Two New Locos Join the Roster

This has been another quiet week.  My 81 Class from John turned up on Thursday.  Just tonight I gave it a quick trip up and down the test track on DC power and it ran smoothly.  I just happened to have an NCE D18SR laying about at home.  I've had that decoder for about 5 years I think.  I was planning to wire up some Powerline 81 class with separately controlled headlights, red and white marker lights and cab lights at each end of the loco.  I completed one loco and gave the second loco as a bad joke.  Anyway back to my Austrains 81 class.  So I installed my 8 pin D18SR decoder into the 8 pin slot in the Austrains 81 class loco and have it a test.  It runs back and forth on DCC and all the lights works off the headlight function at this point in time.  The NCE D18SR is a 8 function decoder.  I have read somewhere that it is possible to have the various lights on the 81 class loco controlled separately.  So I will investigate this by utilising the 8 functions available on the D18SR.  Without checking out how separate the various lights are, I think I will have the  headlight, number board lights, white ditch lights and red marker lights controlled at each end.  I will track some wires on the 81 class light board and do some testing over the next week.

 

Earlier today I pulled my Auscision 45 (actually it was a 35) class loco apart (it came apart like a bought one) and I ripped out the existing control board which the 21 pin decoder would plug into.  I had reports from a guy at the Club yesterday that he had trouble removing the couplers at each end.  Mine were a breeze.  So I used an NCE DA-SR decoder, which has 5 functions, as my replacement to the installed control board and had to solder up all the connections.  I just referred to Marcus Ammann's great notes.  So far I have the headlights at each end wired up as standard on the decoder and the white marker lights at the same end are also wired to the same functions.  I have also wired the red marker lights to two other functions.  So I can turn these on separately.  I may install an LED into the cab of the 45 class so the cab light can be turned on and off independently from the other lights.

 

Yesterday I went to the Club to just double check the dimensions needed for my NSW wooden road over rail bridge for the Club HO layout.  I think I have everything and will stain up the various dimensions wood pieces over the next two weeks.  One of the guys at the has recently (about 12 months ago) started a laser etching/engraving business.  He also makes various wooden kits for assembly.  They look very good.  I asked if he could create a sheet of 320mm x 100mm of 1.5mm ply with 9" planks laser scribed into the deck.  He said it was easy.  That will be my decking for the Club layout bridge.

 

Today I also received an invite to a running session for next Saturday so I am looking forward to attending that.   I Just need to seek permission from the boss.