Rails in the Roof

Time flies...

2009-08-04T15:15:00.003+01:00

Wow, you don't notice how time flies past, and your life with it. Over 18 months since my last post.
Well, on a personal note, our third child was born since then, but the main lack of updates is our moving house. The "rails" are still "in the roof" of our old house, bought by good friends of ours. Everything up there is mothballed, waiting for me to make a decision on what to do with it all!
My thoughts right now are to probably sell my locos (they won't keep that well over time), but keep my rolling stock. In good condition, it will probably increase in value over time.
Now I'm approaching the ripe old age of 35, I'm considering a small N Gauge layout. I've got plenty of space in the new place, but the smaller size is appealing. Currently googling for small track layout ideas - we'll see!

Coach Lighting

2007-12-08T23:10:00.000Z

With a spare hour or two, I've had fun tonight with DCC controlled coach lighting.

Bachmann are now producing a good range of coaches with built-in lighting. I thought it would be good fun to have these DCC controlled using the function buttons. Express Models also produce some great LED oil lamps for your coaches. These two combined in one coach was just too much for me to resist. Out comes a used (spare, having replaced 08419 with a Gold and Power1) Lenz Silver Decoder (overkill, I know), the tool kit and soldering iron, and here we go.

I fitted the decoder inside the coach, the LED tail lamp on the rear, took the wiring from the internal lighting and connected it all together. The internal lighting was wired to function output A, and the tail lamp to function output C. Function output A was mapped to the F0 key, and function output C to the F1 key. A"flashing" lighting effect was added to function output C (Function outputs A and B share the same lighting effect, so the tail lamp had to be on C).

The end result was terrific. There's nothing like pressing a button on the controller and watching the tail lamp on your rake start flashing.

Maybe I should get out more?

Fitting a Lenz USP Power1 Module to a Hornby Class 08 Shunter

2007-12-06T21:57:00.000Z

Perhaps "squeezing" is more appropriate than "fitting"? Phew, this was a tight one!

My previous post explains the issues I've been having with my Hornby Class 08 stalling on insulated frogs. Well, after some of the most delicate soldering I've done, and many attempts with the Lenz Gold decoder and Power1 module in different positions, I've finally found a snug fit.

The macro mode of my camera doesn't do justice to how fine the soldering of the Power1 onto the Gold decoder is. Had to be very careful not to short the three wires with stray solder, whilst at the same time not overheating the tiny circuit board.

Here's the Decoder and Power1 wired up to the loco. I tested by coupling a truck behind containing the decoder and Power1!

After fiddling with several combinations, here's the location of Gold decoder and Power1 that I found you could fully refit the body shell on. The decoder is plug-side down and facing the decoder socket. The plug/socket arrangement itself is slightly recessed over the brass flywheel. The Power1 module just fits snugly in the nose of the loco. If I could have been bothered, I'd have shortened the wires from the Power1 and re-soldered them - I thought that was tempting fate somehow though!

The end result had the desired effect. No more stalling on those blessed frogs! That fact that the electronics inside now cost more than the loco is neither here nor there!

Of slight note, the Power1 does get very hot in a very short space of time when the loco is running slowly. I've seen other posts concerning this. I'll report on any smoke I see churning out of the loco. Still, would add to to the realism wouldn't it?

The Trouble with Insulated Frogs...

2007-11-22T16:48:00.000Z

Sounds like a great song title...

Anyway, Since upgrading to DCC, I've got a minor problem with my Class 08 shunters going at slow speed over some points. The insulated section at the join of the rails (go google if you want to know more, or start here) causes a rather jumpy motion for the loco as it looses power.

There are several resolutions to this. The one I've decided to try is implementing the Lenz USP feature - Uninterruptable Signal Processing. This involves upgrading the decoder from a "Silver" to a "Gold" and adding the optional "Power1" module.

As far as I can see from the photo, it's just an electrolytic capacitor and probably a diode or two on a circuit board. The idea being, that the capacitor stores a charge to power the loco and decoder during brief (sub 1 second) power interruptions (dirty track or insulated frogs) and keeps everything running smoothly.

I've found very few retailers stocking Power1. I've eventually bought one from eBay.

Having taken apart one of my Hornby Class 08s and looking at the dimensions of Power1 from the manual, it'll be a very very tight squeeze indeed. Watch this space to see my progress of the next week or so. I want to see if I can get a Power1 to fit in the chassis before I splash out £25 or so on a Gold decoder!

Fitting a DCC Decoder to a Bachmann Deltic (Class 55)

2007-11-09T22:01:00.000Z

Nothing too difficult here, but thought I might aswell document it. Here's how to fit a DCC decoder to a Bachmann Class 55 - a.k.a. Deltic.

My "standard" decoder is the Lenz Silver Direct. However, and extremely annoyingly for a loco of this size, obstructions in the chassis prevented this. Instead, I implemented the good old Plan B of the Lenz Silver decoder.

First task as always is how to remove the body shell. On this model, three screws under each bogie did the job - two of the three are pictured here under the bogie. Once these are all removed, the shell can be removed.

Here's the bare naked loco. Reminicent of a Heljan loco. First things first, snip off that capacitor labelled "C1". It'll only cause problems on a DCC layout. Next, remove the little plug on the DCC socket.

Once that's done, simply plug the decoder in to the DCC socket, taking care to ensure the orange wire is at the Pin 1 end. Apply the supplied double-sided sticky pad to the circuit board and attach the decoder as shown.

After a little fidding with the positioning of the wiring, the body shell can be screwed back into place. Then, you're all ready for the programming track!

Don'cha Just Love eBay?

2007-11-01T20:30:00.000Z

Further to my Hornby Class 37 upgrades of previous posts...

My two new Hornby 37s cost £37.50 each - and after a few eBay auctions, the unused, new DRS body shells, and two old motors and chassis sold for... £54.52!! What a bargin upgrade!!!

Fitting a DCC Decoder to a Hornby Class 37

2007-10-14T15:14:00.000+01:00

As described in one of my previous posts, I've purchased new chassis frames, bogies and motors for my Class 37s. Finally (after 20 days!!) the locos arrived from Rails of Sheffield. Having not seen it documented elsewhere, here's how I fitted a DCC decoder to a Hornby Class 37. The photos may not be as pristine as other sites, but here goes...

Firstly, here's the new loco. The cheapest available was a DRS liveried one. To remove the body shell, slide your fingernails alongside the edge of it, just under the doors, and release the four clips.

Naked Class 37! There are three pairs of pickup wires (red/black), each soldered onto the capacitor that sits across the two motor terminals.

These six wires need to be un-soldered, and the capacitor removed.

Once this is done, the six wires should be floating free, and the two solder terminals of the motor disconnected.

Now, you'll need a way to solder together the three red wires to the red lead of your decoder, and likewise, the three black leads to the black lead of the decoder. I'd suggest some veroboard, available from stores like Maplin. (I've only got "triboard", but it'll do!)
Solder the three red leads together on one strip, leaving a hole for the decoder wire. Solder the three black wires together onto another strip.

Now attach the red wire from the decoder to the "red" strip, and the black decoder wire to the "black strip". (I'm using a Lenz Silver decoder here). I've tied the five function wires out of the way for now as this model doesn't have lights.

Now solder the orange decoder wire to the left-hand terminal of the motor, and the grey decoder wire to the right hand terminal of the motor. This results in the motor end of the loco becoming the "No.1 End". Stick the decoder down on top of the loco weight using the sticky pad supplied with the decoder.
Test the loco on your decoder track, set the loco ID, and check it runs fine. Then replace the body shell, and away you go!

Express Model Lights on my Heljan 47s - DC to DCC?

2007-09-30T23:06:00.000+01:00

I've got two fine Heljan Class 47s - 47063 in Railfreight trainload construction livery, and 47299 "Ariadne" in BR Blue livery. They're fine models, except for the brass wheels that corode over time...

Last year, I purchased two Express Models kits to upgrade the simple light bulbs in the front of these models to more realistic directional LED lights.

Having recently upgraded to DCC, the "DC" kit I'd installed now simply lit all LEDs regardless of the direction of the loco. Express Models would gladly furnish me with new DCC lighting kits for £20 each, but wanting to avoid this cost, I'd have a go at a little rewiring!

Having an A-Level in Electronic Systems, re-jigging the little circuit board shouldn't be too much of a chore I thought. Fortunately for me, armed with a soldering iron, within 10 minutes or so, I had the yellow and red LEDs lighting in the direction of travel, but getting those white LEDs running properly? I could only get the both on at the same time.

The little circuit board supplied with the lighting kit seems to have some transitors on board, but with the circuit tracks not visible, I'm not quite sure how they're connected up. I didn't want to blow them sky high with 16V, so decided to unsolder the white LEDs for now - we'll see if I get more time in the future.

Oh, I set CV55 and CV56 down to 192 to hopefully reduce the voltage on Functions A and B down to 12v, so as hopefully not to fry those LEDs...

New Lease of Life for my Hornby Class 37s

2007-09-28T16:42:00.001+01:00

Most of my locos are in excellent condition, being either the high quality Hornby models (Class 31, 50, new 08 etc), Heljan or Bachmann.

I've got two older Hornby Class 37 locos (R402 37207 "William Cookworthy" in BR Blue and R348 37063 in Railfreight livery). Both are poor runners and are not much used.

I've investigated the price of replacement motors and bogies from Model Spares of Burnley. They're a friendly bunch, but I was looking at about £30 per loco all in.

Instead, I've decided to look around for the cheapest, new, Hornby 37s I can find. I eventually ordered 2x R2574 "DRS Class 37 038 Co-Co Diesel Electric Locomotive" from Rails of Sheffield for £37.50 each. My master plan is to remove (and sell on) the two DRS body shells, clip my existing BR Blue and Railfreight body shells onto the new chassis, and sell on the two old chassis for "spares or repair".

I recently did something similar for my aging HSTs, having bought two new Hornby Midland Mainline HST sets for just £54 each with two Mk3 coaches per set. Having sold on the parts, the upgrade paid for itself.

We'll see if I'm as fortunate this time.

I've also forked out for two of the obligatory Lenz Silver decoders. I've not seen a DCC installation on the web for a Hornby 37, so I may well document it here if I get chance.

Programming ANY CV Value Using the Lenz Compact

2007-09-28T16:41:00.001+01:00

I've recently sold off my old Hornby HM2000+ controller and am upgrading to DCC. Having looked at the DCC systems out there, I eventually went for a second hand Lenz Compact DCC Starter Set - with a Compact controller, a TR100 transformer, two LE1024 decoders, and an LS150 stationary decoder. This was a bargin at £86 including shipping (it's over £160 new).

With all of my points already wired using good old Peco PL26 switches, I had no plans to use DCC here. I sold the LS150 for £23 - result!

Now, according to the manual, you can only alter CV values 1-4, 7-8 and 29 using the Compact. I discovered (quite by accident) how to program ANY CV value using the Compact - so here goes:

Place the loco you wish to program onto the programming track.
Enter programming mode "Pro" as normal.
Select, and read off the value of R1 (CV1) - the loco address.
Press F2 (X) to return, so the display reads "r1" again
Now use the "-" or "+" buttons to scroll through r2, r3 as normal, but you'll now find that after r8, instead of wrapping back to r1, it continues to "c09" and onwards and right up to 255 - all CV values are now accessible for reading or writing.

I've not seen this documented anywhere on the web, and in fact have seen a few sites that state that the Compact cannot alter other CV values - I can confirm happily that this is not the case!

Hope this helps!

Mr RailsInTheRoof

3 Section Steel Loft Ladder

2007-09-28T16:40:00.001+01:00

After 6 years of using a step ladder, the Loft Shop has finally (two months after ordering!) fitted a Three Section Steel loft ladder. This should significantly improve access, and gives a much larger opening.

A Rolling History of Rails in the Roof

2007-09-28T16:21:00.001+01:00

My love of model railways began at Christmas 1980, with my first train set. A GWR 0-4-0T tank engine No."101", a "Texaco" tanker, "McVities" box van, and two trucks. "101" still runs today (all be it with a replaced motor). The set also came with a vinyl record narrated by Bernard Cribbins. He was doing some Hornby adverts on TV at the time I seem to remember...

At that time, I had to lay out the track on the carpet each time I wanted to play trains. I still remember coming home from school one day to find loads of track laid out on the floor, and my Dad having made a 6'x4' baseboard.

Here's a photo of me (aged 6 probably) with that layout. You can see "101" with the aforementioned wagons, and 0-6-0 Pannier Tank "2744" hauling a rake of three GWR "Chocolate & Cream" liveried coaches.

Another photo of the same layout here, showing GWR 4-6-0 "Hagley Hall" passing Swindon station on a passenger run, and 0-6-0 Pannier Tank "2744" in a siding awaiting its next turn of duty.

As time passed, the layout progressed. Birthdays and Christmas's brought more locos, wagons and accessories. We see the same baseboard here in 1986.You can see how my wagons and locos ended up in play-worn condition!

As my teenage years went on, I played less and less with the railway. I suppose I had "better" things to do with my limited money by then.
When I was sixteen, we moved house. I carefully wrapped and boxed my locos and stock, knowing one day I'd take up the hobby again.

Some ten years later in 2001, now married and with a house of our own, I decided to setup a permanent layout in the loft.

This photo, taken in June 2001, shows the task which awaited me; a few suitcases, and lots of fibre glass.The first job was to install better lighting (there was a single tungsten bulb), followed closely by boarding the floor. A few weeks later, the roof was fully boarded.

The next job was to design the layout. I didn't want to make any kind of start without having first planned how the layout was going to look. After taking extensive measurements, I purchased a copy of "Hornby Virtual Railway", and used that to plan the layout of the track.As a design tool, it was pretty good really. I'm sure there are better programs out there, but it did for my purposes. The only real problem with it was that the largest layout you could do was about 2x2 metres, meaning I had to split the layout into four chunks, called North, South, East and West. Imaginative eh? Fortunately, Hornby Virtual Railway 2 doesn't have this limitation.

Once I had a good design, it was a case of starting building in earnest. I decided to start with the one side of the loft that was brick wall (adjoining next-door), as this would be the easiest. This would be the "South" of the layout. I put up a length of baseboard 240cm long, and about 100cm wide, supported by cheap shelf brackets. Here's my first photo of that proud moment!

I then arranged the planned track on top to see how it looked, and to make sure it fitted well.This photo was taken in October 2002

I decided early on to use roofing felt for "ballast". (You'll soon learn one thing about me. I'm not big on scenery. I'm much more interested in operating the trains). Once the ballast was down, the track was pinned, motorised points installed, and a simple DC controller connected up.

Once I was happy with this part of the woodwork, I extended to the left...

and to the right of the first piece of board.

I then spent some time adding a bit more details. Like I said, I'm not big on scenery, but a few nice details here and there are always good.

I also experimented with some platform and yard lights - to good effect I think. This photo was taken in February 2003.

Next it was time to extend clockwise round to the "West" of the layout.This took quite some time, as there was a fair amount of woodwork involved, and I'm no carpenter! This piece of board was 2.4m x 1m.
You can see 37207 "William Cookworthy" and a MK1 coach testing the newly laid track. As you can see, the board is still propped up on a workbench - the "leg" isn't in place yet.
This picture was taken in June 2003.

More time passed (much more) and I have started to extend further round to the "North" of the layout.In June 2005, you can see 31270 with an engineers train testing the newly laid track. In the background is the West loco shed (minus the shed building!), with 08830, 56105, 50035, 25033 and 25056 residing.

I decided to put in place all the supporting woodwork for the "North" and "East" sections of the layout before fixing any baseboard or track. My aim was to make a complete circuit of track, simply resting on baseboard laid over this supporting woodwork. This would give much greater pleasure operating the layout while the long task of finishing the "North" and "East" sections of the layout were completed.

To this end, on 3rd July 2005, the circuit of track was completed. The aforementioned 31270 with engineers train was the first to make a complete loop, closely followed by 50035 "Ark Royal" with a passenger service.

More to follow...

Here we go...

2007-09-28T13:09:00.000+01:00

Hi all.

I'm a 30-something train buff from the UK. I've been modelling a large OO Gauge railway in my roof for some time now. I'm currently going through the pain (expense anyway) of upgrading to DCC. I thought I'd scribe some of my experiences here as I've learned a lot along the way, not all of which seems to be on the web.
Hope you find at least some of my mumblings of use!

Bye for now,

Mr RailsInTheRoof.