Decoder troubles


wheeler1963

wheeler1963

Aurora & Portland Owner
OK all of you DCC decoder guys, I need help. Got 3 Athearn Genesis GP9's with factory decoders in them. 1 runs fine, 1 lights up only, 1 is dead completely. I have an NCE powercab. What can i do to check these decoders to see what is wrong with them???
 
The first thing I would do is to put it on my test track. Hit the PROG/ESC button in the very lower left corner of the controller 4 times. Then hit Enter. That puts you in Program Track mode. Select option 1, STD. The Power Cab should display the manufacturer ID #, for Soundtraxx it's 141. This lets you know the controller can communicate with the decoder. If it can't ID the decoder, the decoder is probably defective. If it can read the manufacturers ID #, try setting the address. If it accepts the address, try changing CV 2 to a higher number to see if the locomotive will move. CV 2 is the start voltage and sometimes it needs to be boosted up a bit.
If it won't move after the CV 2 value is rather high, the decoder may be defective.
I do all my programming on my test track in Program Track mode. I am "between layouts" so I don't have a dedicated program track on a layout.
Hope this helps. I have NCE Power Cab as well.
 
NCE will sometimes trap addresses in phantom consists. Before you do anything else, enter programming, either OPS mode or programming track, and set CV19 to 0, and try again. If that doesn't do anything, then set cv8 to 8, and try that. At that point, follow the above instructions, hopefully it's something simple and cheap to fix.
 
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Thank you guys. I did everything you said to do. All 3 are working just fine again. Only one of them the rear light isn't working on. Will hot wire that to check the bulbs.
 
wheeler1963 said:
Thank you guys. I did everything you said to do. All 3 are working just fine again. Only one of them the rear light isn't working on. Will hot wire that to check the bulbs.
Click to expand...
Don't forget those bulbs are 1.5v, and not very forgiving.
 
Found it. Removed the dual LED from the rear of the engine. The red lead had come off of the LED. I'll solder it back tomorrow. ;)
 
Jerry, are these brand, brand new Genesis engines? Almost all except the very latest ones use bulbs.
 
OK. Let us know. when you can. Preferably those product numbers on the end of the boxes if you've got them, the ATHG ones, makes the search a bit quicker.
 
Athearn has records of the models produced and when announced on their site, going back to the beginnings of the Genesis line. If they are not the recent ones factory fitted with LED's then we'll be able to tell you when they were announced and roughly, made, and the decoder fitted.
 
I'm off to bed now, so no rush for me, but if Terry is still on line and watching, he will know how to find them.
 
But as I stated above, they are working now, I found 1 wire broke off of a LED, and they are all equipped with duel LED's.
 
wheeler1963 said:
But as I stated above, they are working now, I found 1 wire broke off of a LED, and they are all equipped with duel LED's.
Click to expand...
Okay, they must have been an aberration on Athearn’s part, unless LEDs were installed later.
If they’re all working now, all’s well that ends well.
 
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