Model Railway Forum

Yes, but totally impractical as they still need to charge and have relatively fast discharge rates. But rechargeable batteries would work if contained in an attached wagon.

As if the building and installation of stay alives wasn’t challenging enough, today I decided to fit one in an old Hornby 8F with a pronounced stutter. On this model the DCC socket is in the loco, great for non-sound, direct fit decoders but it will put up a fight when adding sound.

I found a home for the TTS decoder in the smokebox after adding the two stayalive wires and extending the wiring for a sugarcube speaker. I managed to find a route for the two pairs of wires back through the cab and into the front of the tender under the fall plate. I may need to revisit this and use a slightly thinner wire for the stayalive wires - time will tell.

Inside the generous tender is a large ballast weight which, combined with the slope of the coal space means there is little room for the SA and speaker. So I had to get creative with the layout of the capacitors a d other components to get them into the narrow space between the tender top and the weight. This was version five.

It’s taken a significant amount of time but it absolutely transforms this old beast.

2023-07-04_03-31-19 by Steve Mumford, on Flickr

Oooooh!



It's been challenging finding these in the UK a) at a competitive price and b) in stock.

These have just arrived, free shipping, from Texas in less than 48 hours.

That should keep you busy. Are the pre-wired plugs and sockets the same size as the Hornby version?

bulleidboy wrote: ↑Fri Jul 07, 2023 1:42 pm That should keep you busy. Are the pre-wired plugs and sockets the same size as the Hornby version?

As you say, should keep me busy for a while, Barry.
No, I did look but could not find a supplier of prewired plugs - believe they are JST SUHR (I may be wrong) - and I’m told they are almost impossible to make yourself. I opted for JST 1.25mm - plenty small enough to fit inside a loco and possibly between loco and tender.
I will work the actual cost of these at some point and let you know. I have enough parts for about twenty stay alives and I anticipate that some of my TTS locos will still need the smaller Hornby version.

More to be said on this later.

2023-07-09_06-27-59 by Steve Mumford, on Flickr

I’ve mentioned a new service coming from ModelU on another thread - I have today been painting a few of my first home printed figures

After printing, the figures need to be carefully cleaned and separated from the printing supports. It always pays to print a few extras to allow for some of the finer parts to be damaged in the process. I choose to glue my figures to barbecue skewers ready for painting (this backfired on me this time so I may try an alternative next time).

20230710_095521 by Steve Mumford, on Flickr

After a light spray with white primer, I paint the faces, hands and arms.

20230710_100236 by Steve Mumford, on Flickr

When it comes to painting, start in the Centre and work towards the outside of the model, so after the flesh tones, paint shirts/blouses, then more on to jackets and trousers, finishing with hats and shoes.

20230712_162053 by Steve Mumford, on Flickr

Finally, I dipped these figures in a thin black wash to bring out shadows and creases then dry brushed light grey to accentuate the highlights. To separate the figures from the sticks, a drop of IPA will usually release hot glue but on this occasion, three feet got left behind.

20230712_184518 by Steve Mumford, on Flickr

20230712_184613 by Steve Mumford, on Flickr


20230712_184448 by Steve Mumford, on Flickr

That's really Impressive and handy too as I have a pack of a dozen or so unpainted figures to work on when the cold winter nights return ...

Incredible detail, very impressive (as always).

I returned to my ongoing stayalive project this morning, fitting a ‘home brew ‘ to my RailRoad ‘Evening Star’ with a TTS decoder.
I also did the maths - these stayalives cost just £5.77 each plus a bit of brainpower working out where to hide them.