I know somebody has posted this and yes I have searched and checked manuals and can not find the answer. So, here is my question: I have 5 (73800's) LS selects consisted together and when I press f8 to turn the prime mover on they all light up at the same time. There is a setting to change on each decoder that will stagger the start up. Anybody know or can tell me where to to find the procedure? Sorry to be a pest but I have not done a very good job of saving stuff, Carl
Ouch! Did you read the first line of my post? ESU has some of the worst "manuals" for their products. In fact, a friend, sent me a link to an "unofficial" "manual for dummies" for the Lokprogrammer. Much better written than the ESU version and a person can actually learn how to use the programmer. BTW, I have been using ESU products for 6-7 years or so. Regards, Carl
Hi Carl. I don't know of any way to have the engines start up sequentially automatically. What you can do is change how the consisted locomotives respond to F8 while in the consist, and instead turn them on manually one by one. If you have a LokProgrammer, the screen for changing how a locomotive responds to function keys in a consist is on the Address pane at the bottom. You need to un-click the box next to F8 in this area for each of the consisted engines, then reload the decoder settings (not the sound file, just the decoder settings). You can still turn on the prime mover for the consisted engines by calling up their main address and pressing F8. John C.
+1 on this John.. I was programming a few Loco's this evening to see if you could delay sound on start-up. It would be cool to hear Carl's consist of 5 start a few milliseconds apart from each other.
Hi John and Mark, Top of the New Year to you both and may the year be kind to you. Yes, it would be cool to hear the 5, could now be 7, prime movers fire up sequentially but I can not figure out how. Yes, on the SP it would not have been unusual to see SD-9's, GP-30's in a large consist. I do use the LokProgrammer and yes I have looked at the address pane. The f8 box is not checked on any of the decoders. So, I guess I need to learn how to consist so Loksound will play right. I use Digitrax throttle and assign or "mu" everything to the right hand throttle with the 1st loco being the consist address. I'll keep plugging away and maybe the sawdust will burn out and I'll figure it out. Happy New Year, Carl
You would be better off consisting the locomotives together using JRMI, much simpler than a throttle especially if you are having a significant number of locomotives. Depending on how many are running you may run out of slots in the controller. This was you can alias them all to a single slot.
David, You are right on, thanks. What I actually did was, using JMRI, gave each locomotive the same address, turned off the functions I did not want to come on such as headlight, bells, horns on the mid consist units. Probably not the best way but I do not intend to run these sound units with another "silent" consist of 4 SD-9, SD-35 etc. Thanks for your input, Carl
Carl, If you use Advanced Consisting where each locomotive retains its own number and every locomotive corresponds to a consist address, you can manipulate the characteristics of each locomotive independent of each other instead of setting them all to the same address, that applies all the settings the same on all locomotives. For example, I created multi-unit distributed lash-ups using locomotives with Zimo decoders and modified each locomotive with different Momentum Trim. this allowed the locomotives to wait a tad longer before starting to roll. In this was I was able to have mid-train helpers and end train pushers where all the locomotives ran with different Momentum Trim settings but ran under the one consist address. it took a little tweaking on my part to set it all up. But now I can turn very long trains with distributed power with no discernible slack or pressure on any of the couplers on the train I am thinking in a similar manner you may be able to setup your locomotives to spin-up in the manner you are looking for with the sounds. The point here is that you could make the sound adjustments to each locomotive to better implement the effect you are looking for.
David, thank you for the reply, very much appreciated. To start let me say that I downloaded the sound files from ESU via my LokProgrammer into each locomotive so I have the units in my ESU file. Now, good or bad, I tweak sounds in JMRI as well as function characteristics. All done in each individual loco. I have set the same dcc address in each one so yes I understand that each unit will respond the same to commands. I have "turned off" functions that I do not want to see or hear in each unit. I can change the address back to the cab # on each loco and then consist them together. Here is a list of what I am working with : ATLAS/KATO GP30 ESU EMD 567 file Bloody Nose ATLAS/KATO SD9 ESU EMD 567 file Bloody Nose ATLAS/KATO SD9 Silent ESU LokPilot Black Widow ATLAS/KATO GP30 Silent ZIMO 621 Bloody Nose ATLAS SD9 ESU EMD 567 file Tiger Stripes ATLAS SD35 ESU EMD 567 file Bloody Nose Inter Mountain F7B Silent DZ 126T Black Widow KATO F7A Silent DZ143PS Black Widow All of these have been speed matched and run very well together. I know that the f9 "Drive Hold" will not work because of the silent decoders without drive hold capability. I have run the 4 ESU sound file units together and they sound good. I have mixed non-sound units in with the sound ones and they all play well together. When I speed matched I also tweaked sound, etc. on each one. I think I set them all with a very low (2) Accel/decel because I did not want them sitting to ramp up. Thanks for your suggestions, Carl
Sumner, I sure hope so. I do intend to make vid at some point. BTW, that '48 p/up of yours is one cool ride. Do you still have it? Carl
If you put LokPilot V.4 non-sound decoders in the non-sound units, you can use Drive Hold. The LokPilot V.4 works with Drive Hold. John C.
Yep, but it needs work. I've put over 150,000 on it and over 2000 on the salt flats and it has a lot of rust problems so I've neglected it , too many projects, Sumner
