MOP Soft Key

Hi Micheal,

I will not tell them to buy "The Book", neither will I shamelessly Plug a Book that I may have written.

I will do my best help you, but first...  I did not write Barry's book, but I am a VERY strong advocate of folks like yourself buying the book.  Not because Barry is a friend and all around good guy, but because it is worth every penny.  Barry has made tens of thousands of posts helping people with DCS over the last ten years and has been hugely generous with his time.  And, he continues to do so even though his book has been out for a few years.  He frequently quotes information directly from the book.  He doesn't deserve to get negative attitude from people for making a few pennies after all he has done for the hobby.

The solution to your problem is covered on pages 32 and 33 of the DCS Manual (5th edition).  The softkeys for each engine are held in a list.  Most engines have about 35 (give or take a couple) softkeys in that list.  However, only the top 15 are visible using the softkeys.  Scroll through the soft keys using the S5 key (the one with the arrow above it) until you see "more" over the S4 key.  Press S4 and you will enter the softkey list at spot #16.  In the list, the softkeys are described by their full name, not just the alphanumeric abbreviation.  IIRC, the MOP softkey appears in the list as "Pantograph Menu."  Scroll up and down in the list until you find the feature.  Once you have the scrolling arrow next to the panto menu feature you can press the S2 softkey (move) and relocate the feature to one of the top 15 spots in the list.  You can use this method to re-order any and all the softkeys to make the ones you like the most accessible from the softkeys in the engine view.

Thank you Dave ......I had found both of these pages and diligently worked at trying to find the list but when I pressed the S4 key all I got was the Doppler menue and could not activate the required list to to locate the MOP key. 

Should I be in a specific menu setting prior to using S5 and S4?

Thank you

Michael

You need to be in the engine view (where you can adjust the locomotive's speed).  When you press S5 (arrow key), what are the four sets of softkeys (over S1-S4) you currently scroll through?  What is the item number for this particular engine?

Dave,

Thanks for the support. We can cut Michael some slack. He only joined the forum a couple of days ago, and he's new to DCS as well. He and I don't know each other very well yet.

Michael,

"Shameless" doesn't begin to describe my attitude as regards my book. "Zealot" is closer to the truth!

If you don't care to purchase the book and contribute to my retirement fund (every few pennies helps!) please don't feel any pressure to do so. There are a few thousand folks who found it a decent read, and some others whose praise for its usefulness caused me to blush.

If you're attending York next month, there's a DCS User Group Meeting Wednesday evening and a series of seminars that Dave (and his brother Ted) and I will be conducting on Thursday and Friday at the MTH booth. It's all free of charge and you're welcome to attend. See the thread at the top of this forum for info regarding the User Group Meeting. MTH will be issuing the seminar schedule in an upcoming E-mail.

Regardless, I wish you a great DCS experience!

MIKE P ..  considering the investment you have,/ will have,in trains, the cost of THE BOOK is like pocket change. I bought the book and i dont even run DCS yet.  just buy the dam book already !!  its a fantastic wealth of information from the authority of DCS !!!  

Just keep pressing soft key S4 "->" until either "MOP" appears or "MORE" appears over soft key S4:

I'm sure Barry meant...

Just keep pressing soft key S5 "->" until either "MOP" appears or "MORE" appears over soft key S4:

Dave,

I'm sure Barry meant...

 

Just keep pressing soft key S5 "->" until either "MOP" appears or "MORE" appears over soft key S4:

Of course that's what I meant. I wrote it just that way, too - go look!

Sure glad I'm going to the DCS meeting

I would like to buy this book.

I'd also like for you to buy this book!  

Just click on thsi link: http://www.mthtrains.com/content/60-1279

I just got the same locomotive, the Swiss Cargo Traxx electric, and I also cannot get the MOP softkey to appear. Unlike the example above, the unit appears to have added properly to the remote, as all the normal softkeys are present. Signal quality reads 10. Also I added the unit to both my remotes separately, and both added the same way and neither will show the MOP softkey. The automatic pantograph operation is fine, as are all other functions in a quick test: Start Up, forward and reverse, couplers, horn, bell. MOP appears to be the only function that doesn't work. 

I am wondering if it might be the software version on my DCS equipment. I have 4.10, and the manual for the unit says that the MOP softkey should work with 3.10 and up. However, since this is a Proto-3 unit, I'm wondering if the manual may be wrong and in fact I need 4.20 to get the MOP softkey in a Proto-3 unit. I have other electrics with Proto 2.0 and automatic pans, and the MOP softkeys work fine on them. I probably should get 4.20 anyway, but will that upgrade solve my MOP problem?