When you do an ABA lash up with powered A and B units and a dummy trailing A unit is the trailing A unit the rear unit or is the middle placed powered B unit. Do you count an unpowered unit in a lash-up?
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I set mine up as follows:-
Powered A unit as the lead engine. (With sounds etc.)
Powered B unit in the middle
Dummy A unit as the trailing unit (Reverse direction)/
I give each unit its own engine ID too.
When set up this way, the lights all function correctly according to the direction of travel.
Yes, but I think he is asking:
Powered A + Powered B + UNpowered A = ?
Is the answer 2 or 3?
IMHO, 3 because you are simulating a full scale 3-unit consist.
Nicole is correct-there are three distinct units in the consist.
I totally agree, Nicole nailed the correct answer.
I was (perhaps wrongly) assuming that turbgine was asking the question regarding the current versions of the Legacy F3 locomotives. In these, both A units have Legacy circuitry , even though one is unpowered.
In addition to the lighting not functioning correctly if they are not built into the lashup as A-B-A, the couplers will not function correctly either. If the lashup is built with the B unit as the rear unit, then activating the rear coupler will cause the B unit's coupler to operate.
In the PW years when Lionel was doing AAs, only one powered, there were discussions about which "engine" should go first- the powered A (pulling the dummy A) or the opposite (dummy A first, pushed by the powered A which pulled the rest of the train). There was some consensus and evidence that he latter would result in more overall pulling capabilities-and so many of us ran our PW AAs that way ( dummy first). Wonder if the same would apply to the present discussion?
The units I am referring to are the B&O F3 set from 2005. I am using a powered A, powered B and a trailing non-powered A. Thanks everyone for your input.
Turtle,
Before I powered all my units, I ran my "dummy" engine as the lead engine for the same reason: I heard the engine consist pulled better this way and I wanted long trains. I set up my TMCC lash-up this way (the dummy unit had TMCC controlled lights and coupler):
Dummy powered A unit as the lead engine
Powered B unit in the middle
Powered A unit as the trailing unit set up for reverse direction
I addressed the powered A unit separately to get the sound. Needless to say, this was cumbersome. I would have set up the system per Nicole's guidance above to make things simpler, but I bought another powered A unit and permanently stored the dummy A. Problem solved.
Ron
I keep it simple. I run only conventional. The only address It use is: it's on the track. And if it is on the track and it has a coupler on each end, then its a different unit.
