Hi!

You need to program CV17 and 18 for long adress and CV29 to enable the new long adress and to disable short adresses.
How your certain system handles this operations is way out of my knowledge but most of the DCC-systems can do such changes with just one step.
So RTFM for programming a long adress and good luck!

Regards
Mathi

Oh, I'm sorry about that!
Skipgear, you are absolutely right, I just saw the diagram and then dropped it. My J's are numbered 608 and 611!

Regards
Mathi

Hi!
Is it really the new DCC-ready J-class you have or is it the older version. I don't know the older one but the new J has tender pickup for sure.
No matter if you run it DC or DCC the tender provides power via these thin wires between tender and loco. Make sure this will work because if not the behavior is like you experienced.
These wires on some of my J's, brand new out of the box, showed some shiny copperish spots now and then and I suspected them to short out in curves if they can touch among or the metal body.
Then I tried out some of no longer used nail enamel from my wife and coated these spots. Tell you what----> the loco runs like a swiss watch after doing so.
So is my conclusion: these wiring is the main flaw with these J's and if anything else is ok as well they're really nice engines.

Well, you are right, without explan. and experience in decoderizing non-DCC-ready locos is it not an easy job, but on the other hand is it not more difficult than a non-ready atlas diesel engine.
Here's the parts diagram:
http://www.bachmanntrains.com/home-usa/dwg/dwgs/60052.pdf
As you can see was it not correct what skipgear said:
As every newer Bachmann loco has this MDT a plit frame and you can pull track current from each of the two frame halves. The motor has to separate from the frames and red and grey wire is to atach to the motor contacts, red and black to the frames and that was it.
To check the space available for a decoder I usually use good old kids putty, put a reasonably ball on the body and place the shell back on it. After removing the shell again I can measure the putty.
If the decoder is a bit to fat for the space I would think some strokes with a file over the body will do it.
Gouda, your nick lets me think you are dutch?
If I'm right you can get by a handful of european DCC decoders which are much smaller than this TCS thingy.
I hope this will help you back on track!

Regards
Mathi

How about this:
http://www.tcsdcc.com/public_html/Customer_Content/Installation_Pictures/N_Scale/Bachmann/MDT/bachman_n_scale_mdt.htm

Well, I thank you all for reading!
Although there was no response to my quest I gave it a shot and put a decoder into this loco. I choosed a nicely thin DH10 made by Doehler&Haass and placed it upon the chassis. I removed the LED-pcb in the shell and everything fits without milling down the body.
It turns out that this old and not so beloved construction answers with top running abilities and an outstanding creeping skills.
Atlas or Kato are not doing better even though are they less noisy.

Regards
Mathi

Hi there!

I have an old version (not DCC ready) of the Spectrum Dash 8-40CW which runs reasonably quiet and decent so I decided to put a decoder in it. Then I was looking for a good installation model and the only example I could find was the one Ron Beardon shows in TCS website.
Unfortunately is it just sketchy and therefore I'm in search of something that's giving me deeper insight.
Hopefully can somebody provide me with some closeup pictures how to do the wiring that will be appreciated very much.

Thanks in advance

Mathi

Hi!

Why not grabbing a DZ125? Cheap to get by and doing a great job!

Regards
Mathi

Hi!

I own a bunch of different Bachmann locos with this factory decoders inside and I'm so far satisfied with them except the sometime buzzing noise at slow speeds owed to the fact the decoder run with with low frequency.
Tony, you are surely talking of CV2 and not 3, right!
I usually put the loco on the track, set the cab on speed step 1 and set CV2 to 0 and then go up step by step until the engine starts creeping-----that was it!

Regards
Mathi

Hi!

The only problems I had whatsoever was with the wiring in my 4-8-4 Js and the Heavy Mountains as well.
These tiny wires shorted out in every curve and I was thinking about replacement harness. Almost impossible to get by such thin wires I decided to insulate the wires again.
I grabbed one of my wifes unused bottles of nail enamel and coated the wires one by one with this stuff, peculiar where they are bended and got in contact to the frame.
Since I did this I never had a short and so I claim that this problem was solved!

Regards
Mathi

Hi!

Ideas plenty but if you could be so kind and give some more information about the certain engine it would make it much easier!

Regards
Mathi

Hello!

Since the Bachmann on-board decoder does not support CV5 or a speed table your only chance to slow down the loco speed is in reducing the system power. I run my system with just 15V DC input which brings about 13,4V digital juice on track. This is absolutely enough for N-scale but the engines run much faster if I switch to more input, lets say 18V DC.
Here's the Bachmann decoder manual to check up:
http://www.bachmanntrains.com/home-usa/ez_content/1_Amp_Decoder_Instr.pdf

If you need furthermore information don't hesitate to contact me in german.

Regards
Mathi

Hi!

CV29 sets a few options. If you like to rum the loco with 28/128 speed steps, short address range and enable DC set the value on 6.
If you just want to run on long addresses with enabled DC set it to value 38.
So you can chose a certain address for each loco you have.

Regards
Mathi

Hi!
It may helpful to check with the space between the wheels. Very often ist the derailing to be cured by extending or narrowing the wheelspace a tad.

Regards
Mathi

Ok, I don't know which dcc central you are using but if it can handle CV values set the Value of CV8 to 8 or 33.
I'm not quite sure which value will reset the decoder but one of them works and will set back the decoder to the factory values on adress 3. With these basic values should each Bachmann loco work effective.
If the loco won't work better after reset it really is a mechanical problem in which I foremost believe.

Regards
Mathi