I recently got 3 of the new Kato N scale Alco PA's with the Kobo custom ESU loksound 90812 decoders, and I thought i'd never say this- but i'm having sound problems. The speakers on all 3 units either cut out or sound blown out within the first 10 minutes of run time. It happens quicker the faster i'm on the throttle. The area where the speakers are feel hot to the touch afterwards. Letting the Units cool down for around 5-10 minutes relieves the problem and they sound fine- until the next 5-10 minutes of run time. I'm not sure what to do. I've turned down the master volume and it still prevails. Worse yet, this is my second batch. I returned the first set having the same problems. I'm not sure what to do, does anyone have ideas or come across this before? Thanks,- Mike
These are the older Select Micro decoders, not their newer LokSound 5. It sounds like there may be an issue with the speaker and/or speaker wires. Kelley at Kato should be able to trouble shoot the problem. The speaker are should never get warm, while the decoder area might.
I use an ESU Ecos system that gives 13.1 volts to the rails, I know that's on the higher side but I've never had issues with any other decoders. The problem also persists on my older digitrax dcs51 and jmri sprog at my club.
