Garden Railway Forum

Hello all,

I'm hoping someone can offer some advice...

Not having had a working railway for a while I'd not used my Andel Moelwyn for 18 months - when I did come to use it the battery had died.

Both Andel and Strikalite have offered advice but the problem is that I'm entirely clueless when it comes to this stuff - I've just come off the phone to the very friendly chap at Strikalite wondering whether he was talking another language...

Andy at Andel suggested a trickle charger, but I don't possess one, and I think the chap at Strikalite was suggesting using a different charger to run a bigger current into the battery to kind of kick start it - I don't know if I possess the right kit, and anyway don't feel very comfortable doing something I understand so little about!

It seems like I could get replacement cells for about £12 which might be the best solution for me. The pack says 6V 2/3A 1500 on it and consists of 5 cells joined together. I don't know how those are wired together or connected into the rest of the loco's wiring - that's concealed beneath a plastic sheath which I'm loathed to remove unless I need to. Would replacing the cells be a relatively simple job?

Any thoughts or an idiot's guide would be very welcome!

Thanks,

Andrew.

This is a good place to buy battery's http://www.componentshop.co.uk/batterie ... harge.html and this is a guide to battery's http://www.componentshop.co.uk/batteries-exp/

This is the charger I use works well.     http://www.componentshop.co.uk/mw3168vd.html

The problem with rechargeable batteries is they do self discharge, and these days the chargers tend to be fast or ultra fast chargers which do not help. The best and safest way to charge batteries is a slow charger - it takes a lot longer but there is less risk of overcharging which effectively reduces the life of the batteries.

One tip I've learned is you can sometimes use a basic 12v car battery charger to "jump start" a dead battery pack to a voltage that your charger may then accept for charging. Make sure you connect the power leads up correctly and switch the car battery charger on for a very short time - depends on your battery pack voltage but start off with 30 secs to a minute.

If your battery pack is a nicad one then it will probably have lost a lot of it's capacity and be destined for the bin - I'm refurbishing some Radio Control equipment for some non-Garden Railway projects and I've just had to bin lots of dead AA nicad cells.

Chris Cairns.

It's not entirely uncommon for a dud nicad cell in a pack to actually reverse voltage. If you don't know what you are doing, don't mess with a nicad pack. All rechargeable cells are potentially dangerous if not treated correctly. Buy a new pack and a suitable slow charger. I've been doing electric R/C flight for 20 years so have some experience with rechargeable cells wheters it's NiCd, NiMH or LiPo cells.

Is there no data sheet or instructions with the loco on how to change the battery pack. Always a problem when the batteries are concealed and with on board charging convenient but not when batteries die and need replacing. Five cells in 6v ?

Thanks for all your thoughts so far folks, much appreciated - good links Big Al.

The batteries are Ni-MH, so that sounds a little more positive. If I can find a way to revive them that would be good because yes, the battery pack does seem to be "hard-wired" into the circuit. Guess to replace I'd snip the wires then twist the new ones to the old and secure with a little solder? If I had the skill I could solder the new pack directly into the gizmo (technical term) the existing pack joins to, but I'm not great at soldering and fear I'd fry something important.

I have an Axtronics smart charger for another loco which claims to act as a trickle charger when the appropriate point in the charging cycle is reached. Its plug doesn't fit Moelwyn's socket, but it looks like that could be changed - perhaps that's the way to go? At least to start with.

Again, thoughts welcome! My poor old Moelwyn has probably only run for about an hour or so in the two or three years I've owned it - I'd love to get it up and running so I really appreciate the assistance!

All the best,

Andrew.