I have a LifeLike GP9 witth DCC including sound. As far as I know it came from LifeLike with the DCC and sound.
The problem that I have with this is that as soon as it is removed from a powered track or the power is shut off when I stop running my trains it looses all its memory including it’s “adress” and all CV’s. I have a dozed or so other engines with DCC, some with sound as well and no other ones have this problem.
I bought it as a consignment items at a hobby shop that is 1500 miles away from where I live when I was on vacation so going back there is not an option. I ran it at the hobby shop and did not have any problems there although I did not program it or try it multiple times.
Doe anyone have any ideas why this occures and what I can do to fix it?
Did you do a reset on that engine? You probably did.
Is it the engine that forgot the information or was it your control system that dumped the “Stack” of addresses?
It should not be losing it’s memory, the only thing I can think of is maybe the chip is loose but I would be very surprised if that was the case.
Another idea would be if the engine at some point in it’s past suffered a massive short and a damaged chip. You would think such a big short will leave burns or other signs on the locomotive.
I dont know any more than you do, I am fishing for ideas here.
I can’t think of anything other than a bad decoder that would cause this. Sorry. Loose wires shouldn’t cause something like this.
Can you read back the decoder ID with your DCC system? If we know what kind of decoder it is, someone might have seen this problem before and know what to do with.
I assume the engine goes back to being #3, the default. That might indicate that it’s somehow being reset. One thing you might try is to deliberately reset the engine back to all factory defaults, and then re-program it. I’d give this idea about one chance in ten of working, but it won’t take long to test it. Let us know what happens, OK?
I have heard of rare instances of decoders losing their settings between operating sessions if CV29 is set to allow them to operate on DC if they are a dual-mode decoder. Resetting CV29 to a value that disables Power Conversion (bit 2 of CV29) for some weird reason cures this problem.
Try programming a value of 34 into CV29 if you are using a long address, or 2 if you use a short address.
Im betting it is a QSI Decoder. Now if it was totally something else it should be pretty obvious.
Hang in there! Sometimes these critters stump me and I have to sit there and think because the very first thing I was told about computers: Start Qoute “They are stupid, but execute the last instruction flawlessly” End quote
Hmm… now what was that I put into the decoder? LOL.
I dont believe that for one second. I have like 12 of these children and they get run occasionally with VERY long “Box” times on the shelf of a year or more between runs and they havent forgotten thier numbers yet.
Now the CRAPPY MRC Decoder on my Roundhouse 4-4-0 had to be reset twice because it forgot it’s numbers. I dont think it will run again on my road because there has to be a better 4-4-0 coming in the future if not already.
Actaully, the early QSI chips did have this issue. I had a client that had 2 BLI switchers and both had to be sent back to BLI because of the reset issue. BLI upgraded the chip and the issue went away…but hey, what do I know?
Ok. I dont know much either. Did BLI fix that with new chips then? My early NW switcher had two different issues, reversed wiring and derailing front truck. The new run NW’s dont exhibit this behavior.
I dont know for sure but you may also want to check the CV that resets the decoder back to OEM settings. I believe this is CV8 (if I am wrong some one please correct me) If you have a 1 in this CV it will reset the decoder back to factory settings including the Address and the decoder will need to be reprogramed again. This CV is not supposed to hold the 1 as the factory setting is a 0. If that CV is holding its bit then every time you reapply power to the decoder it sees the 1 and resets everything. If you can readback the decoder it will help to find the problem. I dont know if this is true for QSI decoders I have never had to play with mine that way. QSI usually has a magnetic wand of some sort to reset the decoder. Digitrax decoders tho use a reset CV, others might as well.
To reset the QSI decoders place the loco on a DC track. place wand in the proper location (Call Walthers if you dont know where the reset location is they can tell you) Any magnet other than a business card magnet should be strong enoug for this. Apply power to the track just until the sound starts, hold loco still if it moves but dont stall it. Wait till you hear the decoder say “Reset” then remove power and reprogram the address and other CVs as needed.
If it is a QSI, and has no wand to activate a reed switch, then you must reset three separate CV’s. CV49 must be set to a value of 128, CV 50 must be set to 255, and CV 56 to 113.
Even if it’s a QSI with the reed switch, I have ran into cases where the “Magic Wand” doesn’t work because it is too weak. A powerful magnet out of a microwave oven’s magnetron does the trick, though, as should any magnet that is larger and more powerful than the wand.
Maybe way off but I had trouble with a few of my locos because I was between systems and had them programed in a consist on the old system. I put them on the program track and started over with reset, but for some reason they would retain the consist memory. It didn’t make sense to me as I thought the comand station held such info?