Randy, indeed adding the 2nd power source does resolve the problem! Thank you for your advice! The setup now works fantastic!
That's your problem, you have no power to the slave board. With just the ground (common) on pin 6 and the control (pin 8 of the slave to pin 7 of the master) there is no power source to run the processor on the slave. You need to connect a power suppy to BOTH boards. I guess they don't explicitly say that because it's somewhat obvious I suppose.
Skip any other wiring or testing - hook it up exactly as stated and then connect your power supply to BOTH boards. Bet it will work fine.
--Randy
Modeling the Reading Railroad in the 1950's
Visit my web site at www.readingeastpenn.com for construction updates, DCC Info, and more.
Randy, thanks for the suggestions. Perhaps that is part of the error of my ways. I only power the master with a 12v power supply. I use the same power supply in diagnosing both boards. The instructions don't state you have to have a power supply for the slave (I guess that could be implied from the NJ International instructions, that you do each multiple power sources). I thought the slave received the power from the master using the pin 6 & 7 hook up to 6 & 8 off the slave. I'll add a separate power supply to see if that fixes the problem.
Just as reference for your understanding:
From the master the pin hookups I use are: 1 & 2 for the crossbuck lights, 5 for the crossbuck lights, 6, 7, 8 (6 & 8 is for the bell ringer board). Pin 6 off the master board is dual purposed (operate slave board and bell), according to instructions. Pins 3,4, 9 and 10 are not used off the master board.
I'll hook up my volt meter as well and test as you suggest to see what I can determine off those readings. Thanks for the direction.
Henry
What are you using to power the two boards? The symptoms seem to be like a lack of a common refernce between the boards, but ifg you have pin 6 of one to pin 6 of the other...
Both board DO need a power source, those two wires do NOT supply power to the slave board. Once is the common, the other is an active low (goes to ground) signal from the slave to trigger the master even if the master's sensors are clear.
For whatever reason, it's not going to ground. When you test eash board, measure DC volts from Pin 8 to pin 3 which is +5V. When the sensors is not blocked, no train detected, you should get 0 volts. When a train IS detected, you shoudl get 5 volts.
If only one of the two works this way, use that one as the slave board, the other one is potentially defective.
If you get the opposite - it reads 5V when no train is detected, and goes to 0 when detected, check pin 9 the same way. 9 is supposed to be low when no train is detected and go high when a train is detected, but perhaps they got it backwards. If pin 9 works so that it's low when a train is detected, connect that to 7 on the master instead of 8.
Of course you could just ignore the problem and allow the crossbucks to flash indefinately. Park a signal maintainer's truck at the equipment cabinet. Have a local policeman there to direct traffic. Issue a slow order for all trains due to the malfunctioning crossing gates. Fun will ensue.
Otherwise, I got nothin'.
Bill
"Never try to teach a pig to sing. It wastes your time and annoys the pig"
Not sure if anyone has run into this problem and if so, how you got around it... I have two NJ International FlashMaster boards (1 board is the master, the 2nd board is wired to be the slave). I have two boards because I have 3 tracks to control - with one being a spur. The Slave board is configued to have the XOVER jumper set over both pins (as the instructions indicate), this handles the spur and the bi-directional track the spur tangents off of. The Master board controls the single bi-directional track. According to the directions, off the master, pins: 6 (GND) and 7 (cluster) need to go to the slave board, pins: 6 (GND) and 8 (cluster) respectively. I have that wired as such. When I power the master board on, that powers the slave (as expected). As a result, the NJ International crossbucks infinitely alternate flashing and never go off (this is my problem, that I cannot figure out how to fix). Now, if I isolate both FlashMaster boards and power them individually to diagnose this issue and hook the crossbucks up to each respective board (one test at a time), each FlashMaster behaves as I expect. By doing this test, each board is its own master board. The point here is to prove that each board is not defective when powered on its own, and that the IR sensors operate as expected when rolling stock goes over the appropriate track that has the powered sensors working. I can get the XOVER flashmaster to work as expected powered by itself (no master-slave relationship), and I can get the singe bi-directional track to work by itself on the 2nd FlashMaster (no master-slave relationship). I just cannot get a XOVER slave board and master board, single bi-directional track to all work in one hookup.
Has anyone else had this type of setup and gotten this to work? I called NJ International and the owner is not sure if that combination has ever been tested on their boards in 13 years since he's been in the business. ???!!?? I'd be interested to hear what you all have to say around this behavior I am seeing with these hookups.
Thanks,