Rivarossi with Loksound bell doesn't work

Yes by saying being muted, when I press F8 is goes into a shutdown mode. When I press F8 again, it goes through engine startup. (just like when I power the system up).

All the functions work fine. When I press the Horn button, the horn blows. When I press the Bell button, the bell sounds.

The CV documentation of the functions that came with the packaging, indicates F1 Bell, and F2 is whistle.

Randy that doesn’t make any sense? When I press F8 it goes through shutdown sequence. When I press the Bell botton, or F1 the bell sounds.

Why doesn’t mine work exaclty like yours, when shutting down with F8, it should stay that way until I press F8 again, regardless of powering my NCE system.

Based on your description, your engine is a current release and not an earlier version with the European standards. I have of my own, and installed for others, many of these decoders that have not exhibited this behavior.

Hang in there for just a bit, I’ll be talking to Matt at ESU tonight and I’ll run your problem by him during our conversation.

Mark.

Oh really? Thanks Mark, I really appreciate all the help with this!!!

The Rivarossi model # is: HR2356

I’m going to have to say that one of the assignments is still messed up - after all, the bell did not originally work because F1 was assigned to a different sound slot. I can’t check in the Lokprogrammer software, since I don;t have my Lokprogrammer hooked up to this computer and unlike JMRI there’s no ‘simulator’ mode where you can fully operate the program with no connection. Only one I can think of is the Delayed Start setting but what that’s supposed to do is keep the loco from moving until the sounds start up, not keep the sounds from starting up until F8 is changed. Elminates that Tsunami Diesel issue of the loco rolling while playing the engine start sounds.

—Randy

Randy, the F1 was not assigned to a different slot. What I did in JMRI, was disable it, by unkchecking the box, then enable it again.

I’ll look to see if I can find the delayed start setting.

Michael - I just got off the phone with Matt. The problem is not the decoder, but rather the way Hornby (Rivarossi) wanted the decoder programmed. Like other sound decoders, Hornby WANTED the sound to turn on automatically on power-up. Matt tried to convince them otherwise, but that is what they wanted. Loksound is the only sound decoder that prefers to have the sound off on power up, but since the other companies don’t, Hornby wanted to maintain that “standard”. So don’t blame the decoder - blame Hornby. Matt even went as far as to suggest contacting Hornby about this to voice your concern as this may sway their decision as to how it SHOULD be programmed.

The good news is that it can be changed by inverting the logic of F8 to equal OFF instead of ON. The bad news (for you) is that this is very simple to do with the LokProgrammer, which myself and Matt (and Randy here) all use and are familiar with. It CAN be done by changing CV’s manually, we just have to figure it out.

Bear with us, we’ll get this figured out for you.

Mark.

Looking at the V4.0 manual, the process for this change is explained starting on page 50 under function mapping. Page 53 shows that Control CV-C is the one you need to be working with. The chart on page 52 shows the column of associated CV’s for Control CV-C, but I’m not quite wrapping my head around the Mapping Line concept yet.

Randy - Can you get a handle on that ?

Mark.

Ok - I think I might have it … or at least I’m down to an “either / or” situation, But I’m pretty sure this is the one …

First set CV31 to a value of 16. Next set CV32 to a value of 2 (these are the index register CV’s that must be set first before changing any upper register CVs). After you have done this, set CV403 to a value of 16.

Now, cross your fingers and give it a try.

Mark.

Mark, both he Paragon 2 and QSI decoders are silent on power-up.

Crandell

No experience with the Paragon 2 decoders, but any Atlas or Life Like engine with QSI I’ve had through here starts up soon as I place it on the rails. (?) Factory installs are often different than off-the-shelf decoders.

Mark.

Wow this is crazy, Hornby wanted it this way. Do they realize that people with more than one of these locos would go nuts?

I just sent them a tech support email about this. I’ll let you know if they respond.

OK so tonight I will try the CV settings you suggested.

Thanks again for all this help, it is very appreciated.

I’ll take another look at the manual. After looking at it last night i can see why the JMRI definiteion just replicates the chart, more or less, instead of trying to simplify it into dropdowns - it’d be nearly impossible, since the combinations are almost limitless. That’s good for making the decoder do things, but bad when trying to make specific settings. I’m using mostly Selects which aren;t quite as complex (but then I can’t swap out individual sounds, either). My 3.5’s were easy to swap sounds - the whistle they had on F4 was the one I wanted on F2, and that turned out to be an easy change, to make F2 play the sound that F4 was originally assigned to, and vice-versa. This huge chart for the V4 - I’m sure if I study it a while I can figure it out.

I notice by default if I open a blank Loksound V4 in JMRI, it shows F8 assigned to Aux1. I don’t have a real one to read to see if that is the true default or not. Should be able to select the correct option from the chart via JMRI on the F8 row to get it fixed.

–Randy

Hmm, I opened up a few V4 projects in Lokprogrammer and they seem to have F8 assigned to nothing. F1 is assigned to a bell sound. Ah, under Information, Functions, it lists F8 as volume/mute. index 2, moment unchecked, inverted unchecked, and type set to Physical. Don’t see where I actually change it to anything else though.

–Randy

Hmmm thats interesting Randy. Thanks for taking a look for me in lokprogrammer.

I will try the CV settings Mark suggested and let ya know if it works.

That’s how I discovered the difference myself. I opened a file in the Lokprogrammer that performs how you want it to, then changed the parameter of F8 to be on. The only CV that changed in the updated list list was CV403, which lead me to believe that is the one that needs to be changed in order for the sound to be off at power-up.

This is so simple to do with the programmer, but those instructions can be mind-numbing when you have to do it manually.

Mark.

Randy - WHAT file are you seeing those parameters ? F8 should have no physical outputs OR logical functions. It should only have control over one (possibly two) sound slots. Are you looking in the function mapping section of the 4.x.x programmer ? In the conditions drop box for F8, F8 should be set to ON as opposed to OFF or IGNORE. All other parameters for F8 should be set to IGNORE.

Mark.

I have a bunch of them I downloaded, all V4.0 project - Alco 244 for RS3, EMD 567 for F/GP, Cat for 44 tonner, and a couple others.

On Decoder, Function mapping, F8 has no settings across the board. If you go down to Information, Functions, F8 has the description “Volume control/mute”, it has the black F in yellow circle icon, index is 2, moment and inverted are unchecked, and category is Physical.

I got prompted for a software update but I didn;t install it yet, so I’m on 4.3.3

–Randy

Craaaap, it didn’t work.

I set the CVs that Mark suggested, multiple times, still no luck.

At this point I don’t even care, I can live with the hiss sound or mute it manually. I adjusted the master volume so its not that obnoxious.

The decision maker at Hornby needs to get his head examined.

Well, I did say either / or. Follow through the same process and try a value of 32 in CV 403. If that doesn’t work, I don’t know what to tell you right now.

This is the unfortunate part of having to fine tune a very complex decoder manually. With the programmer, this could be solved in ten seconds - did it to my own engine a couple times to verify.

Mark.