I just bought a new Athearn F7-A-unit and want to install a decoder in it. I was hoping someone here has already done one and could explain what is necessary for the installation.
Also what decoder best fits this unit?
I appreciate any help you can give.
Thanks,
Bill
Depends on what kind of Athearn. If it’s newer, I think the motor is already isolated. If it’s an older BB Athearn, then you have to isolate the motor before installing the decoder. Not hard, just different.
What type of decoder do you want? I use NCE pretty much exclusively- their website has a decoder locator which will tell you which one to use. ncedcc.com
I have installed the NCE Model DA-SR with very good results. These were installed in a few year old Athearn GENESIS F3 A-B Set. I’ve still not hooked up the lights back into the A unit. (I really should do that!)
Here is a link to a PDF file from NCE with their reccomendations.
http://www.ncedcc.com/ncetest/decoder_use_list.pdf
I hope this helps ya out.
Chris
I just did 2 Athearn F7’s and used TCS T1 decoders with the Athearn harness. The Athearn harness makes it really easy because there is no soldering to do. Bad news was one of the harnesses was poorly soldered and I had to do it anyway. The Athearn harness is not nescessary for most people I just wanted to try one. The TCS T1 decoders are very simple decoders but do the basic job. They have more advanced decoders in their line of products. I choose those for the economy.
RMax1
The Athearn F7-A is brand new. I got it from Wholesale trains online. It just arrived yesterday. It is a BB not the Genesis. I pulled the shell off of the frame to see how a decoder could be installed. It does not have any circuit board. It has a large weight covering the motor and a metal tab that runs from the front truck to the rear truck and contacts the motor as it goes through center of the weight covering the motor.
There’s no way to plug anything to anything. Any decoder will have to be soldered in.
I only recently started in this hobby so I don’t know if the design of the Athearn BB has changed much in the past few years.
I have an NCE DCC system. Looking at the NCE DASR decoder, as suggested by NYC56 will work on a Genesis but I don’t think it will work in the BB.
I was also looking at the Digitrax DH123AT. According to Digitrax it fits an Athearn F7 but looking at the drawing is not giving me warm fuzzies.
Bill
This will explain how to prepare your Athearn for a DCC conversion. I used an F7-A in the thread.
http://www.trains.com/community/forum/topic.asp?TOPIC_ID=66749
Jeffrey,
Thanks for the link. That was exactly what I was looking for. It is exactly like the one I plan to install a decoder in.
I should have remembered reading the thread. Once I opened it I remembered it. This time I printed it out.
Once I decide on a decoder and install it I’ll post it.
Thanks again,
Bill
That’s the direction I was going to send you with my original question . . . . Somebody beat me to it . . . . MR did an article months ago on the same thing. The motor has to be isolated in these, not a big deal with some vinyl electrical tape and a sharp #11.
I have done this exact install in a LL BL-2 and used the TCS T-1 decoder with excellent results. The decoder works great with the club’s PRo-Cab system.
It’s a simple 4-function decoder and what I like about it is this: The decoder plugs into the wiring harness with a 9 pin connector. This means you can solder the wiring harness in and once everything is buttoned up, then you can plug in the decoder. Much easier to solder in my experience because you don’t have the decoder itself flopping around and getting in the way.
The T-1 comes with an 8 pin plug attached to the wiring harness, just cut it off and solder away.
Good luck!