New Railway Modellers Forums

the very best bit about kids, grandkids especially, is when parents are fretting about "its too old for them", "they are too young", She/he won't understand that"

and then said youngling takes to it like a fish to a deep fat fryer and loves it

Looks like a fun layout, and the track plan with the decent sized MPD becomes a perfect way to display and collect stock. nicely done too. what sort of gradient have you got up to the coaling stage & how high is the track through it?? wanting something similar here and wondering on the practica...

What DCC system is to be used? will be DCC-EX, initially a 1.5A shield, but later the 5A system they are promoting. supply is rated for more slightly as that was the AC-DC converter I could get easily. have used this system before, the 1.5A is fine to shift a pair of locos to test, swapping later a...

idea is there is a power board, this has 15v (which gets white), 12V (orange) and 5v (red) with a common ground (black) - that is the larger cable to the DCC base station (15v & ground). then there is a 5v and 12v bus with 24/02 ground around for stuff like lighting point servos etc the DCC bus ...

Think I have this right, least I hope so as this is whats on order. 32/02 wire for the DCC bus (12'x7' layout, will be a 5A capable system eventually though), the same for the 15V feed to the DCC unit 24/02 wire for the DC bus, 5V and 12V (controls and lighting mostly), note the DC ground to the DCC...

Top class carpentry there sir! Jim when you look closer is most definitely is not, somewhere there is a woodwork teacher crying. amazing how much a jigsaw blade wanders. did try a "fence" to run alongside and even that didn't work with the blade starting to bend as it wandered. hopefully ...

framing is 9mm plywood, track deck likely will be the same, Save yourself some cash, 6mm is quite enough for track bed providing there are enough supports, and it's easier to start and end transitions. I used it for sides and ends 100mm deep with 25mm square cross battens and double thickness where...

More progress, the primary baseboard framing is done, more secondary cross bracing will be added where needed as the track beds go in (happy for 9mm to go a 24" span supported all around so no part is more than 12" from support but for narrower say 3" wide track beds figure every 12&q...

yes the floppy central wheels do seem a liability, why they didn't just make them part of the tender frame I'm not sure. will see how she runs first but if it looks like adhesion is up to it stripping traction tyres out may happen. guess the easy way is to find some utter wreak of a loco driven tend...

second image doesn't look so much like it was taken with a modern digital camera and is far more atmospheric. I suspect though for low pressure sodium its nowhere near orange enough, its very hard to emphasise enough just how monochromatic the light they spit out is. modification is borderline greys...

checked that, honking weight at both ends of the tender with what appears to be no clearance to speak of above them. probably not hard to shave one of the weights. have ordered one of the CD motor replacements, this looks thinner on the wiring side (as well as making damned sure its fully isolated f...

You may already know this, but with Hornby ringfield tender drives you need to check with a test meter to check there is no direct means of current from the wheels to the motor as on some of them (Not all) they have current feeding through one of the screws. (Trying to remember where) which needs a...

Hi, anyone installed a DCC decoder into a R378 Hornby loco? had the tender off, isolating the motor brushes looks a doddle, to spade connectors and done, ditto getting at the track feed - same two connectors, cut the wires and strip both ends then insert the decoder. only issue I see is there is so...

On the subject of tender drives, these loco's have been sat in a box since 2004. Last week I thought I would take the plunge and rather than have them sat on isolated track in a shed, I converted them all to DCC. They all run really well, so if I want a rest from all of my sound fitted steamers, I ...

Hi, anyone installed a DCC decoder into a R378 Hornby loco? had the tender off, isolating the motor brushes looks a doddle, to spade connectors and done, ditto getting at the track feed - same two connectors, cut the wires and strip both ends then insert the decoder. only issue I see is there is sod...