Doug, becasue of this thread, I got off my rear-end and did the mods to my sons UP SD70ace prior to going to a club running sesstion yesterday afternoon. I made a huge difference.
Simon Modelling CB&Q and Wabash See my slowly evolving layout on my picturetrail site http://www.picturetrail.com/simontrains and our videos at http://www.youtube.com/user/MrCrispybake?feature=mhum
Thanks to Simon1966 for all the information. This how-to YOU-TUBE and the Tony's Train forum post nail the problem where it starts.
I had heard it might be the original speakers they used in the first run $1***$2this goof to the first run ATSF FP-45s defects)...........
Add another one.......................I just got the new SOO LIne "candy apple red" scheme SD-40-2. I ordered #98209 which was suppoed to be unit 772. The box came stickered 98209 alright but the unit is lettered 761 and the rest of the box label identifies it as 761 also......whew.....give me a damned sheet of decals any day !!!!!
Doug
http://www.tonystrains.com/technews/loconews/athearn_sd70ace_sound_improvement.htm
See this link. there is a design defect in the first run. I have heard the results of this improvement and it makes a big difference. Google the issue, there are several hits on the web.
like this for example http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EFSIucRROlU
Here is the thread with the CV changes
http://cs.trains.com/TRCCS/forums/t/183783.aspx
There was a posting here last year, of a long list of CVs that needed to be changed in order to get the original decoder to sound right. The list was provided by Athearn, and may be on their web site or on the SoundTraxx web site, if you can't find it here.
I have the Athearn Union Pacific Heritage SD70ACe units with sound., the first unit (Missouri Pacific) and now just added the Western Pacific unit. I am having trouble with the sound on the MioPac engine.
The Western Pacific one, being the newest, all the sounds are loud and operate fine. The original one which is the Missouri Pacific has a lot to be desired. Some of the sounds are weak sounding and the horn can hardly be heard at all.
I have tried Athearn's suggestion by boosing the system sound value in CV-51 all the way up to 155 as well as the horn sound volume in CV-49-0 setting CV-52 at 15, also the maximum value and nothing changes the weak sounds still heard.
Does this engine have another problem or is it an Athearn "flub" that something wasn't done right when the engine was made????
Thanks for your help correcting it
Doug Nash