Should this put out 18Volts? I checked it with a volt meter and I only get @14.5 volts. Is this normal? This is of course with th elevercompletly up.
Thanks
Jeff
From what I know of the thing, it is not right. My guess is that the handle is not adjusted correctly to the potentiometer that it moves.
Can I just remove the handle and adjust it? I am not positive the voltage, but when I lower the lever, the loco shuts off. If the lever is adjusted incorrectly, wouldnt their still be some small voltage even when in the off position?
No. If the handle is off in the direction that limits the maximum voltage, it would be able to shut off entirely and then some.
I am just guessing about the handle setting. It seems that I read somewhere that this is sometimes a problem. Perhaps someone else here can confirm this. Or not. I have no idea how to adjust the handle or whether it is possible.
Jeff, how much did your meter cost, and what was connected to the outputs(as a load) when you were testing?
Are you trying to troubleshoot a power problem?
Rob
well I bought a new train set and the first transformer didnt work properly. Voltage wasnt consistantly going to the accesories. My meter is one from Radio shack…probably $25. I tested the voltage with the loco and all 6 cars on the track (running) as well as all of them off the track. I also added 1 light. Voltage was always in the 14.4 and 14.5 range
My real issue is that after I got the new transformer, the steam in the loco worked for about 5 minutes and then that was it. I read in a manual that it needed higher voltage to operate. Not really sure what the issue is at this point, but I was starting with the transformer since everything worked before I added this new one.
Jeff
jwalker,
Turn the transformer upside down and provide the date you see on the bottom. It may be four digits (such as 1104) or it may be a five-digit alphanumeric (such as G1007.)
I am out of town on business. Hopefully, I can have my wife check that for m eso I can post.
I think most conventional locos will go off the track at 14.5 volts. So unless you are running command locos, 14.5 volts is probably more than enough.
Earl
resistor in the smoke unit failed due to lack of packing.
I am using a command unit…this is a hand held remote right?
Is ths resister something easy that I can replace? and I assume I should add additional packing so it doesnt happen again.
You’re throwing more into the mix here, jwalker.
If you were running in command, it is quite possible all that happened is the resistor went out - it can be replaced easily.
The CW transformer, with a less than professional VOM, will give erratic readings with different loads - you would need a true RMS meter to get the 18 volt indication, and that would be with a minimal load. It should drop off with greater loads. The important thing with a CW is that it will put out up to 5 amps continually & continuously, and no more, when it hits 5 amps the “foldback” circuit kicks in.
If you can tell us exactly what you are using for power, control, & trains, someone here can help you out.
Welcome to the forum!
Rob
It should be possible to read the CW80’s voltage accurately when it is fully on, since the triacs will be conducting through the entire cycle of the sine wave. So his reading of 14.5 volts means that the triacs are not on full-time. The RMS voltage is not 14.5 of course, but it surely is less than the full 18 volts of the transformer. Or his meter is very far out of calibration.
lionelsoni,
Bob, while we are waiting for jwalker to provide more info on his particular CW80, I have some data from two of mine – 1 pre-revision, 1 post revision – just for “benchmarks.” I have only an El Cheapo ® multimeter which I set to the 0 - 50 volt AC range. I measured under three conditions: no load; 1 section of track; 1 section of track with an illuminated Lionel caboose.
Old (pre-revision) CW80:
No load: 20 volts constant, throttle has no effect;
Track only: 20 volts constant, throttle has no effect;
Track plus illuminated caboose: 0 to 15.5 volts.
New (revised version, came with HWX set.)
No load: 1 -14 volts, throttle functioned;
Track only: 1-14 volts, throttle functioned;
Track plus illuminated caboose: 1 -15.5 volts, throttle functioned.
Perhaps you could re-post your voltage-conversion chart to indicate what these readings would be if measured on an “RMS” meter; which I understand is more appropriate for “cropped” AC.
Note 1. On both transformers, the voltage ceased to increase as the throttle handle was advanced from approximately “105” to its maximum travel.
Note 2. Either old or new CW80 appears to run a new Hogwarts Express set quite well, although the smoke unit could possibly use a little more “oomph.”
Note 3. Dale Manquen, on that other forum, stated quite recently that the “revised” CW80’s now have a resistor across the outputs so that a lamp is no longer required to bleed off any residual current; i.e., the new transformers are supposed to drop the voltage far enough for the e-units to cycle without any additional “help.” I have found that the e-unit in the Hogwarts loco will cycle equally well via either the direction button or at zero throttle.
Hope this proves useful to jwalker and perhaps others.
Bob,
I found your conversion chart. As I understand it, the leftmost column is what you might see with an “ordinary” ac volt-meter if trying to measure a “cropped” wave-form such as employed in the CW80’s, both old and revised; whereas the right column is the “true” reading one would get with an RMS meter. So where a standard meter might read 15 volts, an RMS meter would indicate 17 volts. Right? (I hope you don’t mind my re-posting this.)
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CW80 voltage measurement |
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This might be of some use to anyone who needs to measure the voltage out of a CW80 transformer. I got to thinking about this in connection with Jim’s (jaabat’s) question about a beacon accessory. It has gotten far enough from that topic to warrant starting a new one I think, and stop beating the other dead horse. The usual way of measuring AC voltages is the root-mean-square (RMS, the square-root of the average of the square) voltage. Any AC voltmeter you are likely to have will measure the correct RMS voltage only if the waveform is sinusoidal. Unfortunately, the CW80’s waveform is not sinusoidal. So its voltage can be measured accurately only with a rather special voltmeter. What I have done i |
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This is what I just purchased. I also bought the command control module. I got it 3 weeks ago, so I would hope that I have the new revision of the CW-80
SET INCLUDES:
2-8-2 Mikado steam locomotive and tender, boxcar, single dome tank car, hopper, caboose, three straight FasTrack sections, eight curved FasTrack sections, a FasTrack terminal section, CW-80 Transformer, smoke fluid
LOCOMOTIVE FEATURES:
TrainMaster Command Control equipped � able to run in Command Control Mode or in Conventional Transformer Control Mode
RailSounds sound system with CrewTalk communication, TowerCom announcements, and DynaChuff synchronized chuffing
Operating headlight
ElectroCoupler on rear of tender
Powerful maintenance-free motor with momentum flywheel
Traction tires
Puffing smoke unit
Die-cast metal locomotive body, frame, and trucks
Die-cast metal tender body and trucks with a metal frame
Engineer and fireman figures
ROLLING STOCK FEATURES:
Die-cast metal sprung trucks and operating couplers (Caboose has die-cast metal trucks)
Opening doors on boxcar
Removable single-piece coal load in hopper
Interior illumination in caboose
Individually boxed
Gauge: Traditional O Gauge
Minimum Curve: O-27
Dimensions: Length: 59"
Layout dimensions: 40" x 60"
jwalker,
I too hope you got a revised CW80, and I expect you did. But you don’t have to hope – you can easily know.
Set your multimeter to read “ohms” at the lowest range – probably 0 t0 10 ohms.
Touch the two leads together. The needle should swing completely over from infinity to zero ohms. If it has a digital display it should read zero ohms.
Now, with the transformer unplugged from the wall and absolutely nothing connected to either the “track” or the “accessory” side, touch the probes to the U-under-A and U-under-B posts simultaneously. The needle, or the meter, should again go to zero. If this happens, you have a revised one.
If that doesn’t happen, try the same test between posts A and B. If the reading goes to zero this time, you have an old one.
bf, thanks for posting the chart. I am beginning to suspect that I based it on a wrong assumption about the CW80’s transformer, however. Your measurement of 20 volts with no load suggests that that is the actual transformer voltage, not the 18 volts that I assumed from Lionel’s rating of the unit at 18 volts. This means that they are not letting the phase control go to 100 percent, for whatever their reasons. So we should expect the full output voltage, under a little load, to be somewhat more than a simple meter would measure. I have recomputed the chart with the 20-volt assumption:
Meter RMS
0 0
0.5 1.6
1 2.7
1.5 3.7
2 4.6
2.5 5.4
3 6.1
3.5 6.9
4 7.5
4.5 8.2
5 8.8
5.5 9.5
6 10
6.5 10.6
7
lionelsoni,
Bob, thanks again for your continuing efforts in the long-running CW80 saga. With both of your charts now displayed in the same thread, “the truth” must be up there somewhere – even if a little interpolation is required. In any event, I trust that jwalker has gained confidence that his device is running as designed. Whether it’s adequate for his needs remains to be seen, but evidently Lionel thinks so – given that they included it with his set.
As my screen name implies, I am a psychologist by training – specifically a pseudo-quasi-neo-behaviorist. I always recommend hooking-up a new device to a minimum number of components (first, just plug it in; then connect it to a piece of track; then track and loco, then track and loco and a car, etc.); all the while carefully observing the behavior of the system at each stage of the process. To my way of thinking, it’s better to know what an organism* will do before worrying about what it won’t. I think that’s what the real B.F. Skinner would have done, and he was a pretty smart fellow.
*Yes, in this context, a train layout can be considered to be an “organism” in the sense that it either behaves in certain ways or it doesn’t.
Here’s a visual aid for the CW-80’s track output.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OEAy_B5bVX8
Maybe it will help.
Bobby