Diesel Sound Issues

Been a long while since I've touched one of these. Because the Lionel transformer adds positive DC to the AC wave for the horn/whistle and the button will add negative DC for activating the bell sound. Reversing it will do the opposite. Don't think it raises the voltage though.

The 1033 could have an issue with it's whistle circuit.  Of course, you could also have the transformer connections reversed, did you try swapping the polarity of the track connections.

Any results?

Swapping the polarity did the trick!  Not exactly excited about the horn quality.

I'd like to get my hands on a 5904 or 5906 to see if I like that versus the transformer controls.  Any advantages / disadvantages?

Well, the horn will still sound the same.

No doubt... problem solved and thanks again for the help.

Doing some reading - looks like all the 5904 does is controls the polarity of the transformer controls - ie: one setting for horn, the other setting for bell.  Switch the leads and it does the opposite.  You still need the transformer to turn on the horn.  The 5906 can accomplish the same thing with two but actually has a button to activate.  Am I reading this right?

Thanks again!

Looks like the 5904 was a specialty item that was just used with a specific transformer according to this document.  I truthfully never used either of these units.

Operating Instructions Boxcar with RailSounds