Don't forget that Bachmann is part of a Chinese company.

Ton

years ago i converted a Little Big Haulers caboose into a more realistic model.
https://www.amerikaanse-treinen.nl/forum/index.php?topic=352.msg7951#msg7951
Have a look at the pictures.
I used Accucraft couplers #11730.

if you look at the history of 0n30 you will find that before Bachmann found it commercially interesting, builders took H0 material and converted them to 0 scale.
That's why 0n30 uses H0 couplers.
The EZ mate coupler by Bachmann are the plastic version of Kadee after their patent ended.

Ton

Those cars were initially made for 0n3.
the coupler height for 0n3 is higher than for 0n30.
The Kadee 803 couplers are also bigger than the 0n30 couplers.
0n30 uses H0 couplers.
You better use Kadee ol'#5 couplers with shims to get the right height.

Ton

I sympathise with you.
I know these connectors are fragile.
I usually take a locomotive out of the box, connect it to the tender and leave it alone.
What I did in a similar situation was to forget the connectors and soldered the wires directly to the board inside the locomotive.
It's not the most elegant solution but it works.

Ton

When I started with trains 60 years ago in Holland you had Fleischmann couplers and Marklin couplers.
Funtional but not very lifelike.
When i started with American train in the seventies, Athern locomotives and cars, you know the ones you had to put together and paint yourself, you had the hornhook couplers.
Also functional but not so lifelike.
Then a schoolmate of mine introduced me to KaDee.
The revolutionary lifelike couplers I always wanted.
For me it's a nobrainer, knuckleheads in 2020 are still the best.

Ton

There are also red and green leds with two connections.
One way in is red and when you switch polarity it is green.

Ton

Same scale other wheel spacing.
on3 cars are usually longer , on30 cars tend to be shorter.
So yes you can use those decals.
I had them from San Juan Decals and i found a Dutch guy who can print custom decal sheets in the Netherlands.
https://www.decalwinkel.nl/
You provide  him with a JPG or a pcx file you have drawn yourself and tell him how you want it; in colour , black or in white.

Ton

Current is what an appliance draws when it needs it. (Ampere)
The tension ( Voltage) is what is applied. (Volt)
A LED is nothing more than a diode that emits light.
A diode only lets a current through in one direction.
The name says it all , a Light Emitting Diode and fall in the category of semi conductors.
When an electron in a high energy state goes back to its original energy level it emits a photon.
The colour emitted depends on how high the jump is.
Thats quantum mechanics.
Take AC and put a diode into the circuit, it will only let through one polarity.
Then you get a DC Voltage with a frequency of 60 Hertz in your case and 50 in mine.
Using a bridge rectifier you also flip the omitted polarity up and you get 120 Hertz and in my case 100 Hertz.
That might count for the flickering you get when making DC from AC.
A capacitor can been seen as a loadable battery that gives of Voltage when needed.
Taking a capacitor and connecting it behind the rectifying diode(s) from plus to minus it will flatten out the pulses.
Gone are the flickers.
To keep it simple, DCC is not AC but DC but it behaves like AC if you measure it with a multimeter.
That is why you need to rectify the voltage with a couple of diodes or a bridge rectifier.
I hope you get it because this is difficult for me to explain in English.
My native language is Dutch.

Ton

Quote from: J. S. Bach on May 13, 2020, 10:36:46 PM

Quote from: RailMan63 on May 12, 2020, 07:13:33 PM...snip... I did some research after reading your post, and I found that the bridge rectifier is unnecessary when running on a DCC system ...snip...

What, if anything, would happen if you ran that car on a DCC system with the rectifier in place?

Nothing at all.
The rectifier has no influence on the dcc signal at all.
You are just adding four more diodes to the system as a LED is also a diode.
That said, I was told that using a LED as rectifier shortens the life of that LED.

Ton

A bridge rectifier is made for rectifying  AC to DC but also works from DC to DC.
https://www.electronics-tutorials.ws/diode/diode_6.html?utm_referrer=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.google.com%2F
Have a look at the schematics.
I made a mobile power supply on a flat car for a wireless camera and have no problems with DCC.

A LED usually consumes  20 mA.
If I make a power supply I always use the rule of thump, 2200uF per Amp.

2200x0,02=44uF per LED
Times the number of LED's.
3?
=132
taking the E24 standard sequence it would be 150uF.
That should be enough but to be sure use 220uF.

Ton

nice.
I don't use a bridge rectifier because i have DCC.
But i understand why you are using one.
What value resistor did you use?
And is 1000uF a bit overkill?

Ton

Yes, documentation on the decoder is to say the least sloppy.
That goes for the TCS site and also the Bachmann site.
I did some programming using this part of the TCS site.
https://tcsdcc.com/4CVSteamV4
And with JMRI using the TCS wowsound decoder.
It is not the correct decoder for this model but you can do some programming.

Ton

I opted for 0n30 because of the track available and the costs back in 2006.
0n3 track is difficult to get  outside the States or is usually hand layed.
Most models in 0n3 are brass, $$$$$$$$$$.
0n30 (16.5 mm) is , what the Bachman says about 30 inch, 0n3 (19 mm) represents 3ft.

BTW I have a rake of AHM D&RGW box cars that are originally 0n3 but also came out in 0n30.
Yes  , if you compare them with the 0n30 boxcars that Bachmann produced , they are bigger.
But they go well with my Bachmann locomotives.

Ton

She was painted in the Bumble Bee colours in 1949 for the Chicago rail fair and left that way after the show.
Before that occasion the #268 was standard black.

Ton