BLI DCC?

[CBQ Fan]

How well would you expect the upcoming E6 to work with DC and not DCC?  Any real experience with their past DCC products on DC?

[wm3798]

They actually release products?

[CBQ Fan]

Nasty rumor I know!  Maybe I should have started this post in the crew lounge! 

[atsf_arizona]

I have the BLI PA's with their Paragon2.

Sound is really great.

Unfortunately, in my opinion, DC operation of sound is, well, a bit touchy.   My experience is there are
various kinds of DC powerpacks, some work better than others with my Paragon2 PAs.    The speed
control is sometimes touchy, takes a little bit of trial and error to understand how to 'feather the voltage' to
get your sound to match the speed and movement of the loco.   Once you've done that, you have an OK
experience.     I say "OK", not "great", because you really have to learn to "feather the voltage" to get any
sort of realistic correlation of sound and movement.  It takes a fair amount of attention to do that.   Also,
all the special effects (bell, horn, dynamic brakes, etc) are not intuitive to use on DC, if they are available at all.

That having been said, sound quality itself of both the BLI PA's and the BLI E8's that I have are superb
on DC as well as DCC.   I would guess the E6's are going to be the same way.

Bu I would clearly say, that if you have any thoughts about going to DCC, do it if you are going to have sound
locos.  It's said that sound sells DCC and DCC sells sound.   It's true, it's like night and day.   

There's nothing wrong with 'trying a sound loco on DC', I did that myself.  But after trying it, I ended up
buying the NCE PowerCab for DCC, because I wasn't satisfied with DC operation of the Precision Craft Models E7s
(which are from same manufacturer as BLI).     I found that was a good move to get the PowerCab,
it wasn't any more expensive than a couple of locos, and I then had the full
experience of sound.    After you run your sound loco on DCC on a test loop,
you'll see what I mean.

You can read a little more about that on my layout at:  http://home.comcast.net/~j.sing/Peavine_Layout_Overview.html#DCC

By the way, my layout, I can switch it from all-DC to all-DCC (and swap locos on the track accordingly, of course).
That prevents me from having to decoderize everything.   When I run sound locos, I just switch the layout
to DCC.     And although I love DCC, the majority of my locos are still DC and run on the layout when it's in DC mode, as
there's too many to decoderize.   So I have the best of both.

Hope that helps    Just my 2 cents worth.

[delamaize]

everyone knows that BLI don't make N scale trains, they make Vapor, as in Vaporware! 

[Nato]

      I have both the Precision Craft (pre BLI) E-7 and the newer BLI E-8/9 . You get sound and a Mars Light in DC ,my GN E-7 seems less touchy than than my two UP E-8's. Be aware that a single unit takes along time more voltage to start up in DC and running two sound units is overkill ,in DC I have to have the throttle jacked up practically all the way and the locos are then bairly crawling. One loco does much better. I operate these locos as DCC at train shows,much better. Someday my layout may be DCC. Nate Goodman (Nato).Salt Lake, Utah.

[nickelplate759]

Related question - I have a couple of the first-run Precision Craft E7s without DCC.  They have 8-pin plugs, and a space under the circuit board for a DCC decoder.  Any idea what fits?  The Digitrax page doesn't list this engine.

George.

[C855B]

I converted four E8s two years ago with TCS decoders, and it was a miserable job. It turned out there is very little space above the connector with the shell on, and the TCS board/connector was too high by about 1/16". I had to modify something... IIRC it was the sockets on the loco board, which had a header adding the thickness. If I do one again I'll just solder in a generic decoder like an M4 and call it done.

[nickelplate759]

The original Precision Craft  Models run of E7s had a different board and chassis than the E8s and later runs - so what fits or doesn't is different. Still hoping someone has already solved the matter of what decoder fits in the original E7s.

George

[mmyers]

Digitrax DN143IP fits PCM E7's.  I have them in my B units that were purchased without factory installed decoders.
http://www.digitrax.com/products/mobile-decoders/dn143ip/

Martin Myers

[rogergperkins]

I have two of the BLI E-6A units with dummy E-6B; these are  my first venture into DCC with sound.
I am delighted with the locomotives, but have not run them DC.
In DCC mode, they are great locomotives.
I was so impressed that I purchased two of the BLI E-7A locomotives and the powered E-6B.