Is there a sound decoder that installs easily into an N-scale Life-Like Proto2000 USRA 2-8-8-2 Mallet? I bought mine without DCC; I see they are available with DCC w/sound, was wondering what this decoder is, and is it easy to retrofit.
Has anyone done it? Maybe got pictures?
Soundtraxx makes a good decoder for that engine.
No they dont.
In N scale, anything you add to the tender (decoder/cap) has to displace the needed weight in the tender.
David B
The Tsunami 750 seems like the logical choice. Any idea about the LokSound Micro?
What would you suggest, then? Am brand new to this, have no bias at all.
I have the one with sound factory installed after pulling the tender shell of to check the spreakers for funny noises, I am glad I bought the sound equiped version.
Everything is cramed in there, and it does not look lt is one I would want to do from scratch.
Truck.
It is not a bias at all.
What needs to be realized is that N scale requires 2 things to operate smoothly.
As much weight as possible.
As much electrical pickup as possible (uses #1 as a factor).
When you are looking at adding sound, you also need 2 other things:
A large capacitor.
Speaker.
In the world of N scale steam, you have lots of wheels picking up electricity (usually). However, the majority of the work is usually done by the tender wheels. Over the years, the right mix of weight/wheels pickup in the tender has been achieved. If you want to cram a sound decoder in there (the boiler of the loco is out of the question), you need to “gut” the tender to fit what is required. What is required? You need 4 things in N scale to produce sound.
A sound decoder (Soundtraxx TSU-750…in this case)
A capacitor (to store a small charge to help the loco over dirty track).
A speaker (to make the sounds)
Weight (to allow for proper electrical pickup).
Now, each of these things in N scale take up room, and unless you want to mate a box car or something else permanently to the loco, you have a finite amount of it. So it is about finding the right balance between the 4 items.
Do you leave off the Cap? (no, because now your loco will stop and reset everytime you go over dirty track)
Do you use a smaller speaker? (no, because the sound quality gets worse and worse if you go with smaller and smaller speakers.)
How about removing the tender weights? (no, because we want to actually run the loco and we need all the electrical contacts we can muster).
In short, there is no balance you can achieve unless you introduce a large
I disagree.
The weight that you “displace” can be made up elsewhere. I have have done this with outstanding results in my steam engine.
Yes, I had to get rid of some of the weight inside the tender, but the weight of the decoder made up for some of that lost weight. With the weight of the chunks of lead that I took out to fit the decoder, I added weight using moldable weight. So I have added weight to my tender, including a speaker and capacitor.
Theory disproved.
One key word here. EASY . No not easy and I would not do this unless I had more than one sound decoder install under my belt. The SoundTraxx Tsunami (TSU-750) series decoder would be the way to go. There is lots of room in the tender for the decoder, speaker and cap. Speaker size- you can fit a 14MM X 25MM under the coal load. Tight fit but can be done. You could also use the 10MM X 18M speaker from Digitrax. Gives you a little more room. No need to remove any weight in the tender. you will have to remove the rear light board and install a LED for the rear light. The decoder and speaker will add weight to the tender.
NOW the hard part. You must get into the loco. and run wires from the loco to the tender.You will need 5 wires. 2 for the motor, 2 for the power pickups and 1 for the front headlight . I use a very small small connection between the tender. This will let you remove the tender from the loco and store it in its original box. When done this way you will now have power pick up from the tender and the loco. I also replace the front light bulb with a small surface mount LED. You will need to rework the front light board here too.
Too many things to describe here but I have done several and they run and pull very well.
Yep, it can be done.
Show me.
David B
I will upload a video tonight if I can David.
All this was done using a Kato-to-Model Power tender conversion using a medium tender length.
This might help you too:
I have installed a Tsunami sound decoder into more than one these locomotives and I did not have to remove any of the weight. The tender is large enought for me to get the decoder and speaker into it without removing any weight.
Show me? Do you want a photo of one?
I want a video of the loco traversing turnouts without powered frogs, forward and reverse, as well as audio so I can hear the ‘quality’ of the sound produced.
A mere photo of the install is useless, as it does not show the performance of the loco at all.
David B
Fair enough. If I remember when I get home, I will do that.
OK,
Send me a PM with your e-mail. I sure don’t know how to post a vidio here. nor do Ihave the time to do so.
Post it on Youtube. Take the link from Youtube and post it here. Pretty easy.
–Randy
Randy,
I do DCC installs and I don’t have the time to open and post videos on u-tube.
I have done several of these and I know done the way I have done them they run very well.
And the sound is about as loud as you need in N scale. Now he wants them to run over insulated switch points. Well they run fine on my layout and I use Peco InsulFrogs for turnouts.
I took video of the 4-6-2 Pacific running over insulated turnouts and with the sound and bell being used, but the video is about 3 minutes long and it would not upload right (aka errors), so I have to try again tonight.
Suffice to say that the engine worked flawlessly.