The Polulu Shield works the the corrected Sketch settings for the Digitrax decoders. I have one. Dennis
I have got the PoluluShield now and it works fine but reading CVs from that Piko-Loco is not possible. So now I have four possible combination with UNO/MEGA and Arduino/Polulu Shield. With all other of my decoders each combination works fine Read and Write except that loco. Here is a link (https://www.piko-shop.de/index.php?vw_type=artikel&vw_id=28057&vw_name=detail) so you can see what I'm talking about. Thinking about that "stay alive" wvgca talking about @#38 was inspired me to some tests. I connect an extra load to the track in form of a 24V light-bulb. At 15V it gave a current of 300 mA so I have a load which I can "watch" but should not be a problem for the com-station. With the minitrix MobileStation2 I can read the CVs. This commmand-station has no different outputs for Prog and Main track. When reading CVs it interrupts the power at least 3 times, a connected ampere-meter moves between Min (zero) and Max (which is 300 mA of the bulb + around 42 mA for the loco) The same attempt with the DCC++ Station on the Prog-Track runs very different. The bulb is on with "power on" 300 mA constantliy, then reading a CV with a loco where I cant read the CVs its visible(!) that the brightness of the bulb changes three to four times, ammeter reading is not that exact, but one can see that the current rises a little about that value above. With the Piko-loco nothing happens (as expected), the bulb did not change, ammeter didn't alter I would say, the sended signal for reading the CV did not reach the decoder. With the ms2-station I get a full stroke from zero to 300+ mA, while on the DCC++ I get a small lift of around 40 mA on a succesful read/write command. It seems that this is not enough for the Piko-loco. Raising the driving voltage on shield input dosn't change anything. So for now, I see no chance or easy way to read CVs of that loco. kind regards Peter
Hello Thomas, Thank you for great tip. It helped me with reading my old homebewed decoders, MERG Decod10 and MiniDCC decoder by Georg Ziegler. My Programming Track is controlled by affordable L298N module which did not feature any current sensing. I have fitted 0.33 Ohm resistor and L358 opamp to match original Arduino L298N motor shield design, and clearly was seeing nice acknowledgements with my oscilloscope, yet reading was mostly unsuccessful. I did attribute this to old designs imperfection and to my own soldering and programming skills, but then I ran across your post and now reading CVs is a pleasure!
Hi Peter, Thanks for your post here about the PIKO SmartDecoder 4.1 Sound I have found this on the website of Piko Under booklet: Hinweis zur CV-Programmierung: Mit modernen Zentralen ist eine Programmierung ohne Weiteres möglich. Alte Zentralen können u.U. Probleme verursachen. Sollte sich das nicht per Softwareupdate der Zentrale klären lassen muss evtl. während des Programmiervorgangs der Kondensator abgelötet werden (eine Litze ablöten). Notice for CV programming: With modern command stations CV programming is no problem. Old command stations may cause problems. If problems cannot solved by updating the station it may be neccessary to unsolder the capacitor during programming (unsolder one wire only) Maby this is the problem? Can you please test and let me know. I do not dare to solder this expensive loc. Best regards, Wil
