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Add DCC to K4 Specrum

Started by ny1776, May 05, 2009, 10:27:01 AM

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ny1776

Just purchased a K4 spectrum without sound.


I have not yet opened the tender but am going to add Tsunami DCC with sound to it.
The diagram seems to indicate a PC board inside the tender but some questions are not answered in the assembly instructions.

Toyed with doing it to my olde bowser loco but the backmann is a much finer locomotive.

Is the pc board designed to take a plug in DCC sound decoder?

What is the wiring from the engine to the connectors on same.

Can we presume the 2 pin are the lights and the 4 pin are the motor & wheel pickups?
If true what goes where?

Thanks

Allan

rustyrails

As far as I know from what I read, this locomotive has an 8-pin medium socket in the tender.  The wire color and pin assignemnts are part of the DCC standard.  The orange wire goes to the number 1 pin which should be marked on the socket by a dot of paint, small arrow, or some other unique feature.  Bachmann sells this engine RTR with sound.  Perhaps Mr. Bach-mann could let us in on what decoder and speaker the factory recommends.  Hope this helps,
Rusty

Rangerover

#2
I believe this decoder is in my Bachmann Decopod and it is an 8 pin plug in.

http://www.soundtraxx.com/dsd/lc/index.php?p=dsd101lc.php

scroll down to speakers sold seperately

richG

#3
The K4 should have enough room for the standard Tsunami. It is a better decoder than the DSD LC series. LC means low cost and less features but still ok if you are not concerned about features. You would have to carefully insulate this decoder. Think magic smoke.
The Tsunami also has a 9 pin JST connector so you would need a 8 pin NMRA connector to 9 pin JST adapter.
Litchfield Station has good prices and free shipping under $75.00 the last time I ordered.
Speaker placement, I have no ideas about. Others will have good ideas.

Make sure you cut out the capacitor if it has one on the PC board. The Tsunami does not like this capacitor. With the capacitor out, the renaming inductors are out of the equation. Think tuned circuits.
Any possible remaining capacitance is negligible.

Rich