This may be a moot point as I dont’ know if there’s an reliable source of “official” RS4 components short of old stock TAS/DD kits that may be out there, but I have a bit of a project in mind I’d like to try.
I have a 1997 PA-1 ABA set(two powered units). Like a lot of Lionel’s early diesels, they put Railsounds in the non-powered B unit. The A units have Signal Sounds, or Lionel’s late 90s “stripped” sounds with just whistle/horn and bell. This is actually more than the F3s have, a lot of which have no sounds in the powered units.
Looking at these, though, there is a LOT of room in the shells, and the signal sounds board is really not that much smaller than a Railsounds 2/2.5 board.
I know I COULD track down a Railsounds 2/2.5 board(I’m wondering if it would be possible to dump the sound chip from the B unit, find a new blank, and write to it, but that may be getting too weeds to much) and I can’t imagine why it wouldn’t work.
With that said, I seem to remember that one of the “generic” RS4 soundcards was an Alco loco, and it might be nice if I were going to the trouble of upgrading to put RS4 in instead of 2.5.
Will RS 4 work with the older LCRU units? Are they capable of addressing the additional sounds available in RS4?
With that said, my head is also turning with this, as these PAs do have dual can motors w/flywheels. There’s a part of me tempted to yank the all the original TMCC electronics and drop in an ERR Cruise Commander or, if I could find one, an NOS TAS EOB board, but since I have two powered units that gets expensive…
I have a bunch of RS4 boards, generic power supplies, and RS4 motherboards. The serial data coming from the LCRU isn’t any different that any other TMCC locomotive, the serial data originates with the TMCC command system. If your PA units have can motors, I’d expect them to have and R2LC and a DCDR motor driver.
Of course, knowing the actual Lionel Product Number is a big help in these kinds of discussions…
OK, I forgot about the rare DC LCRU that used the DCDR motor driver, haven’t seen one of those for many years!
The Signal Sounds board receives track power and serial data on the single connector, and of course connects to track power. You could drop in any suitable TMCC compatible Railsounds package there, either Railsounds 4 or 5, or the ERR Railsounds Commander board. If you wanted cruise, replacing the DCDR motor driver with the ERR Cruise Commander M is a drop in with a one-wire addition, that being the serial data from the LCRU.
Yes this is a bit of an oddball for sure. From what I remember, as a ~7-12 year old kid who literally had the 1995 catalog fall apart in my hands from reading it SO much(I still have that one, plus a few replacements I’ve picked up) and who has a pile of badly dog-eared late 90s catalogs from, again, reading them so much, I remember TMCC in the early days being mostly a Pullmor motor thing, 1997 V1, the same catalog as these PAs were in, shows a $199 DC-motor NW2 with TMCC that they made a big deal about being the lowest price TMCC engine ever made, and as best as I can tell never was made(a shame as I love my PW 622, and I’d enjoy this). Now that I can afford some of this stuff, and I’m finding it’s plentiful and fairly inexpensive either NIB or lightly run, I’ve been on a bit of a binge with it.
The PAs actually caught me off-guard for being can motored, and I didn’t realize they were until after I’d bought them. They were cataloged as having “Pullmor Direct Drive”, whatever the heck that means, which as best as I can tell is what Lionel briefly called some of their can motored engines. I don’t know EXACTLY what it was supposed to mean, but I think maybe it was early marketing for engines that used the bigger Mitsumi or equivalent cans with nice big flywheels(what we pretty much expect to find now in things like the mid-range diesels), maybe to separate them from the small can motors used in lower end MPC and Kughn stuff. Maybe it means a vertical worm drive can motor, since a lot of the low end can motored stuff was spur geared.
Heck if I know, but they seem to run pretty nicely, albeit I’ve only done rollers on them and not on open track. I THINK this was new tooling in the late 90s, and as best as I can tell they are scale or near-scale sized but are about as detailed as a 90s F3 or Geep.
I really should stock up on the the ERR Cruise Commanders while they’re still available, since from what I see ERR product availabilty is spotty and they’ve said some things are EOL due to components being discontinued. I have a K-line Trainmaster-a really nice model all said and done-that I attempted to put a second-hand EOB in. I had it running really nicely with the shell off, but clearance was tighter than I realized and I couldn’t find a spot that the tach sensor would fit and allow the trucks to swing properly. I haven’t touched that in probably 15 years now(graduate school, life, kid(s), etc) and the last time I was at my parents house it was still there on my old layout right where I’d left it. I was going to trim the cab shroud, but thankfully never did that. I could finally finish that one with a Cruise Commander.
Well, I think that the ERR product line has a few years to run, but I think Scott is eyeing retirement at some point, and I’m guessing the ERR product line could well go away at that point. The ERR products have been pared down to just the basic cruise boards, the AC commander, and the sound kits as it is. Scott recently stopped selling the R4LC-C08 boards, obviously conserving his stock for the remaining internal use and for the Cruise and AC Commanders. Another clue is that 3rd Rail stopped doing steam, they’re just doing diesels and of course the passenger cars.
The prices of ERR stuff has reached the point where I find it cheaper to buy Legacy boards from Lionel and do Legacy upgrades. Even as an ERR dealer, the stuff is getting out of reach. Another issue is the limited sound selections available with ERR sound kits. When I add in the universe of the Lionel new LCP2 & LCP3 boards as well as the older RCMC and RS-Lite boards, I can have a wide variety of sounds, and I can usually find the proper sounds for specific engines. I just finished a pair of Centipedes that started life as MTH Protosound 1, now they’re full Legacy with the proper Centipede sound sets.
I don’t remember much about the 90’s products, I returned to the model train picture in the early 2000’s after a long absence. For a few years I was heavily into postwar steam, then I discovered command control. Being a long time electrical engineer, that captured my fancy and I never looked back. All the postwar stuff is gone, and I’m a modern man.
I guess I’m REALLY out of touch with the landscape of what’s out there, and I don’t think I realized Legacy upgrades were really even a viable path.
Back in the day(like 2005-2010 when I was a lot more into this) I seem to recall Lionel being pretty reluctant about direct to consumer sales of parts. They supplied things like R2LCs to Kline, Atlas, and of course to Digital Dynamics and TAS(and OEM makers that offered TMCC that I’m probably forgetting). From what I remember, Lionel would only sell end users boards on an exchange basis, or maybe not even to end users but service centers.
That was always a big deal too with Railsounds, as there were only a handful of generic sound cards that the 3rd parties could get. Looking at ERR, I think it was probably a similar set as what they now offer. The Lionel sounds were of course often more engine-specific, and when Crew Talk and Tower Com came along, I remember them being SUPER protective of the road-specific ones especially. I may not remember this 100% correctly, but I’m pretty sure service stations had to send service replacements back.
It’s a bit of a revelation to me that some of the engine specific ones can be ordered by anyone without restrictions.
Still, though, looking at the cost of ERR kits, I’m wondering if I really want to spend that much on these locos. Even just spares of the RS 2.5 board out of the B unit(assuming there’s space-I can’t imagine there’s not!) might be welcome, but I know I’d be looking at finding pulls from someone or really old stock tucked back somewhere…
Years ago we did have to send parts back for exchange, now it’s only warranty parts that have to go back. I’ve bought dozen’s of RCMC and RS-Lite boards. Of course, the downside of Legacy upgrades is you have to do ALL the wiring harnesses, and there’s typically a lot of wires to do. I buy pre-crimped cables whenever I can which lowers the labor a bit, but there’s still a lot of wiring.
I just wrapped up installed the Lionchief Plus 2.0 electronics and smoke unit into the MTH Railking Doodlebug. Now I have a Doodlebug with dual motors and smoke, something that the folks at Lionel couldn’t seem to do.
I actually prefer the more generic crewtalk of the Legacy stuff since having road number specific crewtalk is a problem if your locomotive has a different roadnumber.
My next Legacy upgrade is an older TMCC Class A, I have the RCMC and sound board, and I’m also going to give it whistle smoke.
Okay, you make me want to at least try a Legacy upgrade. As long as the wiring diagrams are out there, I think I can handle it. As a side business, I repair camera flash gear(or at least a few specific brands of it) and I’m not a stranger to having to remake a damaged wiring harness. I’ve managed to have stashes of…well quite a few different types of mini-connector kits(and finally broke down and spent $100 on a quality crimper to make my life easier) and if the Legacy boards use the same as earlier TMCC stuff I know I have the connectors.
I’m mixed on the idea of converting these particular PAs. On one hand, they seem a perfect candidate as there’s lots of room and they have can motors. Everything else I have with a similar can set-up(aside from the K-line Trainmaster I mentioned earlier) already is at least Odyssey or Legacy, so I have less motivation to upgrade those as compared to something with simpler TMCC electronics. The downside is that these PAs are a bit detail lacking, and I’d probably also want to work a smoke unit into them. Also, since I have two power units that I’m planning on running together(maybe to finally pull a dozen or so 15" aluminum streamliners-something a single Pullmor F3 struggles with) the cost for everything gets doubled.
As a question-how does Odyssey II in Legacy work? I’m ashamed that I’ve never actually looked at one of my Legacy engines that closely. Does it use an optical tach like older Odyssey and a lot of the older cruise systems, or does it use back EMF like-I’m guessing-the ERR cruise commander uses?
I buy pre-crimped JST-ZH 1.5mm pitch cable assemblies from Aliexpress.com, that’s what most of the RCMC and LCPx boards use. There’s also the 1.25mm pitch connectors that show up in a couple of places, I get those there as well. For the JST-PH 2mm and JST-EH 2.5mm connectors that also are used for certain functions, I typically crimp those as they’re easy and I’m pretty good at it.
The Legacy Odyssey II speed control uses a toothed wheel and a hall effect sensor to measure motor speed. It is pretty much the same as the K-Line cruise, I’m pretty sure that’s where Lionel got it. The encoder PCB mounts on the two motor brush connections for Mabuchi motors and on the mounting screws for larger motors in steam.
