Legacy Signal Cuts Out?

Tell us do you have any Ground Planes set up?  It does sound like a lack of signal, not sure why it deteriorates after time though

The failing after some time is a mystery, that doesn't sound like the traditional ground plane issue.

I have a ground plane running in the tunnel using some craft wire on telephone poles. It's the starting out OK and then just quitting that has me stumped.

Every once in a while my trains act the same way with lights flashing and no control of the trains. The only way to fix it is to reboot the Legacy. I unplug the power for a minute or two and everything will go back to normal. At other times if the battery gets too low things get real weird. I just shut down and let it charge up.

I've recharged the batteries, I use asseverate charger. Thanks for the reboot tip I haven't tried that one. I'll give a whirl this afternoon.

Yeah, but constant re-booting is a PIA. You need to
find out what is drawing down the signal. From this
forum its my understanding that TMCC/Legacy uses a
combination of track (outside rail) and house wiring
(gnd wire) to communicate with the locomotive.  Is
something in the house running during the failure period?

I know this sounds really far fetched. But, I have
an old "X-10" system and some of you know that this
system uses house wiring to communicate with remote
devices. I had a similar problem not with trains, but with

house wiring, after moving into my latest house.

I have a lamp on a far wall that wouldn't
respond at certain times. I tried changing to the other
plugs on the far wall and controllers, to no avail.
What I discovered, is that when the dishwasher was
running, the signal to control the light, couldn't get
through to the lamp. Thats my reason for this theory.
Is the failure all ways withing 3-5 minutes of running?
Does the failure only happen at certain times of the day?
Or any time of the day?
Are you home alone or is someone else in the house
running a device during the failure?
Like I said, this sounds a little "far out" but you are dealing with
radio waves here and they can be affected by almost anything.
Dale Manquen has a good explanation of how TMCC/Legacy works
at this link: http://www.trainfacts.com/trainfacts/?p=317

Speaking of Dale he might have additional ideas on what might be

causing your problem.

I guess I could try unplugging my router. I'm home alone when this happens most of the time. It seems to happen all times of the day. I'm heading to the train room now to try some more things.

I had this same thing happen when I ran my Legacy during our club's Christmas layout tours and what was interrupting the signal was my K-Line video car.

 

It seems my issue was that my ground plane wire came off when doing some work on the layout. I unplugged my router and reattached my ground plane and everything ran fine. I also plugged the router back in and things also ran fine. Why it would kick off after five minutes without the ground plane is a mystery.

I appreciate the suggestions and they got me on the right track (no pun intended).

Glad you got it fixed