I'm quite curious about this. Can this only be done from a tablet or laptop, or can it be done when using your phone as a throttle? Sent from my SM-S901U using Tapatalk
Exactly! Its a good option because sounds r controlled on the throttle screen like with sound decoder.
Any Android device, phone or tablet, equipped with Bluetooth and the Engine Driver App installed. BlueStacks is an Android emulator allowing Windows PCs to run Apps which is what ED is running on. I haven't decided whether I want to power by track or battery.
Thanks Pastor John. I was in the train room earlier working on the freight transfer building and looked at the river. It’s not perfect but it looks a whole lot better in person than in the pictures. Speaking of the transfer building, it’s a nice kit but the instructions stink. The problem is that the pictures and print are so small that I have to use reading glasses and a Magic Eyes headset and they’re still hard to see.
Have you experimented with that Bluetooth board at all? They seem to indicate that it draws 1 amp. They mention that it won't run on the charge circuit since that is limited to 500mA and it needs more than that to operate so maybe 1 amp is correct. Also strange the they give example wattage to 2 and 4 ohm speakers and not the more common 8 ohm that most the cell phone batteries are that we use in sound installs. I almost ordered a couple but will wait to see how these work for you. If that is true that would be quite a bit from the track or a battery. The amplifier I'm running in the boxcar is 750 mW. I chose it since it wouldn't overpower the phone speaker. I know almost nothing about those circuits so maybe it won't draw that much in normal situations. I found, if you listen to the YouTube, that .75 watts seemed to be plenty for sound. Sumner
One of the residents for whom I "went shopping in the basement" last week is pretty happy to have progress on a new chimney. Let's see how long the painting and installation takes. Good thing it's A/C season not heating season. Looks like this guy paints windows about as badly as I do
I don't know anything about this circuit specifically, but, if what you say is true, then maybe the solution is to build it as a hybrid (if not completely battery powered). In a DCC environment, you could build a circuit that was much like the ones used to provide lighting to passenger cars, but use the output to provide a continuous, low amperage trickle charge to the battery. Since you only use sound occasionally, and the cars sit on the tracks all the time, a low level trickle likely wouldn't put a strain on the system (unless there were a lot of them) and would still be enough to keep the battery topped off. Depending on how much power was needed, a storage capacitor (like the ones used for "keep alives") might be more than enough.
I'm not running via the charge circuit at all. Unfortunately the BT-Amp was purchased from a reseller who did not disclose all info. A prob buying from aliExpress. The product's description from another seller indicated this particular board can be powered solely by a standalone 5V supply without any battery. Most product info on Ali is "light" at best so typically look at same product but different vendors to get as much info as possible. Think may have mentioned Sunday in CNJ thread that never had any interest in having BT-Amp circuit do the charging. Instead, I'd use either an inside car mounted AA or 18650 battery holder, depending on which battery type chosen and modify shell for easy battery swap. I have a 5V Buck-Boost on my to-purchase list so regardless of battery, the BT-Amp will be operated in PS mode. Video - Ammeter in series with the BT-Amp and 5V PS. Monitored current drawn from supply at varying amplitudes. Peak occurred, as expected, at high throttle speed about SS126, then sounding whistle and bell. About 170mA max, thus, the total BT-Amp module power dissipation, including audio, about 850mW. Believe the Dell pc spkr is 8 ohms. Haven't opened the new 15mm 8ohm spkr - dying to compare sound repro. My crafting skills are novice so it is desired to minimize car or shell mod. The current collectors plus the metal wheels add cost. Will evaluate consumption and outcome powering by track before getting current collectors and metal wheels.
That looks like the pre-built Bachmann 7202 Farmhouse that I still have after 55+ years. It's a great little structure.
Gee, what a terrible sounding 15mm speaker...Put back the Dell Current drawn is close to the Dell spkr. Other thing forgot to mention. Class D amps draw current based on the amplitude of the input signal as video indicated. With same Steam Class 64 as prior tests, reduced BT volume to 75% at throttle which reduces max AVG current drawn - 52mA to 32mA at SS126 w/o horn or whistle. Definitely loud enough at 75% with the spkr pointing down and away. ReRan using the EMD645 Turbo sounds. The EMD645 Turbo sounds are the loudest at any given speed step of all the loco sounds provided in EngDrv. I’ll sufficiently intrigued and moving forward with battery and DCC options testing. Don't want to clutter this thread -- will move status updates to my CNJ thread..
Thanks for the additional info. Probably wasn't clear on that. I wasn't suggesting running via the charge circuit. I was trying to use their info that stated the 1/2 amp limited charge circuit wasn't enough for it to work to indicate that it might actually use around 1 amp. Sounds like from what you found, if I understand correctly it uses 850 mA (close to an amp). I guess I don't understand the 850mA thought as the high was about 120-140mA in the video. Was that just the speaker circuit or what is going to the complete board? If you are going to use a cell phone type speaker in a car on the layout I don't think you need anywhere near the output that this puts out in watts and the speaker probably won't live at those higher watts. What Their info isn't clear as you posted and neither was the info on what I used. It looks like theirs should run on the 3.7v battery but not sure when the battery drops into the low 3's. My info was similar although they did recommend 5v so I went with the 3 to 5 booster. Sumner
Thanks for the input. With the circuit I used.... ... for my boxcar I plug in a charger to recharge the battery. I haven't used it enough to see how long the battery will actually work but hope for a couple hours even though I wouldn't probably ever need it to last that long. The car is so full now I don't think in my case that I could add track pickups and additions needed for a charging circuit and still get it in the car. The reason I went with the external charger. If this was HO there would be a lot more options. More info here.... https://1fatgmc.com/RailRoad/DCC/page-43.html Sumner
Its 850mW total board power consumption. 5V PS x 170mA Total current drawn by BT-Amp board (max current drawn by Steam Class 64 at 100% BT volume.) Excerpt from another BT_Amp vendor "1. Type-C direct power supply cannot be used. The Type-C charging interface has power limitations and can only be used when charging the battery. If you want to use DC power supply, it needs to be welded to the battery interface."
Usually only run for an hr. If I go with a battery instead of track... I'll mount holder to car floor, remove shell and swap when needs charging and will charge by external charger. the holder for 18650 is similar. Would use buck boost to get to 5V Inside equals BT-AMP board, booster, holder and speaker for battery ops.
Unsure why you would use charger at all. Using track power, the plan is a FWB rectifier and 5V Buck to power BT-AMP from the rails without any need for charging or battery. Oh yeah, like the camera car, HO easier... These at 3x2.5cm could fit in HO and then use the removable shell concept for battery charging or 1 connector on shell for charging.
Was replying to Pastor John's suggestion of not using track power to power the system where it would use more track power at any moment but to use it to trickle charge a battery when the car isn't being used for sound but is sitting idle on the tracks. Maybe I didn't understand his suggestion though. Sumner
Think you right on to what he suggested. Although now.... If the AVG MAX current of BT-Board is 150mA or so, it would be acceptable to me. The highest load or max current occurs when at SS126, and concurrently blow whistle + and hit horn -- around 200mA The throttle's BT volume is the key to keep within desired amount. My guess -- could drop the throttle's BT Volume to 50% or so based on EDs loco sounds I've heard at 100 and 75% vol further reducing max current.
Probably time to build and test ... I'm working on a number of other things so not a high priority for me right now....happy with what I have at the moment but look forward to what you come up with. Sumner
Thanks for the praise! I did spend a lot of time sanding the wall sections that make up each face of the building to get them to align. Each face was then assembled on my desk, with the pieces being glued together and some Evergreen styrene channels added on the back (interior side of each wall) to provide reinforcement. Back in December I glued the two street-facing sides together while they were standing upright and painted them with some DecoArt white acrylic paint; the thick paint does a pretty good job of hiding the joints between the different wall sections. A couple of weeks ago I added the two brick sides on and painted them brown. The joints are more obvious there, but I turned the horizontal ones into through-wall flashings by adding some styrene strips into the gaps and painting them to look like gray metal (visible in my first photo). I'm less concerned about how the brick sides look since those will be facing away from the viewer and/or blocked from view by other buildings once it goes on my eventual layout (many years from now).
