I bought an old unopened Bachmann CSX Dash 8-40cw DC at a flea market last summer.  I was planning to convert it to DCC with sound during this winter. When opening her up, I noticed a bright green corrosion like you find on corroded copper battery cables. I did a lot of sound decoders conversion on my fleet of DC locomotives and they were all made from aluminum or magnesuim alloy. However, this one looks like its made of copper because of the color of the bare frame when I scraped off the corrosion. I'm planning to cut/grind the frame to fit a speaker. After the cutting and the grinding, I will spray paint the frame. My question why copper? When did they change over to the other alloy? Can I cut copper? I never cut or grinded anything copper before.

Thanks Rich. Will do.

Talking about track expansions. I'm planning to expand to a 3 track layout. An inner, middle, and outer. All 3 tracks will be connected by using 4 bachmann crossover. My question is what raduis curved tracks should I use? Actually what raduis curved tracks would I use to create the middle curved tracks? The inside track is easy because I'm using 18 raduis curved 30 degrees. The outer is 22 raduis curved the middle should be 20, but ez tracks don't make 20 raduis curved tracks.

Thanks. Will look into it.

Sorry for the late response. Been busy with all the snow. I did what you said and it works on DC with the jumpers. Does that mean the DCC decoder is bad?

Thanks guys. It's a bad board. The meter test failed on the board for VDC check. The 9v test on the LED worked like a charm. I replaced the board with another brand decoder and all work great. Thnx again. I started another topic for the Dash 8-40cw.

Yes, that is the same board. I saw that and I was afraid that I would have the similar problem he had, but it worked with my NCE power cab right off the bat. Only problem with the GP40 upgrade are the lights.

Thanks for all the information. I will check it out with my meter. The DCC board is a bachmann H601X PCB01 decoder.

Hi, I'm converting all my Bachmann trains from DC to DCC.  I converted 2 already. A F7 and GP50 and all went well. No problems with the LED lights and decoder installation. The 3rd one, a GP40, works find, but no lights. Front or rear does not light up. Is there an easier way to test the lighs to see if it works or to test the board? I have a resistor already attached to one leg of the LED's. I know the difference about the polarity. Like i said everything worked on my other 2 trains.

What brand of DCC controllers (NCE, Digitrax, MRC, and Prodigy) are able to do decoder resets that is within my budget? Under $100.00, but $150.00 tops.

I think its time for me to think about purchasing a different controller. However I will stick with the EZ command for the meantime until I can figure things out. I wish Bachmann would add something to their EZ Command product for this problem. If this suppose to be a starter kit for going to DCC, its definitely a turn off. I would rather stay with analog.

Did that. I defaulted back to 3 on the EZ command and it still did the same thing. Is there anything I'm missing here. I looked online for CV 8, but where is CV 8 on a Bachmann EZ Command? I checked the EZ command manual and it explains nothing. Including this forum under the search engines. It just gives me go to CV 8.

I have a Spectrum DCC SD45 that I got in the beginning of last summer. I read today online that Bachmann had some board problems. My problem is my Spectrum SD45. It started running jerky with lights coming on then off by itself. Then the locomotive stopped. The SD45 now sits there jerking backward while the sound decoder is run in repeat mode and then chirps and then it repeats itself. It has a MRC 1643 8 pin sound decoder attached to the Spectrum H6034 board. I removed the 8 pin sound decoder and still does the same thing. I put the SD45 on an analog track and it sits there with the sound decoder going through its cycle in idle mode sounds. What could it be? I think its a bad board because the wiring connection looks good. All the other DCC trains runs flawlessly on the DCC track.

Thanks Doneldon. I'm trying to do some research for sound decoders from various brands. MRC, Digitrax, and Soundtrax.  Soundtrax I am able to get some idea for Bachmann locomotives. I can't get a definitive answer for MRC or Digitrax. They  give a direct brand usage that it would work for like Atlas, Kato, and Athearn. None will say Bachmann. However youtube post will say something like "Bachmann SD40-2 with MRC sound decoder", but they don't give an item # used in that particular locomotive. They might say EMD 645, but there are so many style of boards for an EMD 645. I wish someone post a list of sound decoders of all various brands that will on work on particular locomotives.

If you anyone have any ideas, please PM me thanks.

Doneldon:
Thanks for the input. I have a 8x4 layout and all my equipment are Bachmann and going on 2 yr old. I am now going over to DCC keeping the same track (EZ track grey). I got myself a EZ command and 2 DCC locomotive this past Christmas. My set up on my 8x4 is a simple set up. Will try to put up pics.

I have a 3 track set up (outside, middle, and inner). When it was just analog trains, I had 3 separate controls for each track. Now the outer and middle are connected with 2 crossover turnouts and I made it for DCC. The raduis on the curves of both tracks were simple. I used 22" curve raduis outside and I mixed 22" and 18" curve raduis for the middle. The inner track, kept analog, has 18" raduis curves and multiple turnouts (4), for a depot set up. I am thinking of having a jumper to connect the inner track to the other tracks, so its wired as a DCC. This way I can run a DCC sound train on it and also keep an analog train on the set up.

Is this good enough for the EZ command to handle. The turnouts i have a separate Bachmann analog controller for it. The control is not connected to the track, but my turnouts are connected to the accessories connection on the contoller. Is that bad? I would like to keep the turnouts analog with the separate controller.