Tsunami in an Atlas RS-11...done!

Model Railroader Electronics and DCC
1

I didn’t take any pics, but last night I installed a TSU-1000 Tsunami in a modern Atlas Classic RS-11 (it came with white LED’s, not bulbs). It came out pretty well.

The speaker was the small oval speaker with it’s snap on enclosure. The decoder was the Alco 251 version of the Tsunami. The system used for testing and programming was a Digitrax Zephyr, using a DT300 throttle.

Opening the shell, it was obvious it would be a tight fit. First step was to remove all the black wire clamps and strip the Atlas board of all electrical connections. Next, I removed the LED head lights, and then took off the Atlas board from on top of the motor. The rear weight needed to go to make room for the speaker, so by removing the two screws holding it on, it came off.

Doing some quick measuring, it was clear that the decoder mounts had to go to make room for the decoder. Using a Xuron track nipper, I cut these flush with the top of the motor.

At this point, I had the four wires coming from the trucks, and the two wires on the motor. The motor wires were unsoldered, and the Tsunami decoder wires were cut to fit and soldered to the motor (orange wire goes on the top motor lead, gray on the side). The decoder was then taped to the top of the motor with 3M Magic tape so that the speaker wires and the capacitor were towards the rear.

The truck wires were long enough to connect to each other, so I did so and used the resulting connection to attach the red and black wires from the decoder. I used heat shrink tubing to insulate the connections.

Next, it was time to connect the LED’s. The red wire from the LED connects to the blue common wire on the decoder (I left this connection bare for adding the rear LED lead later), while the black wire on the LED connects to the white wire on the decoder. The LED was left in place on top of the metal weight at the front.

The rear LED’s black wire was then c

2

Paul, you KNOW that this thread is useless without pics or a video.

What are you impressions about the horn sounds, level and such? What about the Hyperdrive system (fellas in my group are having issues with jerky running and such)?

David B

3

Yeah, I know about the lack of pics, but even so…at least I told folks what color wires go where.

My thoughts about the horn levels are that they are okay. Not great, but okay. A factory install will be louder, but that’s only expected since they design the loco around the speaker instead of trying to cram a speaker into a loco that was never made for it. At my club, the room is so large (6300 sq. ft. & 12 foot ceiling) and there’s so much white noise (fans, people, etc.) that the diesel engine sound does get kinda lost more than 4 to 5 feet away. The horn can be heard from much farther away, and the bell is probably the most clear (high tones in a small speaker and all that).

Meanwhile, on my 25’x50’ finished basement home layout with an 8 foot wallboarded ceiling, the same loco at the same sound settings is too loud. I can hear the diesel sound anywhere in the room, and the whistle and bell are almost overpowering.

I like the horn sound quality. They certainly sound like the various air horn samples that I’ve played on the internet, with the problem of the Tsunami sound coming from a small speaker. This, of course, means that you’re gonna miss out on the lower tones. I was able to try some Heavy Bass speakers from QSI with the Tsunami, and it made a signficant difference to my ears.

I haven’t tried the “hyperdrive” yet. That’s next. The motor control is a bit wonky without it, so far. In one direction, the loco starts moving at 10% throttle…and it’s not a gentle transition, it sort of instantly moves at 10mph, which is a little fast. In the other direction, the loco doesn’t start moving until 25% throttle and it’s a very gradual change from 0mph to 5mph or so. The loco is 2 years old, and I’ve been using it so it should be broken in by now.

I don’t like that CV5 and CV6 are missing from the decode

4

Thanks for the post, Paul. I didn’t realize the Tsunami had a Hancock as one of the ‘horn’ options, that’s very good news to me as I have several Minneapolis Northfield and Southern diesels that used Hancock air whistles. [:)]

5

Paul3 - thanks for the primer. I just ordered a QSI Tsunami decoder for an Atlas RS-1 from Tony’s but I had no clue that it was going to be that tough to get everything in.

I am printing out your instructions but if you could come up with some pictures, even better.

[bow]