Cruise commander lite help

Are you using incandescent bulbs or LED's? 

 

Are you using the full Cruise Commander or the Cruise Commander Lite?  If it's the Lite, and you're using LED's, you need to use the .01 caps across the lighting connections, they came with the kit.

 

Did you properly program the R2LC with the correct type code, in this case it would probably AUX1/4 for a steamer with smoke.

 

Have you tried removing the wiring and testing two bulbs directly off the Cruise Commander?

LED's. I soldered the included caps across them. I'm using the cc Lite. 

 

I programmed the engine followino instructions. Then thinking I made a mistake, followed them again and programmes a second time with same results. 

 

Not it sure I unstand the last test? Remove all wiring but the wiring for the lights do you mean?

Correct, remove the front and rear light connections from the CC-Lite screw terminals and connect two incandescent bulbs directly to the terminals.

 

This sounds like some sort of wiring issue.  Also, remember that LED's have polarity, so the positive pin goes to frame ground as the lighting outputs are negative in respect to the frame.  You are using resistors in series with the LED's, right?

 

The LED's I have a spare evans designs ones i have that are already set up to work on 18volts ac or dc. They are these ones: http://www.modeltrainsoftware.com/bl-212.html

 

ill ill look through my parts bin for an incandescent to try

Let me know how the board test works out.

Jason,

 

   What direction will the engine start in, forward or reverse? Try programming engine using Aux1-8 tell us what happens.

 

Bill

GRJ - with just an incandescent bulb, I get the same results as my LED. It does not light connected just to the board.

Boxcar Bill - it starts in forward. Reprogramming to Aux1 - 8 seems to make no difference.

All functions are working as they should except the headlight. Since my led can be powered off track power, I could wire straight to track and skip board but would like to figure this out if I can.

Try a different R4LC.

 

Bill

Yep, sounds like you have a bad R4LC.  If you have an R2LC-C08, that will work as well for a test.

I swapped out the r4lc and have the same problem.

I've test all functions and everything works great but this headlight. I can't figure what I'm missing. I walked away, came back and retraced my wires and I'm not seeing anything backwards with them. Any other thoughts?

It is possible both r4lc's are bad. I pulled it from another mini commander kit. It is the only other board I have access to at the moment. I would think it unlikely both boards are bad and more likely I am missing something simple.

Do you have another CC Lite you can test?  I had one where the locomotive would not reverse.  It would run forward, you hit the DIR button, the backup light came on, but advancing the red knob made it move forward again.  Hit DIR, the backup light went out and the red knob made the loco move forward again.  I did have other boards to test and all of those were fine.  Ken at Electric RR sent me a replacement CC Lite and I returned the defective one to him.  At this point, I'd suggest you call or e-mail Ken.

I'd put the other CC-Lite into the circuit, it sounds like the lines from the R4LC to the terminal strip are open.

 

I've used six of these so far, and other than a stalled motor taking one out, they've all worked 100%.

 

Just wired up the other cc lite and it works the same as the first one.

I'm somewhat at a loss, I'm sure there's something simple that we're missing.  I'm truly at a loss as to why the bulb doesn't light connected directly to the CC-Lite.  You connected it between the light outputs and the common, right?

 

Thank you everyone for the help. After completely switching boards and having the same problem I figured it had to be something simple. So I cleaned up my work space and put everything away.
Then called my brother who also installed a cc lite into one of his engines. As we talked, I found my problem and boy is my face red.
I thought I followed the directions last night, I thought when I double checked I was following directions, I also thought I was when I triple and quadruple checked. But when your mind follows the connections on the directions wrong you don't rralize you are doing anything wrong.

I was not tying my headlight to the common but to both hot wire outputs. Very embarrassing but very glad it is figured out. I'm just surprised I could look at the directions so many times and not see that I was not following the connections properly. I should have used the directions of page 3 for double checking instead of page 4. Thanks everyone for trying to help my dumb mistake!

Hey, the problem is fixed so it's all good. 

 

Glad you're up and running.

 

I'm glad you sorted it out.  Funny how the mind works...

 

Good to go 

Glad it all worked out.

I will have my chance on this as well soon.

In about 2 weeks, I will make my first purchase and attempt to install ERR products into my brand new WBB 0-27 UP Alco.

The Cruise Commander and the RailSound board.

I have done a couple tmcc upgrades, but never an engine. It was a lot of fun and the cruise results are great. I'm still waiting on a few detail parts and then I will test and video my whole hogwarts train with upgrades. 

Did the Hogwarts Locomotive get fan driven smoke?

 

No fan driven smoke. It was originally on my list to do for this project, however my fiancé has a real hard time with the smoke so I usually have to run with it off. For that reason I decided to save the cash and leave the puffer unit.

If you don't use the smoke, probably a wise move to save the money!

 

My thoughts exactly. I did put in an electro coupler though. 

Did you find the EC difficult?  I didn't bother as I figure it'll pretty much always be pulling the same set of cars.

 

It was a bit challenging. The electro coupler I had was a gpod length but didn't mount the saMe. I had to think it over before I decided to make what I call franken-coupler. 

 

I hacked off the mounting piece of the original coupler, then hacked off the mounting piece of the electro coupler. Did some grinding to make flat ends and super glues the electro-coupler shaft to the original mountint part. I don't usually pull long trains so I hope the superglue will be strong enough. 

 

That's why I didn't do the EC.   I thought about it, but figured it was going to be a kludge if I put it on.  If I ever get the urge, I'll go back and figure it out.

 

I am going to put a backup light on the tender and also light the lanterns on the pilot, those changes are coming.

 

I'm putting a backup light in also. Please take notes on lighting the latterns. It was something I thought about as well but wasn't exactly sure how I would tackle it.

I'm still thinking about it.   I did something similar some time back.

 

I drilled a hole, then used a small chip LED at the back, gluing a backing cardboard behind it.  I used clear epoxy to create a lens in front of the chip LED.  That's how I put a backup light in the Thomas set, it had very close quarters and I couldn't fit it in with a regular LED.  It appears the same thing could be done with these, then just run the fine wires down through the pilot and connect them to the headlight circuit.