I bought a used HO 80 ton Shay and am new to the hobby. How do I determine if I have a DC or DCC loco?
I would open the tender up and see if the 8 pin socket is installed.
Sid
Here is a link to that loco. You can see an eight pin socket that will either have an adapter plug in or a decoder which would be shrink wrapped and much larger than the socket. Some have been six pin or two three pin adapters. I have had both in different Bachmann locos.
There are different decoder manufactures if the original owner did not go with Bachmann decoders.
Check the drive system.
http://www.bachmanntrains.com/home-usa/dwg/dwgs/81907.pdf
Rich
Thanks. I have a board in the tender that has a plug in the 8 pin socket. I assume this is not a DCC unit? Can I assume it only needs the DCC decoder and sound plugged into the socket?
Another question, some of the plastic gears are cracked on the drivelines. Where can I get the metal replacement gears or does anyone have another suggestion?
You may need to cut into the loco to get sound in it, but a standard decoder will slot into that socket.
As for the gears, try e-mailing NorthWest Short Line. they make high quality replacement gears for many brands of locomotives.
I see that the 80-ton HO Bachmann Shay is crossed off of their availability list, but that may simply mean they're out of stock at the moment.
http://www.nwsl.com/Home_Page.html (http://www.nwsl.com/Home_Page.html)
NWSL has not had HO Shay gears for quite a while now, and has no plans of stocking them again. This was from Dave himself.
Your best bet for repair is Bachmann's new updated sideframes. They are redesigned and much more robust than originals.
Good luck getting a sound decoder in one.....it can be done, but it's difficult.....there is zero extra space.
Sid
Sound in the 80 ton. Bruce favors SoundTraxx but they sell a better sound module than the 750 which was prone to overheating. I did read a post by Bruce in the MRH forums that he has been running his Shay with the 750 and no overheating. You might find the 750 on sale as it is no longer produced.
I have used the 750's with only one overheating issue.
http://mrdccu.com/install/hoss/Bachmann-Shay-826020.html
Below is what SoundTraxx suggest now.
80-Ton 3-Truck Shay TSU-1100 | 884001 ECO-100 | 881001 810112 / 810102
No idea of what your DCC knowledge or soldering is like.
LokSound sells small nice decoders but no idea on which one you should use.
You might search the ho forum for 80 ton shay sound.
If you have trouble getting into it, look at the below link but it is not for sound.
https://www.tcsdcc.com/Customer_Content/Installation_Pictures/HO_Scale/Bachmann/80_Toner_3_Truck_Shay/Bachmman_Spectrum_80Ton_three_truck_Shay.html
richiy