Electronics and DCC

 I installed a NCE D15SR decoder into an Athearn Genesis SD75M (one of the newer releases that has everything wired and ready to go) I followed the instructions in the manual on how to program this decoder for the lighting effects F0 turns head light no and F1 turns rearlight on, however when I turn the front head light on the ditch lights go on as well,  before I reprogrammed the decoder F0 turned on both front and back head lights when direction dictated but the ditch lights did not come on F1 controlled the on/off of the ditch lights.   Now that have programmed the decoder I lost independent on/off control of the ditch lights.  By the way F4 now dims both front and back head lights but not the ditch lights.  hope someone can help,  Andy

Open the chassis and check the wiring. My SD60 had both ditch lights attached to the same output.

 I should've mention I did check the wiring and it is connected to their own terminals.  One of the things I did first was to check and see if the locomotive worked with default settings and at that time is when I discovered that I could control the ditch lights by pushing F1 however now F1 controls the rear haed light.  Thank you for the thought  Andy

 On the Athearn Genesis SD70 locomotives I have the ditch lights were connected to the same light output as the headlight and both ditch lights were wired in series.  When you say that yours were "wired and ready to go" are you sure it's wired correctly?  Athearn's definition of "ready to go" may not mean that the ditch lights are separately powered like they need to be.

I am sure they are wired correctly I checked them before I did any programming and they worked then and still work now, the problem I have is now they come on when I actiate F0 before programming the ditch lights worked by activating F1, as I said before I programmed the deocoder so that F1 would turn the rear light on independently so I no longer have independent control of the ditch lights.  Thanks Andy

Best place to start is the beginning. Find the reset CV for the decoder and set it to factory default.  At least you'll know what all of the current settings are.

 This post has an answer just took a little time.  The Athearn SD75M with no sound using NCE D15SR decoder needs the CVs of 33 and 34 to set at 1, CV 37 at 2 this allows F3 to activate the rear headlight, F0 will still work the front head light, CV120 at 32 allows F4 to dim front light CV121 at 36 allows F8 to dim rear light  and F1 will activate ditch lights.    Thanks to all that tried I am very happy now

Andy