kato "hiroshima railway type 200 hannover tram"

[nik_n_dad]

Does anyone have this little tram and installed dcc?  I think there's room, but I haven't seen anything anywhere on it  (we recently picked one up).

 

 

 

[Bernard]

Does anyone have this little tram and installed dcc?  I think there's room, but I haven't seen anything anywhere on it  (we recently picked one up).

 

 

 

 

 

If no one responds that has this tram.... then I would suggest that you take it apart in different stages, take photos, post the photos, and some of the members here can tell you what to do to install the decoder.

What decoder where you planning on using? If it's an older model you might have to solder the connections.

[Martijn Meerts]

I don't have the tram, but I'm pretty sure it's no problem fitting a decoder in there. Of course, you'll be able to see it through the windows, some people don't like that ;)

 

Although, you might be able to hide a small one in 1 of the driver cabs..

[nik_n_dad]

It's going to be a wire-in, so something like a DZ125.  I was thinking about adding tinting to the windows to make the decoder less visible.

 

I'm very new to wired decoder installs, so I was hoping someone already had the recipe  ;-)

[stevenh]

That was the very first N-Scale loco I bought (years and years ago) by accident.

And seriously, I haven't taken it out of it's box in a while, but there's very little room in the cabs... gluing it to the ceiling would be a better choice and running copper wiring.

 

I hadn't even thought of DCC'ing it.

[bill937ca]

It's going to be a wire-in, so something like a DZ125.  I was thinking about adding tinting to the windows to make the decoder less visible.

 

You could just add window shades like many Japanese streetcars have.  That particular prototype doesn't have them.

 

http://www5.big.or.jp/~hatashi/ichiran/i0238.html

 

But other Hiroden cars do have them.

 

http://www5.big.or.jp/~hatashi/ichiran/i0351.html

 

http://www5.big.or.jp/~hatashi/ichiran/i0353.html

[Kabutoni]

You could just add window shades like many Japanese streetcars have.  That particular prototype doesn't have them.

 

http://www5.big.or.jp/~hatashi/ichiran/i0238.html

 

That it's becuase it's a German made car, completely left in its original state (apart from some very minor changes). Trams don't have window shades here ;)

[nik_n_dad]

Unfortunately the digicam wasn't working the night I decided to tackle this conversion.  We're thinking of getting another because 1) they're fun ad 2) they're pretty inexpensive.  When we do we'll post images.

 

In the mean time, if anyone's interested, I can post (in text) what we did, for what it's worth. But honestly, I've had drop-in decoders that were harder than this wire-in.  It's about a 10 minutes conversion, and works like a champ.

[Bernard]

Congratulations! Sometimes the older train models are harder or even impossible to install a decoder.

[bill937ca]

Here's Hiroshima 200 on one of its now normal assignments: Christmas light display.  That should be enough to keep you DCCers busy for months.  

 

http://f-page.txt-nifty.com/blog/cat640168/index.html

 

2009

 

http://translate.google.com/translate?js=y&prev=_t&hl=en&ie=UTF-8&layout=1&eotf=1&u=http%3A%2F%2Ff-page.txt-nifty.com%2Fblog%2Fcat640168%2Findex.html&sl=ja&tl=en

 

2008

 

http://translate.googleusercontent.com/translate_c?hl=en&ie=UTF-8&sl=ja&tl=en&u=http://f-page.txt-nifty.com/blog/2008/12/2008-merry-chri.html&prev=_t&rurl=translate.google.com&twu=1&usg=ALkJrhgTeptvBnk9xCC2i4i3Wg7jxafw1g

 

2007

 

http://translate.googleusercontent.com/translate_c?hl=en&ie=UTF-8&sl=ja&tl=en&u=http://f-page.txt-nifty.com/blog/2007/12/2007_merry_chri.html&prev=_t&rurl=translate.google.com&twu=1&usg=ALkJrhghq8WczV9xP5LMkccSDyTZFHWjTQ

 

2006

 

http://translate.googleusercontent.com/translate_c?hl=en&ie=UTF-8&sl=ja&tl=en&u=http://f-page.txt-nifty.com/blog/2006/12/2006_merry_chri.html&prev=_t&rurl=translate.google.com&twu=1&usg=ALkJrhigI7kfyQrEyg_kzZs-JgmWZ4wNvw

[alpineaustralia]

I should be installing a decoder in one within the next week or so and so I will post photos of my install unless someone beats me to it.

At this stage I am even toying with the idea on installing an EM13 decoder which may just work. Not sure yet.

[nik_n_dad]

I used a z-scale wire-in decoder.  The key (learning) for me was to remove the big blue capacitor that you can see through the windows (simply pry up that white "kato plug" that holds it and the motor tabs down.  Other than that, it was simply soldering to the rails and the motor tabs and a bit of kapton to isolate the tabs from the rails.  Because these are fun little trams, we bought a 2nd that I'm going to try to add headlights to (using surface mount LEDs)

 

Let me know how it goes.

[alpineaustralia]

Have you got any photos of your install?

[Mossberg]

I have also orderd one of these trams. Thought it will be The Thing that connects my current German layout with my future Japanes layout :-).

 

So I am also interested in some pictures of a decoder install.

 

/Magnus M

[nik_n_dad]

Nik & I will try to take before & after photos tomorrow (we bought 2, only one has been converted).  Be forewarned, this was my first wire-in so it may not be pretty