Marlkin to DC conversions.

Make friends in the hobby. Visit Garratt photos for the big steam lovers.

Or, why not buy the Trix version, and repaint/redetail/renumber? If you are willing to go to the trouble of AC to DC conversion, you must have the skills for mere repainting, etc. :-)

If you were in NZ I would do the conversion for you.

- Isolating the non-tyred driven wheels is easy with a lathe; drill and bush.

- The unpowered end ditto.

- Snip off the slider and springing and solder on a wire wiper to the slider base to run on the backs of the isolated wheels. There will be a Hamo spare that does the same thing, but it only wipes on two wheels.

- Rewire using two IN4001 diodes to feed the field coils. The Hamo field pieces and magnet will give lower voltage operation, but the beast will run fart too fast at 12 volts anyway.

Regards, Greg.P.

In article , Gregory Procter wrote: (Marklin HO Belgian diesel loco's (20V AC stud-contact) & need to convert have them converted for 12V)

Phil: Aren't the wheels standards also likely to be different? BAsed on the Roco catalogue, where they offer alternative wheels sets for Marklin and 2 rail models, the back to back of Marklin wheels is 16,2mm, and for their HO stock 16,3mm - plus any difference in profiles used? A bit like going back to old Honby wheelsets??

ask alan Marlow, at Caravelle Models, Shepperton

Alan Marlow (alan.marlow at talk21.com)(replace at with @)

Cos the Trix models are a tad rare in the UK & therefore hard to find!

I'm going to do as you suggest with my existing green 205 207 & swap it with a blue (passenger) 5500 , but there are 2/3 other green / yellow 5500 models on offer & it would be nice to have a choice on a running day. day.we,

As for selling the resultant AC model, who to? It wont be in the corect box & may well be a hybrid, livery & numberwise, therefore it wont appeal to the average Marklin collector, IMHO.

Cheers, David C.

Such a sense of humour!

I'd be a lot happier working on a loco chassis than repainting & striping the body shell.

FWIW, I've been told that recent, decoder - ready, Marklin locos have PM DC motors, fed with rectified AC when running in normal AC mode. Also, the most recent models have wheels to the NEM norms.

I've got the Trix chassis in front of me & it has the decoder socket, minus the decoder but fitted instead with a PCB with 6 diodes, presumably to control the directional lighting?

I'm therefore hoping that the AC version will at least have a PM motor & NEM wheels. As for pickups, one side is through the live axles, t'other via three wheel-back wipers, spread over both bogies.

Nothing like the current all-wheel drive suytems, just traditional Marklin engineering.

Thanks for all your helpful suggestions, David C.

In message , Phil writes

Phil, are you sure you meant to say 16,2 and 16,3 mm back-to-back, and not 14,2 and 14,3 mm.? Otherwise the wheels' flanges will be exceedingly thin if not non-existent.

The difference between Ma and NEM wheel standards is (just) within tolerances provided you get the back to backs right. The flanges are excessive if you want to use code 70/75 rail but otherwise ok. - that would surely be 14.2 mm and 14.3mm?

Perhaps he's running converted Marklin on his Scale 4 layout? ;-) No-one _ever_ called Ma flanges exceedingly thin!

Regards, Greg.P.

Some models in the Ma range come out of the old Trix factory - with those you can expect DC motors, NEM wheels and possibly NEM decoder sockets. The rest will be traditional Ma engineering, some with the standards lowered a bit these days.

If you don't know the Trix products, possibly the best way to spot them in the Ma and Trix catalogues is to check the replacement motor brush part numbers. (except that Ma coreless motors don't have replacement brushes)

Phil: Yes, of course I meant 14,2mm and 14,3mm (I DID remember to use a decimal comma though 8-) )