MR104

Bachmann
JP BUCKLEY explains how to fit
locomotive decoders to Bachmann’s
‘OO’ gauge Virgin Voyager.
Here’s How You Can Do It…
221101 ran more than 30,000kms on test in
France before entering service with Virgin. On
February 1 2002, the day it was named Louis
Bleriot at Cahors, the unit shows off its tilt
mechanism at Brive-la-Gaillarde in central
France. INSET: Close up of tilt mechanism
and bogie of 221101. BOTH: BEN JONES
MASTERCLASS
in France between August 2001 and March
2002. Specific tilt tests were undertaken on the
Paris-Limoges-Toulouse main line, on the
notoriously tortuous section between Brive and
Cahors in January/February 2002.
For these tests, the cars were loaded with
test equipment or weighted to simulate a full
passenger load. To mark this feat of Anglo-French
co-operation, 221101 was named
Louis Bleriot at Cahors on February 1 2002.
This was followed by high-speed trials at up
to 137.5mph (125mph maximum plus 10%)
between Le Mans and Nantes in western
France, on lines cleared for 220km/h operation
with TGVs. In total, the unit ran more than
30,000km (18,640 miles) on French metals, a
third of which was with tilt activated. After this,
221101 was returned to Bombardier for a refit
and eventually joined the fleet in the UK, being
delivered out of sequence.
External differences
Internally, Class 220 and 221 are identical. The
layout of bodyshells, saloons, toilet provision
and shop car are standard across the fleet.
Second Class saloons have a mix of dark blue
and red seats largely in 2+2 ‘airline’ fashion with
a few grouped around tables. ‘Club Class’ has 24
seats with dark blue upholstery arranged in 2+1
format with seats in both airline fashion and
around tables of four or two.
Between the saloon and driving cab of the
DMF car is a small galley for serving hot food
and drinks to First Class passengers.
However, the major external difference is
Meet the family
After initial teething troubles, the Voyagers have become
comparatively reliable and are said to be popular with
passengers. Their rapid acceleration, 125mph top speed
and reliability attracted the attention of Midland Mainline
and later Hull Trains, which were both seeking to upgrade
services from 100mph Class 170 Turbostars.
MML took delivery of seven 9-car and 16 four-car
Class 222 ‘Meridians’ in 2004/05, based on the non-tilting
‘220’ but with a revised body design and improved interior.
The units are used on London St Pancras-Leicester-Nottingham/Sheffield/Leeds
services. During late-2006/early-2007
some 9-car ‘222’ sets have been reduced to eight cars,
losing one Motor Second car to strengthen other sets to
five cars.
In 2005, Hull Trains received four 4-car Class 222/1
‘Pioneers’ to improve its King’s Cross-Hull services. These
share a bodyshell design with MML’s trains and have
a similar internal layout, albeit in HT corporate colours,
rather than MML’s sober blue scheme. All four HT units are
named after notable citizens of Hull.
Bachmann announced in 2005 that it would produce
a ‘OO’ gauge model of the MML Class 222, although this
has since been quietly shelved. However, the company is to
offer both MML and Hull Trains units in its Graham Farish
‘N’ gauge range in 2007/08.
Vehicle end detail on 220008 Draig Gymreig/
Welsh Dragon at Nuneaton on August 18
2002. MEL HOLLEY
Firstly, test your Voyager on DC to
1 check that everything is working well.
Undo the four screws underneath the
motor car - two at each end as shown
circled. Insert strips of card between the
body and chassis and gently remove the
bodyshell.
Place the body carefully away and
2 undo the printed circuit board (PCB)
screws on the chassis. Cut the wires from
the PCB off as close as possible to the
PCB. Group the pick-up wires together on
each side of the chassis but do not confuse
them with the wires to the motor! Cut
off the plastic PCB mounting lugs which
were underneath the PCB.
Locate the decoder on top of the grey
3 plastic motor cover and secure with
a sticky pad. Cut the decoder wires to
an appropriate length. The white, blue,
purple, green and yellow wires will not
be used in this car. I later moved the
decoder to the right.
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digital Voyager
The modifications explained here are the
same for the Class 220 and 221 variants
produced by Bachmann in ‘OO’.
I used the lighting supplied by the manufacturer,
though Express Models also makes a
lighting kit. Once I had completed the DCC
easy - Skill Level - advanced
installation I renumbered it as 220034
Yorkshire Voyager and lightly weathered it
using dry-brush techniques, particularly black
deposits on the roof around the exhaust pipe.
n A full article on detailing and weathering the
Bachmann Class 221 will follow later this year.
Shopping list
✔ Three locomotive decoders with at
least two function outputs - I used a Lenz
LE1014E/Bachmann 36-550 available
from Lenz/Bachmann dealers for about
£13 each. I prefer to use locomotive
decoders rather than accessory decoders
such as the Lenz LF100XF for locomotive
lighting as they will also work on DC,
whereas the accessory decoder will not.
This is useful for visiting friends’ layouts
or using your model on a DC club layout.
✔ Heatshrink tubing, available from
electronics stockists such as Maplins
✔ Sticky pad (supplied with Lenz
decoders)
✔ Insulating tape
✔ Optional Fox Transfers for renumbering
(F4763/20, £6.95) and Shawplan
etched plates for renaming.
Wire the decoder as follows, using heatshrink
tubing to insulate the joint:
4
n Decoder black to two black pick-up wires
n Decoder red to two red pick-up wires
n Decoder grey to black motor wire
n Decoder orange to red motor wire.
Unplug the body to chassis power
7 connection. Cut the red and black wires
as close to the cab roof PCB as possible.
Put these wires and plug on one side - they
will be used shortly.
Tools
✔ small crosshead screwdriver
✔ soldering iron and solder
✔ wire strippers
✔ pliers
✔ Stanley knife
VIRGIN VOYAGER
I then secured the wires using insulating
5 tape. Test the car on your programming
track to ensure the installation was successful.
Then replace the body and the four
screws. Note the direction of travel of the
car and mark the underframe accordingly.
Ensure your cars are arranged in the correct
order.
Looking from underneath, the nearest
8 bulb to you is the white main headlights,
the next down is the red lights and at the
very top of the cab is the white marker light.
Group wires as follows, cutting decoder
wires appropriately:
A) one wire from each bulb together - this
goes to the decoder blue wire
B) the two other wires from the white bulbs
together - this goes to the decoder yellow
wire
C) the remaining wire from the red bulb goes
to the decoder white wire.
I then secured the decoder to the car
10 roof and tidied the wires with insulating
tape. Be sure to route the wires well around
the screw mounting - you don’t want to screw
wires in half! I then replaced the body, the
under cab section and the three screws and
tested it. To program the decoders in the
driving cars you’ll need to program them at
the same time as the motor car or wire a light
bulb across the tracks when programming.
I programmed all three decoders to the same
address.
Now onto the driving cars. Taking the
6 ‘Club Class’ coach first, undo three
screws underneath, two at either end of the
underframe fairing and one underneath the
cab. Remove the separate plastic section
which the cab screw was holding on. Use
card strips in between the body and chassis
again and remove the bodyshell.
Again, use heatshrink tubing to insulate
9 the joints and this is what it should look
like. The orange, grey, green and purple
wires are not used.
For the other driving car, the instructions
are as in steps 6 to 10, except that
11
in step 8, the two wires go to the decoder
white wire and the single wire to the decoder
yellow wire. And this is the result - head
lights and tail lights which stay on even when
the Voyager is static.
May Issue 2007 Get the latest news at www.model-rail.com 25

Sound support
JOHN FERGUSON tests Dapol’s claim
that it is possible to install realistic
digital sound in an ‘N’ gauge
Virgin Voyager.
When I saw the attractive box for this
set at my dealer - John Dutfield in
Chelmsford - I was impressed that
Dapol had taken the initiative in
providing the means to fit not only DCC lighting
but a sound decoder as well. The
set promised the most realistic model yet in ‘N’
gauge with quality and detail finish to
a very high standard.
While the box has basic printed instructions
for fitting the decoders, detail guidance needed
for the sound decoder is only available on the
Dapol website. There are two decoders used for
lighting, one to each of the end cars, together
with a sound decoder used also as the motor
drive. If preferred, a normal motor drive
decoder can be fitted in place of the sound
decoder.
I thought that having completed and tested
the set-up a detail article would be useful for
readers contemplating the purchase of this
model. No advance skills are required.
On its website Dapol shows an example of
the process for fitting an ESU Loksound Micro
sound decoder with motor drive and an
associated loudspeaker. This type of sound
decoder has the advantage that sounds can be
installed and modified later.
I purchased mine from South West Digital as
it offered to install suitable sounds for the
The triangle of lights with a single very bright
headlight is a key feature of all modern trains
- including the Class 220/221 Voyagers.
VIRGIN TRAINS/MILEPOST 92 1 ⁄2
model. It is supplied with a 6-pin plug to be
inserted in the NEM socket provided for each
decoder. Other sounds are available from the
ESU website for downloading and installing,
using the Loksound Programmer, but these are
only suitable for European locomotives.
For the two lighting decoders I used Lenz
Silver Mini No. 10311s - the type that comes with
a 6-pin plug. These are to control the lights but
the built-in motor drive was not used. I found
that they could not be programmed by my DCC
command station to change the address in CV1
or other CVs as with no motor connected the
command station just reported errors.
MASTERCLASS: DAPOL VOYAGER SOUND
Here’s How You Can Do It…
easy - Skill Level - advanced
Cover of the box containing the ‘N’ gauge
1Dapol Class 220.
Driving car showing the lighting scheme
2 with three white headlights leading.
The plug from the sound decoder inserted
3 in the NEM socket provided.
May Issue 2007 Get the latest news at www.model-rail.com 27

MASTERCLASS: DAPOL VOYAGER SOUND
This problem was easily overcome by
mounting the car with the sound decoder -
which also drives the motor - on the programming
track together with one of the cars fitted
with the Lenz decoder. The address for the
model’s number in CV1 was then programmed
to both decoders. The decoders then had the
same address so that they acted together. The
other car with the Lenz decoder was then
exchanged with the first one and once again
programmed with the sound decoder using the
same address.
If it was found (this did not happen in my
case) that the lights are not alternately white at
the front and red at the rear then using CV29
adjustments for forward to reverse or vice
versa should deal with the problem. I am
indebted to a member of the Model Electronic
Railway Group (MERG) for this advice.
The model as supplied including the lighting
units works satisfactorily on a DC system as
special plugs have been fitted instead of DCC
decoders.
The installation of the Lenz decoders was very
straightforward. The chassis to the two end cars
was removed by springing the body way from
the chassis. I used my finger nail rather than a
metal tool as this seemed less likely to cause
damage. To install the decoder it was simply a
matter of removing the DC plugs and plugging
in the Lenz decoders making absolutely sure
that pin 1 on the decoder lined up with pin 1 on
the socket. This is clearly marked. Careful
inspection of the documentation for the decoder
ensured that pin 1 was properly identified.
Replacement of the chassis was again by
springing the body outwards and pressing the
chassis into position.
The sound decoder was installed in the car
with the motor again by removing the chassis,
removing the DC plug, and plugging in the
sound decoder. The position for the sound
decoder is over one of the drive shafts mounted
Here’s How You Can Do It…
The sound decoder mounted on a
4 Plastikard support above the drive shaft
as recommended by Dapol.
on a support made from Plastikard as shown in
the photographs here and on the Dapol website.
Wires for the loudspeaker must be taken
through holes made in the ends of the cars
leading to the other middle car next to the
powered car. These need to be of very light
gauge or they will affect the stability of the cars.
White wire has been used to make this clear.
The photographs show the loudspeaker
mounted on the chassis, first having been
trimmed with a sharp knife to reduce its width.
Holes were drilled in the bottom of the chassis
to let the sound out. No speaker enclosure is
necessary or supplied.
easy - Skill Level - advanced
A side view of the Plastikard support
5 for the sound decoder mounted over the
drive shaft.
Voyagers undergoing routine
maintenance at the dedicated Central
Rivers depot near Burton-on-Trent.
The manual for the sound decoder is very
comprehensive and allows for many adjustments
including modifying the sound effects.
One area of realism to get used to however is
that on powering up the model with the sound
switched on is there is a delay to simulate the
motor coming to full power before the drive is
connected. I have found the realism achieved
enhances the pleasure that comes from the
hobby.
n John Ferguson is a member of the
Model Electronic Railway Group. (MERG), web:
www.merg.info MR
Holes need to be drilled through the
6 bottom of the body to let out the sound
from the loudspeaker.
Holes will be
8 needed in
both coaches
for the speaker
wires. In practice
black wires
should be used.
Otherwise the
installation
process is
relatively
simple.
The loudspeaker must be trimmed to
7 reduce its width for mounting in the body.
28
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