Strange problem with new BLI

[Anonymous]

Just received my first BLI loco - this is the nicest loco we own, and the first purchased with sound and dcc installed (have several with dcc installed retro-fitted)...

I put the thing on my layout (Zephyr controlled), and it sounds great, runs great, for 15 minutes... Then all of the sudden the sound cuts out, and then starts back up but sounds really strange, almost like there's a short circuit in a set of speaker wires on your stereo (loud, then soft, muffled and static-like).

I took the tender apart and reset the system with the jumper and everything is OK again... Just wondering if anyone out there has ever experienced this and what the cause may be?

[simon1966]

Does the loco movement hesitate at all when the sound cuts out? In other words, does the short seem to impact the operation of the loco, or just the sound?

I had a problem with a BLI Mikado where the electrical pick up from the tender wheel sets was intermitently shorting to the metal chassis of the tender. This then caused a direct short at the drawbar betweent he tender and the hookin post at the back of the engine.

[tstage]

petejung,

Which BLI locomotive are you talking about? (Since it has a tender then, obviously, it must be a steamer.) I wasn't sure by your post. Did this happen more than once? It looks like you did the proper thing in resetting the system.

On the BIL web site, there's a news flash about problems with some of the new NW2/SW7 switches that were recently released. Turned out to be a software problem and they have 3 different fixes for it. Don't know if that problem and your problem are related at all but I wanted to bring it to your attention anyhow. The blurb will be in "BLI News", on the right side of the screen. Click on "News Archives" at the bottom.

Hope that helps...

Tom

[Anonymous]

Thanks guys.

Tstage- It is a 2-8-2 Heavy Mike, BLI#253. It only happened the one time... I was afraid to run it too much after the incident...

Simon1966 - Everything seems to run just fine, normal speed, no jitters, and the unit is very responsive to the DCC controls, the sound was just muffled and cutting in and out.

[mike33469]

I've had some strange sound and motion problems with BLI Hudson, it seems not to happen when my track is very clean. You might try cleaning your track and try running the engine again, worked for me. Good luck.

[steveblackledge]

I have an M1A and this has done a similar thing ( i am on DC) when i set the system volume on option one level 9, when i stopped the loco and changed direction all sound stopped for a few seconds then suddenly started up again, i re set the volume to level 12 and the problem disapeared, very strange