Train-O-Rama – 49 Class

A few hints about the 49 Class not in the manual.

The new 49 class released by Trainorama is a beautiful model and comes with a few features not mentioned in the instruction that come with the loco.

THE HEAD LIGHTS – ON DC

Besides the obvious reversing headlights are the reversing marker lights. When you take the loco from the box and put on a DC track for the first time the headlight and 2 x white markers lights come on when going forward and 2 x red markers are on at the back of the loco. Change direction and the backup light comes on and the rear markers change to white and the markers at the other end change to red.

In a little plastic bag in the box is a strange T piece – this is a magnetic wand. It is used to turn the lights on/off – there is a reed switch at each end and by placing the wand over the switch the light AT THAT END can be turned on/off. How neat is that?

Photo courtesy Allan Brown

FITTING A DECODER (NON SOUND)

First off, to remove the body just remove the two coupling and their housings then the body will lift straight off. Once the body is off you will see the dummy plug mounted at the end near the speaker (8 ohm, 1 watt). Remove the plug and you are ready to plug in your 8 pin decoder plug. This will allow you to turn all the lights on and off as you would normally. I used a TCS T1 for this test as it is small and probably has the best low speed running of any decoder and is a very good price.

Now, if you want to control the marker lights seperately, then the TCS T4X is the ideal decoder for the job. The two extra functions can be used for the markers at each end and the markers can be programmed to operate in the right direction.

Gerry Hopkins MMR