Engine not on Track

What version of DCS are you using?

Which version TIU?

TRy tethering the TIU and remote together with the curly phone cable... It may be a loose transceiver board in the remote (probably) or tiu.

Connect the remote to the TIU's Remote Input port with a 4-conductor (curly) telephone handset cable and try again. If that works, the transceiver board in the TIU, remote, or both may be loose.

This and a whole lot more is all in “The DCS Companion 3rd Edition!" This book is available from many fine OGR advertisers and forum sponsors, or as an eBook or a printed book at MTH's web store!

So, I went to do this and relatned that phone jacks and handset jacks are different (VERY LOONG TIME since I messed with a landline). My TIU is well under the layout and inaccessible other than with a long cord. Since standard telephone jacks (and the attached cable) will not work, I am slightly stuck. Thoughts re adding an extension and input jack on wood table facia?

Engineer-Joe posted:

What version of DCS are you using?

Which version TIU?

Version 5.00; TIU mounted on facia (internally) and I won't take it down unless absolutely necessary ��

 I'm not making fun of you. You really need to move the TIU or make it easier to remove for upgrades or issues just like this. How would you change the internal fuses if needed?

 Good to see you replied!

Hi Var:  Welcome to my world.  I have had the same problem on and off for some time now.  I love the DCS system but when it acts up it can drive you off the bridge. Nothing worse that being told no engine to add when your remote is resting on it!!!.  In the book, it states DC power supply 24 volts DC. .Running HO not so. If you are ho and using an adjustable power supply , drop it down to 22 volts. It does make a difference. I have a HO H-10 steam engine that drove me and MTH absolutely nutzzzzzz . Half the problem was the 24 volt problem . They have it now and are working on the other half. Call MTH and explain it to them.  Good luck.  Still  like MTH and there DCS. 

Var,

You can confidently place your TIU on the dark side of the moon, as long as you plan for the right eventualities.  

Due to a lack of layout "real estate", my 3 TIUs are inconveniently located under the layout and,  although I can reach them if necessary, an injury some 9 years made that considerably more difficult. However, I'd successfully mitigated the situation by planning ahead when I built the layout.

As a long-tine DCS beta tester, I update TIU code much more frequently than the average DCS operator. Therefore, when I built the layout I took some steps to facilitate the upgrade process.

I used extension cables to bring each TIU's serial, ProtoCast and ProtoDispatch ports up to the edge of the layout. Connecting to the PC now becomes easy to do. Note that there's no reason to disconnect any cables other than these 3 when doing TIU software upgrades.

Power to the layout is controlled by a single power switch. To cycle TIU power, I use. this switch.

I use only Z4000s, which have excellent circuit breaker protection, for track power. Further, each TIU is powered by a Z500 brick that also has an excellent circuit breaker. Therefore, I'm not concerned about replacing fuses in the TIUs. In fact, in 14 years of operating this layout, I've never had to replace a fuse in a TIU.

The only times I've ever had to access the TIUs thus far was to replace the TIUs when I upgraded to Rev. Ls a few years ago, and once when I had a TIU fail and require repair.

Do  you feel comfortable taking the remote apart and reseating the board/// you may get lucky and just have to slightly push it down .  Do you have  barry's  book?  ( it's in there). My guess the odds are a loose transceiver board in the remote.

Engineer-Joe posted:

 I'm not making fun of you. You really need to move the TIU or make it easier to remove for upgrades or issues just like this. How would you change the internal fuses if needed?

 Good to see you replied!

Turns out this location is ideal for other reasons. I did plan for fuse replacement:  cover held in place with velcro (works great). 

I appreciate your reply; did not take it as "making fun" - it is a valid suggestion. I will probably add extensions as Barry suggests although have not heard or seen any driving need for upgrades (took it with me to York a year or so ago and got the upgrades but the benefits were invisible). Frankly, I expect it to work reliably with no fussing (the DCS isn't my hobby). 

Var,

The 4 pin cord used to connect the TIU to the remote is the cord between your land line phone and its base, the small one.  I suspect two problems - one being the receiver or antenna in the remote is out of its socket, second - the TIU is not getting a clear signal from the remote.  Probably too much interference from the materials on the layout blocking the remote.

Do you have a test track? somewhere?  Are you powering the TIU from the aux port? or fixed 1?

If you do not want to open the remote to reset the receiver, you are near GGG on the forum.  George can help and is close.

bruce

Barry Broskowitz posted:

Var,

You can confidently place your TIU on the dark side of the moon, as long as you plan for the right eventualities.  

Due to a lack of layout "real estate", my 3 TIUs are inconveniently located under the layout and,  although I can reach them if necessary, an injury some 9 years made that considerably more difficult. However, I'd successfully mitigated the situation by planning ahead when I built the layout.

As a long-tine DCS beta tester, I update TIU code much more frequently than the average DCS operator. Therefore, when I built the layout I took some steps to facilitate the upgrade process.

I used extension cables to bring each TIU's serial, ProtoCast and ProtoDispatch ports up to the edge of the layout. Connecting to the PC now becomes easy to do. Note that there's no reason to disconnect any cables other than these 3 when doing TIU software upgrades.

Power to the layout is controlled by a single power switch. To cycle TIU power, I use. this switch.

I use only Z4000s, which have excellent circuit breaker protection, for track power. Further, each TIU is powered by a Z500 brick that also has an excellent circuit breaker. Therefore, I'm not concerned about replacing fuses in the TIUs. In fact, in 14 years of operating this layout, I've never had to replace a fuse in a TIU.

The only times I've ever had to access the TIUs thus far was to replace the TIUs when I upgraded to Rev. Ls a few years ago, and once when I had a TIU fail and require repair.

I was hoping you had IDs for the different phone jacks - quick Google search was confusing re getting unambiguous terminology. I may extend the serial ports too, but frankly, am so far uninterested in upgrades as I have yet to see any benefit (I am willing to be convinced, just need some incentive).

Some additional data re the basic problem:  took the Yellowstone to my club yesterday for an open house yesterday. It ran well for about two hours; brought it home and, just for fun, tried loading it into the controller - loaded right in and the engine ran nicely for about a half hour. My casual thought was that running it at the club may have "polished" any oxides off the wheels. Today, I decided to try the engine briefly and it was right back to where it was before - engine not on track (note that it was sitting untouched from where I shut it down last night).  Decided to delete and reload the engine - now, it came up out of RF range. Decided to try the handset cord to TIU under the layout - still does not load engine (no engine to add).  If he Yellowstone had not run well yesterday, I would be suspicious of the engine (although I do not rule that out).  

I have your book (2nd edition) and am reviewing it for other ideas.  Any additional thoughts would be appreciated .

Gregg posted:

TRy tethering the TIU and remote together with the curly phone cable... It may be a loose transceiver board in the remote (probably) or tiu.

Thanks, please look at my comments to Barry. 

bruce benzie posted:

Var,

The 4 pin cord used to connect the TIU to the remote is the cord between your land line phone and its base, the small one.  I suspect two problems - one being the receiver or antenna in the remote is out of its socket, second - the TIU is not getting a clear signal from the remote.  Probably too much interference from the materials on the layout blocking the remote.

Do you have a test track? somewhere?  Are you powering the TIU from the aux port? or fixed 1?

If you do not want to open the remote to reset the receiver, you are near GGG on the forum.  George can help and is close.

bruce

Right, I knew it was the small one - I was hoping to find an adapter so I could use standard phone jack for an extension and then go to the coil cord.

No test track; TIU powered from aux port.

Dumb question:  what is GGG and who is George? ��

John Y. posted:

Hi Var:  Welcome to my world.  I have had the same problem on and off for some time now.  I love the DCS system but when it acts up it can drive you off the bridge. Nothing worse that being told no engine to add when your remote is resting on it!!!.  In the book, it states DC power supply 24 volts DC. .Running HO not so. If you are ho and using an adjustable power supply , drop it down to 22 volts. It does make a difference. I have a HO H-10 steam engine that drove me and MTH absolutely nutzzzzzz . Half the problem was the 24 volt problem . They have it now and are working on the other half. Call MTH and explain it to them.  Good luck.  Still  like MTH and there DCS. 

Running O-Gauge with DCS, Legacy and TMCC. Most of the time, all is well, however, as I stated in the original post, gremlins affected all MTH engines on Tuesday (Legacy, etc. functioned perfectly). Now it is my Yellowstone (purchased at York two weeks ago) that is the focus of problems.  I have to take a look at reseating the board on the handheld (although that doesn't seem to be the real source of the problem since it persisted when hard wired to TIU). 

Var posted:

bruce benzie posted:

Var,

The 4 pin cord used to connect the TIU to the remote is the cord between your land line phone and its base, the small one.  I suspect two problems - one being the receiver or antenna in the remote is out of its socket, second - the TIU is not getting a clear signal from the remote.  Probably too much interference from the materials on the layout blocking the remote.

Do you have a test track? somewhere?  Are you powering the TIU from the aux port? or fixed 1?

If you do not want to open the remote to reset the receiver, you are near GGG on the forum.  George can help and is close.

bruce

Right, I knew it was the small one - I was hoping to find an adapter so I could use standard phone jack for an extension and then go to the coil cord.

No test track; TIU powered from aux port.

Dumb question:  what is GGG and who is George? ��

GGG and George is one and the same person. Those are his initials.

https://ogrforum.com/member/ggg

Var,

Decided to try the handset cord to TIU under the layout - still does not load engine (no engine to add).

Did you delete the engine before attempting to re-add it?

Barry Broskowitz posted:

Var,

Decided to try the handset cord to TIU under the layout - still does not load engine (no engine to add).

Did you delete the engine before attempting to re-add it?

The engine had previously been deleted; I am now unable to readd it (Now says no engine to add).  I have been reading your book and watching baseball (not sure which topic more frustrating right now).  I noticed a significant writeup on batteries and PS-2. This engine was "hardly used" before I bought it at York. I put a BCR2 in it at York, checked it for operation at Jeff Steinbacher's exhibit (we are friends, he was not the seller), and went home happy as it powered up and ran perfectly.  I noticed over the last two days that when power is applied, the engine starts up even though it isn't loaded, but not always (I know this is typical DCS behavior, just surprised by the inconsistency). I am still grappling with all the clues to try to diagnose. Thanks again for your help!

Var, you say you run Legacy, TMCC, as well as DCS. Just by chance, have you recently been running a TMCC engine that you had not been running prior to your problems? Certain TMCC engines give the DCS signal fits. I know that my Lionel Lionmaster Clinchfield Challenger creates all of the symptoms that you describe. It truly interferes or degrades the DCS signal. I know the solution, but I am timid in adding the Rf chokes to all of the hot wires to the engine and the tender. That may not be your problem, but just one more thing to eliminate.

Rick

Ranger Rick posted:

Var, you say you run Legacy, TMCC, as well as DCS. Just by chance, have you recently been running a TMCC engine that you had not been running prior to your problems? Certain TMCC engines give the DCS signal fits. I know that my Lionel Lionmaster Clinchfield Challenger creates all of the symptoms that you describe. It truly interferes or degrades the DCS signal. I know the solution, but I am timid in adding the Rf chokes to all of the hot wires to the engine and the tender. That may not be your problem, but just one more thing to eliminate.

Rick

Nothing new on the layout but the Yellowstone. Also, I would presume that a day after running any TMCC engine (which I did not), any affects would be long gone. If I can't straighten this out soon, my simple solution is to gut the MTH stuff from the engine and replace it with an ERR module. At least the ERR (Lionel) equipment works consistently without sacrificing a goat and baying at the moon to get it to run ��

Just a couple of thoughts.... does the read find the tiu?   and what kind of track signal do you have where you're trying to add the engine. Do you use a programming or small  test track. A programming track can be any track with a good track signal with no other engines receiving power anywhere on the layout.   good luck.  

Gregg posted:

Just a couple of thoughts.... does the read find the tiu?   and what kind of track signal do you have where you're trying to add the engine. Do you use a programming or small  test track. A programming track can be any track with a good track signal with no other engines receiving power anywhere on the layout.   good luck.  

Thanks for the comments. Using the "Read" function shows my entire inventory of engines except for the Yellowstone which I cannot seem to get into the system (it was loaded on Saturday; Sunday when the "engine was not on the track", I deleted the engine and then tried to reload it, I got a number of different negative messages and could not load the engine, where I am now).

Track signal is generally in the 9-10 range however there are some small areas that drop low. As I said in the original post, I noted signal changes from 9 down to 6 and then back to 10 within only 6-10" on the same piece of Gargraves; I am hard pressed to understand that. 

I don't have a test track but plan to disconnect all channels from the layout, use one block as an effective test track and sequentially connect different channels to it to see if I get different results. 

So, I have accumulated a number of good ideas (thanks to ALL who took the time to offer me some help).  As of yesterday, not only could I not find/load the Yellowstone, but  one of my other engines parked on a siding next to the Yellowstone, a Dreyfus Hudson, was now no longer recognized by the system (engine not on track).

Today, based on many suggestions, reading Barry's book, and trying to use my own logic, I tried to methodically track down the problem.  I took everything but the Yellowstone off one block of track (I call it block 3 on my wiring schematic); disconnected all TIU outputs from the layout (effectively eliminating the rest of the layout), and then sequentially connected the TIU channel outputs to block 3 while performing the following (try to connect to the Yellowstone; if connection established, start the engine, run it briefly on block 3, shut down the engine, and then delete the engine from the system).  I did that using all four channel outputs from the TIU; only Fixed Output 1 (which is normally connected to block 3) would not find the engine.  At that point, I thought I had finally tracked down my problem.  I reconnected the TIU outputs to the layout, and to my chagrin, I now found that the engine would not load or run on any of the other blocks (even trying one of the other three channels on block 3 no longer worked).  I did physically remove the Dreyfus from block 3 and relocated it to another block on the layout; it works fine.  I also "reseated" the circuit board on the TIU (by my assessment, it was not unseated or lose in the first place).  Bottom line:  nothing is reproducible, including the suspicion that Fixed Output 1 is suffering poor performance.  I have pulled the Yellowstone from the layout; everything "seems" to work right now, but I will be more convinced if I can go downstairs tomorrow and run the various engines.  If that turns out to be the case, I will conclude that the problem lies in the Yellowstone.  I read (and others commented) that TMCC engines can interfere with DCS performance (the cure being an RF choke on all hot connections in the TMCC engine); I saw nor heard anything to indicate that an MTH engine (in this case, the Yellowstone) could be the source of DCS interference.  Thoughts on the possibility that the Yellowstone is really the source of the problem?

I will update this post again tomorrow; in the mean time, any thoughts, suggestions, or prayers  on my behalf would be welcome.  Again, thanks to all for time spent engaging on my problem - it is a serious annoyance the likes of which I have not had before.

Thoughts on the possibility that the Yellowstone is really the source of the problem?

While nothing is actually"impossible", this would be extremely unlikely.

Well although you did start the troubleshooting correctly, you didn't finish it.

You need to connect things methodically to narrow down where the trouble lies. Only connect or change one thing at a time to be sure to eliminate possibilities. Sure that takes a lot longer, but unless you're really lucky, you won't be able to conclude anything.

For example if channel one fixed works on a block, then try channel two fixed on that same block and the rest of the channels. If a block is a problem no matter what channel is used, that helps pinpoint the problem closer. There can be anything going wrong so don't think anything is safe. Even a switch or dependable engine, everything should be considered broken until proven otherwise.

In a lot of instances, it is recommended to start with a single piece of track connected to the TIU. That helps eliminate things and have a starting point. When someone can't even get a piece of track to co-operate, it's easier to see what's wrong.

 You may just have a wiring issue between blocks or similar problem. Your Yellowstone ran fine on another layout so that also helps point to another issue.

Engineer-Joe posted:

Well although you did start the troubleshooting correctly, you didn't finish it.

You need to connect things methodically to narrow down where the trouble lies. Only connect or change one thing at a time to be sure to eliminate possibilities. Sure that takes a lot longer, but unless you're really lucky, you won't be able to conclude anything.

For example if channel one fixed works on a block, then try channel two fixed on that same block and the rest of the channels. If a block is a problem no matter what channel is used, that helps pinpoint the problem closer. There can be anything going wrong so don't think anything is safe. Even a switch or dependable engine, everything should be considered broken until proven otherwise.

In a lot of instances, it is recommended to start with a single piece of track connected to the TIU. That helps eliminate things and have a starting point. When someone can't even get a piece of track to co-operate, it's easier to see what's wrong.

 You may just have a wiring issue between blocks or similar problem. Your Yellowstone ran fine on another layout so that also helps point to another issue.

Perhaps I didn't express myself well but I believe that I did what you are suggesting:  I methodically tried each channel with block 3. I am planning to review the wiring for anything loose, but I do have good signal strength (as measured by a different locomotive - I presume that measurement validates a particular block for all engines, accepting any internal variabilities. 

I do plan to try the system again today sans Yellowstone to see if it behaves ��  Frankly I am rapidly growing tired of the DCS dilemma - it is chewing up more time than it is worth!

Anyone here can only offer help on exactly what you type. We are not there and don't even know anything that maybe implied.

If you get tired, I fully understand. I have had many issues myself over the years. It takes away any fun with toy trains.

I myself, am having issues crop up with signal again outside this year. I believe that leaving the track and wires connected outside all winter, was a mistake. I'll understand better, once I find out what the problem is.

 I just had 2 engines not respond that I ran just 2 weeks ago. Upon inspection I found the batteries are dead. That seems to be my big issue with having old trains sit idle all winter. These 2 engines were made in around '05 and have the original single AA batteries inside. So I'll guess that at their age, they didn't like all the idle time and then sudden use?

Engineer-Joe posted:

Anyone here can only offer help on exactly what you type. We are not there and don't even know anything that maybe implied.

If you get tired, I fully understand. I have had many issues myself over the years. It takes away any fun with toy trains.

I myself, am having issues crop up with signal again outside this year. I believe that leaving the track and wires connected outside all winter, was a mistake. I'll understand better, once I find out what the problem is.

 I just had 2 engines not respond that I ran just 2 weeks ago. Upon inspection I found the batteries are dead. That seems to be my big issue with having old trains sit idle all winter. These 2 engines were made in around '05 and have the original single AA batteries inside. So I'll guess that at their age, they didn't like all the idle time and then sudden use?

You are exactly right:  it is difficult to unambiguously communicate the nature of the problem, things that are done in the way of experiments, and advice. Anyway, I had other chores to attend so I have gone dark for a while. The Yellowstone is off the layout and all other DCS engines once again running normally as of today  (who knows what tomorrow brings ��). 

At this point, I have to believe the Yellowstone is the culprit - will have to accumulate more evidence but I am leaning that way (still doesn't explain the odd behavior with different channels powering block 3; could be an intermittent problem in either the Yellowstone or the DCS system). A friend asked me if this was a Proto 1 conversion; the answer is no. Bottom line; I am going to let it lie for a while and enjoy working on some scenery - if/when I am able to resolve this, I will post the details. Again, thanks to all who took the time to give me ideas to try!