DCC Programming Problems

"zen83237" wrote

You're not giving us much help. What decoders are you talking about?

John.

I have been told that the chips are Lenz silver. The fact that some programme as 4 digit, some as 2 digit and some don't programme at all makes me doudt that.

Kevin

The most common problems in my experience are mistakes installing decoders including the temporary or permanent shorting of wires/contacts, not properly isolating the track power from the motor wires and not getting good electrical continuity between controller and loco. Mistakes can damage the chips on the decoders and cause them to malfunction in various ways (for instance powering up and then realising that some wires are shorted out can kill the chip). I'm not familiar with the digitrax controller but if you are having variable success then presumably you are using the controller in the correct way otherwise none of them would work?

Firstly check and double check that no wires are joined and that the motor is properly isolated from the track pickups (sometimes there are multiple pickups and maybe only soem were disconnected?) use a multimeter set to resistance/ohms setting. Then place the locos on the decoder track with their bodies not fitted so that there is no danger of the body causing a short. If you can, try another controller/programming track (you might have a shorted out connector to it? Other locos bridging the dcc signal? A broken loco making other good locos appear broken?). Then you should be able to identify which item is at fault.

Oh yes and you might want to read the controller manual (but only as a last resort ; )

Luke

These chips were fitted by somebody who repairs locos and fits chips for a living so I am assuming the fault isn't here. If it wasn't for the fact that a spotty geek who goes to a Grammer School also had problems I would have put it down to me. I have condensed the instructions into simple bullet points without the verbage, why do instruction manual writers pad it out so by the time you get to the end of an instruction you have forgotton the start. I am going to start from scratch and cross check every stage, at least that way I can eliminate human error. I should say that I have been getting problems with my own Gaugemaster on my test track and the club's Digitrax on the club's test track so I suppose this does point to loco problems, assuming that I am not the common factor.

Kevin

"Kevin" wrote

All my locos have either Lenz Gold or Silver decoders and I've never had that or similar problems at any time, although I have with others which is why I no longer use other makes.

John.

I have elected (somewhat expensively) to stick with Lenz Gold only (either Gold or Gold Mini). But if NMRA specs are supposedly adhered to, then there should be no problems with different makes of decoder working with different makes of controller... Just goes to show that companies can still interpret specs in such different ways...

Ian J.

You could always try resetting to factory settings if it will take programming.

Chris

Don't assume. Check with a multi-meter. A basic one is less than a fiver from a branch of Maplins (last time I went it was two for a fiver, the cheap ones are fine for this).

The pain of typing hex codes into a keypad. Its the really difficult way to do it.

Get a copy of DecoderPro (its free software) and a computer interface (either specific for your DCC system, or a stand-alone device like the Sprog). If the computer interface is considered a bit expensive (sprog is £50-ish), discuss a shared one with your club.

Then you can read and set the values on a nice easy to see computer screen. You can save them for each loco, so if a later change is to the worse, you can go back to the old setting in seconds.

The finger points to the locos and their wiring. Or to fried chips.

- Nigel

Whoa - now theres a common factor. Presumably he gets them a batch at a time and perhaps once in a while theres a faulty batch. Ask him if anyone else as had similar problems and take one of the dodgy ones back for him to test.

Cheers, Simon

I assume that by your test track and the clubs test track you mean a separate short section of track competely isolated electrically from the rest of the layout and with just the one loco on it. Only some decoders / controllers can program on the main with other locos present the rest cann't causing all sorts pf interference between the locos present.

Alan