Sound for Athearn sw1500

[richhotrain]

Hamltnblue

looks like it's your lucky day having a post with diagrams installing on your exact loco

Yeah, that is rare.

[jrcBoze]

WPAllen

That is on my list of things to do. However I was thinking of taking a slightly different approach. I have a powered and a dummy unit. I was think of putting the speaker and Tsunami in the dummy and run MU wires to the powered unit for the motor and lights. I would also have power pickup in both units. I have already converted the dummy unit to pick up power from the track. That would makes things easier.

I actually did a similar thing some years back. Have an HO Athearn SW1000 or 1500 (same chassis and shell except for stacks and truck frames). This was before Tsuanmi's. I put a Soundtraxx DSX sound decoder in a boxcar, permanently coupled to the switcher and 2-conductor power plug linking them. A Digitrax 163 series motor decoder is in the switcher, driving lights at both ends and a flasher on the roof as on prototype (BN 441). The 163 has excellent BEMF and is adjusted for great slow speed. This works for me and needed no 'milling' or other metal cutting. It runs/sounds just fine with an old Wabco single chime horn. With an ear 'close up', one can tell of course that the sound comes from the boxcar - but so?

I found it very difficult to get reliable track pickup power from the boxcar freight trucks. I tried virtually all of the commercial products - none work with any reliability, hence the power coupling to the prime mover. I can separate them and use a second plug to connect to track power for programming just the boxcar. I use the same 4-digit address for both decoders, but two different short addresses for each - so I can separate them via CV29 for programming on the main in Ops mode. Also, I put another plug inside the boxcar for connecting a parallel 100 ohm 10 watt resistor (one of those big gray thingies). The plug is easily accessible by opening the boxcar door.

I used an old 40 foot brown GN boxcar, pretty beat up, for the sound unit. This would have been a not-too-unusual combination in the BN-ex-GN years.

Today I might attempt the metal-cutting procedure suggested by Soundtraxx, but with my senior clumsiness I'd be a bit reluctant.

Dick Chaffer

Bozeman

[jrcBoze]

WPAllen

That is on my list of things to do. However I was thinking of taking a slightly different approach. I have a powered and a dummy unit. I was think of putting the speaker and Tsunami in the dummy and run MU wires to the powered unit for the motor and lights. I would also have power pickup in both units. I have already converted the dummy unit to pick up power from the track. That would makes things easier.

I actually did a similar thing some years back. Have an HO Athearn SW1000 or 1500 (same chassis and shell except for stacks and truck frames). This was before Tsuanmi's. I put a Soundtraxx DSX sound decoder in a boxcar, permanently coupled to the switcher and 2-conductor power plug linking them. A Digitrax 163 series motor decoder is in the switcher, driving lights at both ends and a flasher on the roof as on prototype (BN 441). The 163 has excellent BEMF and is adjusted for great slow speed. This works for me and needed no 'milling' or other metal cutting. It runs/sounds just fine with an old Wabco single chime horn. With an ear 'close up', one can tell of course that the sound comes from the boxcar - but so?

I found it very difficult to get reliable track pickup power from the boxcar freight trucks. I tried virtually all of the commercial products - none work with any reliability, hence the power coupling to the prime mover. I can separate them and use a second plug to connect to track power for programming just the boxcar. I use the same 4-digit address for both decoders, but two different short addresses for each - so I can separate them via CV29 for programming on the main in Ops mode. Also, I put another plug inside the boxcar for connecting a parallel 100 ohm 10 watt resistor (one of those big gray thingies). The plug is easily accessible by opening the boxcar door.

I used an old 40 foot brown GN boxcar, pretty beat up, for the sound unit. This would have been a not-too-unusual combination in the BN-ex-GN years.

Today I might attempt the metal-cutting procedure suggested by Soundtraxx, but with my senior clumsiness I'd be a bit reluctant.

Dick Chaffer

Bozeman

[conrail40]

      Thanks to all of you for your responses I was begining to worry there for a while . I ll take a look at that I thought I had seen a write up but couldnt find it anywhere.  Thanks again

[Hamltnblue]

looks like it's your lucky day having a post with diagrams installing on your exact loco

[Hergy]

Here's a link to a step by step pdf from the Soundtraxx website:

http://www.soundtraxx.com/documents/appnotes/SW1000&SW-1500App.pdf

Requires a little milling of the frame, but a hacksaw and a file should accomplish the task. If you snoop through their website you can find some other step by step install how-tos for different manufacturerers locos. . Very helpful.

Dick

[WPAllen]

That is on my list of things to do. However I was thinking of taking a slightly different approach. I have a powered and a dummy unit. I was think of putting the speaker and Tsunami in the dummy and run MU wires to the powered unit for the motor and lights. I would also have power pickup in both units. I have already converted the dummy unit to pick up power from the track. That would makes things easier.

[conrail40]

    Has anybody installed sound in an sw1500 ? Thoughts,advice,anybody