip for example but most people have diodes kicking about vs specific components Any questions ask away, here is the ammended schematic..

Hi guys, i dont want to alarm anybody but it might be worth checking your motor wires are not rubbing on your flywheel in your power cars. I like to pull things apart and found my red and black wires were rubbing on the flywheel weight.. ive caught it before it turned into a problem but it may be worth looking to avoid a future short and possible decoder short happening in your locos. Il try and add a photo of said issue.. il probably tape my wires so they are pulled away from the flywheel or dab a bit of superglue to hold the wires away from the flywheel... Thought it best to say something now and hopefully it can save future headaches for people. There are four screws at the front and rear of the big PCB. Once removed the pcb just lifts up to reveil the motor as shown below...

Peachy rounded that up nicely, Please Hornby maybe update the firmware to cap the global volume CV to avoid blown amps on your decoders 🫣. From the testing i did, anything much over 25% volume and the speakers do heat up, i mean got close to melting plastic hot, I tried different enclosures too. A symptom of this speaker overheat happening is gradually the sound will quiet down and get crackly/distort. Potentially this could maybe damage the decoders. This is just from my experience so i dont want to scare anyone, at 25% volume most locos are blimming loud anyways. This was the Next18 And 8TXS HM7000 sound decoders, with Hornby Speakers.. If your reading this, i personally dont go above 25% volume 👍 I set my locos at 15-20%

Cheers Peachy👍 I think for the BR Blue it should probably be more amber i suspect. Im almost scared to open it back up now to remedy it 🤣

The way ive done this is non "consumor quality" it was a make it happen type build for my layout so theres definitely areas which i think could be improved but at the very least it gives hope to us mere mortals that fitting these chips is possible if you willing to take the risk and like tiny soldering 😅 The NXT18 version as far as i can tell is the same PCB as the 8TXS. It may be beneficial just to use the NXT18 version and just solder your wires to it vs using the 8TXS like i have and removing the speaker and power module sockets(i probably didnt even need to do this). My 8TXS even says NXT18 on it next to where the NXT 18 socket would go! Another point i want to highlight is you may be able to get a 9 pin micro plug or somehow find a hole in the loco somewhere for the existing 8 pin plug but plugs are points of failure and waste space. If the decoder doesent break i have no reason to remove it. If my 8TXS breaks il put my TTS chip in the lil bugga 🤣 oldschool for the win👍 Hopefully ive answered many questions for you all, if you have any other queries ask away👍

Hi Fishmanoz, -The schematic il try and screenshot that from the video unless someone else beats me too it - to maximise space available i tend to hardwire my decoders so yes i tend to cut plugs off. The 8 pin plug still actually thinking about it wouldnt of sufficed anyway as theres an extra wire id also need to use a plug on too, the purple aux wire... - i removed the speaker and power module sockets from the pcb, again it was to give me any space i may need for install, this probably isnt necessary however i did it anyway, on the other side of this PCB there are solder pads for the speaker wires and power module that you can solder too, this is what i did. - yes placing the decoder diagonally means less removal of material however its a balancing act as you need to make the decoder not touch the motor. I kept carefully grinding until the decoder was just not touching the motor. One slip and the body could be annialated so it requires a delicate touch here... -The cab almost slightly unclips then you just lifts up and away off the body to expose the interior. My cab was not glued, the black firewall peice had two dots of superglue holding that in, it came off again quite easily. -The power bank is just wired as it was stock, i should add there are tiny ID marks on the pcb for the power bank + and -, theres also ID marks on the decoder, c+ and c- (solder pads on opposite side of removed power bank socket. - The couplings i removed, no real reason other then i forgot to put them back in - chassis mods... The only chassis mod was removing the chunk of metal which protrudes up where the cab meets the body.. it was in the way of the power bank and served no purpose for me, thats why i showed that area in the video. Tbh i need to almost annotate the video really so its more clear - the clip over the motor is not used, i didnt need its weight or function. The motor is superglued down, if the motor fails il tap the motor and because superglue is brittle the motor will release for me, for its lifetime it wont ever move out of its recess. -The Yellow wire and White wire are used for directional lights (lights on bufferbeam), - The Cab light is the green wire - Floodlights at the front and rear are wired in parellel to the purple wire

Heres the video, Mr Moderator please if this is not aloud please just let me know 👍

Hi Nigel, i couldn't give you a price here im affraid as this is Hornbys forum so id be gone from here pretty sharpish and actually ive been so busy ive not been able to sit down and crunch the numbers yet either. What i would say is my video of how i did mine should be up Friday evening, and il hopefully be able to link the video here so then lets say at a later date you could maybe drop me an email chap 👍