I'm slowly making the transition to DCC. I have two Athearn CF7's that I want to install decoders in. I have been studying the TCS installation website; and it finally dawned on me that the CF7's have a 1.5 volt voltage regulator as part of Athearn's light board. (note: I have not opened up my CF7's yet; I'm doing research and stockpiling the courage to install my first decoder). I have been told about this feature several times, but the information either passed straight through my brain or I thought they were talking about the TCS A6X decoder, which has a 1.5 volt voltage regulator as part of its inner workings.
Anyway, the TCS site shows a T series decoder as a simple drop in decoder installation. I get that. Of course, I have to make this difficult; I want to add a rotary beacon. Looking at the installation picture, the T series has a harness that plugs into the Athearn light board. Looking at a picture of a A4X; it appears that it must be soldered; even though the description says it is a drop in installation for many Athearn locomotives. Or is there some sort of harness involved that is not pictured?
Thanks in advance for any suggestions / advice.
Hi Tin
The A4X and A6X are board replacement decoders. You can reuse the little plastic clips that hold the wires but they are not reliable. I solder mine. If you want a rotary beacon than the A6x will do for you. If the loco has an 8 pin plug than the T4x or T6x with a short harness will work.
TCS has instal pictures that are very helpfull for novice decoder instalers.
Pete
I pray every day I break even, Cause I can really use the money!
I started with nothing and still have most of it left!
I have over 50 of the A4X decoders on my layout and they are great. Personally, I prefer to use the A4X (or A6X) and eliminate the factory boards altogether. Some factory boards have directional diodes, filter capacitors and who knows what else on them .... by just plugging into these boards' socket, I've found it's very difficult at times to speed match different engines.
Scrap the factory board, that way you know the only thing between the decoder and your motor is two wires !
Mark.
¡ uʍop ǝpısdn sı ǝɹnʇɐuƃıs ʎɯ 'dlǝɥ
Tin Can,
You do realize that there's a certain Hippie basically down the street from you that can help with that, right?
The A-series are board replacements, as said above. The T-series are the ones with the plugs. Like Mark said, I'd definitely lose the factory circuit board (with the exception of that F45 of yours...the factory board on that has the 1.5v regulators on it already, all you need to do is plug a T4 or T6 into it to get all of the functions you need) in most locos.
Robert Beaty
The Laughing Hippie
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The CF-7...a waste of a perfectly good F-unit!
Then it comes to be that the soothing light at the
end of your tunnel, Was just a freight train coming
your way. -Metallica, No Leaf Clover
Mark,
the newer boards on Athearn's locomotives have 1.5v regulators built onto them for at least 4 functions. They also have both NMRA AND 9-pin decoder connectors, so you can plug your choice of decoder into them without having to worry about resistors. That also gives the advantage of constant 1.5v power for the lights regardless of the track voltage (i.e. if you take your locomotives to different layouts, and each has the track voltage slightly different).
This is actually something of an "undocumented feature" of the Athearn locomotives...my FP45 had no mention of it at all in the instructions. I discovered it when I was looking at the board and saw "LM317" on some components, then asked Athearn about it directly.
Arjay1969 wrote: Tin Can,You do realize that there's a certain Hippie basically down the street from you that can help with that, right?
I know that, but I wasn't going to bother you at 10:30 at night....
and we've got to get our schedules synchronized...
as I type this from work....
I have a question about the TCS A series decoders. Does the A4x have the built in resisters for the 1.5v bulbs? Also would I be able to run ditch lights off the 4 function decoder because I am not clear on what constitutes a function (do the headlights and rear lights count as separate functions?). Thanks for the help.
UP3985
I believe the A4x decoder is no longer available/made. It has been replaced by the A6x.
The Head light is 1 function and rear light is another function. Then you have optional lighting functions like ditch lights, beacons, mars lights ect. ect.
The A6x has resistors for 1.5volt bulbs built in but you have to remove a couple of traces on the board.
It seems I was hasty in telling you the A4x is no longer made. They list it on their web site. It is 4 function, That is it has head and tail lights and two other lighting functions. It does not have resistors on board for 1.5 volt bulbs or LEDs. The A6x gives you 6 functions with dropping resistors.
4 functions = Head light and tail light and 2 ditch lights.
6 functions = Head light, tail light, 2 ditch lights, rotary beacon, and mars light or any other lighting you can think of.
Thank you very much.