Push
Randy,
I guess I should have noted the intended audience. After a few installs under my belt now, I would agree with you... no need to keep the circuit board in there. But I could have saved myself some needless headaches (and I did to some degree thanks to David B) on my earlier installs had there been more information / hints out there. This model and my Kato SD70Mac were exceptions to straight plug and play installs. This post is intended for newbie’s that want to upgrade this type of model not seasoned pros like your self. I will try my best to keep the original circuit board in there just for simplicity sakes.
Peter
Question: why are people afraid to remove the factory circuit board when all it does is handle some diodes for directional lighting under DC? It's all but useless when a decoder is installed, and in many cases it's just a huge expanse of wasted space. When there's a ton of room under the hood - sure, leave it in - sometimes it makes a handy shelf to tape the decoder to. But on smaller locos, if the decoder itself doesn't replace the factory board, you can probably gain additional room for a slightly larger sound decoder, or room to use a slightly larger speaker, if the factory board is removed and the wires simply soldered on.
--Randy
Modeling the Reading Railroad in the 1950's
Visit my web site at www.readingeastpenn.com for construction updates, DCC Info, and more.
Update 12/20 -
I installed the speaker and as you can see there was so very little room. Over the speaker I glued in a piece of styrene to complete an enclosure. Probably not needed as there is so little room.
Update 12/19 -
Finally got the parts and some time to work on my loco. After getting the ESU Loksound 3.5 decoder and speaker, it became very evident that space was still going to be an issue. I tried every configuration I could think of while trying to retain the PC board and the speaker stand. No go
So with that, I stripped all the components and fabricated a speaker enclosure from the existing speaker holder and some styrene. Also made a styrene holder for the decoder. This will help to keep it away from the moving parts, etc.
Tomorrow I will start assembling the unit.
>>> Original post >>>
Hello all,
I really enjoy reading other's how-to posts and I am starting a project to upgrade a recently purchased Atlas MP15 so I figured I would post it. There was a similar post on the Atlas Forum but I think that loco was an older model and not quite the same. I would have purchased a Gold version but couldn't find any in my prototype and road number. I have a Atlas GP40-2 Gold and I am very happy with the QSI sound in it.
First I removed the body and that only took removing the couplers (2 screws) and then prying the body up (carefully).
First thing I noticed is that the pc board is not in the standard Atlas format. It is smaller because there is simply not much room. So that ruled out the QSI Revolution A that I had my eye on. Atlas mentioned that QSI may be coming out with a small version in the near future. Even the height of a Soundtraxx Tsunami sitting on top of the pc board wouldn't work either; too high. Someone suggested an ESU Loksound micro but I was a little leery of the amp rating on that one. So I opted for the full size Loksound 3.5 with the MP15 sounds loaded. It will be a very tight fit and I suspect I will have to do some body modifications. The speaker cavity is small but I did find the right size ESU mini oval speaker (16x25mm) and order that too.
The order should be here within a week and I will update this post as I go. If you have any questions, feel free to ask.