OK, I have 3 Athearn Genesis LoCos I want to run in a consist all the time. They’re a F3 A and B unit and a F9A unit all older units with factory MRC sound decoders. So far it’s been next to impossible to speed match them. I thought I kill two birds with one stone by installing Tsunamis in them. To save some money, Ive thought about using only one sound and two motor only decoders. Soundtraxx website says there non sound decoders are made to work well with there sound decoders. So, has anyone tried this? If so, give me all the info you can. THANKS
Also, two of the units have a buzzing/clicking sound. Could this be cracked gears? I’ve never heard of a cracked gear problem with Athearn Genesis locos before?
I have a number of consists with sound and non-sound engines. They all work pretty well, including those with Tsunamis.
Is the MRC decoder still in the locomotives that make the buzzing sound? The MRC decoders had horrible motor control circuitry and it was practically impossible to speed match them with anything else.
Not sure about the clicking noise. Some club members have had Athearn Genesis locomotives that developed cracked gears, but it’s not very common. Athearn does not sell replacement gears for Genesis locomotives as a separate repair part, but does sometimes have replacement wheel/axle/gear sets available.
Speed matching a Tsunami-equipped engine to an engine with a good non-sound decoder isn’t a problem. MRC decoders, particularly early ones, aren’t generally regarded as ‘good’ decoders. Replace them with a regular TCS, NCE or Digitrax decoder and they should work fine together.
Sound and NonSound Tsunami’s have F11(or whatever other function you may change it to) braking and are great to speed match, even using JMRI. But I speed match them to Digitrax, TCS and other high quality decoders. I’m not crazy about MRC or Bachmann decoders, for lots of reasons so I just replace them vs trying to speed match.
Richard