I still have a number of the sound machines like "forest night", "city sounds" and others. Going to install them in the new layout. Anyone still use them? Wish they still made them. Don
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They are still in use on my RR, city sounds, station sounds and farm sounds, stormy winds in cemetery. Also have from OTT Sound System- the bascule bridge sounds and car dealership sounds. Mth eventually sold the technology in the their early years
I still use them I have city train station, church music, barn yard, stock yard and country nights. and they all still work very well.
Yes! I have a brand new one stashed away somewhere...freight yard sounds if I remember correctly. Hope to use it on my new layout.
Also have city sounds. Good product.
I'm sorry QSI went out of business, they made many great products.
Love them. I have 6 that work scattered around my layout. Run the loco yard (steam & diesel) ones through larger speaker boxes mounted under the bench.
Yes QS Industries made some nice stuff. I also have about a dozen of those car loads. The kids loved the chickens and turkeys in the box cars. I run the cattle one in a stock car. Visitors look and say "what the heck was that?" Just fun stuff.
gg1man posted:I'm sorry QSI went out of business, they made many great products.
QSI may have dropped out of view in the 3-rail O scale segment but they are still in business and still a major player in the model railroad hobby: QSI Solutions | Ultra Realistic Model Rail Sound Decoders
Bill
The Sound Blox has 5 terminals. The terminals labeled left to right are labeled Spkr1, Spkr2, Spkr3, 12V, Gnd. As shipped there is a jumper or shorting wire between Spkr2 and Spkr3 which enables the internal speaker. Without the jumper, the internal speaker is disabled. To use an external speaker, remove the jumper. Attach an external 8 ohm speaker's leads to Spkr1 and Spkr2.
Power for the Sound Blox is listed as 12 to 17 volts by QSI and 11 to 17 volts by MTH ProtoSound. I've found it will work down to 9 volts. It can be AC or DC. It is not polarity sensitive. 12 volts AC or DC is quite adequate. Tie it to the 12v and Gnd terminals.
Light it up and enjoy. Hope it works for you.
QSI did make SOUND products for "O"!
gg1man posted:I'm sorry QSI went out of business, they made many great products.
I associate QSI with MTH's problematic PS1. It caused a lot of hassles for the folks who didn't know that a depleted battery could result in a scrambled chip. It took me a year to figure out how to revive a secondhand MTH locomotive, since I had no previous experience with these and less internet access at the time.
Regarding SoundBloxx, I imagine there are many other options now for playing back custom digital sounds, but I note that SoundBloxx had a random sequence feature? As well as being conveniently unitized.
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Appears to be "Train Station 2."
NOt to be confused with "Playstation II"
Ans it seems one could activate it with control rails, relays, or IR detectors!
Does anyone know where they can be found. Thanks!
Good idea, but I always found most of the range of "ambient sound units" from whoever (there have been a couple of others...?) to be a bit long on barnyards and short on: steam roundhouse (and diesel shop, for some), big harbor, heavy industry, large sawmill and so on.
I have a number of them, my favorite is the night sounds . Don
I checked my LHS they only had Haunted House sound @$65
You can actually home brew these things to play any sort of sound you want, if you don't mind soldering together a small kit.
The digital sound recorder units below -- which are available from a bunch of electronic hobby suppliers -- can hold up to 90 seconds of high quality audio, which can be set to play back on demand or cycle constantly. I've used them in Halloween props as well as a model of the Disney Haunted Mansion that goes with the toy monorail models Disney used to sell The Haunted mansion sound is a recording of the "Ghost Host" introduction in that attraction. I found a clear recording of it online and recorded it directly into the kit via a patch cable from my laptop.
Moral: whatever kind sound effect you want is likely accessible online, and if you want to really customize a sound scheme, Audacity is a free online tool that lets you do that by mixing sounds together. I used it to create a sound effect I needed but could not find online: by combining groaning, wood squeaking and cracking and earth moving sounds, Audacity allowed me create the perfect soundtrack for a "moving grave" prop that is in my annual Halloween graveyard setup
As for playback, these recording units can drive the small speaker that comes with them. But I prefer to use their line output going into a set of carefully concealed small computer speakers. They put out much better sound and you can still pick them up for practically nothing at garage sales. Also, as you can see there is a screw in power input, so these can be run off a wall wart or any other form of DC power supply providing 9-18 volts.
rdg_fan posted:Does anyone know where they can be found. Thanks!
just have to keep searching the internet.
scale rail posted:I have a number of them, my favorite is the night sounds . Don
I'm pretty sure I have that one, and maybe a couple others, stuck away in a box somewhere. I also have the cow sound board, inside a stock car. Both from enterTRAINment.
This earlier thread has some very good information on how to create custom sounds. Simply scroll up /l\
