Hi folks. While I really like my BLI PA-1's for their overall smooth running and attention to detail, I've never really liked the Paragon 2 sound decoder in them. They are complicated to operate (e.g., pressing F7 turns the Mars light OFF, instead of ON), and the prime mover sounds didn't seem to sync well with engine speed no matter what settings I tried. Moreover, the sound just didn't have the ALCo "bucket-of-bolts, bucket-of-bolts" beat that I recall from hearing the Alco 244 V-16 prime mover in the prototype. So, I decided to see what I might be able to do to improve the sound. When I removed the shell, I realized that one problem was the cheap 15mm round speaker used by BLI. Fortunately, they did mount it in a nice more-or-less sealed enclosure. And even nicer was the fact that I could fit an 11x15mm Knowles Donau speaker in this enclosure with a tiny bit of thinning of the sides. But I also realized that replacing the Paragon 2 decoder board with an ESU LokSound Select Micro wouldn't be too difficult - there was plenty of space, the truck and motor wiring was all hard-wired, as were the front headlight and Mars light. So I decided to do a full transplant: ESU LokSound with the Knowles speaker. After I was done, I made a video comparing a stock BLI PA-1 to my modified PA-1. The video starts by comparing horns, then lighting (the headlight and Mars light) and then has about a 1-minute segment with each engine accelerating from a stop to compare the prime mover sounds. My own view is that the ESU-transplant version is far superior sound-wise to the factory Paragon 2, especially when it comes to the prime mover sound. But I'll let you make up your own mind (if you want to skip directly to the segment of the video with the ESU LokSound in full roar, it is at the 1:41 mark in the video): Sometime over the next few days I'll post photos of how I did the transplant in case any of you are interested in going this route for your own PA's (similar techniques probably could be used for other BLI cab diesels). But this experiment cements for me the superiority of ESU's sound files. John C.
John, your work and videos coupled with my own limited experience has convinced me the ESU LokSound dcc decoders are at the top of the current list for sound and performance. I do not own any BLI PA units. I had ESU LokSound dcc decoder with sound installed in a Kato SD70ACe locomotive and am delighted with the results. I provided the speaker which was one of the now discontinued Knowles speakers of similar size which is one you recommended sometime ago. THANKS!!!
