F40ph

[trainforfun]

I have one that puzzle me all right ...
I own and did DCC conversion for over 150 units .
This is my 4th KATO FP40ph . All others 3 run perfectly but this one ... I am almost at the point of using the concrete wall to solve the problem .
At first I just used the famous grey clip to connect the motor brass bar to the new Digitrax board , motor was working on and off but the lights did not even flicker , so I decided to solder the 2 brass metal flat to the board and get rid of the poor contact using the grey clips .
I thought to myself , problem solved , not quite so , when I run the unit without the body everything is perfect , as soon as I put the body on the frame I still loose the contact to the motor ...
I trimmed the interior of the body where I tought it was touching the board , no success ...

Never had this problem before , the last thing I am thinking of is maybe the copper strip is loose where it connect to the brushes cap or there is maybe a bad brush . It cannot be the conection at the board since I soldered it .

Help , help , I don't want to use the concrete wall as a tool ...

[Bob Bufkin]

Maybe the board is bad.  Test it on another loco and also put a different board into it. 

[trainforfun]

Yes , maybe an hairline crack in the board , when there is pressure by the cab it open slightly , good point Bob . Will try that , good idea .

[TiVoPrince]

Got
five of the Kato F40PH.  Three wih MRC sound decoders all work a treat.  Digitrax decoder is quite reliable but can have finicky contact issues.  One TCS is usally fine but is annoying me lately to the point I'm thinking along with you and I may have tweaked a motor brush or commutator along the way.  I have a couple of sets of pickup strips on order but I may just add a motor to my Kato parts order. 

Maintaining enough pressure to have consistent contact but not stress the motor leads may be the problem.  I'm also thinking about soldering the track pickup strips directly to the decoder, so I don't need to have so much pressure holding the motor/gray tray/pickup strip/decoder/motor pads 'sandwich'.  This would be similar to some popular HO drop in deoders. 

I'm thinking that too litle pressure means contact problems, too much and there are stresses that deform the motor brushes.  There is obviously a 'goldielocks' point there somewhere, but I seroiusly dislike those tochy-feelie type of adjustments.  I would prefer to simply tension the 'sandwich' with some Kapton tape and calling it a day...

[trainforfun]

Got
five of the Kato F40PH.  Three wih MRC sound decoders all work a treat.  Digitrax decoder is quite reliable but can have finicky contact issues.  One TCS is usally fine but is annoying me lately to the point I'm thinking along with you and I may have tweaked a motor brush or commutator along the way.  I have a couple of sets of pickup strips on order but I may just add a motor to my Kato parts order. 

Maintaining enough pressure to have consistent contact but not stress the motor leads may be the problem.  I'm also thinking about soldering the track pickup strips directly to the decoder, so I don't need to have so much pressure holding the motor/gray tray/pickup strip/decoder/motor pads 'sandwich'.  This would be similar to some popular HO drop in deoders. 

I'm thinking that too litle pressure means contact problems, too much and there are stresses that deform the motor brushes.  There is obviously a 'goldielocks' point there somewhere, but I seroiusly dislike those tochy-feelie type of adjustments.  I would prefer to simply tension the 'sandwich' with some Kapton tape and calling it a day...

How is the sound , maybe it's the time to change the decoder to sound one since I have to try a different one .

[TiVoPrince]

Sound
is plenty loud.  I'm still looking for my favoured setting.  Right now I have most settings on 1 of 3 with many intermittent sounds turned off on trailing units to tone them down.  Changed the horns around a bit to get a little more richness of melody out of them. 

All in all I prefer the TCS for the ditchlights, they blow away the Digitrax.  Side by side, nobody would pick DigitraxFX over TCS effects.  IMHO Digitrax needs to wake up and realize that FX3 effects are not LED friendly but need to be.  Soldering those tiny LEDs for this adds a level of difficulty but also adds to the operational realisim.  TCS with onboard resistors for LEDs is helpful because you won't need to find resistor space inside an already crowded shell.

The lack of lighting effects in the MRC1810 decoder is a huge downside, at least for me.  Not even a CV setting to turn off the lights of trailing units when consisting remains a big dissapointment.  I'm still thinking about how to conceal those 'extra' LEDs without actually removing them...