Yesterday while nephew and I were disassembling his layout him and I were talking about sound in loco’s. We were throwing questions back and forth on how to make it cheaper for people on budgets and came up with an idea. This idea may have already been tried, so I am just looking for opinions here.
MRC makes a host of sound units for loco’s both for steam and diesel, and they make the hand held unit for activating the sounds. Lets say you dont have DCC decoders and just want to run trains the old fashion way or cannot afford to run the DCC way, but want the sound part.
[?]What if you took a sound unit that works with DC only and put it inside a structure on the mainline run, then took another unit and put it close to you switch yard both on seperate packs, both with seperate controls to activate the sounds. I know MRC makes a complete unit already to install with a speaker, but what if you have both early diesel and steam like most do, can these units be hooked to the same pack with a three way switch to activate one or the other. I own both the diesel&steam hand held activators and was wondering if this could be done in both diesel and steam on one track with 2 handheld sound controllers with a switch between each one to turn on and off?
Look around for an MRC Sound and Power 7000,I’ve had one for a few years now,It will do the job tell I can afford in-engine sound.Your Idea is great allso!!!
JIM
I’m just considering buying one sound decoder for steam, and one for diesel, hiding them on layout then using one or the other with a 3 way switch to bypass one while operating the other, can I do the same with the newer hand held units steam and diesel on the same track is my big question on my main pike? I have the newer MRC sound hand held in steam&diesel, is this basicallt the same that im thinking as a setup?
Sounds like it, but in a conveiniant pre made package. The MRC says it is a syncro sound unit. I don’t know what that means. I wish my LHS had one I could hear first.
I thought about the decoder in a building thing. I guess you’d just asign it it’s own address like a loco. You could also use a better speaker with maybe a little amplifier unit too.(just a thought)
I have mounted two Soundtraxx DSD-100LC decoders under the layout. One for steam and one for diesel, each with a 4" speaker, to give voice to my non-sound equipped locomotives. Each decoder has its own address and an in-line switch to isolate it from the layout when necessary. Just use the decoder’s address for the top address and MU a soundless loco to it. Sometimes I just assign the decoder’s address to a throttle and use it for general sound effects. Works okay, but a decoder and speaker in a loco is more effective.
You can see my installation on my website, link is in my signature. Just pu***he What’s New button and scroll down the page.
BRVRR, Thats the answer I was looking for! I purchased The new diesel and steam hand held activators and am waiting to purchase the sycro. sound decoders so I can have the best of both worlds without having to put a sound unit in each loco. I have about 25 loco’s I have as regular runners and it would be very expensive to convert all them to syrc. sound! Thanks for the input guys!
I’ve been carrying the MRC Synchro Sound units for short time and I think they’re a nice little unit. They’re easy to set up and the sound quality is good, with the main variable being the speaker setup, as is the case with any sound.
For a small layout, or as discussed in this thread, they’d do fine.
The engine sounds are synched with the transformer and you can piggy back a steam and a diesel on the same transformer. I do that at train shows to demonstrate them.
Clarification: I have both units attached to the transformer. No switch is needed, since both have volume controls. I turn one up, the other down. You could actually have both turned up, but speed sound would be the same. You could use both whistles, though.
I thought about doing that awhile ago but decided not to. Any way you look at it the sound is going to come from the speaker hidden in the layout somewhere, not from the locomotive that is 20’ away from you. For areas that you want stationary sound, like farms and heavy industry it is a great idea.