Some old locos getting upgrades.

[Clay Mills Junction]

I have no idea where this came from but I found in a box a Lima class 37, looks like it was resprayed into coal sector livery or renumbered as it was never a standard Lima 37. Dad must have bought it when I wasn't with him. I've ordered a CD motor plus conversion kit and I'll wait for that to come and see if I can make it work better. Ultimately with directional lighting and DCC. The other thing I might try is ultrascale wheels, though there is an 8-month wait if ordered now.

Also to have a go at is 86414 Frank Hornby. This was the loco you could only get by collecting the little cogs or wheels on the boxes of Hornby products. I've already swapped this to a CD motor with the conversion from 'Horns&Whistles' and it seems to run from a much lower power on DC. Bent axles on the original wheelset meant I swapped the driving wheels with non-traction tyred set off a spare Cl86 chassis Dad had. If all it hauls is a few carriages then thats OK but since it has heavy cast cabs at the end plus a fair weight in the middle I'm hopeful it won't be totally useless.  Next up, I've ordered a Hornby X8786 pickup set from later Cl90/91s which will give me pickups on both sides of the trailing bogie rather than one-side and I'll try to create a set of pickups for the second side of the motor bogie to give a reasonable basis for DCC. If all of that works then my next thought was ultrascale wheels so it could run over the Peco streamline points but I think I'll wait to see how successful the rest of it is. Cost wise, the motor kit was £16 inc. postage, the trailing bogie pickup kit £13.50, 8-pin socket with solder tabs £2.50. I've got loads of LEDs etc and the stuff to make new pickups for the other end but we could probably call that another tenner. The ultrascale wheels are about £15 inc. postage. So to get that model to a modern standard of functionality I'd be looking at about £55 to 60.

After that, I have an old Hornby Class 91 to have a go at if the 86 is successful. That would need lights at the front but not at the back. Dad will get a new 91 whatever price it turns out to be. I think we have the etched side louvres somewhere and Shawplan do a buffer beam kit. I'll cost that as well with ultrascale wheels but I can't see it getting anywhere near the £200+ of the new model.

[Clay Mills Junction]

The Class 37 is definitely a respray. 37332 - the depot symbol is a hammer above an anvil which would be Motherwell.

Looking up https://www.class37.co.uk/fleet.aspx?strnumber=37332 (if you filter on status changes only) it was renumbered to 37 332 on the same day the name plates were removed. So it would never have been 332 with the name and the depot symbol. Though post 96 it was renamed until being scrapped in 2000. It looks as though it was always dirty and distressed after the renumber.

The CD motor is installed but I've not yet tested it because I've ordered 5 solderable 8-pin plugs from Strathpeffer.
Working on it I've discovered it already has additional pickups on the trailing bogie. I could add another on the middle wheel of the motor bogie (between the two with traction tyres but I'm not sure its worth it, I'll see how it runs as is.

Next on the list for it is lighting. You can see the real one on flickr here. It has a central high intensity light which the model does not. I'll have to look at adding one. They can be sourced from TMC, but given the idea to remain cost effective on this, I'm wondering if there is a reasonable way to do it cheaper?
I was thinking of sticking a lighthouse LED through in the correct place with a small square of thin plasticard for the plate and some square box profile plastic around the outside of the LED. The Strathpeffer DCC sockets have solder tabs for function 4 so tail lights could be individually switched making it possible to have no tail lights when hauling and tail lights both ends when sitting in a depot / sidings etc.

Last additional mod will be to replace the massive couplings with modern narrow tension locks.

Edited February 6, 2022 by Clay Mills Junction
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[Clay Mills Junction]

On the 37, I've decided it should be renumbered to 37239, it would be closer to the model as it is at the moment if it is 239. It was a rare 37 without a high intensity light pre renumber.

I've been doing the 91 today. I've soldered up the track and motor feeds to one of the Strathpeffer 8-pin plugs.

Next to do will be lights on the front but I've not decided how to do that. I'll edit some photos in, but I think the "light bar on this old Hornby model is more narrow than the original making the front overly pointy. The result being it is too narrow for any of the LEDs I have. Any suggestions welcome.

Edit: I've decided the pickup part on the trailing bogie is not sufficiently low, being for a later model than this. So I'm going to file down the top of the metal casting by 1mm and see if that helps.
Also I've filed down the front of the body and started filling the gap with modelling filler. I'm going to sand that to shape, paint it black and drill through holes for the LEDs. My other option was short lengths of fibre optic sticking through but that would be a lot more complex and there isn't a huge amount of space.

Edited February 12, 2022 by Clay Mills Junction
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[Clay Mills Junction]

The changes to the trailing bogie on the Class 91 were a success. It now runs quite well for a ringfield on dcc. It's fine hauling or pushing 5+DVT, no slipping from the motor bogie, which is as long a train as we can fit on the layout.

I was disappointed in the red light brightness, checked the 1k resistor I put in with a multimeter, it read 100k ohms. Oops! Must have slipped in with my 1k resistor pack. I'll need to resolder that and the marker light resistor as that is on the dim side too. 

Edited February 27, 2022 by Clay Mills Junction

[Clay Mills Junction]

The Class 91 on a low speed pull out of the station. Not as smooth as the flywheel drive models but still reasonable low speed control for a Hornby 5-pole ringfield motor. There isn't too much of a problem with stalling on points, no worse than any other loco to be honest so the pickups on all wheels must be doing their jobs. Reasonable top speed, maybe not able to do a scale 140mph but plenty fast enough.

Excuse the unfinished corner of the layout.

That is all of the Mk4s we have, I did add a few Mk2s into the train as a load test and it had no problem taking off smoothly, I'm quite happy with this for such an old model.
(Ref: x9890 for future reference, Hornby spare snow plough for class 156)

Edited March 6, 2022 by Clay Mills Junction

[Clay Mills Junction]

So the 156, I've been having a look at. I should really finish the 37 before I start this but, you know. I've also decided the 37 needs renumbered so it is the correct number for when it carried the name. As 37239 it wouldn't need the high-intensity lights either.

I have the 156 already so no cost, actually got a couple. But an intact one seems to be about £65-70 on ebay these days for cost comparison.

Parts and materials roughly including postage:  12v CD motor kit £20, 8-pin DCC solder tab plug £5, 6-function decoder £25, Hurst Models Brass snowploughs £5, Hurst underframe kit £25, Eileen's pickup kit £6. The rest including LEDs, resistors, connectors, wires and solder and paint probably adds up to £14. So if we say £100 for parts and materials.
That would be a lot of effort to get to not far off the functionality and detail of the Realtrack model, which I've looked on their website and with the two decoders it needs, is £290.

Given that I have the Lima model (I think we bought it second hand without a box in the early 90s), that is a saving of about £190! The extra details that 190 provides I can live without.

Edited March 27, 2022 by Clay Mills Junction