Tetter's 2010 EOY Challenge

[tetters]

Good Evening...

I'm done. Sort of. I had a couple of things I've been putting off for months but finally got out of the way. In each case I had some of the parts and pieces needed, but just not the wear-with-all or time to get'er done.

The first and certainly not the last thing to be done was the construction of my very own GERN STATIC GRASS BLASTER. I won't bore anyone with construction photos (besides...there are none...) as we've seen a couple of 'em put together here on BB already. However, here is a pic of the completed project.



Next is a sound decoder install and loco rebuild I've been putting off since last year. I completely disassembled this poor P2K SW900/1200 switcher and then placed all the parts in a zip lock baggie vowing I would not rebuild it until I was ready to put sound in it. Well that happened last night.



I had a very interesting time with this one. There were a few times where I thought to heck with this...I'll just throw this in another geep and get a Micro Tsunami for the SW9. But I didn't. So...

I purchased a Soundtraxx TSU AT1000 board and an MRC 3/4 speaker. Which in hind sight was probably too big a speaker, but I managed to the get it to fit. However not without some reservation and the idea to go back and "fix" a couple things...which is why I say, sort of, when I say I'm done. For now this will stay as is for a another week before I take a crack at making a smaller enclosure for the speaker. I think I found a rather unique place to put the speaker once I removed it from the factory enclosure. The weight over the front truck was removed and that left a considerable gap underneath the decoder, even after I got the LED w/resistor in place which is another "fix" I will go back to later on as the bulb looks rather dim as it doesn't line up well with the lens.



You can see the black factory installed enclosure at the back. I managed to get everything to fit minus the enclosure. However I had to sacrifice my cab crew and interior, in order to hide the capacitor inside the cab.





I was also visited by a new friend this morning as well. The tiny Spider here I think was getting a little impatient with me as it got to roaming around on those little legs "looking" at my progress for the better part of entire morning. I think my little friend wanted to go for a ride on my loco when she was all wired up and ready to roll...



I'll post up some pictures next weekend showing how I fixed the two issues I've noted. I hope to be able to build a tiny enclosure and get the front light better aligned to the lens.

Maybe then I'll move on to a bigger project which is layout based...hold on to yer hats for that one...

[Squidbait]

Tetters,

Good first crack at sound in the SW9! It's a bear of an install. You could have saved yourself the bother of using a resistor on the LEDs by wiring them to the F5, F6 outputs - they're 3.3 volts. Then you re-map the F0 outputs to the F5/F6 by setting CV33 to 16 and CV34 to 32.

Also, without any baffle, you may not get as much sound out of that speaker as you could. The more you can seal the area around the speaker so that it pressurizes the shell when it's in place, the more volume and better-quality sound you'll get.

That said, once you get it tweaked the way you want, you're going to be very happy with the sound in your switcher.

[tetters]

Tetters,

Good first crack at sound in the SW9! It's a bear of an install. You could have saved yourself the bother of using a resistor on the LEDs by wiring them to the F5, F6 outputs - they're 3.3 volts. Then you re-map the F0 outputs to the F5/F6 by setting CV33 to 16 and CV34 to 32.

Also, without any baffle, you may not get as much sound out of that speaker as you could. The more you can seal the area around the speaker so that it pressurizes the shell when it's in place, the more volume and better-quality sound you'll get.

That said, once you get it tweaked the way you want, you're going to be very happy with the sound in your switcher.

Ahhh...so that's why you suggested using them in my last sound install thread! I'll make that change. I need all the room I can get in there. To clarify, I run the common wire (blue) off the F5/F6 outputs correct?

I did try to get everything in the cab but it wasn't happening. LED, Capacitor, and speaker with the baffle. It is a lot to cram in there.

It runs nice and smooth, although a little jerky at speed step one, but I think that has more to do with the drive mechanism then anything else. I may need to put a small swab of grease on there as I did scrub all the parts clean before putting everything back together again and I didn't have any lube to put on the gear tower. Maybe the guys at the Club can spare a bit of Labelle grease on Tuesday?

So the to do list on this in order to get this puppy all buttoned up.

1) Modify factory supplied baffle enclosure in order to get it to fit under the decoder...which should be easier once the resistor is gone.
2) Re-wire LED's to F5/F6 outputs and eliminate the need for resistors on the LED's...this should also help with my front light brightness issues.

Still a bit to do.

[Genetk44]

Tetters...keep in mind these locos can suffer from the dreaded "cracked axle gear problem" that can cause jerky noisy running...just have a very very close look at the little gear on each of the axles...if its cracked just get a replacement gear from Athearn.

Cheers
Gene

[rrinker]

Call me nuts, but wouldn't a micro-Tsunami be a better choice? It's a much smaller decoder but has the same sounds. More room. And the speaker DEFINITELY needs to be sealed with some sort of baffle or enclosure, to get decent sound out of it.

--Randy

[Gary S]

Tetters, have you tried the grassBlaster yet? I have discovered that it is possible to make something similar to Heki Wildgrass with the contraption.

[tetters]

Tetters...keep in mind these locos can suffer from the dreaded "cracked axle gear problem" that can cause jerky noisy running...just have a very very close look at the little gear on each of the axles...if its cracked just get a replacement gear from Athearn.

Cheers
Gene

It's not a cracked axle. Otherwise it would be doing the "Funky Chicken" at all speeds. I've repaired a couple of P2K GPs with the cracked axle problem and know the symptoms...a couple of them jerking so bad I thought they would launch off the track.

At speed notch 2 its like butter, nice, slow and smooth. I think it just needs a small dot of grease on the worm gear and it will be nice and super slow at 1.

[tetters]

Call me nuts, but wouldn't a micro-Tsunami be a better choice? It's a much smaller decoder but has the same sounds. More room. And the speaker DEFINITELY needs to be sealed with some sort of baffle or enclosure, to get decent sound out of it.

--Randy

I shied away from the Micro Tsunami on some advice from one of the decoder guru's at my LHS. He explained to me that he's installed few of them in different locos and all of them have let the blue smoke out. He has not been impressed with them so far. He sent them all back to Soundtraxx get them warrantied.

That said, still looking at how much room is inside the shell, the Atlas decoder fits in there just fine. It's flat and narrow. With the weight out of the front, I should be able to modify the factory baffle and make it a little slimmer allowing me to slide it right in under the decoder where the weight would be.

[tetters]

Tetters, have you tried the grassBlaster yet? I have discovered that it is possible to make something similar to Heki Wildgrass with the contraption.

I saw your experiement with the grass tufts. It just occurred to me that I could test it out using your method and see if I can make some of my own. I'm ready to start sprinkling some lawns, however could use some grasses in between rails and in my yard tracks.

Thanks for the suggestion.

[Squidbait]

Ahhh...so that's why you suggested using them in my last sound install thread! I'll make that change. I need all the room I can get in there. To clarify, I run the common wire (blue) off the F5/F6 outputs correct?

I did try to get everything in the cab but it wasn't happening. LED, Capacitor, and speaker with the baffle. It is a lot to cram in there.

Actually, I've confused the AT board with the KT and BW boards, which have LED-level function outputs... the AT board has 1.5V F5/F6 outputs.
No, the common goes to the 1.5V common (on the same side of the board as the speaker connections, but run the cathode (-ve, or short lead) of the LED's to the F5 and F6 outputs - they're putting out 1.5V rather than 15. I used the factory-installed GOW bulbs in the cab, and mounted 1.5V bulbs in the headlight rather than replacing them with LEDs.

When I did the SW9's, I cut the leads on the capacitor very short so that I could strap it under the decoder board just above the front gear tower. I removed the crew and the seats, modified the cab floor to act as the baffle, and sealed up the cab with canopy cement to act as a sealed enclosure.

In your case, if you're going to leave the speaker where it is, I would look at making a baffle that seals to the box over the frame, and try to seal up the rest of the shell as best you can. The more airtight you can make the space behind the speaker, the more air you'll pressurize, and the better your sound performance.

I have had good luck with the Micro Tsunami's, but you have to keep in mind that a) they're only 3/4 amp decoders, b) they generate a lot of heat, and c) they don't have any extra function outputs, just headlight/reverse light. In most HO instances, the thin AT boards are more easily mounted under a hood, have extra low-voltage outputs for LED's, don't have the heat issues and support a higher current draw. If I am doing an Athearn or some other application with 1.5 GOW bulbs, I'll use the GN board, since the headlight outputs are set for 1.5v.

[tetters]

Well I couldn't quite let this go so I went ahead and modified the factory enclosure by making it skinnier and covering the back with some sheet styrene. I sealed up the speaker and enclosure with some clear silicone. I'm happy to report that it slid under the decoder at the front perfectly. The sound coming from that little speaker was instantly 10x's better!

I also discovered a way to fit an LED and resistor in that small space at the front as well by making the leads of the LED and resistor incredibly short for starters. I then soldered the (-) lead of the LED directly to the soldering pad on the decoder. I then soldered one end of the resistor directly to the common lead on the decoder and then ran a small wire from that to (+) lead on the LED. I all neatly tucked underneath the decoder. I was able to angle the light as well to get it to point at the headlight lens to improve the light at the front.

No pictures... sorry... I was too involved and on a mission last night in order to have it ready to take to the club tonight. I promise I'll remove the shell later this week and take a few snap shots to show what I did.

That said, does anyone have any suggestions on how to repair the clips that hold the shell on to the frame? I broke one of them a while back and well, broke another one last night. They are not exactly the most durable little plastic bits and a rather flimsy way to attach the body to the frame. But I digress...