Hi Joe, If it has anything to do with your N Scale layout, this is as good a place as any to start. I will help you along here. The size of the layout is not the only determination for the booster. There are other things to look at and see if the controller can source the power. They are things like how many locomotives will be running at the same time, and do any of them have sound. Next, are you going to be driving any accessories like stationary decoders, signal or occupancy detection, because sometimes they required being hooked up to track power to work. There are many good starter sets out there, so you do have choices. Digitrax - Zephyr, 4 amps NCE - Power Cab, 1.7 amps MRC - Prodigy Express, 1.6 amps Lenz - Set 90, 5 amps and several others. They vary in the amperes supplied so that is why you need to take a look at all things using power on the layout to help in you decision.
jocatch Sharkman and Pastoolio cover most of the issues with them. I use to get my Atlas locos with there decoder and could never figure out why they ran so different form my other locos with aftermarket decoders until I started switching the stock decoder for aftermarket. This made a big difference in how the ran. The installation is not to hard, you are just replacing the light board with the decoder.
BTW all of my Atlas locos with factory installed Lenz decoders have the Lenz logo on the outside of the box, so that is one way to tell which decoders are installed. On my new Atlas Dash 8-40CW, the factory installed decoder is made by NCE and has all of the features found on most newer decoders. Jamie
Hello. As to me : There are different brands, but i think, it's worth to focus on some particular models of each brand. I have experience with 2 types of american locos: Life-Like - RS-2 good quality good digitability and applicable current pickup. For better performance i use couple of them Kato-P42 - good detail, but not so good dynamic backlash of truks. Their fixed at one plate, and some problems can occur on curved or not so ideally layed track. As a solution - use couple of this loco as back-to-back (one motor reversed) My friend has InterMountain - SD45 - but their motor has poor digitising abilities. Speed instability are taking place. I thing this is all because different sections of motor's core has different quantities of turns and therefore - unstable measured back EMF. ------------ Vadim.
That's an interesting point. Is the number of turns very critical? I have little knowledge in this field. Though with today's technology one would expect the machines to wind all parts equally. As I only use DC, it may not affect my engines much, maybe?
Hello swissboy! Only very old models like Roco - BR150 have very old motor constructions. At 80th and 90th years there was no DCC and nobody worried about it. These motors works well at DC, even if they has different quantities of turns on core poles. This is all because no feedback - and, then - no possible unstability. The main problem appears only in DCC when we are measuring Back-EMF to estimate loco's speed. This measurment happens at short moments of time when controller swiches off any current. If the quantity of turns (of appropriate motor poles which is temporarily conneted through collector at this time of measuring), is smaller then Back EMF becomes also smaller, therefore controller (which dont know about this deffect )are triing to increases speed by increasing current, and, thus, we have disturbance in speed. This affection also can occur due to old wide constructions of motor brushes, which can occasionally pickup current from differen angles of collector - and therefore we also have a chance to obtain reduced or sufficiently noised back EMF. As a solution - some DCC decoders has adjustable time intervals of collecting and averaging Back EMF as well as adjustable PID constants . Appropriarte fiddly adjustments may solve this problem. As a result - i was forced to change LENZ onto ZIMO decoder, and fiddly CV adjustments allow me to achieve more smooth run. ----------- Thanks, Vadim.
Back EMF is not necessarily the problem. It is actually there in every magnetic core motor. DCC just enhances (increases) the level of Back EMF, but I have not seen any decoder where this can not be turned off.
Well guys I went out today and bought my first N scale loco, an Atlas CSX GP38-2 with Lentz decoder installed (#47826). I picked it up from my local train store and it was the only CSX engine he had. I paid more than I what I could have gotten it from the net but this guy's business is hurting and I wanted to help him stay in business. I don't have a DCC contoller yet but have decided on the Digitrax Zehpyr. So far I have run the engine on a piece of flextrack with a DC power pack. First thing I noticed were the couplers. Very nice, I think they are called Accumates? Anyway, they don't match any couplers of the couple of cheap freight cars someone gave me years ago. Do the moderen freight cars come with Accumates or will I have to retro fit the cars like I did with Kadees and my HO Atherean cars? Joe
Joe, All of the current releases come with compatible couplers. Atlas uses the Accumates, Micro-Trains uses their couplers, Intermountain uses Micro-Trains couplers, Athearn has used Accumates in the past, but is now using McHenry, I believe Bachman and Walthers are both using Accumates as well. In any event, all of these are compatible with each other.
What DCESharkman about the various knuckle couplers is true. What I do to make it even more true is set all my couplers to the Micro-Trains gauge and leave them there. Anything that cannot be made to work with other knuckle couplers set to the MTL gauge get replaced.
I would like to chime in on the Atlas & Kato King of the hill statement. Can't go wrong with either. Both are tried and true Winners. The others are more hit or miss in my opinion. And these days with my Bucks I want a sure Winner. But I will admit I am taking a chnace on the FVM GEVO's; which from rumors seem to be a winner also.
