murphaph

I am looking forward to having many "unusual" bonnet first workings on my layout some day!

That's a good point about having some pristine examples. I think I will spare at least one of each of my IRM models from the weathering station and put them all together in a glass display case at eye level. As for the Kadee conversion... I will also want most of my wagons on Kadees though I have seen the idea of small fixed mini rakes (the McKinley Railway uses the idea of "triplets" which are permanently coupled rakes of three small wagons with couplers on the outer ends. I can't remember if they use Kadees for the outer couplers but that isn't relevant). I think this fixed triplet idea has merit for things like the cement bubbles and ballasts. It's cheaper and easier. I want to try an alternative solution to the ballasts (when I get some) and bubbles. I think it may be possible to glue a second NEM pocket to the underside of the existing pocket. The height deviation from the standard is 2.1mm I believe so this may work. The advantage would be that the pocket (in fact either pocket!) could be used as intended with different couplers, should one ever lend stock to someone else who doesn't use Kadees. It will depend on how thin walled I can source replacement pockets.

Sorry for any confusion. I meant the Irish Railway Rambler book. The picture shows a failed 121 at Clara on the mainline in charge of a rake of mkIII suburban coaches. I haven't the book to hand right now to check the page number but it's in the chapter on 121s and the author noted the rarity of the event in the caption.

The picture I mentioned above is in the IRR book and shows a 121 bonnet first at Clara in 1990. Looks really cool like that.

There's at least one "bonnet first" image of a 121 in tippex livery that I'm aware of so it did (very rarely) happen later in their lives. I can look for it later.

On page 56 of Irish Railway Rambler there is a tippexed EGV (rest of train still in ST) and the it does not appear to have all black coach ends yet. The wraparound orange and black ST seems intact to me, with just the tippex stripes being added and stopping a few inches around the corner of the end of the coach. The EGV is not identified in the book. The photograph is very early IR days though (87) but it's still valid I think. I doubt it would have gotten the black ends for a while after that shot was taken.

I'd be mostly interested in standards.

Hi Noel. Yeah as I wrote above I understand that the sound files are the intellectual property of the authors and cannot and should not (even if it were technically possible) copied. My question was about the CV settings only.

I'm going to pickup a Lokprogrammer in any case. They come up used on eBay here (Germany) regularly enough. I'll snag one of those. Could one buy a master MM decoder for each type and then copy all the CV settings (I stress NOT the copyright sound file which AFAIK cannot be read back out of a programmed decoded) and then "just" install your own sound file on a blank Loksound, using the saved CV data rather than programming from scratch? This would not fall foul of any IP rules I believe but correct me if I'm wrong. I don't need absolutely perfect sound. A good approximation of the engine from a US loco would be good enough for me but I would want all the lighting to work perfectly. @controller: T-Cut you get in a motor factors. Be careful with it. I've seen videos of it removing the paint before the loco number. Charlie Bishop's Chadwick Model Railway YouTube channel has an episode on renumbering locos.

Thanks a lot for the prompt clarification Fran. That answer obviously pleases me I missed the ballasts first time round but I know you've hinted at a second run perhaps late this year. I am assuming they will be identical to the first run, including pocket height? I will still definitely buy 2 rakes and a second set of ploughs regardless of pocket height but great to hear that just those 3 earlier models deviate from the standard (and I accept you had your reasons there). I got my first ploughs on Monday and I'm astounded how finely detailed they are! Just waiting for the hoppers! All the best, Phil

This has been an informative thread. Is it an ongoing issue that NEM pockets for Irish stock are not at the correct height/depth according to the standard? I note that Kadee explicitly state that they do not make offset NEM couplings because the pocket height above the rail should be uniform. Personally I would be prepared to sacrifice fidelity (the coupling itself is never going to be a true representation of the prototype) for interoperability without having to shim rolling stock etc. I'd be interested to hear what IRM's policy on NEM pocket standard will be in the future.

I'd take IR too of course. Even better in fact.

I have never attempted anything like this but would it be possible to use masking tape to achieve a straight line not for painting but to slide the decal lining up against? To be honest I think you're being about hard on yourself. It looks good to me as it is.

Same here. Missed the mkIId IE stock completely. Would welcome the opportunity to buy them at RRP. I saw one on eBay starting at 80GBP last week. Too much for me.

Thanks chaps.

When was the very last one of these still in service? I am into the IR era so probably a no go for me but I would take any excuse to help another RTR supplier get established! The more the merrier.

Simply using MM's chips is undoubtedly the easiest thing to do but I would really hope that using a third party DCC chip would not void the warranty in a DCC ready loco.

Hmmm that would be bad for a number of reasons. For example, many people like to maintain a single decoder type so they have no variation in CVs. Others, like me, need Railcom+ for their planned layouts.

Thanks a lot Noel. Yeah I agree that a din of locos all emitting sound should be avoided. I have seen YouTube clips (I think it was Charlie Bishop and his Chadwick Model Railway channel) where he showed how he reduced the volume or muted it on all but locos in motion. One could do that automatically using rocrail (my preferred train control software) as a base measure and then look at finer automatic control (eg only full volume for the loco currently under manual control). I think I will stick with the Lokprogrammer route. I live in Germany so I can buy blank v5 chips from any of the vendors though the cheapest I've seen is around 90.

I'm looking to have in the region of 20 locomotives on my layout which will be in a reasonably large ca. 3 x 10 metre space so most of not all of my locos will get sound. I was leaning towards a Lokprogrammer and modifying free ESU sounds but it sounds like there are none for the baby GMs. What about the 121s? Can you shed some more light please @Noel?

Thx Ken. I guess you mean Connolly rather than Heuston but valuable info nonetheless.

Very useful!

Thanks George. Is it also possible to illuminate the ssm round post signals do you know? I was also looking at ratio round post (to be honest I think the vast majority of signals around the area I want to model were round post by the 1990s, which is my era) kits. Have you any experience of them re: servo control and illumination?

Are the ssm signals capable of function or purely for decoration? They are beautiful in either case but I need (well, want) servo control for any of my signals (possibly excluding shunt signals) that aren't supposed to be fixed at danger.

Seems crazy to convert two snack cars back to standard while converting two standards to snack cars but I suppose if the two original cars needed major work and would have been unavailable for a prolonged period then it would have made sense to take one of the spare standards and convert that and if only 2 snack cars were deemed necessary then the logical thing would be to convert the originals back to standards. Thank you very much for the details.