Brilliance Sound Decoders

I've had excellent results just drilling the end of the LED's plastic housing, and gluing the end of the optical fiber INSIDE the led. Use a clear cement like ACC or Future polish. A high degree of optical 'coupling' is thus achieved quite simply.

Just be careful not to drill so deeply as to damage the semiconductor junction in the base of the LED.

Dan Mitchell ============

I hear you, I'm just more tolerant of poor sound than you are. It annoys me, but so does silence! To me *NO* sound is also VERY poor sound indeed. Still, we'd both like far BETTER sound to be sure.

Dan Mitchell ============

Yes, DSX. They have sound only, no motor or light controls.

I don't like the idea of consisting them because sometimes my command station "forgets" the consisting information and I don't want the aggravation of having to re-consist all my locos. Also, it takes two locomotive numbers. I program both decoders to the same address, separately.

In one case, the electrical pickup for the sound decoder is a dummy unit and the electrical pickup for the motor decoder is the powered unit (they are permanently connected together by a drawbar). I place the appropriate unit on the programming track when programming.

In the rest of my locos, I have installed plugs/sockets so I unplug the decoder I don't want to program, then plug it back in after programming. I have to take off the shells to do this (which is a pain), but I rarely have to do it because I don't normally change CVS after the initial programming.

Paul Welsh

I'm always looking at LEDs - if I spot a bicolor white/green I'll give you a shout. They'd be handy for modeling airport beacons, too.

Mike Tennent "IronPenguin"

.....snip...........

I tried that, but I couldn't get it to work, account I have to have -two- different colors available at a single end point, i.e., the class light lens. Of course, it can be done, but not in a home workshop. The light pipe has to be fused such that either color can be transmitted. If that is ever done the "lens" should actually have three pigtails, so that the end user could add a red source to emulate marker lights.

Putting two LEDs in the tube won't work the same as using two incandescent bulbs, account the LEDs emit a very small, highly focused light cone. Incandescent bulbs (globes) radiate a sphere of energy such that enough of it gets transmitted to the receiving end of the light pipe for the contraption to work at an acceptable intensity for viewing on a lighted layout. So.then, you don't have to imbed the light pipe into the light source, but can put the sources side-by-side, and place the light pipe in the "valley" between them. Froggy,

That's what I said. Decoders ~prior~ to the DH163 did not have enough functions to do everything with a single decoder In my application I have: F0 headlight F1 numberboard lights F2 cab lights F3 white class lights F4 green class lights F5 ground lights

That's all six functions.

Before the DH163 you had: F0 forward and reverse headlights F1 F2 momentary.

It was possible to make F0 split into two separate functions such that you had F0 F1 F2 momentary F3 And that was that.

Now, you can have working class lights with a four function decoder, but you have to give up control of some of the other functions or integrate them into a single function thus: (for example)

F0 headlight / number board lights F1 green class lights F2 cab light / ground lights F3 white class lights

Froggy,

Why don't U use a double led, they ate emitting red OR green depending on drive...? There are even three color LED:s available, red, grren and yellow...

my 2 c Thomas

Froggy @ thep> >

Because I don't want red or yellow. I want green and white, and there's no such LED. I thought I'd made all that very clear in previous postings. Yellow is not an acceptable substitution for white. Red is not needed since I don't need marker lights on any of my locomotives.

WHITE: indicates a train that is not listed in the timetable, i.e., an extra.

GREEN: indicates a scheduled train which has another section following, running on the same schedule. All sections display a green signal except the last one.

DARK: indicates a regular train, one that is listed in the timetable, that has no additional sections following.

Froggy,

White LEDs use a phosphor coating (or other coating) to get white, so it's not presently possible to make them multi colour as any light emission will come out white.

Your choices are to channel the light from (> >

My method of using two adjacent incandescent globes in a tube with a single light pipe situated in the valley between them is working very well. I have a nice, bright light in the class light lenses that can be seen on a fully lighted layout. Actually, I am quite pleased with the results. I am quite sure that the same arrangement would work equally as well with three globes for someone who wanted/needed the red aspect. Froggy,

It's there. Look here: