It's here. I have no affiliation with Randgust other than I ordered a kit and have been building it. I like the level of information available on the website.
I have several areas, where I notice many sites seem to stumble. One is how some do not maintain them, with up to date information. After a while, I no longer stop by. Which surely must be losing them customers over time. Also, there is the joyful search for contact information. Often requiring bloodhounds, and other sophisticated methods to find... Which can be non-functional, if ever located. Another is how some sites get completely carried away. With all kinds of graphics and other action. Seeming to forget that a large portion of Internet users are still on dial-up accounts. Which must be very frustrating, as those potential customers sit, and wait, and wait, for such top heavy pages to load. Keep it simple. Keep it fresh. Make it valuable. Boxcab E50
Very well said, Doug. The Lionel site is beautiful, but hard to navigate and find what you're looking for. Impossible to bookmark a product you want to come back to. Poor return on what was likely a large investment in the web.
Well Tony. I decided to take your advice and I went rooting around and I finally found the box and the instructions. Being a dutiful modeler, I opened the instruction and read the instruction in their totality. This took about 15 seconds. The DCC instructions are 3 sentences. No...I lied again. 2 sentences and one non-sentence (again). Only one sentence involves the installation of the decoder. ************************** C. Simply remove the dummy plugs and install the DCC compatable decoder (see diagram A). ************************** :tb-shocked: Here is a link that I found on Bachmann's site to these instructions. http://www.bachmanntrains.com/home-usa/dwg/dwgs/N614X_IS001.PDF As you will notice, the "diagram" simply shows the joint locations. These are VERY slim instructions by any standard. I should note that Bachmann markets this as a DCC ready engine. After thinking about this whole situation and Bachmann's flippant "instructions" I would give Bachmann a "D" grade for effort.
As I've pointed out earlier, different manufacturers place different emphasis on their web sites. Some "old school" manufacturers, run by product line managers, are satisfied with minimal instructions and web presence, because the product line managers have to pay for their own web sites. If you are making your quotas and bonuses, then the less spent the better, in their eyes! Other companies have a little more vision. When I was involved in the "hobby" business from 1973-1977, the competition was cut-throat, and I'm sure that aspect has only increased. I'm also sure that some old school product managers are looking at the web bust of 2000-2004 and thinking, "See, I told you so." This is a ruthless business. It can be a lot of fun, as I learned. But still ruthless, which is why many product managers are loathe to throw a few thousand bucks toward competent web design. Also, a small company's computer resources may be very limited, especially on the software end. Man, that can stop development of web sites cold.
Well, with all my frustration over the H16-44 documentation problems, I have decided to make my own "How-To" and post it here. I posted a request over on the Bachmann board asking for more information from the tech guy, we'll see if there is any response.
This is a cut and paste directly from the PDF linked to at Bachmann, lower right hand corner. The PC board in the loco has two small metal jumper clips that are removed and then you follow chart as to where the decoder wires get soldered. The light board has numbers imprinted on the board to identify the the positions. I don't really know any other way they could have done it. There is no guessing as to what wires go where. There are no motor contacts to insulate, no need for Kapton tape. There is a weight under the light board that can be removed with one screw but some have found with the small decoders available now that you can leave the weight in for added traction and still have room for the decoder.
That's a good way to go about it. Flash Blackman has been working on finding material for the "How-To" forum out of the old threads, and that forum is turning into one of the very helpful spots on this board.
That is far too easy to say. Of course, everything has its price: a website costs money and updating the content takes some time, but I do not think that it affects prices and releases that much as you state. Each company does advertising because they have to convince us buying their products. When I see the Atlas website, I can find rather easily the things I want; I get their e-newsletter with clear product information; their webshop is easy to understand and I recieve my orderings within 2 weeks. All these things make me return to their website - and maybe I will buy some more of their products. Con-Cor on the contrary has a bad reputation on quality and when I visit their website, I see a terrible design, very old content, no updates, no information about their new coaches (I saw a mention of them on the site of Walthers), so my negative feelings about their products is being strengthened by their lousy website. A site doesn't have too be flashy, I only want some good pictures with good information about the products. That won't take too much money and time of a company, I think.
I wonder if the issue here is that we are spoiled by the likes of say Kodak or HP where if you have a question about or need a driver for a 10 year old printer or other device you can find it at their website in 10+ different languages. I doubt there are any model train manufacturers even close in size to either of those companies. I just don't expect the same caliber of website. If I have a question I ask it here. It is simple, easy, and quick. In an ironic way this very thread personifies the solution.
No, me neither, but there are enough possibilities to make a nice website that may not be as good as HP but far better than Con-Cor's.
Skip, I have to disagree with you there. The "insulation tape" installed at the factory is actually plain old masking tape. If plain old masking tape is an adequite replacment to Kapton tape, then there is no need for Kapton tape in your hobby at all....which is close to 100 times the cost of masking tape. I'll be re-isolating the engine on this one. And yes, one can extrapolate from the instructions what to do with the wires, but I can assure you that the aenemic text provided does not come close to the documentation I would view as required for an item that is SPECIFICALLY marketed as "DCC Ready". With all that said, the DC version of the engine is superb. The couplers are terrible, but the performance across all speeds is superior. Stall speed is very low, and top end speed is comparable to most traditional engines. And for Bachmann, the hand rails are even superior.
John, There is no extrapolation or insulating needed. I think you may be trying to make it more complicated than it is. It takes approx 5 minutes to install a decoder in the Bachmann H16-44's. The factory lightboard stays in place. It doesn't even need to be disturbed. All you do is remove the two PB shorting jumpers and solder a DZ123 or similar to the solder pads as indicated by the chart. If the decoder doesn't fit under the shell as is, remove the added weight and slide the decoder under the light board. You need to keep the light board intact because there is no electrical contact to the frame otherwise. The lightboard has two wiper contacts that contact the frame halves when installed. Use their solder pads on the factory board and be done. I found a post in Atlas's archive illustrating installing a decoder in one: Atlas Model Railroad Co. - Bachmann H-16-44 a pleasant surprise
Yeah...that would have been a help from the get go. Over on the Bachmann board I did get a reply from the B-mann, but he hoted that it's not DCC Ready/Friendly and needed engine isolation. I tend to think that I was talking about an earlier version, and not the newer version. In any case, there was another board member who posted a link to a DCC conversion that he did on an almost identical board. Overall, the response over there was pretty good. That part of the Bachmann site should be praised. Thanks for the link, I'll be using that as a guide.
Well.....my voyage through hell continues.... I carefully performed all the steps for installing a DCC board in the engine. I even took extensive pictures so that I could make a "how-to" page so that others wouldn't face the same frustration that I faced. In fact, my frustration was to continue after the installation. After all the soldering was completed I surveyed my work. Things looked pretty good! I had taken all traditional steps....even tinning the wires before soldering them. I resecured the main board and DCC board in their respective positions and headed off to the track to make sure that everything worked. I put the engine on the track (with out the shell) and slowly applied power. The engine started rolling...a little jerky at first but smoothing out after about 3 or 4 feet. I reversed the direction to check reverse movement. After about 5 feet of motion there was a spark/flash and a pop; the engine came to an abrupt stop. I retrieved the engine and noticed that there was a burn spot on the shrink wrap casing of the decoder. Interestingly, the set-up that I was using is one of the Bachmann transformers that accompany their sets, and the matching track from that set. I say this because this is the same set-up that I have used many many time with out any problems. I even used the H16-44 the previous evening to check the pre-modification performance. I double checked the order of the wire installation. All that was correct. I double checked the solder points. All that appeared fine. No solder flow even left the points. I'm very frustrated. As far as finger pointing at this point, I'm not sure where to start. I have inspected my soldering several times, and I haven't seen anything that could have gone wrong there. Since the train actually moved and I was even able to get it to change directions leads me to the opinion that the soldering was fine. I have always been a fan of Digitrax decoders and I have never experienced any problems. Where to go...what to do.....sigh. I'll have to sit on this one. I'm so frustrated I could spit.
Yep...let it come to a stop...then increased throttle in the other direction. Nothing out of the ordinary there. I see what you are looking for, but that's not the source of the problem. I wish it was that simple because that would at least resolve my frustration.
I've had a dz123 decoder grenade in one of my two Bman Spectrum dash 8's for no apparent reason. It ran ok (that's being generous) for a few days then blam ! Never could figure out why. Never had a problem with any decoder in any other type of loco that wasn't bad out of the bag.
I think that this is the key. We have tried to get our site to be simple and easy. Is it? We do not get much feedback by email [without putting a feedback sheet on the site - perhaps we should] We know that we need to put some more instruction help sheets up, but we would welcome any comments on our site. I would hope that a site that is simple, with the key information is what folk want. Peter Peter Harris N Scale Kits N Scale Kits
