That's what he should be telling people, ....by putting the harness/socket in, you make the loco DCC ready, after that, everything just plugs/unplugs can be upgraded/changed as many times as you like with no more soldering ever needed. the harness/socket costs £3 in August 2020 ....NEVER hard wire a decoder directly into a loco as this video suggests 🌈😷🇬🇧
HI Jason. Thanks for this vid, it's been really helpful. I model Germany in the late 70s early 80s and have picked up various old lima locos that were around in this period. They are all dc. I've opened one of my DB103s up to see how it looks, and its VERY similar to this. However, i have a light at either end, as well as what appear to be resistors attached to the wires of the pickup on the opposite end to the motor. Would these be safe to remove? I've not done a great deal of 'under the bonnet' work before and am a bit nervous. Any help or advice would be greatly appreciated. Cheers Rod.
you might find the problem is with the pickups, I found that adding pickups to the wheels that don't have any improved that but the problem on the motor side is that the traction tires are insulating those wheels so you only get pickup from the flanges.
I read somewhere else that you should NEVER hard wire a decoder into a loco as you're suggesting. Why couldn't you solder the harness/socket to the loco, making the loco DCC ready......... then the decoder can be changed/upgraded easily at any time by plugging in as intended, decoder socket is not expensive.
Further to my earlier comment, I just went and checked the price....£3 from "Rails of Sheffield" for a "Loksound" socket with 30cm (12") of wire ......today 6th August 2020..... now I'm modelling on zero budget with twenty year old locos and free to download card kits (bought a Lima class 37 for a tenner at a car boot sale two days ago) don't know when I'll be able to afford to go DCC ......but surely we're not so hard up for £3 to do the job correctly ? What if that decoder was faulty and you had to take it out again and send it back to Hornby? ......Unsolder everything? Just shows ANYBODY can post a video on RU-vid, doesn't make it useful 🌈😷🇬🇧
