Hi All, I have had the 4367 SBB Euro City set with extra cars 4366 and 4368 since 1998, apart from a test run on the layout they have stayed in storage ever since. I decided to change some rolling stock on my layout and the Swiss set seemed to be a good choice to run but I wanted to have all the coaches with LED lighting operated by an old 6080 decoder. The last coach would also have red tail lights. I m very pleased with the final result shown above, so if I have sparked your interest read on to find out the tips and tricks to achieve this great result. Warning: - You undertake the following modifications at your own risk. Decoder and LED Installation in the Buffet Car The Buffet Car is an ideal choice to install the decoder as it has a large area for the decoder and also it is in the middle of the train separating 1 st class from the 2 nd class coaches. The decoder has enough space to fit as shown below. I covered the two windows on the right (red arrow) with white paper on the inside folded around the window insert to hold it in place without using glue so the decoder cannot be seen, some light still shines through these windows making it look as if the blinds were pulled down. On the left end I had enough room for a relay, diode bridge and capacitor to power and switch the coach lights for the entire train. See circuit diagram page 8. There are six LEDs, spaced at 30mm mounted on a Vero board (3 foils) that is supported by a homemade light diffuser cut from a fluorescent light diffuser. Also note that I have inserted white paper without glue in the roof to help reflect any light. http://members.ozemail.com.au/~rossstew/rms/marklin.html 1
Decoder and LED Installation in the Buffet Car continued Wiring the decoder and connecting it to the relay at the other end wasn t without difficulties. The interior seat detail sits flat on the chassis and there is no channel to run wires the length of the coach. I overcame this problem by drilling 16x 1.5mm holes under the seats close to the edge as shown by the blue arrows. This allowed me to run two wires (yellow f0) and brown for the ground connection. On the left hand side I had a two pin socket mounted to the coupling pocket and wired up to the Vero board and on the right hand side I used a two pin connector wired to the Vero board. This is the path for the 16Vdc supply to the LEDs and for each coach. Note that the white dots on each connector and socket indicate the +plus and must only be connected this way for the LEDs to work in each coach. The wires on the left coach (male connector) are held in place with a small rubber band to maintain the correct length and the wire loops just enough to allow movement of the couplings before entering a small gap in the coach floor. The socket (female connector) is super glued to the underside of the coupling pocket and the wire loops just enough to allow movement of the couplings before entering a small gap in the coach floor. The Buffet Car is the only power source for the entire train, which means one collector shoe and one ground collector so there is very little drag on the train. http://members.ozemail.com.au/~rossstew/rms/marklin.html 2
1 st Class Coaches The coach arrangement to the right of the Buffet Car is one 1 st class coach then the two panorama coaches followed by the leading 1 st class coach which would couple to the locomotive. I arranged all the coaches so the single seats were on one side of the train. The 1 st class coach closest to the Buffet Car requires a socket on the left hand side and a male connector on the right hand side. The wires connect via a small Vero board (see page 7) that holds one 680 ohm resistor at each end then to the LED Vero board that runs the full length of the coach held by a homemade light diffuser. Don t forget the white paper in the roof to help reflect light. The leading 1 st class coach 4368 only requires a socket on the left hand side. For the leading coach I mounted the 680 ohm resistors as shown. The spacing for the LED s on the LED Vero board (3 foils) was 35mm which will centrally position the LEDs over the interior seating. The combined LED PCB and light diffuser fits in to a recess at both ends of the coach http://members.ozemail.com.au/~rossstew/rms/marklin.html 3
Panorama 1 st Class Coaches The panorama cars need a different approach to get the wiring and LED s done. First I cut up a self adhesive flexible warm white LED strip for separate LED s. I drew a line on my desk and marked every 30mm. Using masking tape I stuck the LED s at the 30mm marks and wired three LED s in series then the next three LED s in series soldering directly to the LED. Using a pencil I then marked the position of the LED s on the roof of the coach. With all the LED s wired I then removed the protective paper from the adhesive on the back of the each LED and positioned each LED at the marked locations. This gave me a low profile light without any visible wiring. The socket connector on the left hand side is connected to a two foil Vero board strip glued with hot melt glue in the position as shown. The right hand side male connector also connects to the Vero board strip. Make sure you get the polarity correct and mark the +plus with a white dot. With two 680 resistors mounted on a Vero Board (3 foils) wire the LED group cathode (3 LED s in series) to each resistor and connect the +plus to the remaining foil. For a closer view see page 7. Coupling Modifications As the electrical cables pass underneath the couplings I removed the portion of the uncoupler bar (marked in orange) at the location of the red arrow using side cutters. This allows for easier connection of the plug and socket but also allows you to still uncouple the coaches. http://members.ozemail.com.au/~rossstew/rms/marklin.html 4
2nd Class Coaches x2 With the two 2 nd class coaches from the set I chose to have a limiting resistor mounted on its own small Vero board at each end of the coach hot melt glued to the top of the seats as shown. This also acted as a junction board to make all the wiring very easy at both ends of the coach. See detailed wiring of this small PCB on page 7. 2nd Class Coach 4366 (end coach) Märklin decided to have a lift off roof instead of having to remove the entire body shell for this coach. As I wanted rear red lights for this coach I had to use a 2mm drill and carefully centre the drill in the moulding of the light detail at the end of the coach. The red LED s were wired in series with a black wire connected to the anode of one LED and the cathode of the other LED. A longer grey wire was soldered to the remaining anode and a Black wire to the remaining cathode. The two red LED s where then glued into position with hot melt glue (red arrows). The grey wire from the red LED s was soldered to the +plus foil and the black wire soldered to the end of the 1k resistor. Ensure the foil is cut with a 3mm drill, see red dot between the two resistor leads. Refer to wiring diagram page 8. http://members.ozemail.com.au/~rossstew/rms/marklin.html 5
2nd Class Coach 4366 continued To get the wires from the male connector into the coach I had to drill a 2mm hole at the location shown by the red arrow. On the chassis I used my side cutters to make a small indent (see red line) to allow the wires to pass through the hole in the body shell. The view above shows white paper inserted into the removable roof. The LED PCB (shown upside down) was used to also mount the limiting resistors because I didn t use a light diffuser for this coach. Mechanical Problem On this coach the flanges of the wheel bottomed on the chassis making a strange noise and created unwanted drag on the free movement of the coach. Using a HS Dremel cutter #114 I cut a small groove to allow free movement of the wheels for the bogie turning arc. http://members.ozemail.com.au/~rossstew/rms/marklin.html 6
Mechanical Problem continued The same problem exists on all the other coaches but the solution to fix the wheel movement is different. You can see a slight arc where the wheel flanges bottomed on the chassis. The solution was to place small shims 0.5mm thick on either side of the bogie mounting and super glue them into place. The train now runs very smooth. Mechanical Problem 21-12-2012 After a few months of running on the layout I started having derailments in the most difficult places on the layout. The train is quite heavy and the loads on the close couplers were causing the couplers to jam, flicking the coaches off the track. Using a needle file I rounded off the coupling guide (see red line) by a very small amount and applied Woodland s HL 657 white grease with Teflon to the guide. This allowed the coupler to move much smoother. I would recommend using white grease on all coupler guides where you have plastic rubbing on plastic to minimize wear and tear. While I had the train apart I also noticed that the clip on bogie detail would obstruct the free movement of the bogie (yellow arrow) so I removed this detail by unclipping it from the body of the bogie for each coach. The last problem was I had one double slip (2271) in the shadow station area that would lift the collector shoe a little higher than usual and the Buffet coach would lift allowing the bogie wheels to derail. I added a small weight on top of the decoder in the coach above the bogie with the collector shoe and this seems to have solved all derailment issues at this time. http://members.ozemail.com.au/~rossstew/rms/marklin.html 7
PCB for Power Supply and LED Lighting (typical) The LED PCB is used to mount the PLCC2 LED s and to supply power through the coach. The black arrow is the Neg connection and the violet arrow connects to the 680R limiting resistor. The orange wire is the +plus supply. In the middle of the PCB (red arrow) there is a small wire link between the +plus and the anodes of the two LED s, refer to wiring diagram page 8. LED Spacing 1 st class and 2 nd class coaches are on 35mm centres Buffet and 1 st class panorama coaches are on 30mm centres Resistor Limiting PCB s LED LED Connector Connector For this PCB ensure the foil is cut under the two resistors. Solder a wire link on the right hand side of the resistors. (see black line). This arrangement is only used for the leading and panorama coaches. For this PCB two are required one for each end of the coach. In the Buffet and end 2 nd class end coach the limiting resistors are mounted on the LED PCB. http://members.ozemail.com.au/~rossstew/rms/marklin.html 8
Wiring Diagram Buffet Car F0f 6080 ~ ~ Decoder F0r 10uF 25V +Plus 15Vdc -Neg Wiring Diagram Coach LED Lighting (typical) +Plus 680R 680R -Neg Rear Red LED Lights +plus 1k -Neg LED Array Wizard The current limiting resistor values were calculated using the Led Array Wizard http://members.ozemail.com.au/~rossstew/rms/marklin.html 9
Train Assembly As the train is an eight car consist I assembled two cars at a time by coupling the coaches together then laying the coaches on their sides on a flat bench and plug the electrical connectors together. With a coach in each hand, carefully place the coupled coaches on the track, then assemble the next pair and repeat the process until you have four sets of paired coaches. Now the hard part is to couple the coach pairs together and make the electrical connections. I use tweezers to plug in the male plug to the socket connector, fortunately this only has to be done in three places. Observations With the different interior colours, the LED lighting which is the same for each coach has a marked difference. The 2 nd class coaches with blue interiors look the worse in the train consist. Well lit coaches just scream out to be populated, so I guess I ll have to start painting little Preiser figures. This project took me 2.5 days to complete and most of the time was spent on planning how to get the best results. Parts List (suggested) Part Number Supplier Description Quantity 6080 Märklin Decoder or similar 1 73405 Märklin Collector shoe/ground spring power feed set 1 51942 ESU Black cable, 0.5mm diameter, AWG36, 10m 1 51946 ESU Grey cable, 0.5mm diameter, AWG36, 10m 1 159-3458 Element14 Socket, PCB, 1 Row, 2 Way or similar 7 159-3411 Element14 Header, PCB, Vert, 1 Row, 2 Way or similar 7 149-7586 Element14 2W06G Bridge Rectifier, 2A/600V or similar 1 945-1153 Element14 Capacitor, 10uF, 25V or similar 1 948-0145 Element14 Relay 12Vdc, SPCO 1 100-3186 Element14 HLMP-6300 HE Red LED sub miniature size 2 PLCC2LW3CT Ledz.com PLCC2 Warm white LED 36 STRF3W3 Ledz.com PLCC2 Warm white LED s on Flexible LED strip 1 934-1102 Element14 1K MF25 Resistor 0.25W, 1% 1 934-2150 Element14 680R MF25 Resistor 0.25W, 1% 16 120-1478 Element14 Protoboard 100x220 or similar 1 As always enjoy your model trains. http://members.ozemail.com.au/~rossstew/rms/marklin.html 10