As you may recall some weeks ago, I was having a whinge about the faibless of the loco decoder chips. In order to gain some broader experience I replaced the Hornby with Bachmann so see how they survived. One of these was fitted to a good Lima GW Railcar. It has smooth running and max current consumption, of 210mA. Several times on the odd occasions when it was run for a few minutes it would refuse to run. The same chip ran in other locos and would then run in the RCar. Yesterday it jibed again and then sta
k without being addresed. This happened once before and indicated an intern= al fault. Sure enough it does not function any more.
Now either I am incompetent or the failure rate of these items is higher than publicly admitted. How many DCC fitted (RTR) die in a short time span? Hattons, bless them, honour their retail bargain but?
Are there any more similar tales of woe wherein people fear that they are the cause and so don't mention it?
Both Hornby & Bachmann decoders are very much at the bottom end of the market. Try fitting a decent decoder - I suggest Lenz, Zimo or TCS and see how they compare.
"Cheap" electronics are made with batches of parts that don't quite meet the specs, hence the high failure rate. Unfortunately, price is an iffy guide. Ask users - but if they praise the customer service, you know that the product requires a lot of it. ;-)
Well Wolf me ol pal --ain't that exactly what I am doing? I don't have a shop within some 600 clics and a bit of water. That is the reason for asking on these forums which are not oversubscribed with kiddies spending someone elses dosh on the latest must have. Equally I gave up on MERG because they were heading off down the computer control trail like scalded cats. Having been in that game for
50 plus years it had no appeal. John's comments are valid but finding data on line is not that easy
-- almost as difficult as sound advice in fact.
I cannot believe that no one has had these experiences but all I can do is ask and hope that chaps will not be shy or believe that they may be thought stupid if they are in fact wrestling with a bummer!
without being addresed. This happened once before and indicated an internal fault. Sure enough it does not function any more.
Never had any decoders go wrong like that since I started with DCC in
1998 using Digitrax, Lenz and TCS decoders. Used with Triang, Wrenn, Hornby-Triang, Hornby, Lima, Mainline, Dapol, Bachmann and Heljan locos. Had a couple smoke through bad installation though. Have found that ZTC decoders would not behave with a Digitrax system.
Well having dispatched my dead chip in the general direction of the UK I decided to check out the DC function of the Elite controller. As absolutely nothing happened it was back to my home printed handbook! I was surprised to find that there are two quite seperate sections which enable DC (address 0 ) operation. The first being clearly labled in the index but the second hidden away in the special functions where DCC or DCC + DC can be called up. This is several steps down the chain of settings and very easily overlooked.
Having hacked this little glitch I then braved putting the Select unit into walkabout mode. Apart from the fact that there is no mention of this in the Elite handbook and that the select handbook discusses using a Select + walkabout(an unpowered Select) I pressed on and treated the Elite in the same manner as indicated for the Select. Once again - nothing! Or at least nothing like the book suggested should happen. Using my eons of experience of these PLC type devices I read up on how to make a general reset of the Select unit and bingo
-- off we went.
As this past experience was that all of these little gizmos should be reset prior to any new programming inputs I was a little surprised that Hornby had not made this point especially as it gives the first step in the process as "Initialising" for use as a walkabout unit.
Another point which has jumped out at me is the difference in control when switching from Elite to Select. The three locos I test with have been set to very different acceleration/deceleration values (with similar ringfield motors). The difference in performance is very marked. The Elite very slow and deliberate whilst the Select is maybe
2 or 3 times quicker. (The Elite is doing what it says on the box timewise).
On the whole the experience is going along the "good" track and after all this is my metier and true to life so far , as I have yet to find a perfect handbook or even circuit diagram for most products whether domestic or industrial!
Acceleration and decelleration should be set via the appropriate CVs in the decoder and as such are independent of the controller. Could it be a different track voltage is making a difference. Or have Hornby implemented some half-assed system where the acceleration and decelleration are implemeted in the controller?
I think taking advice *before* venturing into something new is a good step. Many years ago, before both Hornby and Bachmann became obsessed with getting a share of the DCC market, I was told to buy the best or leave DCC alone.
So I asked what was the best and as a result of the answer I bought Lenz. Not one of the all singing all dancing controllers, but the basic Compact unit, and coupled this with their then better quality decoders.
As a result I never really had any issues with DCC, especially as I was told that snipping (TV suppressing) capacitors from locos was a good way of avoiding some minor problems (locos running away when not addressed being an example).
I've moved on since then, and upgraded my Lenz command control system, mainly because I wanted 4-digit addressing and more functions, but the same adage of quality counts still very much applies.
Sadly many people are being attracted to digital by the hype churned out by the likes of Hornby, without really knowing the advanatges &/or disadvantages over conventional analogue operation. Let's be clear about it, digital offers very few advanatges at the very basic train set end of the market, and potentially many disadvantages.
I'd have been more impressed with Hornby's approach if they'd taken the time to explain this to customers, rather than seeing the whole digital thing as a potential cash cow.
The first thing we always ask a customer if they come into the shop saying they are thinking about switching to DCC, is why? You'd be amazed at how few can answer that.
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