I just received my first O gauge LionChief Plus engine today. It is the 6-83610 MKT Mikado. It is Great!...with a little correction to be noted.
I also currently have 2 S gauge FlyerChief engines, a first run PE Berkshire and a Frisco Northern. All 3 of these engines have basically the same innards. However the Northern and the Mikado are Bluetooth equipped.
I did notice that the O gauge MKT Mikado sounds were very low from the factory so I looked up the directions in the manual to adjust them.
On page 18 of the manual the directions say to "hold down the bell and whistle buttons at the same time and wait for the red light to flash". Then turn the dial right for louder or left for quieter.
Well all that is wrong. All that happened was that the whistle and bell sounded at the same time and the red light did not flash. I tried this several times with the same result.
I was dismayed that I could not adjust the volume. But something in the back of my mind told me to find my FlyerChief Northern manual and check out the instructions for sound volume adjustment. Sure enough those directions say to hold down the ANNOUNCEMENT button and then turn the dial right for louder and left for quieter.
When I did that to the LionChief Plus engine all went well. I was able to turn the volume of all sounds up to the level I wanted.
Who knows what happened in the printing of the Mikado manual. Maybe those volume instructions are for an earlier type of LionChief engine. This engine does have Bluetooth control built in so I would think this manual was newer since it too mentions Bluetooth.
Another thing noted is the Mikado smoke does not stay on at idle. This surprises me as the FlyerChief Frisco Northern does keep the smoke on at idle. This was an upgrade over the first run of S Gauge FlyerChief engines. The earlier S gauge PE Berkshire does not smoke at idle.
Other than the volume directions snafu the only other small flaws are a faint squeaking in the running gear which will most likely disappear (with the oil I added as the directions called for) and a minor flaw in the white paint stripe on the side of the boiler. I can touch this up. Neither of these noted items will cause me to return the engine as it performs smoothly. I congratulate Lionel on a smooth running engine!
So if you are trying to adjust your new Mikado sound levels don't follow the printed directions. Use those mentioned above.
Mark
