DELTANG NOTES 2 Steam Trams with Deltang Radio Control, My Loco Sound cards and LiPo Batteries.

[Greg Elmassian]

Are you going to add a protection board to the Peckett? Clearly there is none in those pictures. Just asking after the "more than happy" statement.

Maybe you meant internal protection boards in each cell?

 

[ge_rik]

Are you going to add a protection board to the Peckett? Clearly there is none in those pictures. Just asking after the "more than happy" statement.

Maybe you meant internal protection boards in each cell?

There's a 3S protection board located in the boiler wired up to the charge and balance charge sockets. I always use protection boards with my battery locos even though I use an intelligent IMAX B6 charger and the Deltang receivers have low voltage cut off sensing for lithium packs built in. I prefer overkill when it comes to using li ions. I even include an additional fuse to protect against accidental short circuits. Belt and braces!

Rik

 

[Greg Elmassian]

Thanks, the extra balancing wires are neatly tucked away, I think one of them is the blue wire on the lead from the battery in the top to the battery on the right.

I think it may seem overkill to some, but I have indeed had the experience of them in exothermic situations! (maybe 10-15 years ago, I overcharged (on purpose) a defective Molicell lithium metal AA... a small scale Roman Candle!)

Regards, Greg

 

[dunnyrail]

There has been a bit of a lull recently as I have been waiting for Brandbright couplings but have also decided to swop the chassis to Sweet Sixteen expandable (or in my case mostly the opposite of that) chassis. These have a good set of Metal gears and will be more robust. It also means on both of them that there is better space underneath for NiMh so it is LiPo out, to be honest I was never that certain about using LiPo, so it has proved to be a bit of an expense that was wasted. Still I now know for my personal viewpoint that they are not for me. Also means that a couple of smaller projects that were to get a LiPo setup will not now be going that way. Hm wonder what to do with them?

1 st up the Chassis and Couplings used. Benefit of the couplings is that they add some good weight low down where it is needed, when I add the 12 NiMh Battery Packs for each loco this will add to this.


1st up is the Roger Tram, this has had some serious amendments to the base chassis as well as it being made up as short as it can be. Before fitting.

The revised chassis lifted the Tram somewhat, it now sits above the Corpet in height but as it still goes through the Shed door and under another area in the Shed that is quite low all is well.


Showing the chassis as altered to fit the Brandbright couplings, note that I have used Ally angle and Foamboard to join the coupling to the chassis. Note how couplings attached to the chassis so that the plastic bodies are not stressed. Not very pretty but will not be noticed when Skirt lengthened some to counter the addition of Chassis height. You may feel that the foamboard fill is a little over the top, but the Motor is just clear of the boiler top so this packing down of the chassis was imperative.


Then we come to the GRS bought beast. This has had pretty well the same treatment though the Chassis has remained a little longer. I have also managed to use the screws, not something I managed with the other one as I joined up the Delrin Chain a little too sloppy first and it was catching the screw. This has been attended to but the Roger Tram is still all soldered. Joining the Delrin chain to form it’s non floppy working length is a bit tricky, my method was to shorten to match with the chasis as built up then dismantle so the one can join the chain up with some slop as this means that you can do the job with just 2 hands. Then once the chassis is put back together you should have a reasonably non floppy chain.

Again an underneath view showing how I have used the spare Metal to enable coupling fixing. In fact very little from the butchering to shorten has been left over. On this one the screw has been soldered to the Chassis. Batteries in both will fit 2 deep x 3 long each side giving me the 12 I desire, this should give a good length of run with these little beasties.

The 2 Trams face to face, you can see how both will have some Skirt lengthening.

 

[dunnyrail]

Some things have accured since my last post on these two. Firstly they have been repainted but more importantly I have binned the LiPo’s. Well not binned them but made them redundant by getting NiMh packs to replace them. The way I have done it is not just a simple plug in using the original wiring setup. I have installed a Fosworks Wiring Loom which has been connected to the 3 pin plug that was used for the LiPo balanced charger. So now there are 2 on/off switches but no matter at least the Light on the Deltang loom is still present and available should I need to do any programming in the future.

Below you can see where I have cut the 3 wires from the Micron supplied 3 wire balanced charging loom (that I agonised over soldering up) and connected it to the Fosworks loom and ultimately the Battery. The switch and plug to the right are the Micron supplied on/off and charge wire for a left in battery. This also has a small LED for use as a Programming aid. Note the suppressor from the Fosworks wire, I wonder if this will cause any issues as it is normally supposed to be right next to the motor? No problems encountered during test running this morning.

Initial fit of the wiring and Batteries. 8 x aa here so that Deltang Power Max not exceeded. Note the GPO type single strand wire used to hold the Batteries in place, plasticard stops sideways movement. The wire was a little on the low side and in danger of fouling the Track so a couple of washers on each screw that holds the chassis in place drops it down and gives enough extra clearance.

Additional Forsworks switch and charging socket from the Loom. The switch will have some black heat shrink and black paint to help it go away, a small black plasticard box will loose the socket.

Now all the wires have been neatly held in place to ensure no draging below the skirts. Fuse nicely accesible all runs very well. Just some cosmetic painting to do to losse the blue wire where visible above the skirt then onto the other one where a similar but slightly different job will be carried out.

Meanwhile how do I get rid of unwanted LiPo Batteries safely?

 

[PhilP]

Meanwhile how do I get rid of unwanted LiPo Batteries safely?

I'll buy them off you, once we can travel to show's again, Jon.

 

[Greg Elmassian]

Our hardware stores have rechargeable battery dropoff, as well as our office supply stores

 

[dunnyrail]

I'll buy them off you, once we can travel to show's again, Jon.

Thanks Phil. I was thinking about making you that offer to do the swop at Peterborough! Hm that was a sadly missed opportunity.

 

[dunnyrail]

Today I sorted out the other tram that I have decided to call Tram#2 as it is No.2 on the Transmitter, the other one is No.1 thus it is called Tram#1. To aid identification Tram#1 has the lower roof of the two.

The job on Tram#2 to fit the NiMh was much similar the Tram#1, just stuffing things in a different way. So not much to say that the pics do not show. However for this one I made a better way of holding in the batteries with Plasticard holders, the space in this one between the wheels and skirts is much tighter even with the AAA that are fitted on this one, thus a need to keep things in better alignment.

Below you can see the Battery holders with a stop to keep them from dropping. This pic also shows how the wires have again been crudely held in place with thin wire, if is easier to loose this in visible area’s (where it is needed to hold things in place) thus making it much better than plastic cable clips.



I had to ponder some where to put the switch and charging socket as again I decided to leave the original Deltang ones in situe. This needed some hacking of the bodywork so this has been cosmetically changed to represent a couple of doors that might be used for a long fire pricker. Both electrical gubbins are easily accesible through this gap by the No.1 Fat Podgy Finger.

Now both in the Garden, #1 to the left here you can clearly see the difference in height of these 2 beasties.

Tram#1 runs over the viaduct with the test train if 10 axles. Enough of a train for a small Steam Tram in my view.


Tram#2 takes the test train the other way, here it is on the 1:40 gradient that it is managing in it’s stride.

Finally having hit the 1:30 on a 4ft grade Tram#2 tops the summit triumphantly.

All that remains is to complete the cosmetic paint touching up to loose the holding wires and those doors on tram2 need some as well. Plus now that we have a number I can define some Plates for the two of them.

 

[dunnyrail]

Having got a couple of Locomotives with sound working satisfactorily using Deltang and a couple without I have also managed to get an 0 Gauge Hymec working OK with sound also, I am going to use this thread as my thoughts and experiences with Deltang and how I have resolved many of my issues. But first a link tonthe Micron site that summarises what is occuring with some of the chips in particularly the Rx65 which I have found to be a great product, with some programing being able to manage 4 sound functions and drive a loco without a separate ESC. This has been my chip of choice for the 2 Steam Trams and the Hymec as it is less wiring and less stuff (with a separate ESC) to shove into a Loco.

Micron Radio Control : Deltang Rx6x Receiver End Of Availability

www.micronradiocontrol.co.uk

I am not trying to push Micron here, there are I know others involved with the sale of Deltang and do not wish to undermine their efforts.

I will be updating this thread as I get round to it.