Installation Notebook:
Sound Installed in On30 Rich Yoder 44 ton
In this very large loco, there wasn't a lot of room for this install. With the current state of the art, it was decided to put a TCS-T1 decoder with BEMF in for the precision motor control in this switcher and the decoder lock feature. A DSX decoder supplies the sound. The FM sound decoder was chosen as being the closest currently available.
A SP-27RHB-08 speaker was chosen as being the largest that could fit inside the cab. Holes were drilled in the floor pan to allow the sound off the front (cone side) of the speaker to travel through the internals of the loco and out the trucks. The speaker was camouflaged with marker pen, as painting it would damage the come.
Under the cab floor, the real work of the install got started with the decoders being mounted on each side of the speaker opening. To keep the DSX decoder alive on power drop outs two 470 uF capacitors were installed behind one radiator grille, giving an effective 940 uF of power storage.
A 2-pin connector was used between the DSX and the rail power, so that the decoders could be programmed independently and then the motor decoder locked, allowing for further sound tweaking.
The blue-white LEDs for the directional lights were replaced with Sunny White LEDs. These were selected over the Golden Whites, due to the lens design and a desire not to have the orange lenses visible from outside the loco.
March 13, 2008