Hi Guys, Last night I was cleaning my loco's wheels. I cleaned most no problem, using the cloth with alcohol across my programming track. I have the BLI SW7 with QSI sound, during the cleaning no problem. As soon as I was finished I set it on the layout to test. It does not move at all. In forward the prime mover sounds rev up, but no movement. In reverse, nothing happens when the throttle is advanced, no movement and the sound stays at idle. All other sound functions work as does the lights. I was so annoyed I just eveything down for the night. Is it fried? Do you think a reset to factory defaults might restore it? Anyone else have this happen? Thanks Edward
I take it you have the ability to swap your programming track from "run" to "program" through a dpdt switch. This shouldn't be the issue but I'd double-check your toggle. I've had decoders throw addresses before. For some reason it just drops out. The decoder is still making noise indicating it is functioning on at least some level. I'd try restore then reporgram to see if it works. Otherwise this really makes no sense unless something else happened that you missed/overlooked.
I have found, a number of times, that powering off my base station, and then powering up again, magically restores my system's functionality. You may be 3/4 of the way there having powered down and called it a day. And, if the first intuitively right things to do don't seem to work, I never waste time pondering. I just put the engine on a programming section, isolated from the rest of the layout via an SPDT, and do a hard reset in Paged Mode. Two minutes later, with your main CV's set back to where you'd like them, you are back in business. What is mystifying, unnerving, and frustrating, is the apparent juxtaposition of your rare act of cleaning the wheels, regardless of the method, and what seems to be an associated glitch in operations immediately afterward. It may not be the engine in any way, but an electronic glitch in the system. Often, a power down, pause-two-three, and then power up again snatches my system and ease of mind from funny things like weird messages on my DT400 throttles, winks and blinks here and there...all sorts of voodoo.
Thanks Harron & COverton. Crandell, forgive the newb question, what do you mean by ..."and do a hard reset in Paged Mode".. I am using the NCE with a seperate programming track with a SPDT switch. Edit: I did a factory reset (as per the manual) and thankfully it has returned to active duty. Thanks again guys....and one more time
Sometimes the "Set CV8 to "8" instruction doesn't seem to cause a decoder to reset, and it may be related to the system trying to do the resetting. In the case of QSI's, at least the earlier ones, there were/are three CV's that must be altered to get the soft reset. For a hard, reset, there is a jumper, a small black "office tower" like thingy with what seems like a tiny metal staple embedded in the top surface. You pull that out, power up the decoder, then shut power off again, re-insert the jumper, and then restore power once more. The decoder will toot three times after a brief period of inactivity, and you'll notice volume settings restored to the max, per the factory practise. That is a sign your decoder is back on Address "03" and reset. Alternatively, QSI decoders are often accompanied by a small plastic device with a magnet inside. They call it a "wand". You are to wave this wand over the part of the decoder that has the jumper in it. It is sometimes a bit of a mystery where the jumper actually is because, in some BLI steamers for example, while the nice glossy pamphlet says to wave the wand just behind the coal chute on the tender, a modification has apparently taken place because a piece of paper states that they have changed the location of the jumper after the pamphlet was published. Anyway, you must power down, hold the wand essentially touching the area specificed, power up, and gently wave the wand back and forth two or three times until the engine gives the three toots...I think I have that right. It may be that you have to power down first, and then it will toot as per the previous description, upon the next power-up. It's a pain, and they vary, but sometimes it takes what I call the "hard" reset to actually force the entire factory default parameters to take. If your NCE system doesn't seem to have the oomph to make the QSI, with its heavy inrush current for the capacitor, play the game, change to Ops mode, and try it that way. Try the old address, and if that doesn't produce the desired reset, try address "03" and see if it resets. I guess you'll have to assume, if it does, that it had at least responded to the earlier reset instructions and changed its address. I'm waiting for the first time one of my decoders talks back to me and tells me to take a hike. They appear to have minds of their own.
