irishthump

Forgot to mention my layout will be DCC, so I'm looking at Peco Flexi Code 100, & Electrofrog, & I'm hoping to be using as much a cross as is possible, meaning BoBo's, CoCo's, O-4-O's, O-6-O's, & whatever else I can run, no matter how long, or small,or should that be short !!!

Well then Electrofrog might be your best bet. The 0-4-0's will give trouble over Insulfrog points.

Lovely! The TPO looks SO sweet in that rake!

I've just started a new layout and I went with Peco for all the points. I had some Hornby points on my old layout and I wouldn't touch them again!

All my points are Peco Streamline Code 100 small radius and they are all Insulfrog. I know the purists will recommend using Electrofrog with DCC but if you run nothing smaller than

a Bo-Bo you shouldn't have any track pickup problems.

My track is about 90% Peco streamline Code 100 flex track,. I had some lengths of Hornby semi-flex that I saved from the old layout and I always found them fine so I'll use them in

freight sidings.

...... and - if you're a member of a high-end golf club, or you own a horse, or you play with model radio-controlled aircraft, your hobby will cost you thousands annually......

I got grief from a work colleague when he found out the "bleedin' ridiculous" cost of "bleedin' toy trains".

Funny though, he thought nothing of spending over ten grand on a golf club membership and then lost his goolies when the club went into receivership during the bust!

IT mind telling me what size is your layout, ft & ins. please as otherwise it's complicated, great work in such a short time, well done

The track diagram is out of scale but the main loop is about 8 feet square. The terminus section at the top is about 17ft long while the station at the bottom is about 15ft in total.

I know the CD motor has been suggested before. It doesn't seem very expensive it if fits in and saves some work on figuring out the retrofit from scratch. These must be secondhand motors I suspect. Wonder how long they would last. Possibly a fair while as CD/DVD drive get a fair amount of spinning relative to being on a loco unless you're running it all day long. Free shipping for most of you too!

Anybody used one...?

I used CD motor in a Hornby HST a while back. They fit near perfectly the only issue being getting the drive gear to fit snugly on the motor shaft.

They can be picked up easily from junked PC's, laptops or stereos, here's a link.

http://irishrailwaymodeller.com/showthread.php/77-Graham-s-Workbench?p=51957&viewfull=1#post51957

Second photo 3rd coach down and fourth photo 5th and 7th coaches down

Thanks Anto, I didn't think the Golden Brown was that dark.

Lovely work as usual, btw.

The paint is phoenix precision CIE golden brown you can get it in Marks Models http://www.marksmodels.com/?pid=18593

Exactly which coaches are painted in that colour, Anto?

Hi all,

 

Just joined this forum and although I don't currently model railways I have an interest in the Irish scene, and have been taken aback by the work many members here have produced.

 

At the risk of hijacking a thread and perhaps tempting a ban on my first post here (!) if you'll allow me, perhaps I can give some information on GM engines used in Irish locos which may give some insight into their unique sound.

 

The A class were re-engined with GM 12 cylinder 645E engines in the late 1960s & early 1970s. These engines were fitted with 2x superchargers (known as roots blowers). The two roots blowers were located on the generator end of the locomotive. For the observers among us you will notice the addition of the two "mushrooms" on the roof at the end of the 'air vents' to facilitate this on the rebuilt A classes.

 

The GM engine's sound is very much governed by the type of exhaust manifold fitted to them. The A class have 3x exhaust ports on the roof roughly in the middle between the "air vents". It is this which gives them the unique sound. The original exhaust port for the Crossley engines was the circular hole at the opposite end of the fan which was filled in once re-engining took place.

 

Generally 645 engines idle at 315rpm and have a maximum speed of 900/904rpm when on full power. For the A class most were limited to 800rpm owing to the electrics & generator output (although several were re-rated to 900rpm for several years before being de-rated back down to 800rpm). I would imagine this would have had something to do with traction motor cooling owing to higher voltage being through them (the motors on the A class were naturally ventilated as opposed to all other CIE/IR diesel electric locomotives which were force ventilated).

Incidentally there are still several locomotives still in existence in Eastern Europe with the same engines & exhaust manifolds, and sound virtually identical to A classes - although on full power @ 900rpm!

 

The notching on GMs is somewhat 'gradual' in terms of power. When the driver moves the throttle locomotive from say notch 1 - 2 the engine will rev up to the set RPM and then the load from the generator will increase (governed by the load regulator) and you should notice the engine revs drop slightly as the "load" increases.

On the A class the load regulators (which are Metrovick and not GM) were tweaked to put out a higher rate of voltage once notching occurs, hence less of a "wind up / wind down" sound on the engine when notching up or down. This enabled the A classes to have the ability for quicker starts from stations. The load regulators on the C classes (again Metrovick) were set-up similarly to what is in other GMs, and more of a "whine" can be heard from the engine as it winds up / winds down.

 

The 071s and Class 57s do have basically the same engines, but the 57s are more heavily silenced and have 4 (?) exhaust ports through silencers as opposed to one on an 071. The higher idle RPM on a class 57 may be down to it drawing ETH. Incidentally as far as I'm aware the 071s were fitted with different turbochargers in the early 1990s which seemed more durable than what was in them originally. If you listen to an 071 compared to a 111 there is a distinctly different engine note between the two. The 111s tend to 'whistle'... While the 071s engine note sounds a bit more "meatier"! Although, I should say that 076's engine is fitted from an ex Swedish diesel and sounds very similar to a 111.

 

Hope this may provide some sort of explanation on the unique sound of our Irish locos,

 

Regards,

 

Vlak.

Vlak, thank you for the informative post! A wealth of information there....

I wonder can I pick your brains further? DO you have any information regarding transitioning of the traction motors in the Irish GM's that used the 567 engine?

I'm guessing that transition was automatic considering the time these locos were manufactured.

A little more progress....

Got most of the station trackwork completed. Here's a short video of a rake of MK3's snaking it's way over the pointwork into what will eventually one of the station platforms.

It could be the circuit board in the loco causing a short that fried the decoder. The fact that you were able to programme an address to the decoder in the first place would indicate that the decoder was ok to begin with.

Im trying to gently get him to see the error of his ways

 

In fact you dont need both controllers powered on,( i.e. throttle advanced ) because in a standard emitter follower ( series pass) DC controller, there is a constant path to the OV line, even one controller has its throttle to zero, the other controller will be staring into a 0V line dead short.

 

fundamentally , there is no common rail in a DC system, both rails can assume both polarities ( at different times )

 

DCC is different, it will work in that case ( though its not of course necessary )

I'm glad I run DCC!

Well, nothing, other than the train on the track that is now being fed from the 'reversed' controller will go the other way, as was required.

 

All that matters to any loco is the difference between the two rails that it's on.

But if you have one controller set forward and the other set backward if both are turned on you will have a short at the common rail.

You will have to be sure to never have both controllers powered on at the same time.

By powered on I mean with the throttle above zero.

Congratulations and the best of luck with the new layout, 14x10 is a nice amount of space!

If you simply want to switch between the 2 controllers then you can just use a SPST wired to the red rail as in Broithe's diagram. Then you wire both controllers using the black wire as a common return. This won't cause a short.

I used an old Lima parcel van to make a rough approximation of a Dutch van a couple of years ago. It was just a straight respray with an added grille on each side. I think the chassis is around the right size, but the bogies are all wrong.

http://irishrailwaymodeller.com/showthread.php/77-Graham-s-Workbench

However the original Lima wheels are a bit rough. It would probably be easy enough to buy the correct bogies and scratchbuild a chassis.

Got the track for the main loop laid over the last week. It's all Peco flex track with Peco streamline points (won't touch Hornby ones again!) I fixed the track down with No Nails (clear variety) and I'd highly recommend for laying track. It holds the track down without the need for any pins, even on curves. By the way the points are all insulfrog, I used them on my last layout and never had any stalling issues with them at all.

Anyway here's a short video of me testing out the loop.....

Irony of ironies, they might be perfectly happy to see spot-on Irish rtr models with every rivet accounted for and then go run them on 00 track.

With a dirty great Hornby tension-lock coupler sticking out of each end!

People can choose to buy them or leave them. It's a free country last time I looked.

What's really funny is that some people are getting more worked up about the fact that some people don't care about the inaccuracies rather than the innacuracies themselves!

I checked up on those sound files, and although the sounds were reasonable, the sound programme was pants, with only 2 notches, and very little else. As I said earlier, file 74460 is much more comprehensive with 8 notches, even though the sound is not quite right, but I am working on that. As you say, the A class just don't sound like the other GMs.

I had another listen to 74460, and it appears I was thinking of a different file altogether! It actually does sound quite good.

Hi Eamon,

The design depends on what the most common donor motive power will be based on.

 

hacked Hornby class 33 new version

pancake motor

athearn jobbie

tenshodo

etc....

It would be pretty hard to come up with a "one-size-fits-all" solution I would think.

I agree that the sound is not right for the A Class, but it is better than nothing for the time being. I certainly would not buy a decoder with that sound on it.

I am experimenting with copying each individual sound file and running it through a Graphic Equaliser to change the sound of it, then rebuilding the sound programme. Have had limited success so far, but it is a time consuming task, and not high on my list of priorities at the moment.

I look forward to hearing any results you come up with. And that's the beauty of having the Lokprogrammer; you can chop and change to your heart's content! And in the end the sound only really has to make YOU happy.

Drifting slightly off, but having watched many hours of DVDs on Irish railways to jog my memories of GM and MV loco sounds, I could not help but notice A class locos sounded rather tame and nondescript compared to the evocative and distinctive sound of the baby GMs notching up and down.

That's what I was thinking. The notching seemed much more gradual, maybe the throttle arrangement is different on the A class.

I checked up on those sound files, and although the sounds were reasonable, the sound programme was pants, with only 2 notches, and very little else. As I said earlier, file 74460 is much more comprehensive with 8 notches, even though the sound is not quite right, but I am working on that. As you say, the A class just don't sound like the other GMs.

I didn't realise they were so limited notch-wise, I only listened to the files using the virtual throttle on the Lokprogrammer software. But like you say the sounds aren't too bad.

I just think 74460 just sounds completely wrong for the A class.

Are you thinking of modifying the sound file?

Not sure yet IT. I am working my way through the ESU library looking for something that sounds remotely like an 001 class, and then add horns recorded at Downpatrick. Have you any suggestions?

I've spent some time looking too, to me the A class didn't really sound like the other EMD locos. There are 2 files that I could find that have Sulzer prime movers that I think are in the ballpark anyway. Try files no: 56451 and 54457.