MTS decoder installation

[johnandjulie13]

Hello All:

I have an old Lake George and Boulder starter set with a separate powered tender. I took the plunge and decided to equip the units with MTS decoders. I used an old LGB Telegram article (Summer, 2000, if I remember correctly) as a guide for the installation. The engine installation went fine. However, when I took apart the tender I discovered that the tender has the newer sandwich gearbox as opposed to the older shell gearbox. I am now at a loss. Are there installation instructions for a sandwich gearbox available? Any information would be appreciated. I like doing these types of things myself so I do not want to send it to LGB for installation.

Thank you in advance for any feedback.

Regards,

John O

[RhB_HJ]

John,

Does it have 4 wires out of the power brick, instead of the 3 on the old one?

[johnandjulie13]

Good Morning HJ

There are three wires coming out of the gearbox, white, brown and green. However, the green wire reconnects to the same spot as the brown wire.

Regards,

John O

[RhB_HJ]

John,

That means they use a common wire. What you need is split the wires coming from the pickups and the ones going to the motor. Two wires come from the pickups, two separate wires go to the motor, no connection between the two!.

There's a "how to" somewhere on the Net (applies to older engines, too), but since I don't have that config requirement I don't recall where.
I'll Google and see if it pops up.

[johnandjulie13]

Hello HJ:

Thanks for the response. I do understand that part of the installation. The problem I am running into is the way the sandwich gearbox is configured. The power pickups are directly in contact with the motor. I obviously need to bypass the motor by having the decoder get the power first and then feed it to the motor. However, without some instruction, I am not sure of the best way to accompli***hat task.

Regards,

John O

[devils]

Without having seen one,

"The problem I am running into is the way the sandwich gearbox is configured. The power pickups are directly in contact with the motor" .

Is there room to cut the contact strip short of the motor and solder wires to the stubs, to the decoder and then solder the decoder outputs direct to the motor tags?

[johnandjulie13]

I believe there is. But, given the gearbox configuration, I am not sure the best way to accompli***his task. That is why I was hoping someone could point me to some instructions (diagrams would be even better) on how to perform the work.

Regards,

John O

[Anonymous]

Listen mate i would not take too much notice of HJ; he doesn't respect his parents!

The bloke who knows a real lot about this subject is Troy Betts over in Kent. I have been to his place and seen his old locos operating with LGB decoders fitted too them. They work pretty good too, he has even fitted LGB decoder to a double decker tram.

If you are interested; email me and i will give you his email address he doesnt come onto the forum much anymore.

Rgds ian