I have an Athearn DCC locomotive that suddenly stopped working. I received this new as a gift this Christmas. I had a couple trains running using my Prodigy Wireless system and, as happens quite often, the handheld controller stops responding so I cut the power to the track to stop any trains colliding or running off the end of a siding. After resetting the handheld, when I tried to power up the Athearn locomotive by pressing F8 twice, the usual way for startup, it did not respond. I have tried everything I can think of but it won't run or make any sound whatsoever. I was going to remove the shell and take a look inside but I couldn't even get the couplers removed without fear of breaking something. I e-mailed Atheran but have not received any resolution yet. Does anyone have any ideas or has had this happen to them? This is the only Athearn loco I have. I have 5 other Atlas locos and 1 Broadway Import and all have worked fine so far. Thanks.
Can you put it on the program track and read any CVs? Did you try a reset of the decoder?
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If this is an Athearn with a decoder already installed, it is an MRC and chances are 99 percent that the decoder is bad. Why did you press F8 twice? That's the mute button on some brands of sound decoders. If you're trying to reset the decoder, many brands say to program CV 8 with a value of 8 -- pressing F8 doesn't do anything as far as resetting the decoder.
The only MRC decoder I have is a Sounder, which uses CV 125 as the reset by programming it with a value of 1. MRC often makes up their own CVs.
Your best hope is to contact MRC and ask them what the reset CV is if you don't have any documentation for the decoder.
GKMDBI had a couple trains running using my Prodigy Wireless system and, as happens quite often, the handheld controller stops responding so I cut the power to the track to stop any trains colliding or running off the end of a siding.
GKM,
This I find more disturbing than your problem with the decoder. Your Prodigy throttle should NOT stop responding on an "often" basis.
Is there anything in your Prodigy wireless manual under Troubleshooting about this particular issue? Have you contacted MRC about your throttle flaking out? If you haven't, I would encourage you to do so. This is not normal for a DCC wireless system.
Also, can you plug in your Prodigy wireless throttle and operate it connected to your layout with a cable? Does MRC supply one with your unit? (I know you can with the NCE PH Pro wireless system.) I would be curious to find out if you have the same sorts of issues as you do when operating your layout "wireless".
On the decoder, chances are that it's toast, as Chuck has suggested. GKM, if you can operate your Prodigy throttle with a cord, test or reset the decoder on your programming track to see if you get any sort of response. Here's a handy link from Tony's Train Exchange for the sequence to setting your decoder to factory default settings:
How to Rescue a Faulty Decoder
Hope that helps...
Tom
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I have to agree with David. MRC's have a nasty habit of dying in place. I've found that the quality is not good at all. Would I use one? I'll put it this way. I'll use a first generation Bachmann decoder before I use another MRC.
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I do not know how to reset the decoder and the operator's manual that comes with the locomotive is very brief and says nothing about resetting the decoder. Is this easy to do? Doe sit require removing the shell? Thanks.
I press F8 twice to power up the locomotive when I first turn on my system. With Atlas, it is F6 twice but with Athearn, they say F8 twice. It is an Athearn with the decoider already installed. I have read other posts that say MRC decoders are the worst kind. I will try to program CV 125 with a value of 1. Thanks.
Thanks Tom. I have a cable to plug in the handheld to charge it and I believe I can operate trains whiel it is charging so I will try running trains with it plugged in and see if it loses it's memory when plugged in.
That worked! Programming CV 125 to a value of 1 reset the decoder and then I set CV49 to a value of 1 to restore the sound and everything seems to be working again. Thanks to everyone for their input.