I recently purchased a Bachmann Alco RS3 Bumble Bee engine with DCC On Board. NO sound. Price was good so I picked it up with limited knowledge about decoders and programming.
I have recently activated my NCE Power Cab system on the layout and have started to run the engine. I had hopes of consisting this engine with an Athearn Genesis GP9 I also recently purchased - It has a Tsumami Soundtraxx decoder installed.
I compared the two engines on parallel tracks for speed performance and found that the Genesis seems to perform rather linearly from Speed Step 1 to 28 with a max speed currently at 90 mph, while the RS3 will not begin to move until step 3 or 4 and then dwells up to about 6 and ten is on a more parabolic curve with step 14 at 47 mph and step 28 at 76 mph.
Since I don't have my Decoder Pro yet (on order) I tried playing with CV2 and found that if I push it from from it's default 10 to 28 I can get the engine to start moving at speed step 1 but there is no speed increase until I get to step 5 or 6. There seems to be a dead spot in the curve. I did this with the acceleration cv at 0.
I am new to all this and have tried to discuss with Bachmann and find that they have limited knowledge of the decoder functions, and only to find out that the decoder is a LENZ for which the only support in US is Tony's Trains. They did not help much on this as they claimed to know little about this decoder.
The limited documentation that came with the engine specifies little on the decoder controls and states it is a 28 speed step type. I downloaded a sheet from web on the E-Z Command Two Function Decoder and it it says little about speed control and does not show any speed CVs other than 2. But it does state it has advanced consisting, which I have no idea what that means. If this is truly the decoder I have it states that the decoder is pre programmed for 28 speed steps with an internal speedline but that all configurations can be changed - how is not defined and the list of supported CVs includes 1-4,7-8,17-19, 29 which is multi-functional, 50-52.
There is likely someone out there that is a lot smarter than I am on this and can offer some advise.
My goal is to show I have some control over speed on this unit and then get rid of the flat spot at the lower speed steps.
Thanks
John....
Two issues at work. First, the Bachmann decoder is not nearly as good at motor control as the Tsunami in the Genesis, or even an inexpensive NCE motor-only decoder. There's a reason the price of a loco with a decoder is so low realtive to some others, and the slightly lesser detailing isn;t the only one. It's just not a good decoder.
Second issue, which has some effect ont he included bachmann decoder, but even more so if you would swap it with a good decoder, are the capacitors bachmann puts on their locos to reduce some RF emissions (still haven't figured that one out, even with 70's era open frame trains running int he same room as TV with an antenna input, back before cable and the better noise rejection of coax cable, I never had interference witht he TV or anything. Being that the layout we set up when I was a kid was in the same room as the TV, it's good they didn;t interfere, or my Mom would have never let me run the trains). Anyway, they are there - and for best operation they should be removed - just cut clean off. Which ones they are depends on the loco, I haven't seen a picture of the RS3 to see where they put them, but they are either on the circuit board or directly on the motor.
I've had good luck with 2 of the same loco, one with Tsunami, by putting a TCS T1 in the non-sound loco. They matched up quite nicely without doing any adjustments - the TCS has auto-adjusting BEMF and it synced up pretty well with the Tsunami. With two different brands of locos, you may have to adjust some CVs. If you cna get away with it, most decoders EXCEPT Tsunami support 3 simple CVs for adjusting the speed. CV2 is start voltage. CV6 is the mid-speed voltage (not supported on Tsunami) and CV5 is the max throttle speed. Put a decent decoder in the bachmann, and then use those CVs to adjust it to try and match the Genesis. If that doesn;t get it close enough (they should be similar, they do NOT have to be in 100% lockstep), you will need to start looking in to speed tables, which is how you adjust the operating speed at different speed steps with the Tsunami.
--Randy
Modeling the Reading Railroad in the 1950's
Visit my web site at www.readingeastpenn.com for construction updates, DCC Info, and more.
I don't understand about your comment about 'ordering' Decoder Pro. Decoder Pro is a FREE computer program that you can download from the Internet at the JMRI web site.
Now, if you are talking about the computer interface device for the Power Cab, that is a different thing because that is a Hardware item so you can connect your computer to the Power Cab.
I know we can be nit-picky at times, but specifics can make all the difference. We have a saying in many industries, GIGO. (Garbage In, Garbage Out) That translates to, if you give us the wrong or misleading information, we give you wrong or misleading answers.
Not trying to get on your case, just trying to give you a little insight so you can get the best answers possible of future posts and questions.
Elmer.
The above is my opinion, from an active and experienced Model Railroader in N scale and HO since 1961.
(Modeling Freelance, Eastern US, HO scale, in 1962, with NCE DCC for locomotive control and a stand alone LocoNet for block detection and signals.) http://waynes-trains.com/ at home, and N scale at the Club.