Well, I had the day off today so this: Was replaced with this. Here's the front. I need to get some pin striping tape, but it make sense to me. I think the loco runs better now. Still not great. I took the bad B unit back to my guy at the Local Train Store (not hobby shoppe, Train Store) and he said that instead of slowly ramping up to 50% power I should just immediately put the dial there. This seems to work better. I haven't called BLI. It would be nice to get one of those boxes to try out. Bottom Line: The wiring is no longer a factor. Everything is soldered up real nice. A better power pack or the BLI box, I guess, is my next step. Dan.
For what it's worth, I have have never had satisfactory performance running the PCM E7's with Loksound sound decoders, on my Railpower 1370 or MRC 9000 Tech 3. The Paragon-equipped BLI E8 / PA1s were a little bit better, but still far from satisfactory IMHO. Even the Athearn Tsunami-equipped FP45s I have, which run decently well on the above two DC power packs........ still IMHO on DC, doesn't even approach the fine control, performance, and individual sound/light controls that DCC gives you. While I can't prove it for sure, folks who run pure DC power packs seem to have much better luck with the PCM or BLI locos. But for most of us, we don't have pure filtered DC power packs. However, when I run the exact same PCM or BLI locos on my DCC NCE PowerCab, they run absolutely properly and well. It's been said that "Sound sells DCC" - in my case, this has absolutely been the case. Given that the completely self-contained NCE PowerCab can be had for probably $150 on the Internet - at that price which isn't that much more than the "DC Master" box.... IMHO, if you're having problems with sound locos on DC, the best short term and long term value for your money is to make the plunge and find out what the whole DCC thing is all about - after you do that, you may be asking yourself why you waited so long. And just so you don't think I'm a DCC bigot - like most of us, I too have way too many DC non-decoder equipped locos to change over the whole fleet. So there is a simple solution - I have an A/B switch and can run the entire layout in either "all DCC" or "all DC" mode. I have a small but vibrant DCC fleet and a separate, much larger DC-only fleet. I switch fleets as needed. While that probably doesn't work for everyone, for me it works just fine and I think would be the same for many. It's a way to have the best of both worlds without having to spend $$$$ on decoders for every loco. And after you've played with DCC for a little bit, you'll wonder why you waited so long . Just my 2 cents worth.
Bravo Dan! Looks a lot better! So when you say that you turn the dial up to 50% immediately and leave it there, does the loco then slowly increase speed like it did on my layout? I know the momentum is preset on the chips. I guess I can see where that might help as your not sending out different amounts of DC voltage while turning up the throttle. But that means every time you change the throttle setting, you will be potentially sending out different amounts of DC power that could effect the chip and the loco could start acting up every time. Hmmm, interesting. Will you be able to return the "B" unit?
OK, here's a long overdue update on my BLI N Scale sound equipped E unit. I first had tried it out 4 years ago, using a small loop of Kato UniTrack and an MRC 2800 DC power pack. The pulse power of this pack scrambled the decoders mind and required several hard resets followed by soft resets to fix the problem. Once I got it running properly using my Digitrax system, I put it back in its box to wait until I could set up my T-Trak modules with a proper DCC control. I purchased an NCE PowerCab system last year, ideal for use with my T-Track setup, but wasn't able to actually set anything up until just recently, when my club put up several modules in different scales at a nearby museum for a long-term display (we'll be set up till October 7th, over 6 months!). Needless to say, this long term display has given me a chance to finally get around to doing many long-put-off N Scale projects. Yesterday, I broke out my sound equipped BLI EMD E Unit for the first time since I had put it away over four years ago, anxious to wow the crowd with N Scale sound. Things went pretty well (or so I thought) for the first lap or two around the 2.5' x 8' little T-Trak layout, until, without any warning, there was a loud "pop" heard across the room, and the loco stopped instantly, billowing more smoke than I thought could be produced by a loco this size. I immediately picked it up and removed the shell, but not before the heat from the failed component had caused a sink mark in the shell's roof. There were several charred spots on the board along with what was left of the component that literally exploded with no warning. This loco had less than a half hour of total run time on it when that failure occurred, and most of that time was taken up by doing the resets four years ago. Obviously, I'm pretty disappointed with all of this, as are several of my club members who were watching while I proudly demonstrated N scale with sound. I have just sent BLI an email, and will await any reply from them (but I'm not holding my breath, since the paint scheme (FEC yellow/red) used on my loco is discontinued). Now I wonder if anyone else has suffered similar catastrophes, or am I the only "lucky" one? Bill in FtL
I've got an A B set That I got a few months ago . No problems here , but I do think that the Paragon decoders are a bit batty . My M1's had odd behavior occasionally , had I had a bit of trouble programming my E's . I replaced the M1 decoders with Tsunami 2 decoders , and that may be an option on the E's , if I ever get any other diesels .
For what it's worth, if you have a friend that has DCC, take your locos over there and try them out. Rule out whether there's any problems with the locos first on DCC. My original PCM E-7s would never run right on my MRC 1370, my MRC Tech 3 9500, or my MRC 220. I haven't tried my Paragon locos on those, but I wouldn't be surprised if same issue. But these BLI locos all ran perfectly on my NCE Powercab. Hope that helps.
I'm not too sure which DC power packs are adequate for use with these sound equipped locomotives. I have several BLI models from the first editions to the latest editions. I normally have tested these model on DC using an MRC Tech II 2800. The reality is that they are not really happy with that power pack either. They will run very slowly at full throttle and using the BLI sound module will allow the sounds to operate at the expense of the speed of the locomotives. Yes... they do stall and and the decoder stops working... probably more due to the cleanliness of the track. I also have an MRC Prodigy Advanced Squared DCC system which is not 'yet' hooked up... so I have no idea how well they will work on that DCC system. I have hundreds of NON DCC equipped locomotives, therefore, I am in no hurry to change over to DCC. Given the above information... what DC power supplies are most likely to work best with ALL of the presently available DC/DCC dual mode decoders?
It depends on the decoder brand and manufacturer. My experience: The Athearn F45/FP45's all ran very well on most DC packs, including my MRC 1370, Tech3 9500, and MRC 220. The BLI Precision Craft E7's wouldn't run at all on these same DC packs. I haven't tried my Paragon BLI units recently so I don't know. My NCE and TCS and Digitrax decoder equipped locos all can run on these DC packs. My Bachmann 44-tonner and 70-tonners run on all these DC packs. So, it would appear the BLI / Precision Craft decoders are the ones that have difficulty with some DC packs, but not others?
I run DCC so I can't comment about issues with DC operation but I can add to the info concerning BLI decoders. I have a fleet of BLI N Scale engines, I have PA's (lots of them), Centipedes, E8's and E6's and I have had two problems. The E6B only ran for about one hour before it froze up, a quick email to BLI and they replaced the dead engine very quickly. The other problem was a speaker quit working on an engine. I contacted BLI and told them, they gave me two choices, return it and they would fix it or they would send me a speaker to install myself. I chose to receive the speaker and I have not had a problem since. All the engines run and sound excellent.
My own limited experience with DC and DCC would lead me to confirm that not just 'pulse power', but the modulated square-wave DC from transistor throttles can render a DCC decoder useless. I have experimented with Bachmann and TCS decoders on DC; both are supposed to detect analog DC automatically or latch into DCC mode as the situation calls for it. Using my transistor throttle (which converts normal DC into a modulated square wave somewhat like pulse) was a failure for both, particularly in that the Bachmann couldn't sense direction and the TCS just sat there. if I went back to conventional DC from my supply (an ancient MRC HO Dual Loco Pack with more series/parallel resistors added) they did work, as visiting DCC power has as well. Pure, old fashioned, DC works. What I have seen that drives me nuts is the process that goes on in these chips after a power interruption/stall - they take half a second to decide what the power supply is and reset - so that a normal DC hiccup turns into a full blown stall/reset/run. As far as I'm concerned, a DCC chip in a DC world, analog sensing or not, is more trouble than it's worth. Removing the DCC chip entirely from my Bachmann 44-tonner and rewiring it for DC solved that one, and I completely gave up on the Z TCS chips for DC and DCC because of the sensing feature causing excessive stalling and resetting. What made it somewhat comforting was 'removing the board' so that normal DC had no issues had a weird payoff - I got almost as much for the DCC board off of Ebay as I paid for the entire locomotive. So before the pure DC guys grumble too much about having to pay for the expensive DCC-whiz-bang features, remember that other people are frying boards and desperately looking for parts that the manufacturer may or may not have. As far as for DCC sound, I have to admit I was impressed by the BLI M-1, have yet to hear a diesel that gave me the same reaction. I'm using digital audio chips with larger on-layout speakers and on-demand MP3 loops off an Arduino board. You'll see a portable test-bed I did on the HVRR at Altoona this year.
What Tony said. Try using wire nuts or suit case connectors to solve your wiring nightmare. Also, what Randqust said. You are getting good advice here. I wish you the best with your dilemma and hope you can get it running soon.
I purchased a centipede set from BLI and went thru the same frustration of headlight cycling on/off and nothing else. Sent the set back for repair. The repair invoice stated one bad decoder, had to resolder pickup wires to trucks, and put conductalube on all connections. This seems to be a quality control issue. Plus you cannot market a product without saying you need filtered D.C. To run it!
I have an E7 Paragon 2 and I have wildly different results based on the power pack. I have one from another century that runs my current layout, and the BLI E7 is very spastic on that one. Starts, stops, surges... I've recently purchased Kato Unitrack for my next layout and the E7 works beautifully on it.
