I've been slowly upgrading my locos to DCC/sound over the past decade making mistakes along the way and maybe a little more educated as a result. At this point I'm using ESU products for my conversions including both the decoders and their loksound programmer (which I really like). For my atlas diesel locos I've been using the ESU select direct micro drop in replacement board but it does have it's limitations. (the following relates to the pre-2016 atlas boards p/n 73100 which is all I have/use at this time ) The advantages are that it requires little to no modification of the shell or chassis even with speaker. Disadvantages are that one can't customize the sound files available on the ESU site other than options already published in the particular file one downloads. The other disadvantage is that aux1 and 2 are already wired to pico LEDs on the board which are pretty much useless for anything unless one uses fiber optics to re-route the light to the shell. I did attempt to de-solder the LEDs but it is a super PITA and most people I'd imagine wouldn't want to bother or have the equipment so for the sake of practicality the 73100 has only 2 usable aux outputs which are aux3 and 4. If I need more outputs I'll use a different solution such as the ESU 58820 LokSound 5 Micro decoder. Something else needing mention for the 73100 which as I understand is unique to that board only is that the drive LEDs are not mounted. This is nice because it gives you the option to set the length needed to get the included 3mm (soft white) LEDs right up to the stock light lenses which change between locos. I also picked up some nice 8mmx12mm sugar cube speakers with chambers which make very good sound for their size. Finally I ordered a bunch of pre-wired pico LEDs for this and other projects. So for my first atlas/esu upgrade the SD7 got picked. I was able to get it in without any mods to chassis or shell other than modifying the light lenses to get the number boards to light separately from the drive lights and remotely locate the front drive light since I needed that space for the speaker. I programmed the rear drive light to work as the illumination for the rear number boards then ran a pico to the rear drive lights and used aux 3 for the power there. Finally for sound I uploaded and installed this file: 75868-LSNSelect-Diesel-EMD-16cyl-567C-V3-FT-V1.esux Board soldered up. I later had to remove the front 3mm LED (right) and replace with a pico on 4" wires to make room for the speaker. With a hobby knife I separated the drive lights from the number boards, glued the pico LEDs to the lenses with canopy glue formula 560, let dry then blacked out with some acrylic paint. All wired up and installed.
These are the 8x12mm sugar cube speakers I am using. The chamber as you can see in the pic below (right) has a rather wide mating surface which doesn't fit well to the speaker itself. To fix that I beveled to the inside first carving with a hobby knife then going back over with modeling files to get the surfaces even. 560 canopy glue was again used to join the two with a clamp while the glue was drying to get the result pictured below on the left.
A fine result freddy! There's no way I could handle that work. I like your use of heat shrink tubing on the alligator clip jaws of your holding jig. That's a tip I'll make use of for my other projects.
Thanks hardcoaler. I wish I could take credit for coming up with the shrink tubing but like you I saw someone else doing it and thought "Hey, that is a great idea!"
My next update is this Kato UP heritage SD70Ace. More pico lights to the rescue for number boards , separate ditch lights and driving lights so 5 in all. This install uses the ESU 58820 LokSound 5 Micro decoder. I did have to mill away the chassis to get the decoder far enough forward to make room for the speaker. I tried to reuse the forward light for just the number boards but the result was too dim so I just drilled a hole for the pico LED in the lens (after separating the forward light lens from it) and glued the light in the hole. This is the decoder with speaker installed prior to connecting the lights in the shell. I did have to re-route/shorten the wires for DC pickup and motor from what is shown. After I got everything together all the wires were keeping the shell from sitting flush on the chassis so I had to clear out as much unnecessary stuff as I could. I should be using smaller wires for the light leads but these are what came with what I purchased and being lazy I work with what I get. Next time if room looks to be an issue like this I'll use enamel coated speaker wire extensions. Test fitting the lights. I tossed the piping for the ditch lights but did save/cut-off the ends that were the lenses to use in the DL boxes then installed the pico LEDs filling the voids with canopy glue then painting the dried glue black to prevent light leakage. Rear lamp lens was a simple drilled hole and an LED fitted in there then glued into place. The forward number board/light lens was again cut to separate the two. Here though I notched out the numboard portion of the lens a bit further back then mounted the headlight lens in there after blacking out the void. Not show is the hole I drilled further back and the LED that went inside to illuminate the number boards. Keeping things as compact as possible I use these 1/8 watt DSM resistors.
Currently working on my atlas trainmaster using the ESU drop in decoder 73100. First hurdle was locating the proper sound file. ESU has one for the larger HO scale H15-44 so I downloaded that and converted to a loksound select direct/micro project in my lokprogrammer. ESU only offers 1 format in "select" for HO and the downside with these files is you can't modify the sound files which is an issue here because I really want a 5 chime horn that SP used on their locos but all this offers is a Nathan single chime. Oh well I can live with it for now I guess. Lighting extras here will be adding mars lights to the top lens at each end so more cutting up and drilling the light lenses to hold soft white pico LEDs. Both rear facing LEDs had to be located in the lenses because the speaker gets in the path of light to the rear lens. I also had to mill the frame back there to get the speaker low enough as I was needing about 2mm of clearance to get the shell to sit on the chassis properly. Up front and again the mars light gets a pico led in the lens once separated from the main light but originally I tried to use the supplied LED mounted to the decoder board. It wound up being too dim compared to all the other lights so I remotely located that light as well with another pico LED. Now just waiting for the blackout paint on the lenses to dry, reassemble and take some video.
Next up is my SD70M. I've had this loco for 7 years and never ran because at that time I only had a DCC controller. Finally get to see her run after all this time and she didn't disappoint. I'm using the ESU 58820 LokSound 5 Micro decoder for this install along with 4 pre-wired pico LEDs for direct lens install and reusing the forward lamp already in the loco to light the number boards. First step after shell is removed and disassembled is to glue LEDs into the pockets for the ditch lights. 1K resistors already soldered on the negative leads of each. If you look closely you can see 1/32 heat shrink (clear) near each LED. I do this to stabilize the solder joints which tend to get stressed from all the handling I do and I've broke a few wires off in the past snagging a wire on something so this is cheap insurance:O Next up is marking the chassis halves and light board where I need to cut to make room for the decoder and speaker. Chassis mods complete. Decoder and speaker test fit. I will be cutting off the ribbon and directly solder to pads on the decoder. I've removed the resistor and capacitor from the light board and cut the wire traces to isolate the motor and forward LED from the track power. I will reuse the resistor for the forward light but run it in-line with the negative lead of Aux 5 from the decoder. Here is how I cut up the forward light and number board lens. Blackout paint in the remaining gaps to prevent light leakage. Headlight gets it's own LED and the number plates use the one from the original lighting board. Taped up and ready for testing. Done!
Thanks! Tamiya XF85 - Rubber black. It is the only acrylic paint I have on hand that is flat and almost black. Works pretty good but may take a couple of coats. I have used testors flat black enamel and it works too but the acrylic dries faster which is why I use that now.
I just finished up a 20 year old Kato c44-9w last night. Nothing special outside what I've done already. Happy to have that back in the pile of my operating fleet. Next two are an SD90/43MAC and SD40-2 (both kato). Going in I knew the4 SD40 was going to be a bit of a curve ball but thought the SD 90 was going to be a walk in the park. In both cases I was wrong. Regarding the SD90 although it is a large engine with what appears to be plenty of room for a speaker and decoder it is narrower then usual around the radiators where most of the electronics go. Reason being is kato built up the plastic in this area on the sides making it so the decoder is about .5mm too wide... Ugh!. The sides of the radiator housing/grills press on to the shell so I guess that is why they did it this way. I wound up taking a chisel blade and trimming out this excess to make room, I would have ground it out but the garage where I do my dremeling was too cold. Next one (I have another) I'll grind LOL. Ditch lights are glued in and just need to finish the fore and aft driving lights then assemble and upload the sound file. SD40 had me stumped for a bit. No way both the decoder and speaker were both going to fit in the normal place in the back. Even for just the decoder I have to mill the aft end of the chassis a few mm into the hump. Fortunately the speaker fits perfectly in the cab if I trim the forward lighting lens. On this I'm going to add ditch lights and am awaiting the housings to arrive in the mail so I can get that part done.
Progress on the SD40-2. Wound up having to trim some more of the chassis that extends into the cab area to make room for the speaker. For the ditch lights I was planning on mounting the pods on the deck but it was going to be a challenge to get it to look good so I opted to go lower just above the plow. The pods are aftermarket ones I got off ebay and although nice are very translucent. Working on painting those in way that they don't leak light but without building up too much paint and buggering up the finish.
SD40-2 complete! Up close the ditch lights aren't as clean as I'd like them to be but to the naked eye they look just fine. I do have another SD40-2 snoot that I'm considering giving the same treatment but it is already DCC so not a huge priority at this time. Anyways this completes the conversions for my UP fleet. I still have at least 4 engines of other roads that I want to upgrade but those will have to wait till after Christmas unless an unexpected infusion of cash comes my way. Getting the last of the pieces parts to build a larger layout to run these things has priority at the moment.
Not sure if I missed it? Do you have a link to your supplier of the Pico lights? I probably have to get them pre-wired Thanks!
Here you go. I definitely won't be attempting to solder these myself. For as little as these cost per unit it's better to let them do that work for me. I've installed close to 60 of these and have yet to come across a dud. If I could get them with the smaller enamel coated speaker wire that would be even better but the price seems to go up a bit.
Thanks! I forgot all about Lighthouse. I had several purchases with them quite a while back. I'm sure I still have some of their 3mm round LED's from when I did some customer work. I'm pretty sure they are in a box labelled LED/Decoders that became over populated by decoders so I moved all the LED's to another box. I hate getting old.
