irishthump

The old adage of “you get what you pay for” really does apply here. Lots of people get could results with the cheaper models (myself included) but I got increasingly frustrated with problems with cleaning and paint drying during painting and clogging the brush. By the way I also have a badger single action brush which give far less trouble. I ended up getting an Iwata Neo and it was a great investment. Careful cleaning is still essential but I have far less issues.

I rarely use the Luas myself but it's an excellent service, and if it reduces congestion in the city then more power to it. But until the public transport system is of an appropriate standard I think the removal of cars from the city is a pipe dream at the moment and not something I'd like to see to be honest. There's a small percentage who will want/need to drive there own cars for work or whatever purposes.

Noel, am I right in assuming these are budget airbrushes? If so then cleaning is even more important. The cheaper models, while serviceable, tend to not be as well finished as more expensive models. This becomes a problem as the roughter finish on internal parts makes it much easier for paint to accumulate and harden. I have a couple of cheaper brushes that came with my compressor and while they work ok they are a bi*ch to keep clean and are really only suitable for applying coats when respraying. They're not good for detail work. As Eoin said, cellulose thinners is yer only man for cleaning away paint deposits and sometimes an overnight soak is the only way to get it completely clean.

Not around as much lately but Merry Christmas and a Happy New year to one and all.....

Or maybe they could just treat us to a look at their own scratch-building/modifying skills?

Steam vs. Diesel? No contest!

Thought so. The 071 has a different pcb to the 201.

Does that give you directional headlights or do still have to turn them on and off at each end yourself?

Whoa! And the Lazarus award for thread necromancy goes to.....

Ya gets what ya pays or and all that!

Just to clarify, did that change I suggested move the other light to F3? The problem is the MM chip (ESU Lokpilot) is higher spec than the Lais or Bachmann which are budget decoders (fine for normal use but lacking extra features). Having said that the Lais have a lot of programming options for lighting effects like gyro lights, dimming and strobes but these are aimed at US modellers.

Yeah the TCS looks the same too. The Lais manual is a carbon copy of the Gaugemaster DCC25. It looks like Dave's problem is actually the controller's F2 not being a latching function.

Not sure about the function mapping on the Bachmann, have to look into it. The Lais works fine on the 141 because there's only 2 lighting functions to be mapped, the 071/201's have 4.

I don't think there's way to get them to change directionally with that decoder. You'll have to settle for turning them on and off at each end.

Try changing CV 36 to 16. That should move that headlight to F3 instead.

That's your problem. F2 on the Prodigy is "non-latching" so it only stays on while pressed down. All the other function buttons stay on when pressed once. You need to move it to another function button. Give us a few mins....

OK. You're using a Gaugemaster Prodigy or NCE Powercab? When you say flashing do you mean it only stays on when you keep the button pressed or is it actually flashing on and off?

OK. Taking the Lais decoder first, I'm guessing you have front and back marker lights on F0? And do the lights at one end come stay on when you press F2 or F3?

Noel, Which decoder are you using in the 071/201? The Lais decoder seems to have the exact same manual as the Gaugemaster decoders which means they can be a bit limited when trying to map the lighting functions.

And sorry, which loco 201, 071?

Dave, What brand of decoder are you using? Those instructions were for the Loksound decoders.

Yep, I just got the email warning me that third party hosting would be disabled soon, so all future pics will be local copies. But I'm afraid I'm in no rush to update any of the other links.... Oh and Photobucket can kiss my **s!

Thanks Noel! Yes it runs better than I expected. The only gripe was that I wasn't able to rig the headlights to a different function on the decoder so I just settled for the marker/tail lights. I'd have to check which horn I used, but I plan to change the brake sound anyway as it sounds a bit naff!

That's what I thought myself DV! Did you get your own A Class finished?

Finally got the fibre optics fitted for the lights and installed the sound decoder, so it's all finished bar the weathering! Here's a quick video of it in action shunting a few bogie flats. As you can see the slow running is very good. The soundfile is actually an EMD 567 rather than the 645 that was fitted to the A class but I think it sounds pretty good, please let me know what you guys think.... [video=youtube;ih9y-3Lr-gc]