Before I figured out you can’t even run a non-DCC loco on the NCE, I put the loco on the track, heard a wherring sound, didn’t move, kept it on there about 2 minutes. Well I think I killed my Athearn SD45. It doesn’t even run on DC now, it’s completely dead. It actually moved a little bit, then finally died.
What do I do now? And why wasn’t there a big “WARNING DO NOT RUN YOUR NON-DCC loco with this system” in the manual?
Now what? I guess I can have Caboose hobbies take a look at it, see what got fried.
You most likely fried the motor. You tried to operate a DC motor on AC, just like hooking a Lionel transformer to your track. Next time you turn on ANY piece of electrical equipment and it makes a funny noise, do yourself a favor and turn it off right away and investigate to save yourself a headache. I had a guy come into the store who fried 4 HO locomotives by trying to run them with a Lionel ZW. One at a time he put each one on the track and watched it fry. I would have stopped after the first one when the thing started smoking. He then came into the store saying his locomotives AND TRACKS “must have gone bad while in storage, since they worked when he put them away”.
NCE does not support running a non decoder equipped locomotive. That is one of the questions that needs to be asked before purchasing a system. I still can’t figure out why someone would buy a $500 to $600 dollar system and not a $16 decoder. I put decoders in all my locos before I bought my system and ran on DC until all the non decodered locos were converted.
In the beginning of the manual NCE wants you to set up a test track before hooking the system to your layout to get a feel of the system. Step #5 of the quick start guide. Place a DCC equipped locomotive on the test track. Select loco #3 and on and on.
If we had warnings for every possible thing that could go wrong then we would not be able to muddle through life.
Perhaps he did not want to, or couldn’t? I have DC locos that I will never bother to convert, they are too old and would be a real chore, due to their design. But they hold some sentimental value to me and I do like to run them occasionally, which is how I use the DC support on DCC that comes with my Digitrax system.
I guess I’ll chalk this up as one of my newbie lessons! Expensive lesson, $100 loco. I’m starting from scratch here, I bought the loco for testing purposes with a small DC power supply, it was cheaper than buying everything DCC right off the bat.
I was in the store yesterday, and I saw the new Athearn D&RGW SD50s, so I’m gonna get that next week and have them install a Tsunami for me.
The Digitrax system you exchanged for the NCE does support running DC loco’s on DCC. You just can’t leave the loco’s on a powered track when not running them. It is nice to be able to do that when you can’t afford to put in a decoder, have too many loco’s to convert them all at once, or it is too difficult for you to do it yourself. I have my empire builder system for four years and still run analog loco’s on it. You could still return the NCE and wait for the Digitrax to come in. I did have a problem once when I left a loco on a powered track. The motor heated up and siezed the motor so it wouldn’t move. When it cooled down it ran ok thereafter.
Just hooked up my new Digitrax system to my existing DC layout. I have tested and it works well and passes the quarter test for shorts. I have one DCC sound locomotive and will be converting most of my other locomotives to DCC over the coming months. The DC locomotives work well, but they do “sing” loudly when not running. I use the old DC block switches to turn off power to the DC locomotives whenever they are not running. I can park the DCC locomotive(s) in the engine house the same way.
So, I’m able to run the DC locomotives (one at a time) and things are going well so far with the Digitrax technology.
I’m a bit surprised that two minutes would fry it, but it sounds like it might have. I’d try it (on DC obviously) again now that it’s cooled off. Even though the NCE system doesn’t support operation of a DC loco, the potential for damage is the same on any DCC system, even the ones that do support DC operation. Based on some tests that some folks have done on various forums, most modern locos can handle more sitting still on the DCC rails than the model railroader can handle the noise!
I was in on the original NMRA DCC development. Back then, the cheapest decoder you could find cost $75, so the NMRA decided to include the ability to run a non-decoder equipped locomotive on address Zero by stretching the command signal bit to allow a motor to run on the positive or negative pulse of the DCC signal.
I foresaw problems and potential damage to some motors by allowing this to be part of the NMRA DCC Standards and Recommended Practices, but it was incorporated. I still don’t think it should have ever been allowed.
In my opinion, NCE’s choice to not incorporate this “feature” was a very wise decision. You should either run DCC or stick with DC, but don’t try to mix them or you’re letting yourself in for overheated motors and other problems, such as the runaway trains that users sometimes mention on these forums.
With decoders costing only $12 each in lots of 10 from NCE, there’s really no reason to try running a DC motor on DCC through gimmickry.
I will be getting the tsunami decoders and they are $100 + $40 install. I don’t have the skills to install my own yet. I see no reason to install a decoder without sound.
Funny how people who own the systems that can’t run a DC loco all think it’s the most horrible thing ever and will instantly fry your loco, while those who have systems that can tend to not have any problems with it.
Just remember, NCE DID include the capability at first, you just had to DIY it a little. Of course that gave them the opening to completely eliminate the feature in later revisions - hardly anyone was using it.
I’ll reiterate - I’ve never even come close to damaging a loco runnign it on address 00. In fact, the harsh pulses were exactly what was required to break loose a stubborn Bowser PRR T1 with dual motors. Best I could ever do with it on straight DC was full throttle running, and then barely. After I ran it for a while on address 00 on my Zephyr it was able to run nice and slow as well.
I have over 100 loco’s and when I switched to DCC I had 1 sounder decoder equipped loco (the reason I changed) and half a dozen decoder fitted Atlas locos the rest were straight DC. When I purchased my DCC system the dealer threw in a double pole switch so I could use my existing DC set-up or the DCC depending on the loco being used. I have now fitted decoders to a large number of the locos but still retain the old DC set-up so I can still run my older locos if required a switch is cheaper than a large number of decoders and safer than using address 0 if your system supports it.
if it is a new locomotive, it probably has some sort of circuit board for the factory lighting. if its an athearn RTR it has this board. It is quite possible just the board got fried. If so this may mean that you locomotive may still be able to run
I have installed decoders in over 300 locomotives and the worst I have seen a DCC system do to a locomotive was it melted the truck of a F3 because the breaker in the booster didn’t trip and it was sending 5 amps of current thru the pickups of the truck. I have seen fried decoders, fried circuit boards, burnt out bulbs, cooked LED’s but I have never seen a motor get fried. I don’t think the motor is the problem with your locomotive, but then again without seeing the insides of the loco, I can’t know for sure.
The people at caboose are very knowledgeable and should be able to whether or not it is salvageable.
Also about warnings, This is the first time I have heard that a DCC system doesn’t support the use of a DC on throttle 00. My father and I were early DCC adopters; we started with Railcommand (not DCC), then switched to Lenz '94(club layout), and in '96 purchased our own Digitrax Super Chief system which I have used to this very day (14 years of service so far). Every system (except Railcommand which isn’t DCC) I have used has been able to run a locomotive on throttle 00. There should be some sore of warning stating that NCE made that change and no longer supports, what I consider to be, an industry “standard” feature.
Again this is what I have experienced with DCC. I have not seen everything and never will, but hopefully this will give some insight into the problem with your loco and/or system and/or warnings in the manual about said system.
OK I took it apart and inspected the DCC circuit board and it looked fine, couldn’t find anything that was fried. Also inspected the motor, but I don’t know what to look for. Here’s a couple of pics I just took.
Also, while were talking about this, I’m buying a new Athearn RTR SD50, and I’m about to install a decoder and speaker, and I can’t figure out where to install the oval speaker, in the cab maybe? But it looks like it might rub against the trucks. And there is a big metal weight right under the fan grills, I don’t think there is enough room. Unless if I remove that weight?
Can you elucidate a bit? I have an older NCE Powerhouse Pro vintage 1998-ish, just after they changed their name from System-One or Wangra or whatever it used to be. I’ve updated the firmware to the most recent (as of last summer-2009) so supposedly it is completely up-to-date except for the throttle which has the older keypad design. They tell me that’s not an issue except for accessing the higher-numbered functions (and a couple other minor things) and I can get a new one at anytime for $120-ish bucks that will work fine.
In any case, is there a way to run DC locos with it? I’ve tried using address 0 without any success. Though I admit I have not thoroughly researched the issue…
