St. Blazey's Works and Depot

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And some night shots.

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A bit of an elaborate project, for me at least.
Not mentioned earlier is that I also glued some transparent plastic inside each coach at both ends for windows.
If I was to do it again I would consider using SMD type LED's and work out a better way to hold the wiring and componants so the blooming roof would fit back properly.
Thanks
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After closer inspection I think it's these end wires that are causing the roof not to clip back in place properly.

I think by using slightly longer black and red wires I won't need to go over the middle plastic. Instead by going around the end wall, this would lower the wiring enough to clear the roof.
I'm not sure yet if the LED at the other end may need to do something similar but trying to twist the legs about I accidently snapped off the lighting bar from that end of the seating piece so it's now regluing.
I'm also not sure about that light leakage at the ends of the coaches and the toilet compartment. Something may have to be done about that.
Thanks
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[TimberSurf]

It's always always difficult to tell from a photo, but I think they look a little bright. You could add another resistor to the supply and reduce the brightness, it would also help with the light bleed.

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I haven't moved on with this project yet but this has been on my mind for a while Timbersurf.
As an experiment, could I just sit one bogie on the track and the other bogie connected to the track via a wire which I can split and add resistors inline to test how bright more than one 1K resistor looks like lit?

It sounds right in my head but i just wanted to check.
Thanks
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[TimberSurf]

Yep, that would indeed be in series!

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Excellent. Thanks Timbersurf, I'll give it a go.
Thanks
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Another project slowly making it's way through the works at the moment is upgrading my newly purchased Intercity HST power and dummy car.
I've already taken it apart and cleaned the wheels and the motor as best I could, as the outer plastic motor housing will not come off without removing the wheels. Something I'm loathed to do.
And sprayed the cab control/seating pieces dark grey.

I also intend to DCC it by adding a hard wired harness for the decoder to plug into, add better directional lighting, cab light and driver, extra weight plus paint the windscreen wiper and add some paint to the cab controls somehow. Once I've worked out what is what.

I have ordered most of the componants I need to start the work which will arrive in the next couple of days.
I just need to get hold of 2 decoders now.

When opening the power car I noticed a weird wiring setup. (maybe it's just me)
The left hand tag (I've forgotten what it's called) on the motor (that holds the brush and spring in place) has a black wire that goes around the outside of the motor and connects to another tag on the other side of the motor. (the route shown in red)

NewMotor1sm.jpg (110.3 KiB) Viewed 3350 times

Here you can see the black wire from and end picture.

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Coming off that same side of the motor there is a diode that then runs to the right hand side of the directinoal bulb. (Obviously so the power only lights the bulb in the direction of travel).

What's confusing me is the black wire that comes off the left tag and goes around the outside of the motor and connects to the other side.
I have service sheet No.108 for the loco but it doesn't show this extra black wire.
I haven't DCC'd a motor like this before and the extra wiring is alien to me, let alond trying to figure out how to add the DCC harness.
Can anyone help?

Just for completeness, here is a picture of the front bogie on the power car.

NewMotor3sm.jpg (115.32 KiB) Viewed 3350 times

Thanks
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Hi E2E that black wire is pretty important when you convert to DCC. one end is connected to the bogie block and via the axles and wheels down the one rail, so it needs to be connected as one input to the track side of the decoder. The brown wire coming in from the other end of the body is connected to the other bogie block, which points the other way, and is the other feed from the track, so disconnect it from the brush terminal. They are effectively your red and black. For orange and grey, they go onto the now vacant brush spring holders. Cut away the suppressor components. The wire that's attached to the diode goes to the directional light output (without the diode), but maybe a resistor to dim the light a bit.
You may want to pull out the other bogie and make the firmest possible connection to the block. Half the problems I've had with these bogies have been down to a poor connection at the non powered bogie. The tag should really dig in through the black paint to the metal, and there should be enough slack so as to not pull on the wire when the bogie turns.
Have fun

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I managed to lay my hands on instructions of the wiring and adding DCC but I've run into a problem.
Looking at this instructions pdf, I'm having problems with the tests on page 4.
https://octaviancs.com/hornby125/Fit4FD ... nby125.pdf

Left brush to motor housing - multimeter showing 1. Passed test.
Right brush to motor housing - multimeter showing 1. Passed test.

Motor housing to each wheel on brushes side of motor - showing a jumping reading but never hitting 0.00 - Fail ?

Motor housing to each wheel on opposite side of motor - multimeter showing 1. Passed test
(These wheels both have traction tyres, although reading taken from main metal part of the wheel not the tyre.)

Is this correct?
Thanks
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Hi E2E that black wire is pretty important when you convert to DCC. one end is connected to the bogie block and via the axles and wheels down the one rail, so it needs to be connected as one input to the track side of the decoder.
The brown wire coming in from the other end of the body is connected to the other bogie block, which points the other way, and is the other feed from the track, so disconnect it from the brush terminal. They are effectively your red and black.

OK I understand those.

For orange and grey, they go onto the now vacant brush spring holders. Cut away the suppressor components. The wire that's attached to the diode goes to the directional light output (without the diode), but maybe a resistor to dim the light a bit.
You may want to pull out the other bogie and make the firmest possible connection to the block.

Actually after I cleaned the motor it ran really well on DC so I think that the wire coming from the front bogie is actually doing it's job.
Yes I desoldered the supressor / capacitor off the motor.
What colour (from the DCC harness) would the wire going to the directional light be? Remembering that it will connect to the Black Cat directional light pcb for both white (forward) ad Red (backwards) LED's?
Thanks
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EDIT: I forgot to mention there are no screws holding on the brushes. Thus no short circuit due to an elongated screw as on older models.

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I think you have to put your lights on one of the function outputs, it's that long since I looked at one of these HSTs I can't remember what the bog standard lighting was, I think it was just a single bulb that sort of illuminated the headlights at the leading end, a bit naff even for 1980s standards.

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A quick bump to see if these isolation tests are correct.
viewtopic.php?f=49&t=51555&start=60#p654210

Also to complicate things, I now have a Hornby X9871 cab light that I wish to install into the power car to light up when going in the correct direction, but I do not understand what/where to solder.

The problem is that the cab light and seating part are not shown on the service sheet for whichever loco this is actually for. (Newer version of a Hornby HST) So possibly just slots into the correct (DCC ready?) HST, which mine is not being an older DC version.
Although on the rear of the circuit board there seems to be 3 solder pads.

Here are pictures of both sides of the cab light circuit board.

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CabLight2.jpg (31.17 KiB) Viewed 3285 times

I'm also not sure if they are 2 LED's on the board or one is actually a resistor either? The information on these spare parts is VERY sparse.
Has anyone fitted one of these cab lights to a non DCC ready loco?
I've searched the net to find someone installing one but cannot find anything.
Thanks
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Those look like a pair of surface mount resistors. If you put the board on top of a light source do the tracks show up? It looks to me to be 2 resistors with a common connection on one side. R and W presumably refer to the white and red LEDs, Are 5, 3 and 6 pins on the decoder socket?

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Those look like a pair of surface mount resistors. If you put the board on top of a light source do the tracks show up?

Sadly not.

It looks to me to be 2 resistors with a common connection on one side. R and W presumably refer to the white and red LEDs, Are 5, 3 and 6 pins on the decoder socket?

I'm not sure there is white and red as it's only a cab light.
I am yet to solder in the DCC socket until I find out wether the earlier continuity/isolation tests are correct and I can move forward.
Although, yes the socket does have all 8 wires.

Would it be safe to connect a power source to check what does what on the board?
I have a breadboard with a 4xAA battery holder. Would that be enough power for testing?
And would I need to add a 1KOHm resistor in the positive power supply to the circuitboard?
Thanks
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Going back to DCCing my HST, I'm not at all confident about the tests for short circuits so I made a quick video of the tests for some needed guidance.
I don't have a youtube et al account so had to upload it for you to download - https://tinyurl.com/HSTvid
Please do download and watch it so the rest of this post makes sense.

Using a multimeters buzz (continuity) setting.

First tests - track to each brush tab?. One side of track then the other. No buzzing.
Second tests - Each wire from the front bogie to each track. Both wires only buzzing on one track.
Third tests - Motor body to each track. Buzzing on BOTH tracks.

Apologies if I'm using the incorrect terms, thus the video.
But are the tests correct so I can go ahead and add the DCC harness?
Thanks
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EDIT: I have just done another test and BOTH wires concected to the front bogie are buzzing on BOTH tracks.
This has raised a question. Should the motor bogie AND the front bogie have traction tyres?
As only 2 wheels on one side of the motor have them on mine.

I'm severly confused.
Thanks
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