I’m throwing this out for comment and perhaps some help.
I recently purchased an ABBA set of the new sound equipped Athearn Genesis F3. I’ve been a big fan of the Genesis line, still one of the best F models to date. (Thanks to Highliner shells)
Here’s the problem, although the units look great, they run horribly. Out of the box using an NCE DCC system and the default address, all 4 units would hesitate badly. They would start out OK move down the track a bit and then the sound would reinitialize (just like you put them on the track or tipped them up on one side) and the loco would lurch. Essentially it sounded and acted like it shorted out or lost contact with the command station. This was ALL four units. I’m not exactly a newbie in the Hobby, I’ve had layouts in various stages of completion since I was 12 years old (I’m 40 plus now, God I’m old LOL) so I’m reasonably competent in my layout construction. Needless to say all my other DCC locos run fine. This includes various manufacturers, BLI, Lionel, Atlas, etc and my own installed decoders, mainly Soundtraxx.
Rather than disassemble 600.00 worth of brand new locos I opted to contact Athearn and let them take care of it. So after some rigmarole, (I won’t get into the Horizon Hobbies discussion here) I sent them back to the factory. After 2 weeks, which I thought was actually quite good turn around time, the locos came back to me. I should point out that I heard nothing from Athearn during this interval. In the box with the locos was a work tag that indicated that the circuit boards had been swapped out on all 4 units. Great I think to myself, that was relatively painless.
I was obviously kidding myself. On the track they go and bingo they run fine, just like all my other Genesis units. Well I should say all my non sound equipped units.
Do you have any other sound units i.e., from QSI (BLI, Atlas, P2K)?
What is the voltage and current rating of your power supply for your command station/booster?
Do you have access to another NCE system?
Is you system configured for 128 speed steps?
If the answer to number 3 is no, try connecting your setup to a couple of sections of flex track away from your layout. If that works, we may have to discuss possible RF interference or some other issue.
I only have access to 2 other System One/Wangrow systems and a Digitrax setup. The System One is the fore runner to the NCE and is nearly identical.
I have several Locos from each of those manufactures and they ALL run flawlessly. that is without exception, which is part of what makes this problem so vexing.
The system is configured for 128 step.
I’m using 2 Magna Force MF615 to supply my system. They each put out 6A 15 VAC.
Here is my setup:
1 NCE PHPRO Command station/5 amp booster
1 NCE PB105 5 amp Booster.
1 ProCab Throttle
3 Cab4E hand helds.
No radio/wireless everything is hardwired
The mainline of my Railroad is about 120 feet with track feeders every section of flex track ~ every 3 feet. The track feeders are 18 awg, the buss is 14 awg. The feed from my DCC units to the main buss is also 14 awg.
I will measure the track voltage tonight and also the booster output. I know the MRC decoders are very high current draws so maybe that’s an issue. But as I pointed out earlier every other manufacturers Locos run fine.
Not that this helps, but my Athearn F3 AB runs flawlessly on my Digitrax setup. So perhaps there is a compatibility issue with NCE. These locos suck up power big time, and I’ve never tried an ABBA. So maybe there is a power issue as well.
I’m assuming your track is clean. Because I experienced similar stuttering with the sounds on a dirty section of track.
Back after a bunch of testing. I always try to check the obvious first, is it plugged in, etc. The track was and is clean; in fact just to make sure I cleaned it again with a bright boy.
My NCE output for both boosters was right at NMRA spec of 14.25 v. Just for fun I ran it up first to 15 v, no change and then to 16 v, again no change. I flirted with the idea of 18 v but I really don’t want to burn these units up if I’m going to send them back.
Tomorrow I’ll test them on a System One layout and a Digitrax on Tuesday. It’s not like I have a job or anything! (Yeah right, lol)
On a lark I disassembled a B unit. Standard decoder setup, they used the “fast” clips instead of soldering which I probably would have done. The board is well protected from shorts and the speaker uses a plug connection. The pickups are pure Genesis and seem to be fine. The loco does run well, it sound just keeps cutting out.
I isolated the board and flex tested it and was unable to locate any short. Since my knowledge of integrated circuits is minimal I don’t know what other tests to run on the thing.
Probably not a bad trace but could be a bad component on the board, but ALL 4 units. Even I think that’s a stretch.
Next test is a standard DC test; I did this on a piece of Flex track with an MRC power pack. It proved inconclusive, the loco did run fine back and forth and the sound stayed on. But it’s hard to prove anything in 36 inches, back and forth. I’m going to follow up on this and patch a power pack into my layout. A simple DPDT switch should do it and keep the two systems away from each other. For safety sake though I’m disconnecting the feeds from my NCE system. Has anyone successfully integrated DC & DCC on a separate but equal footing?
I use an DPDT switch in my control pannel to switch from DCC to DC,my lay out is a basic analog but with the switch I can use my DCC and with the ole block control I can turn locos off.I hope you get it fixed!
When I first got my Genesis SD45-2 (same exact decoder and sound system) the sound would cut off inexplicably every 30 minutes or so. I tried taking it off the track and letting it cool, but when I put it back on it just kept doing it. I reprogrammed it to fatory settings (decoder address 3) and it worked fine. I reprogrammed it to my settings, and everything was, and is to this day, working great. However, when I’m letting it run around the oval and working on something nearby, I will hear a mysterious horn blast every now and then.
By the way, I have a Digitrax Zephyr if that has anything to do with it.
Try connecting the NCE system to the isolated track. It is possible your layout wiring is acting as some sort of antenna, picking up some sort of radio interference from a radio station, a nearby HAM operator, cell phone tower, etc. Another test if possible is to place an ammeter in series with one of the feeds to the booster. Measure the current as the loco starts up and begins to move. Take measurements of the other locomotives with sound from QSI and compare them. In the mean time I’ll check with an NCE specialist I know and post any new info here.
I’ve got some more info. I’ve been conversing with a man named Frank at MRC. What appears to be happening is the locos are receiving the signal to go into mute mode. I can tap twice on the headlight key or twice on the F12 key and the sound comes back on. Now as to why this is happening is anybody’s guess. Frank wants me to send him the locos, which I may do after I run them on a couple of other layouts to see if it happens there.
The isolation issue is interesting. I haven’t got the ammeter to wire up but I did isolate the DCC to just one section of track. I basically disconnected the command station from the layout and routed the power to the one section. Unfortunately the locos did the same thing with the sound cutting out.
Let me know what you find out.
I found that the NCE people have been basically uninterested/unhelpful. The last conversation I had with them was “If you’re other locomotives run fine than it’s not our equipment”
It would have been nice if they would have least offered some thoughts or possible troubleshooting options or directions to go in.
So far Athearn has been quick to replace things but with little communication, MRC has been very helpful and communicative and NCE has basically told me to buzz off.
Bottom line is I still have $600.00 worth of locos that don’t run right. Good thing I love this hobby. LOL
I feel bad for any newbie taking a step up from the simple loop phase and running into this problem. It would probably sour them on the hobby for life.
This new info is interesting. I seem to remember reading a review of the MRC Prodigy Systems that stated MRC was using non-NMRA compliant function coding in order to squeeze more than the current number of functions out of the system. Since you can overcome the the problem by double pressing the F0 or F12 keys which are at the outer limits of the NMRA function set, I wonder if there is some connection to the MRC’s non-compliant functions. What is odd, though, is that “Audio Mute (F8)” is part of the NMRA function set. Does the F8 key also restore the sound when it goes away, or can this only be done by double-pressing F0 or F12? While my experience with all of the DCC companies I have dealt with has ultimately been good, I have found that with some, at least initially, there is a tendency toward disbelief that the problem could be with THEIR product, surely it must be something the customer did wrong - sort of the same attitude seen when dealing with computer companies and internet service providers! Given the relative complexity of DCC (and computers) maybe the greater percentage of the time problems can be attributed to customer error, but it is somewhat off-putting for this to be their assumption BEFORE any other causes are considered! Good Luck with your problem, and please keep us posted as to the cause/cure. Regards, Bill Nielsen Oakland Park, FL
News Update for those who were following this thread: The Locos came back from MRC in worse shape than when they left. So after three (3) decoder replacements, 2 by Athearn and one by MRC, the locos still exhibit the same symptoms. I have pulled the decoder out of one B unit and replaced it with a Soundtraxx DSD-AT100. Gee, wonders of wonders it works just fine. After this debacle I am seriously turned off of MRC Decoders. I won’t buy another. By extension I won’t be buying any Athearn Products which feature these decoders. The good news is that the prices for Genesis Locos without decoders have dropped precipitously lately so I should be in good shape. Comments are always welcome. Has anyone experienced a similar problem??? Thanks!!
I saw this thread earlier and was hopeful that this would come to a better resolution. As is, I am very glad I passed on Athearn’s first run of Rio Grande Fs with sound.
My layout is still all DC and the sound units won’t mix well with my other 15 or so Genesis Fs, so I decided it wasn’t something I wanted to pursue at this time. Now it looks like I made the right decision, but for different reasons than I first anticipated.
Right now, my first sound unit will likely be the upcoming Blackstone K-27 with the Tsunami. I’ll be watching to see if Athearn addresses these issues. I’ll still be buying more Genesis units, but they won’t be sound-equipped until users report better results.