I recently bought a new Athearn sd40-2 in NS paint and I could not live with the fact that it did not have ditch lights.I installed a set in the same spot as the prototype(under the anticlimber) and I tryed to hook them up to the headlights and it made it so the loco had to be at high speed for the lights to illuminate.This unit does not have side posts on the circuit board to hook them to.Does anyone know how I can wire them in?
what voltage bulbs are you using? what you've done is hooked an additional set of bulbs up to an athearn PC board that is setup to only deliver the required voltage for the 1.5v bulbs that they already had in there. How picky are you about directional control? if you are using 1.5v bulbs, put a resistor on one side and just solder your connections to the power pickup tabs on the PC board. then the lights will get a full charge and illuminate at lower voltages. However they will no longer be directional.
I had the same problem when changing the headlights on my Proto cab locos from incandescent to LED. The circuit board delivers enough to light the low-voltage bulbs but not enough to light LEDs - even when I put them directly on the headlight contacts without a series resistor and protection diode. So I soldered the leads to my LED light assembly directly to the power pickups (DC locos all around here).
Thanks for the replys.So if I hook the ditch lights to the power pick ups on the board and it wont blow them?I dont have a problem with the directional issue.
depends on what kind of bulbs you used for the ditch lights. If you used anything less than 12v bulbs, than you need to install a resistor of some kind to knock the voltage down. if they are 12v or higher bulbs than no you won't blow them up.
