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Video: Athearn HO scale SD40 with SoundTraxx DCC
Boy, is that horn lame. Otherwise it doesn’t sound that bad. Although the prime mover sound doesn’t start to ramp up until the unit is moving.
NICE SETUP…A BIT OF WEATHERING WOULD BE A NICE TOUCH…
Once again an excellent video by the MR staff-Keep up the good work in keeping us informed.
How long till Athearn comes out with the KCS version as long-ago announced?
I like it sounds and looks good Athearn is awesome you always get the best.
I just put one of these on my layout. It is a very nice unit but as pointed out in the comments the horn is lame and so far no amount of tinkering with CV’s makes it any better. The decoder has a limited function equalizer and reverb function that doesn’t do much as far as my antique ears can tell. I don’t know if a speaker upgrade would help that much but I guess it is a possibility. For the money it is still not bad.
Horn comments aside, I think it is just too bad that Soundtraxx didn’t include dynamic brake sounds on this particular decoder. I realize they are trying to keep costs down, but, come guys give us the proper noises. If you are going to eliminate sounds, coupler clash and brake squeal would be good starting points.