As this is my introduction to DCC I made a bargain purchase off eBay of a Bachmann E-Z Command Control Centre for around £30. As it happened I was visiting Plymouth (where the selling lived) for my brothers wedding the very weekend after I won the auction so I didn't need to pay P&P on top of that. As a beginner this controller makes an excellent and cheap starting point.
I then decided to sell all my old loco fleet (which I have probably mentioned previously) and buy all new DCC-ready Bachmann-Farish locos (their new blue-ribbon standard ones). Being DCC-ready they have the 6-pin decoder sockets underneath the shell, and are designed to take the Bachmann E-Z command decoder chips (product code 36-558).
The fitting of the chips was relatively easy. The steam locos, with the exception of the 3MT tank, all had the chips fitted in the tender. Following the instructions these were all relatively easy to fit. Each tender has 4 screws holding in the tender shell to the chassis (there are more screws so be careful to undo the right ones as per the instruction sheet). Once removed, the shell will unclip from the chassis with a bit of careful easing. The socket contains a small circuit board 'blanking plate' for DC running. This is then removed and replaced with the new decoder chip. This has to be put in the right way round to work. However if it goes in the wrong way no harm will come to the loco or decoder, it just won't doing anything.
Two helpful hints when fitting the decoders:
1, Pin 1 on the decoder seems to be indicated with a small grey dot/square.
2, Remember which end pin 1 ones before you pull out the blanking plate (it is indicated on the plate) so you know which way to put the decoder in!
The 3MT tank was even easier to fit. There are two screws under the front bogey. One of these, as per the instruction sheet, holds the shell on. Once unscrewed, again the shell unclips and the socket is revealed.
The worse one to fit was my 3 car Class 108 DMU. There are no screws holding the shell onto the chassis here (WHY?!?!?) the shell is just clipped into place. What's so difficult about that? I hear you ask! Well, firstly the shell is clipped on so tightly and in so many places that you seem to require the many arms of Vishnu to be able to prise the shell from the chassis in all the places it is clipped. I found on many occasions unclipping one side just lead to the other side clipping itself back on. Secondly, given you have your brand new DMU with all its fragile detailing on the underside its very difficult to apply enough pressure to unclip the shell (of which you need quite a bit) without begin constantly worried about snapping something off. And even worse than this, the DMU set requires two decoders fitting, one to the drive car and one to the dummy (for lights). So you have to go through this pain twice!
I did in fact break something off the bottom of one of my DMU cars in the process of fitting the chips, but it was easily fixed with a spot of superglue. Can you see where?! ;)
One other word of warning with the DMU - the seats and the lighting units seem to have a tendency of moving around when the shell comes off... ie, they try and come off with it in some cases. The lights in the dummy car have since stopped working between now and the last time I used it. So lucky old me I'm going to have to get the shell off again and fix it!
So finally, my loco fleet is up to date (although undressed - Mars still needs its name plate), And here is the final roll call (for now!)... (all from the late crest BR era)
Class 108 DMU (3 car)
Royal Scot "The Royal Air Force"
Jubilee class "Mars"
Black 5
3MT tank engine
Congratulations on a successful conversion to DCC! Even with the 6-in "NEM 651" interfaces I've still had a lot of challenges with chipping some of my locos (in hindsight, most of this seems to be due to the rather inconsistent manner that the folks at Minitrix designed their sockets!) no where as simple or as easy as you had it! Congrats!
ReplyDeleteAnd I hear you on attempting to open up those shells...that's a bit of a trick to do and your analogy with having the arms of Vishnu is spot on! One thing that I've started to use that I had recommended to me was to use a thin piece of styrene ('plasti-card'?) between the shell and the chassis rather than using your finger tips (or screwdriver/tweezers? or...?). This does seem to make it a bit easier!
Thank you Jerry, you reminded me what I forgot to mention in my post! What I eventually found with the shells that made life slightly easier was to use a small watchmakers screwdriver to hold one side of the shell off whilst I unclipped the other! I like the idea of using something thin and rigid under the unclipped shell to hold it off, doesn't seem quite as potentially damaging as a screwdriver!
ReplyDeleteThe sockets and locos seem quite well made and the chips seem to sit very nicely. However, I've still to figure out why the dummy DMU lights aren't working, it maybe a dodgy socket or connection with the lights.
All in all you had some great success! I'm really quite jealous! I'm dealing with my first British train (a GF Central Lines DMU I picked up on my last trip to the UK) and its giving me all sorts of headaches! Ah well....
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