Have had my MAC for a couple of weeks now. Just got my RC/Sound supplies the other day. Now, I'm getting ready for installation. However, I have a few questions that I hope someone can answer! 1. HOW do I get the blasted thing apart? Body removal anyway. The almost instructions don't say. 2. Has anyone added QSI sound board, with G-Wire reciever? How are the lights/smoke unit wired? 3. And worse yet, how does one install KD couplers on the thing? Gotta be able to handle an 8 foot Diameter curve minimum, and maximum! No room to go anything larger. Wish I did though! Would have considered at least 10 foot curve otherwise. When I ordered parts, I was told to call, since there's special wiring required for the lights. And to remove ALL factory electronics and hard wire in the QSI board. Any information is MUCH appreciated! Thanks.
Wow Keith, you should have asked us G scale people what system to buy for your USA SD-70mac locomotive. The problem is that QSI is made for mainly for plug and play on Aristocraft trains and the newer Aristocraft trains are already set up for this system. You would have been better off with a system such as Locolinc or Airwire with a Phoenix sound system on the USA locomotive. As for the kadee coupler problem, the only way you are going to get kadee couplers on that locomotive is if you were setting it up for 10ft or bigger diameter curves. The way you have to set the USA 12 wheel drive locomotives up for 8ft diameter curves, a Kadee coupler will never work. Just to give you a heads up, on that locomotive, it's so big even when you have it set up for 8ft diameter curves, it will still derail your trains in the curve due to the large amount of tension on the coupler from the locomotive because there is a internal spring inside the 8ft coupler conversion box that mounts to the locomotive. I had big derail problems with the SD-70MAC which I never had with my SD40-2 due to it's size and swing on the 8ft curves. You probably would never be able to couple anything with kadee mounted couplers anyway if that coupler did fit on the 8ft set up. I actually made a articulated type coupler on the locomotive that was pulling the train, although very unrealistic you would never know unless you turned the model upside down and looked, this eased the tension in those curves and I never had a derail since. It was even throwing those big heavy 55ft USA modern tank cars off the track in a curve if that tells you how much tension there was. I myself will be looking to upgrade in a couple of corners of my layout that would fit 10ft diameter curves, but I could never convert my entire layout, you are outside, you can sell the 8ft track on ebay and get yourself 10ft diameter, but that runs around $275 for a box of 12, very expensive. I hate to say this, but bottom line the QSI was never built or meant for USA Trains locomotives, you will have more problems than you want and will be disgusted at the model itself, I would return it or sell the QSI, but that is just a suggestion, I don't tend to tell people what to do.
Kieth, by the way, if you still want to move foward, I can help you with getiing that locomotive apart. I have done Phoenix sound installs on USA locomotives
So, what's wrong with the QSI board?? Have the Magnum adapter, plus instructions. Besides, the other system is out of my price range! Put QSI sound/Airwire in a pair of Aristo GP40's, no problem. Too bad that USA can't make their locomotives PnP. Would make things so much easier! Still, gotta figure out how to get into this thing, so I can figure out how to get stuff installed.
Yeah, USA Trains has not come up with a plug and play system which is a downfall, although the Phoenix sound is the easiest sytem I installed on a USA locomotive ok, the first thing you need to do is take off the side rails if installed. You will need to remove the fuel tank. There are 12 screws that hold this thing together if I remember right. I have modified a screw driver to get to them because they are deep inside and plus you need to slip thru the motor block with the screw driver as there is screws near the motor block. I think I will post pictures, it will be easier for you to follow.
Well, the one good thing, I guess, is that I have some extra long screwdrivers available. As for removing the handrails, that's gonna be a slight problem! Glued in, as they would NOT stay in very well when installed. Will figure that out when I'm ready though. With this many problems, makes me glad that I don't own very many USA pieces. And probably unlikely to purchase more, because of the problems. Hopefully, the PA and the NW2 won't be as much of a problem to convert.
USA SD-70MAC body removal part#1 ok, now I have pictures and we can move foward. Good luck by the way with that QSI interface with USA trains board. You can get away on this model without removing the hand rails, but if this was a USA Trains GeeP model, you would have been in trouble. Picture #1 shows the unmodified craftsman screwdriver on the left and the modified one on the right, I simply took the screw driver to a grinder and took off the blue plastic part, this is due to the srews are ral deep inside. Pictures #2 & #3 when you are broke and don't own a craddle, using a pillow like this really helps fro damage Pictures #4 & #5, you must remove the fuel tank, there are hidden screws under there
USA SD-70MAC body removal part 2 Picture #1 working on the front section or cab section of the chassis, you must sneak your screw driver in like this. You can just simply spread the fram work gently and pull the motor block, but this makes it hard to handle once the body is seperated from the chassis. I find it easier to reinstall the motor block back into the truck frames once all of the screws are released Picture #2 mount screw opposite side front Picture #3 & #4 are reference points of where there are 2 more mount screws, but the motor block must be removed on this end (front) to get to them, just for future reference, on a USA GeeP model, you can remove these screws without removing the motor block. Picture #5 now we move on to the rear section of the chassis, again working under the motor block, four more screws here also Note: You may want to remove the coupler mounts from the chassis as they will break easily when tryin to seperate the body from chassis
USA SD-70MAC body removal last part Pictures #1 - #3 working on the rear section still, remove the rest of the screws. Now with the body screws removed and don't forget under the fuel tank, I left mine on during this demo photo shoot, the coupler mounts removed from the body, you should be able to gently work each end loose and remove the body. Note: make sure if you are just going to totally remove the motor blocks and disconnect the wires, to make a wire diagram for yourself, also each truck has the colored wires in different places in relation to each other, so don't think each side is the same. If you cross just one wire you will possibly blow a transistor in your transformer, I know, I made that mistake with my NW-2, somehow, I made a wrong diagram, I figured it out, but blew a linear transistor in the transformer. Well I hopes this helps you out, lets us know how you make out. I'm interested myself to see if the QSI can actually be instaled on a USA locomotive because I have never seen one done.
Got mine from Mike @ Throttle Up. This is the information I recieved from him, regarding install: When you get ready to install, you can give me a call and we can review what will be required for installation. The best way to do the USA train installs is to remove the factory electronics and wire in the QSI board directly. However, their are some special wiring requirements for the lighting that we can review over the phone. So, once I get the thing apart, and can look at what needs to be done, I can slowly proceed to install. Gonna be interesting, one way or another!
Great, hope to see some progress pictures as you go along if you don't mind, this will be a very interesting subject for all USA trains locomotive owners for sure. In thinking about your kadee coupler dilema, I think you could pretty much copy the idea from me of what I did to ease the tension on my SD-70mac locomotives in the curves if you want to keep those 8ft curves. Picture #1 is a typical 8ft curve adapter install on a USA trains SD-70mac. For those not familiar, to run a USA trains SD 12 wheel drive locomotive on a 8ft diameter curve on the earlier locomotives you had to install this 8ft diameter coupler box on the chassis of the locomotive, The later SD-70macs like this Heritage series me and Kieth has already comes with the 8ft adapter already installed and you have to convert it to run on 10ft diameter or larger curves. Pictures #2-#4 shows how I cut off the coupler and left the arm sticking out of the 8ft curve adapter box. Then I drilled a pilot hole and simply screw a coupler onto the arm. This gives me the adavtage of a longer swing and less tendency to derail while also leaving the screw a little loose, the cars swing better in the 8ft curves. This relives the huge tension built up in the 8ft coupler adapter box, it works well. I don't see why you couldn't do something like this for your kadee set up. Although not realistic or prototypical, us indoor G scalers learned it's more important to adapt however possible to run what ever trains you want to run is more important than being realistic.
I'd LOVE to go larger, as I said. However, space restrictions keep me at 8 foot. And I seriously doubt my folks would allow me to circle the house with something much larger! Anything across the front would probably be stolen overnight anyway. Heck, even a 9 foot curve would be pushing my luck! Oh well......
I'm in the same boat, I can't go outside because we have metal thieves around the neighborhood. So having a train layout in the basement is great, but still restrictive in some ways. 8ft diameter curves was about max for me until I redesigned 2 curves in the layout so I may be able to get 10ft in there, but will be tight. There is no way I'll ever have a full 10ft diameter curve layout here. I do love those outdoor 20ft curve layouts owned by rivet counters, but they are huge.
I'll have to inspect the couplers more, at a later time though, to see what I can come up with that might work. As for photos of Airwire/QSI sound install, I suppose I could take photos as I progress. Who knows, it may be helpful to someone! May think about tearing apart tomorrow, if weather gets nasty, again. Planning on going to bed right after I eat dinner. Only a 22 hour day this week!
Well, I figured out how to get the MAC apart!! Just didn't see the #$%^& extra small screws under the cab, preventing shell from coming off! Checked the wiring first thing. Need to get some wiring clips, to match what's inside. Have a link to get them, so that won't be much of a problem. Did have the front power brick fall though, pulling wires out. A quick check of opposite end solved the problem of what wire went where. Only thing I gotta do now, is exchange the speaker that was sent, when I ordered. It's a 2" speaker, and I need a 2 1/2" speaker. So, it's gonna be a bit before I can get things installed, or started.
I swapped my engineer figure from my U25B to my FA-1. While the FA wasn't a problem, you should have seen me trying to get that stupid U25B apart because of tiny little screws you cannot see xD But once you do it a lot, you get really good at it ^^
Regarding QSI installation into a USAT locomotive: No question, after a year or more of research I found the NCE Procab/QSI with sound to be the combination that best suits what I want to do in the near future. A. I like the sound - decoder combination and I've heard the sounds and they're great, and B. The hand held throttle has just the controls I want and need to run trains unlike some 100% menu driven options. "I'm running a train silly. Not a cell phone." But of course your right. It's not going to be an easy fit. Still, when you think about it both USAT and Aristo and LGB and others all are capable of picking up power from the track (like mine) or a battery. They use that variable DC directly to control a motors speed or simply vary the battery DC to do the same job. They also provide a fixed DC voltage for lights and smoke and other stable function. So how hard should it be to cut the main board out of a USAT GP9 for example and feed the inputs and outputs directly to/from a QSI, or any other decoder? Anyway, I'm waiting for some direction on this before I order parts and rip apart an F3 A/B set and rewire the pair of them. I figure if I can do these, with a lot of room inside, I can do all of them. I've asked for some help from USAT but I don't expect any. They sell Phoenix on their web site. There has to be a way! Dave
Well, as of this morning, the MAC has RC and Sound!! Yes, I got things to work, with a couple of minor mistakes! Mainly connecting the wrong wires, so I'd end up with a short. Still need to correct a crossed wire on power pick up, so I can use ALL power pick up points - Both trucks! Have only One truck power pick up at the moment. Right now, the only thing I do NOT have, is headlights/ditchlights. Need to make a phone call Monday, regarding the wiring. Once that's done, I'll have a complete locomotive! Give me a short time this morning, and I'll try to get photos taken and uploaded for folks to see. Really not as bad as I was expecting. Other than lighting. Otherwise, I'm happy witht the results. Now,I gotta outside, between rain, and see if it'll run on the layout outside. I'm betting that current track conditions might not let it, but I want to try. It'll give me a better idea as to where I have to make adjustments to my track, to smooth out the grade more. Same with my USAT ALCo PA.
Might try for photos later. Probably sometime over the weekend. Took more time to cut and splice wires than it did making the necessary connections! I just need to clean things up a bit though. Get wiring a bit more organized. Then make a phone call Monday, to get help on headlight/ditchlight wiring. Once I get that figured out, I'll be done! But, as I've stated before, I'm happy with the way things have turned out so far. Maybe a video clip of the beast in action later?
