[Gary]

Peter. You do not have to. Nobody is forcing you.

If the Select is not for you then don't buy one!

Its so simple!

Those who have bought one don't seem to have the huge questions that you allude to.

It does the job it was designed to do.

For the active high end users here the Hornby Select is not their cup of tea. Fine. Nobody is forcing anything on anybody.

The fact that you have fitted a mix of 7 decoders already to locos suggests to me that you have now progressed beyond the level of beginner and you should be looking for a set up a step up from the Hornby Select anyway.

In the way that markw now is.

Would this be a fair comment?

Happy modelling
Gary

 

[pedromorgan]

not really. i have fitted 3 of the decoders because i wanted to run them on someone elses layout but the rest came pre installed. but i could have installed them if i wanted to.

my current interest in DCC comes from a plan i have in my mind for a tram layout. it would have a common feed going to all the rails and the other wire would go to the overheads, thus getting rid of the problem of track sections and maintainance on track that is going to be embedded in plaster.

as i am very unlikly to have more than 10 trams i think the select or the bachmann version (the name escapes me) should be ideal. but i do have concerns about the health of decoders when they are connected to the select output. but as i said although i could be called a signal expert i am far from a DCC expert.

these concerns have been fairly well publicised both on this forum and others and are not solely mine. i am supprised hornby have not responded.

Peter

 

[markw]

Hey guys

I don't want to get into all this huge debate, indeed i'm not suer my current level of knowledge/experience qualifies me to do so. What I can say is over the last 3 months i know where i've been and i now know where i'm going, (on the DCC front that is), and that's all i'm bothered about.

Anyway i said i'd let you know the progress on my original issue. I filled in a tech support form on the hornby web site yeseterday morning and within a cuple of hours was contacted by their representative who has given me a freepost address to return the select unit to have the firmware updated. That's actually pretty good customer service, i'll reserve full judgement though for when and how fast i get the unit back.

Strangely enough when i emailed them the trade in question the response hasn't been quite so forthcoming, i'll keep you posted if i get anywhere on this front.

Cheers Everybody

 

[pedromorgan]

sounds like great customer service to me!

Peter

 

[Brian Considine]

Off we go again - all I did was state a FACT regarding the way Fleischmann & Marklin ensure that their relatively small dealer network in the UK are knowledgeable about the products they sell - not having a go a Hornby or their supporters.

To be quite honest I was hoping to be proved wrong regarding Hornby.

 

[Ravenser]

Lenz , or at least Mackays do likewise.

I gathered this from a retailer in the town where I come from , who admitted that he didn't stock Lenz because the importer required you to do a 2 day course and as they were starting up the business there wasn't time for them to do it. He does stock Gaugemaster , Bachmann and Hornby DCC , and in fairness does seem to have the sort of general DCC knowledge you'd expect from a user with some experience.

My local shop though - well although the individuals concerned are knowledgeable modellers , one of them has asked me a few questions about DCC (not technical support issues) , he having no experience of digital other than having fitted Zero 1 chips in a previous existance about 20 odd years ago. I'm hardly very expert.....

I get the impression product knowledge could be very patchy and some shops may be selling stuff without a clue how it works or the capability to offer even the most basic troubleshooting or technical support (Like "Have you tried removing the capacitors?")

How you actually train up a sales network that large in a few months before product launch is a very serious practical challenge. It looks as if Hornby may have been hoping their forum would provide one solution, as somewhere experienced users could help out novices. Trouble is, when the product first launches there are no experienced users. Dealer training may well be an area Hornby need to develop going forward, but the challenges in training up a mass market network ass oppoased to a small specialist one are uncharted territory.

My company's just launching a new global system. I know how much time and resource has been put into training in Europe over 12 months - but I doubt if the organisation has had half the training you would ideally have wanted in a perfect world

 

[neil_s_wood]

for some reason this came out twice so I've deleted this one.

 

[neil_s_wood]

QUOTE my current interest in DCC comes from a plan i have in my mind for a tram layout. it would have a common feed going to all the rails and the other wire would go to the overheads, thus getting rid of the problem of track sections and maintainance on track that is going to be embedded in plaster.

Peter, you're not going to feed current from separate source to the overheads and the track are you? There are problems with this. Or do you mean that you will have one of the power feeds going to both rails and the other going to the overhead? This last method sounds perilously close to, dare I say it, 3 rail.

 

[pedromorgan]

yes the last one. sort of like 3 rail but with all the actual rails connected together-and there would only be 2 of them!

because it would only be a very small layout i think this would be an ideal solution.

Peter

 

[Brian Considine]

QUOTE (Ravenser @ 8 Mar 2007, 00:17) <{POST_SNAPBACK}>Lenz , or at least Mackays do likewise.

I gathered this from a retailer in the town where I come from , who admitted that he didn't stock Lenz because the importer required you to do a 2 day course and as they were starting up the business there wasn't time for them to do it.

Not quite as I understand it - they prefer you to, or at least show that you already have some DCC knowledge. On more than one occasion I have been in another retail outlet (who are aware of my DCC experience, & believe me, although it's fairly good I have nothing on Stan @ MacKays) who have "picked my brains".

Personally, IMHO it is almost certain that no one can know everything about DCC. I think the main problems have arisen because of the keen efforts to get the tills ringing (nothing wrong with that either) with intense competition between 2 major UK outline RTR manufactures, coupled with the rapid rise of DCC popularity for "the masses" (or "train set" people as others have called them).

Very different to the more sedate rise in popularity of "traditional" DCC systems such as Lenz, Digitrax et all, with their smaller distribution & dealer networks.

 

[neil_s_wood]

QUOTE (pedromorgan @ 8 Mar 2007, 17:14) <{POST_SNAPBACK}>yes the last one. sort of like 3 rail but with all the actual rails connected together-and there would only be 2 of them!

because it would only be a very small layout i think this would be an ideal solution.

Peter
That should be ok if you wire it right. There have been problems using feeds to the tracks and overhead simultaneously, I wasn't sure if you were aware.

 

[pedromorgan]

i cant see why there would be any problem. i am going to connect evry rail to one wire and alll the overhead to the other instead of using the 2 rails independently.

Peter

 

[Brian Considine]

Peter,

Connecting the running rails all together for one side of the supply & the OHL to the other will not cause a problem & will work OK - you have to bear in mind the tiny contact area of the panto' bow or trolley wheel to the wire itself. DCC does not "like" interuptions to the signal, even for very brief moments & it can cause some very erratic running as the decoder(s) have to "start up" again.

I would advise you to wire the tracks themselves as 2-rail, then bond them together, use the OHL & then if you have problems you can always revert to 2-rail.

The reason that the DCC manufactures do not recommend that you use the OHL for power is that it is possible under some circumstances to end up with double the track voltage across the decoder - not good !