I tried my first attempt at installing a soundtraxx decoder in an RS-3. The only place I could find to put the speaker was in the cab. It seems to work, but the volume is a little on the puny side. Anyone tried putting a speaker under the fan, and don’t you have to eliminate a weight and a light to do that. PS new to chat rooms.
I’ve done five of these, 4 Atlas, 1 Kato. With the Atlas, you have to file/cut one of the weights to remove about a third of it to make room for the thickness of the speaker. Then you can lay the speaker face down on the weight AFTER you drill 4 or 5 holes in the weight to let the sound out. No enclosure is needed as long as you seal the edges of the speaker where it sits on the weight. The shell is a tight enough fit all by itself. I’ve found no discernible loss of performance for removing that much of the weight. Sound is really good. With this method, you get sound out of the front of the speaker and out of the back of it through the shell. Go to the Litchfield Station web site to see pictures of this installation.
The key is to have a sealed enclosure of some sort. I picked up a Soundtraxx LC and a spekaer to play with, hooke dit up on my bench,a nd it works - but the sound is severly lacking withthe speaker just sittign there. Simply cupping the speaker in my hand improves the sound 100%. I’m planning to put it in a Stewart dummy B unit, so I set the speaker ont he one end of the shell and selaed off the edge with a scrap of Woodland Scenics foam roadbed - even better, although it’s not the proper material to make an enclosure. The real thing will have a styrene enclosure, I’m just experimenting for now. I need a bigger speaker or two anyway, the only one in stock at the time was a small oval and there is PLENTY of space in the B unit for a pair of BIG speakers, and then some. The speaker would fit in one of my RS-3’s, but the ‘generic’ diesel sound in Soundtraxx is far more EMD than Alco.
–Randy
Definetely an enclosure makes a huge difference, even a properly baffled 1/2" speaker can sound quite good that way. Easiest way it to use enclosures designed for the speakers like Soundtraxx offers.
The best quality sound I’ve heard in an Atlas RS-3 is from an edgeport speaker. The owner had milled out the fuel tank such that the edgeport speaker’s holes were flush with the end of the fuel tank facing the front truck. It worked extremely well for sound, but it did result in somewhat of a loss of tractive effort. But that was ok with the owner, he had 4 of these things… [:)]
Paul A. Cutler III
Weather Or No Go New Haven