[Ichabod]

So, to make a short story long, on Saturday my wife said to me "why don't you go to Colpar and get an Easter basket car for [the boy], oh and get one for yourself." I believe I was halfway there before the echo of her words had subsided.

After weighing up my options I decided on the two Pioneer Black and Gold cars, #23 and #38, due in no small part to the ease of conversion with the DPR plugs (and the store now has the Rev G ones), saving me some late night soldering. The other possibility was a couple of Slot.Its, but until I can get the chips they're on the back burner.

Unpacked the #23 car, did an analogue test lap, then set to work getting the chip in there. In some distant past SSD promo video I'm sure I remember a hand pulling the plug out of the analogue blank by the wires, but I never do this as it seems prone to damage. I use needlenose pliers to pull the plug itself. As I'm putting the chip in place after doing nothing more (as far as I thought) than moving the plug around a bit I notice that the green wire has come loose, snapped right at the place where the tiny plug is crimped on. After trying all the usual effective curse words, I turned my attention to the #38 instead. It chipped very easily, and I put it back in the packaging.

As I was doing this I remembered that a while back I'd chipped a couple of DPR Ferraris with regular chips in the pre Rev G era, so I had a spare plug that I soldered in place (so much for no late night soldering. . .). 20 minutes or so later both cars were running nicely. Very nicely, actually.

So - has anyone else seen this problem, and was it me thinking I was being careful but being clumsy, or a delicate wire? Plus, would it actually be possible to buy a replacement plug, or fashion some other sort of repair if I hadn't been lucky enough to have spares? It looked very tricky to get the wire back in there to stay.

The cars, as a side note, are superb. A little "blueprinting" (hi Greg!), meaning just removing the magnet and sanding the rear tyres and they drive very nicely. They represent, to me, what Scalextric could be doing with cars with just a little more thought and effort - easy to chip, quick change braids with better quality braid, and better performing out of the box. Of course now I want a bunch more of them. . .

 

[Pioneer]

Ichabod, I pleased to hear you got up and running with digital on those Pioneer Mustangs.

We have some pre-wired plugs in stock so if you need one, send me a PM and we'll get you sorted out.

Jules

 

[JamieG]

for Jules!

Cheers,
JamieG

 

[hankscorpio]

Great service Jules...

I have found that this can happen with any DPR car... the wires in the plugs do not like any stress at all and using pliers can bend the plug... sure this is NOT just a pioneer problem just a factor of the tight fit of the DPR Plugs in the blanking Sockets...

I have taken to using the small jewellers screwdriver.... i now have one with a sharp point grounded out of a broken screwdriver... that i push into the "side" of the plug between it and the housing and a little flick will normally lever it out enough to expose the "slots" in the side of the plug that can then be used to lever it out gently... No broken contacts since adopting this method and only takes a couple of seconds... would recommend to anybody who has ever broken a wire in a DPR Plug... of which i am sure there are many!

 

[Wraith]

I can confirm, this is NOT an issue with just the Pioneer cars but the DPR connectors, Not sure WHY they need to put a plug into the blanking plate as I'm sure it wouldn't come loose as there is never that much space inside (err, unless its required to loop the power, never used any of the in analogue mode.

Nice of Jules to offer a spare, I will bear that in mind as I fixed the issue I had with two of the notchbacks last week.

 

[hankscorpio]

Yeah its to loop the power... but they are a stupidly tight fit!

 

[MrFlippant]

I agree with Sean that it's a tight fit issue. The interiors of the Pioneer cars leave very little room for the DPR chip wires, and I usually end up carefully bending them out of the way with the chassis completely off the car. I even had to cut a foot off (before realizing I could tweak it back into the cockpit and out of the way) to make room for the wires. Even then, they had to be bent severely, and again as Sean pointed out, the wires used for those don't like being bent hard like that. I had to make the same repair on one of mine for the same reason.

What I don't get is why the analog plug is flat to the door, while the digital plug is perpendicular. I'm sure it had to do with fitting it on the chip, but it makes tight fits that much tighter. Ah well.

Oh, and they do blueprint nicely and easily. I'm so glad Pioneer chose to use real bushings and smooth axles front and back. It makes truing and adjusting so much more pleasant. Pull the magnet, soften or replace the tires, a few grams up front behind the guide, and the same amount in back under the rear axle, and they're just perfect. Oh, and swap for the deep replacement guides, too. I managed to miss laps on a friend's track because I was punching it across his PB, but the deeper guide helped alleviate that. Again, very nice that they came with the option of a deeper guide.

 

[Ichabod]

QUOTE (hankscorpio @ 26 Apr 2011, 10:04) <{POST_SNAPBACK}>I have taken to using the small jewellers screwdriver.... i now have one with a sharp point grounded out of a broken screwdriver... that i push into the "side" of the plug between it and the housing and a little flick will normally lever it out enough to expose the "slots" in the side of the plug that can then be used to lever it out gently... No broken contacts since adopting this method and only takes a couple of seconds... would recommend to anybody who has ever broken a wire in a DPR Plug... of which i am sure there are many!
This is almost exactly what I did with the second car, and plan to do from now on.

I didn't think (or mean to imply) it was a Pioneer issue. It's an aspect of the car where Jules can't re-think/improve on the Scalextric design, after all.

At the end of our last race, my son commented "these cars run really well, I wonder how they'd be without magnets". He was pleasantly surprised to hear the magnets were already out.

 

[MrFlippant]

Nice!

 

[Pioneer]

While we're on the digital topic.......

Have any of you noticed a non-registering issue because the laser sometimes 'misses' or does not reflect from the grey guide blade as fitted to later models.

It has been discussed as a possible problem and if I can find evidence that this is the case, we'll revert to black plastic guides .

One car appeared to behave badly last week but in some testing today we could not repeat the fault.

Jules

 

[Ade]

hi
black is the best colour to use.Grey is a maybe and the older scaley blue ones are a definate no no.

 

[JamieG]

I think it is the led sensor registering the car, nothing to do with the pick-up

Never had any missed lap with my Pioneer.
Even when I had my NSR cars with white guide blades I had no issues... OK the chip lasted only few laps

With the (useless) analog scaley lap counter there are some problems of lap registration mostly with some cars but I think it is just due to the depth of the blade (i.e. avant slot rally cars)
Cheers,
JamieG

 

[Ichabod]

I've had no trouble with the Pioneer cars.
I have had trouble with the white guides on my two NSR cars, on the Clio I ended up replacing the guide, while on the P68 I went the cheap route and painted the guide.

 

[MrFlippant]

The only time I had problems was with the short guide at a friend's track where his base is in an acceleration zone when taking his racing line CLC. Any other time I would be going slow enough for it not to miss, and at home with my base in a braking zone I never missed a lap. The former problem was cured with the deeper guide. I don't think the guide color is a problem, so long as it is not of a plastic that allows IR to go through easily.