Thanks Frank. I'm quite the advocate for repurposing things so this is similar in some ways. I plan to locate the Lima Class 20 (that I experimentally weathered) in a siding somewhere. I also thought of cutting away some of the engine panels to show it's being worked on or dismantled for parts.
Hi Julian. The speaker and housing may not look too pretty, but nobody (but you) is going to see them. On my computer, the sound was just fine - even without your lapel mic being held next to the locos. A great job well done!
Thank you Paul for your kind words. You're absolutely right, no one will see my crude speaker enclosure. The main objective is it does what it's suppose to do.
Cool episode Julian. Maybe you should consider getting rid of the tension lock couplings and exchange them for kadees. Also, there’s these rubber hose dummy connections with the tiniest neodymium magnets, which may very well camouflage the connector you added.
Thanks Vincent. I have thought of switching out the couplings and might give that a go. I've got Kadees and I might also try some magnetic couplings which I also have.
A nice conversion, but if you had placed the socket in the buffer beam of the active loco and the wire on the dummy, you wouldn't have the issue of having the dangling wire with the plug when running the active vehicle solo. On reflection though I am sure you considered that and something ruled out fitting the socket into the live vehicle. 😀
As it happens Julian, the TTS class 20 chip is quite good too - I had one fitted to my older bachmann class 20, was a beautiful runner - ended up selling it as, although I like class 20a I don't love them and they were never part of my child hood memories. I had to Dremel the cab housing to fit stay alives and speakers etc but all worked well Enjoyed your efforts mate, all the best 👍
Thanks for sharing. That's the biggest issue with the Bachmann Class 20, there's very little room inside the body to fit anything without having to modify the body or the chassis. Another reason I like the Class 20 is their old-sckool design that harks back to the steam locomotives with the cab at the back. There also very similar in design to the New Zealand Railways DE Class locomotives that were built in the UK by English Electric in the early 1950's... en.wikipedia.org/wiki/New_Zealand_DE_class_locomotive
I can't say I have, but curiously I'm not actually a huge fan of DCC steam sound. I find steam sound less able to truly mimic the sound qualities of steam and they tend to sound more toy-like. And although diesel sound does become monotonous after a while, I find steam even more so.
Great job Julian. I might do something similar although I'm in N. It wasn't possible to have the socket in the loco you want to run solo? Or maybe socket on both locos with a small connecting wire? It would mean no wire when disconnected.
Thanks for your feedback. I did consider a socket in both locos but I was more reluctant to hack a larger chunk out of the chassis and buffer beam on the working/good loco on the bases if I wanted to sell it at some future point it isn't too hacked up.
@12:50 - why didn't you simply do that same small modification to the PCB for both class 20's so each one has a JS connector and then have a small (20mm) link cable between the two. Then when you want to run the powered class 20 on its own you can unplug the cable form both locos and remove it completely so you don't have anything dangling
I did consider a socket in both locos but I was more reluctant to hack a larger chunk out of the chassis and buffer beam on the working/good loco on the bases if I wanted to sell it at some future point it isn't too hacked up.
I assume you wired both speakers in parallel - so that will reduce the total impedance - if you have two 8 ohm speakers in parallel, that puts a total load of 4 ohms on the output of the sound card. Will that be within the tolerance of the card? But very impressive - and the connecting cables could easily be views as air hoses or MU cables.
Interestingly the Loksound v5 has an impedance range of 4 to 16 ohms so you could connect two 8 ohm speakers either way, but in this case the speakers are connected in parallel because one speaker is connected directly to the decoder and the other is connected to the speaker tabs on the loco circuit board.
@@StationRoadModelRailway Dear Sir, I wonder what would they sound together if the sound of the second loco were to suffer a little delay, so they wouldn't play unison. I was just skimming some circuits with a PT2399, but i'm afraid they would be too clumsy to fit inside the secondary machine. But, they already sound quite different. Great work! And the close ups show how smooth is your track! Me brazilian points are a leveling nightmare. Cheers from Brazil!
Having independent sounds for each loco was beyond the scope of this project. The main objective was to utilise an old/dead Class 20 and a larger mega bass speaker that would otherwise not fit in a fully operational Class 20 due to all the operational gear being intact. There are audio delay circuits that might work and possibly fit in the dummy Class 20 but the issue would then be an echo effect unless the delay was significant enough. The only other option is another sound chip but that defeats the purpose of what I was trialing on a budget. The video doesn't do the audio justice but there is no stereo effect.
Hi Julian hope you are well , i did roughly the same but with two tts chips which are cheaper than one high end chip and two iPhone speakers and gave them two different addresses(consist) so they were slightly out of sync with each other , are you going to be really brave and attempt lights, as you are double heading you would only need lights in the cab ends which i believe is easier but that would require another cable between locos , also did you try both push and pulling the dummy loco if you know what i mean.................tony
The 24 and 25 diesel locomotives were great machines. Some still exist on heritage railways around the country. The Class 20 is NOT one of my favourite diesel locomotives!! I absolutely adore the steam locomotives in our fleet, but the diesel makes me ill with Asthma.
Apart from the unique sound the Class 20's make, another reason I like the Class 20 is their old-sckool design that harks back to the steam locomotives with the cab at the back. There also very similar in design to the New Zealand Railways DE Class locomotives that were built in the UK by English Electric in the early 1950's... en.wikipedia.org/wiki/New_Zealand_DE_class_locomotive
They really sound great, Only natural, since you've just fabricated the first 00 scale 'stereo' sound system! Now if you can find a mid-range speaker ...
Yes!! Epping Ongar Railway has one!! What a blinking noise!!!!!!!
The 37 sounds nearly identical to the real things!! The 37 is really a miniature Deltic!! We have an early 37 from 1960 at the Epping Ongar Railway!!
Thanks for you comment about the Class 37 sound. It's interesting considering it's only a Hornby TTS chip on board.
Class 24/25, great choice Julian, that just happens to be my all time favourite pair too.
Awesome job Julian!!! Well done! Cheers Onno.
Nice job, what a good idea for giving a bad loco a purpose, better than abandoning it to a box or a siding.
Thanks Frank. I'm quite the advocate for repurposing things so this is similar in some ways. I plan to locate the Lima Class 20 (that I experimentally weathered) in a siding somewhere. I also thought of cutting away some of the engine panels to show it's being worked on or dismantled for parts.
Hi Julian. The speaker and housing may not look too pretty, but nobody (but you) is going to see them. On my computer, the sound was just fine - even without your lapel mic being held next to the locos. A great job well done!
Thank you Paul for your kind words. You're absolutely right, no one will see my crude speaker enclosure. The main objective is it does what it's suppose to do.
Cool episode Julian. Maybe you should consider getting rid of the tension lock couplings and exchange them for kadees. Also, there’s these rubber hose dummy connections with the tiniest neodymium magnets, which may very well camouflage the connector you added.
Thanks Vincent. I have thought of switching out the couplings and might give that a go. I've got Kadees and I might also try some magnetic couplings which I also have.
Excellent work julian and they sound good as well
A nice conversion, but if you had placed the socket in the buffer beam of the active loco and the wire on the dummy, you wouldn't have the issue of having the dangling wire with the plug when running the active vehicle solo. On reflection though I am sure you considered that and something ruled out fitting the socket into the live vehicle. 😀
Hello from the UK
A great job done Julian and the sound is cool. hope all well down were you are - take care Kevin
Thanks Kevin, all is well down here. Might be a bit different come this Friday when NZ switches to the traffic light system.
As it happens Julian, the TTS class 20 chip is quite good too - I had one fitted to my older bachmann class 20, was a beautiful runner - ended up selling it as, although I like class 20a I don't love them and they were never part of my child hood memories.
I had to Dremel the cab housing to fit stay alives and speakers etc but all worked well
Enjoyed your efforts mate, all the best 👍
Thanks for sharing. That's the biggest issue with the Bachmann Class 20, there's very little room inside the body to fit anything without having to modify the body or the chassis. Another reason I like the Class 20 is their old-sckool design that harks back to the steam locomotives with the cab at the back. There also very similar in design to the New Zealand Railways DE Class locomotives that were built in the UK by English Electric in the early 1950's... en.wikipedia.org/wiki/New_Zealand_DE_class_locomotive
Good job keep up the good video on your channel thanks lee
Have you heard anything like the double Hall Class steam twinned locomotives? It sounds wonderful to me!!
I can't say I have, but curiously I'm not actually a huge fan of DCC steam sound. I find steam sound less able to truly mimic the sound qualities of steam and they tend to sound more toy-like. And although diesel sound does become monotonous after a while, I find steam even more so.
Great job Julian. I might do something similar although I'm in N. It wasn't possible to have the socket in the loco you want to run solo? Or maybe socket on both locos with a small connecting wire? It would mean no wire when disconnected.
Thanks for your feedback. I did consider a socket in both locos but I was more reluctant to hack a larger chunk out of the chassis and buffer beam on the working/good loco on the bases if I wanted to sell it at some future point it isn't too hacked up.
@12:50 - why didn't you simply do that same small modification to the PCB for both class 20's so each one has a JS connector and then have a small (20mm) link cable between the two. Then when you want to run the powered class 20 on its own you can unplug the cable form both locos and remove it completely so you don't have anything dangling
I did consider a socket in both locos but I was more reluctant to hack a larger chunk out of the chassis and buffer beam on the working/good loco on the bases if I wanted to sell it at some future point it isn't too hacked up.
I assume you wired both speakers in parallel - so that will reduce the total impedance - if you have two 8 ohm speakers in parallel, that puts a total load of 4 ohms on the output of the sound card. Will that be within the tolerance of the card? But very impressive - and the connecting cables could easily be views as air hoses or MU cables.
Interestingly the Loksound v5 has an impedance range of 4 to 16 ohms so you could connect two 8 ohm speakers either way, but in this case the speakers are connected in parallel because one speaker is connected directly to the decoder and the other is connected to the speaker tabs on the loco circuit board.
@@StationRoadModelRailway
Dear Sir,
I wonder what would they sound together if the sound of the second loco were to suffer a little delay, so they wouldn't play unison. I was just skimming some circuits with a PT2399, but i'm afraid they would be too clumsy to fit inside the secondary machine. But, they already sound quite different. Great work!
And the close ups show how smooth is your track! Me brazilian points are a leveling nightmare.
Cheers from Brazil!
How do you get the second loco’s sound to be out of sync with the first loco’s so that it doesn’t just sound like a stereo effect?
Having independent sounds for each loco was beyond the scope of this project. The main objective was to utilise an old/dead Class 20 and a larger mega bass speaker that would otherwise not fit in a fully operational Class 20 due to all the operational gear being intact. There are audio delay circuits that might work and possibly fit in the dummy Class 20 but the issue would then be an echo effect unless the delay was significant enough. The only other option is another sound chip but that defeats the purpose of what I was trialing on a budget. The video doesn't do the audio justice but there is no stereo effect.
Hi Julian hope you are well , i did roughly the same but with two tts chips which are cheaper than one high end chip and two iPhone speakers and gave them two different addresses(consist) so they were slightly out of sync with each other , are you going to be really brave and attempt lights, as you are double heading you would only need lights in the cab ends which i believe is easier but that would require another cable between locos , also did you try both push and pulling the dummy loco if you know what i mean.................tony
The 24 and 25 diesel locomotives were great machines. Some still exist on heritage railways around the country. The Class 20 is NOT one of my favourite diesel locomotives!! I absolutely adore the steam locomotives in our fleet, but the diesel makes me ill with Asthma.
Apart from the unique sound the Class 20's make, another reason I like the Class 20 is their old-sckool design that harks back to the steam locomotives with the cab at the back. There also very similar in design to the New Zealand Railways DE Class locomotives that were built in the UK by English Electric in the early 1950's... en.wikipedia.org/wiki/New_Zealand_DE_class_locomotive
Interesting video Julian. Sound is much too fiddly for me to contemplate. Roy.
They really sound great, Only natural, since you've just fabricated the first 00 scale 'stereo' sound system! Now if you can find a mid-range speaker ...
Thank you Ray. Did they ever run Class 20's in triplicate? I could rope in the Lima Class 20 for a mid-range speaker😮
Well done get them running on one of your crack exspresses goods and you will be there
There goes the ‘Whistling Rufus’ again!! My least favourite diesel sound!!