SRman

A couple of short videos illustrating the trains recently running on Newton Broadway.

I'll send you the dimensions of the boards I need for the secret railway.

Well, I have been a bit naughty with spending on the European model front, again. I felt I would like an ICE unit of some sort, and stumbled upon the Piko Hobby ICE 3 set. This comes complete with track with moulded ballast (which I won't use) and a 12V DC controller, which may have a use in supplying some accessories with power, later on. The train itself comes as a 4-car unit, with two driving ends, a 2nd class pantograph coach, and a Restaurant Car, which houses the motor and decoder socket. Drive is on all eight wheels, which have traction tyres and no electrical pickups, as I discovered when I placed the Restaurant Car on the test track, turned on the power and nothing happened. Investigation showed that the unit has electrically active 4-pin couplings, and that only one of the driving cars has track pickups on its bogies. Coupling that driving car to the Restaurant Car produced a result. It was silky smooth and quiet right from the very start on DC, so I set about fitting an 8-pin Lenz Standard+ v.2 decoder. Body removal involved removing two screws (except that one of mine was missing - no big deal because the body clips very firmly back in place). Pin 1 is marked clearly on the PCB, so it was a case of removing the blanking plug, inserting the decoder plug and tidying the wires; there is even a space provided for the decoder to sit out of the way, on top of the housing. A quick test on the programming track with the driving car and Restaurant Car together again proved the installation was fine, and after a bit of programming to set the address and alter the acceleration and deceleration to match my usual standards, the pair of coaches were placed on the main lines and given a very quick test run, before assembling the whole train. I have to say that for such an inexpensive set, the quality is very good. I am sure there are a few details missing to suit the budget price (there are some add-on roof vents to fit), but these trains are so streamlined and smooth anyway, anything missing isn't really noticeable. The lighting consists only of directional head and tail lights, but a nice extra feature is the driver figure in one end cab. While purchasing the unit, I had decided that it needed a couple more coaches, so ordered a 1st class pantograph coach and 2nd class sitting coach to extend it to six cars, which looks better balanced, to me. The train cruised around Newton Broadway beautifully at low and medium speeds, although I have not tried its top speed yet - there seems to be plenty in reserve.

As an example, I have four Hornby M7s, all fitted with DP2X-UK decoders (the only type that really fits!). Three behave beautifully. The fourth one had to have the BEMF turned off and many tweaks to the settings on the decoder to get it to run properly. That one went fine in reverse (with the default settings), but surged then stopped repeatedly going forwards. Swapping decoders fixed that locomotive, but transferred the problem to the other loco instead, indicating a decoder problem. With the BEMF off and the various tweaks to it, the M7 with the dud decoder behaves fine.

I have a couple of DP2X-UK decoders in the storage boxes, but have found them to be a bit variable in quality - when they are good, they are VERY good, but when they are not so good, they can be frustrating to set up properly. I do have reservations about whether the Lenz decoder will fit. Still, it won't go to waste if it doesn't.

After adding transfers to four of the kit wagons I built over the last few months (the ex-GW Mica B meat van behind the loco is one of them), I decided to give a Bachmann N class 2-6-0 a run. 31862 has not been run for quite a long time, but behaved impeccably when placed on the track and had no problems with the load behind it either. This loco was one of my earlier conversions of non-DCC-ready locos, using a Digitrax DZ125 decoder hard-wired to the motor. I'm not a fan of these earlier Digitrax decoders, but this one behaves well enough. If it plays up or gives up, I'll replace it with something more sophisticated, such as an ESU LokPilot micro. On the subject of decoders, I am currently looking at the Lenz Silver+ Direct for the H class loco in the previous post. A minor improvement to the train room as a whole was to put some plastic cable ducting to replace the duct tape previously used to carry the serial cable from the NCE Power Pro command station to the old computer in the room. This followed on from tidying up some trailing cables in other parts of the house using plastic wall ducting. For the future, I will also be able to run the USB cable from the Power Cab used on the programming track as well.

The REP Driving Motors were all new builds, with the centre coaches and 4 TC stock all rebuilt/refurbished loco-hauled coaches. I read somewhere that the TF coaches in the TC units were some of the oldest mark 1 coaches still in existence at the time.

I tried running my Hornby SECR H 0-4-4T the other day, and it was very hesitant. The balance was right out, with it leaning back on its bogie, and the front drivers barely touching the rails. I decided to insert a washer above the bogie, which meant dismantling it somewhat to get at the bogie retaining screw from above. I tried a plastic washer - too thick; then a paper washer - too thin; so decided today to make a brass shim washer, which actually seems to have worked nicely. The H has been trundling around for quite a while now without stalling or trying to leave the rails. While I had it open, I took out the Hattons direct decoder and put in a DCC Concepts one, which has given marginally better motor control. I must try to get a better decoder for it, but the choices are limited because there is very little room inside.

Recently received from Modelu were these figures which are 3D printed, and represent loco crews from the Edwardian and 1940s-50s period, plus some Edwardian seated passengers. There are also a few of the Hattons crews left over from a previous purchase on my rather dirty workbench as well, all in the process of being painted. The Edwardian ladies costumes are going to benefit from some fine detail painting. All are at present only roughly finished, and the colours I have chosen are rather arbitrary as there are no period photos in colour to give me any clues/ideas. All of these figures had an initial coat of black applied before adding other colours. The aim is to populate some of the pre-grouping locos with fairly open cabs, and also the Stephenson's Rocket coaches with the passengers. The Hatton's crews come up as looking quite natural in their poses, and the Modelu ones will be just as successful - I think that Modelu might have been responsible for the Hatton's commission. Here's a photo I have posted before, with one of the Hatton's figures in a Dapol B4 0-4-0T.

I have swapped quite a few Lima bodies onto Hornby chassis over the years, but have left the wheels alone. However, the culprits for fouling the third rail are those moulded on sand pipes, which are way out of gauge anyway, as well as being rather thick. I cut all of them off flush with the lower edges of the bogie frames, on both the original Lima chassis and the newer Hornby ones. If I ever get really inspired, I will add wire sand pipes to them, but, to be honest, it hardly notices that they are missing.

I remember orange curtains, but only in the blue/grey era, as you said. I never saw the 120s in their green days. However, the SR's 4 CEP/BEP units had orange curtains from new, and date from the same era as class 120.

After a bit of a hiatus on the resin Merchant Navy, I have now filled the daylight under the firebox area with some white metal ashpan castings from RT Models, intended for Bulleid Light Pacifics, but more than adequate for the MN, seeing as I really don't want to scratch build them to the absolutely correct pattern. Being white metal, they have the added bonus of putting a little more weight over the rear driving axle. The photos show the items glued into place, and after a first coat of black paint.

Or on top of freshly delivered pizza boxes.

My new laptop was delivered yesterday, so I spent much of the day setting it up and copying my files across from the old one. Half a day later, it was rendered unusable!

I would echo the advice above, but would add: check the electrical pickups. Most Heljan locos in my experience have only picked up power on four or five wheels out of a possible eight when frst out of the box. On the class 33, it is very easy to tweak the pickups if necessary, by simply pulling the sideframes off the bogies and bending the contact strip outwards slightly at the ends - pull the sideframes horizontally outwards, they just clip onto the spigots on the bogie centre block. For decoders, Lenz is good, but I standardised earlier on with ESU because some of my 33s were fitted with ESU lokSound decoders, and the LokPilots allow a delay to be programmed in for double-heading, mixing sound and non-sound fitted locos. Even later on, I fitted a couple of newer 33s with Zimo decoders, also very good. All three of those brands have some overload protection built-in as well, and can cope easily with Heljan's extra power consumption under load.

Maybe it's because of all the steep gradients on the NS system.

Occasionally a different type of coach was inserted into a set as a temporary replacement when a coach was taken out for maintenance purposes. In BR days, the odd BR standard mark 1 got put into a Bulleid set, for example, but the substitution was only temporary. Photos of such things do exist in some of the colour albums, but are not common. Later still, in the md 1960s sets were being disbanded and mixed around, but the brake coaches still bore their previous set numbers in service.

They are people who bang the doors to see if they are there! Sorry, I couldn't resist. In reality, they are usually metal bars that are mounted from the solebars and stop the wagon doors from dropping and swinging too far, cushioning them as they hit the end of the travel - not good for the doors if they hit something hard and unforgiving. They often have a slightly cranked shape. Many plastic kits that have them tend to use plastic for the bangers too, which makes them rather over-thick. The Cambrian Kits 'Sturgeon A' I built around six years ago illustrates them clearly, with pairs of bangers under each of the seven doors on each side. The half-hoops on the doors themselves also act to cushion the end of travel in this case.

The LSWR D.1541 brake vans turned up from Kernow Model Railway Centre this morning. I pre-ordered two quite a few years ago, one in LSWR original livery and one in Engineers' BR grey, which I particularly wanted because it has 'Return to Three Bridges' on the sides - I used to live just around the corner from Three Bridges in the 1960s. For comparison, I have included my Smallbrook Studio resin D.1541 brake van, bought before the Kernow models were announced, but started after that, and still not quite finished, awaiting the weight inscription on each side and the roof gutters and stove pipe chimney, plus lamp irons to be added. The Kernow model is much crisper, and dimensionally very slightly smaller, but the Smallbrook one is still pretty good, I think, and I can say I put it together. It was filling a gap at the time I bought it and a few other brake van kits from Smallbrook.

No, but there are modellers of Queensland Railways who use TT gauge track (i.e. 12mm gauge), and others who use HO/OO track. You could look at Wuiske Models of QR locos, because some of theirs found their way to Tassie, particularly the English Electric powered units. They aren't cheap, but may give you some ideas and starters. Wuiske tend to offer a choice of either gauge for their models.

I would stick with the better brands. They can cost a little more but are worth it for the better control charactristics and for robustness. The brands I am thinking of are ESU, Lenz and Zimo, all of which have some overload protection built-in. There are several budget Zimo decoders selling for around £20 each, and they have a full set of CVs and functions available. If you are looking at sound, Hornby's TTS decoders are very inexpensive, but you get what you pay for. Having said that, the diesel ones are not bad at all, and there are a few available at reduced prices - I paid £25 from Kernow Models for a TTS class 60 decoder. Hornby's decoders in general are not very robust, though, and I really don't like their standard decoders; any of those I have tend to get relegated to lighting functions in unpowered vehicles, such as DMU trailer cars. I would not recommend using any Hornby decoders in Heljan diesels unless you like to see smoke coming out (that only works once per decoder, though! ).

What seems to be a fairly common problem with recent Heljan and Hornby small locomotives is soft and/or brittle electrical pickups. This is made worse with Heljan's locos because they allow rather excessive amounts of sideplay on some or all of the axles. With that in mind, I decided to do something about this with both of my Heljan class 07 diesel electric shunters, after adjusting the existing pickups for the umpteenth time, only to find they have lost contact with the wheel backs again afer a short running session. The leading wheels seemed to be the worst. My solution was to solder an extra length of phosphor-bronze strip at a reverse angle to extend the reach of the pickups. The photo shows this better than I can in words. Th one in the pic (right-hand end) has been given an exaggerated crank for clarity. Similar problems have been observed on Heljan's classes 05, 14 and 1366 pannier tanks, while Hornby's B2 Pecketts also exhibit the same problems. As every one of these apart from the teddy bear have very short wheelbases, effective pickups on all wheels are crucial to good, reliable running.

More appropriate than the B12 impulse purchase for my Southern area layout, my Rails/Dapol SECR D class 4-4-0 arrived today, pre-ordered some time ago. After a quick test on DC, I fitted a Dapol Imperium Next 18 decoder and put it on a lightweight train of period stock. It runs quite smoothly, but hesitated a couple of times on points. I think the traction tyres are interfering a bit with the automatic polarity detection and switching. I will be swapping the traction tyred wheel set out later as I don't have a huge amount of suitable passenger stock and what is there is light and free rolling (my entire SECR passenger stock is in the photos, although I will be acquiring some of the Hatton's four and six wheel coaches in due course). There is a set of wheels without traction tyres in the box, complete with a tool to undo the crank pins. This locomotive, with its open cab, is crying out for a decent period crew. There is a firebox glow with a gentle flicker as well, activated on F0. There have been online comments on these locomotives showing a slight discrepancy in the heights of the valances/running boards where they should line up. Looking at my photos, mine doesn't seem to have this problem, but I will check it on level track later. The fix is apparently quite easy, involving a small spacer over the tender body fixing screws.

Beaten to it by David: I was going to mention the Queensland Railways tri-Bo electrics myself. There were a few variations from different manufacturers, some for the coal lines between Blackwater and Gladstone, and some for more general use on the main north-south line. My photos below show members from all three main batches, although there were actually five number series with sort of master and slave versions of the coal locos using their locotrol units, visible behind the middle pair of locos. This was on the Blackwater line. They were quite ugly locomotives, in my opinion, with almost no style whatsoever. The patchy paint schemes didn't help, possibly emphasising the lack of any sort of coordination in their shapes. And for the record, 11637 is a model of one of the Swiss Re6/6 locos from Lima. This has a central can motor wth flywheels driving the outer bogies only, with the centre bogie being fully floating.

Unfortunately, the original is long gone. I only have the tender left, and that was converted to a snow plough.