I've recently done a couple of diesel upgrades where it was desired to have ditch lights. Since I knew the ERR Sound Converter offered LED outputs and they were programmed for ditch light functionality, I decided to investigate that avenue. It turned out that there were a couple of minor issues with the Sound Converter code as it was delivered, so I set about correcting it. In order to keep the topic where it can be found, I added a post to the TMCC/LEGACY REFERENCE MATERIALS & MANUALS thread in the TMCC/Legacy section. Below is a permanent link to the post describing the installation as well as the source files necessary to properly use ditch lights with the Sound Commander.
Installation is actually quite simple, you just wire up the serial data and power as described in the instruction sheet, and then connect the two ditch light LEDs to the LED connector.
Since I'm not using the sound converter function that is provided by the rather large LM317 regulators on the board, I remove those to minimize the board footprint. In my case, I just stick the whole Sound Converter board in a piece of heatshrink and encase it so I can tuck it in somewhere without having any possibility of shorting things.
Topic Link for details: Adding ditch lights to TMCC Locomotives using the ERR Sound Converter
Obviously, not everyone is setup to compile and program the board, so if you want this functionality, you can contact me and we'll work out an update for your Sound Commander code.
