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Hello,

 So this is another one of those projects that sound miraculous on paper but after you start tearing into it, you ask yourself why you didn't just leave well enough alone.  I have a MTH 30-9102 Operating Fire station that was purchased by my grandfather around 2000.  It has fought many fires but before Christmas the gear that turned the motor broke which caused the fire engine to do nothing but sit outside as all the sounds kicked in.  In my mind, I had it that I was going to tear this thing apart, fix the gear, and replace the two slow flashing lights with new and improved red/blue flashing LEDs.  While I was there, I decided that I would add a couple white LEDs to illuminate the outside of the building.  I think I was able to get the gear fixed but then I came to the part of adding these LEDs to the fire house.  I had successfully done it with my MTH Sinclair Gasoline Station earlier in the year but adding flashing lights is a bit of a different ball game I think.  In order for the new LED flashing lights to actually flash, I think I needed to add a AC/DC converter which I bought to run the 4 new flashing lights I added to the house.  But then I got word that my grandparents decided to sell their house and all of the trains had to come down....  About 4 months has gone by and all of the trains have been taken down and put into storage so now I'm sitting down to tackle this project once again but have completely forgotten where I left off.  I have a couple questions.

1) Where can I wire these flashing lights to on this fire house that they will flash when the door opens and the truck comes out?

2) Where can I wire the two added white LEDs to enhance the interior lighting of the fire house?

3) Does anyone have or know where I can get my hands on a wiring schematic for this Operating Fire House?

4) What was I thinking?   

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1) Where can I wire these flashing lights to on this fire house that they will flash when the door opens and the truck comes out? The power for the opening door and rotating platter?

2) Where can I wire the two added white LEDs to enhance the interior lighting of the fire house? Off of the existing light?

3) Does anyone have or know where I can get my hands on a wiring schematic for this Operating Fire House? Been awhile since ours was apart, do you still have the original wires? 

4) What was I thinking?   Yep! Stopping in the middle makes every project more exciting!!

Last edited by BobbyD

I was able to use the diagram given to me by John to wire my interior lighting with ease, my next step is wiring up the new flashing lights.  I was going to try and tap into the 4 wires that are designated for "LED 1" and "LED 2." I tried testing the wires with my test light but they didn't seem to be getting power.  I tried hooking a light up to one of the positive lead wires and to the other  negative wire and still nothing when I push the button to activate the fire house.  My new question is, what voltage were the two original LEDs and is it even possible to use the existing leads?  Or should I try a different approach?

@metsno1fan posted:
 

So, quick question on this. Is there any way to alter the sounds on this firehouse? I’m toying around with the idea of turning it into the Ghostbusters Firehouse replacing the fire engine with Ecto-1, but figured I’d see how feasible it is before I get my hands on one.

Any way, yes.  But realistically or practically, no.  That is, you might have seen threads about guys reverse-engineering how MTH stores sounds in the memory chips of Protosound engines.  So given enough time and effort, I suppose the same could be done for the sounds in the Fire House.  It's one of those when pigs fly scenarios!

As GRJ suggests, your best bet is to effectively disconnect the stock audio electronics and replace it with a sound-module with your custom sound.  It would not be particularly expensive (say, less than $10) but would require soldering, poking around the Fire House circuit board with its tiny components, and so on.  There have been many OGR threads on custom sound modules for layout accessories and rolling stock. 

mp3%20player%20for%20DIY%20enthusiast%20-%20ebay%20free%20shipping

Above photo from this OGR thread.  What you have going for you is the Fire House's existing source of DC power and speaker. 

Also, you probably have in mind what the sound should be - perhaps a segment from the movie.  As mentioned in the various OGR threads you can use a "free" audio editor to create the MP3 file to store in the memory card.  There are "free" youtube-to-MP3 converter programs also since most popular scenes from movies are on youtube.

But, it's not plug-and-play so understandably not in everyone's comfort zone.

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@stan2004 posted:

Any way, yes.  But realistically or practically, no.  That is, you might have seen threads about guys reverse-engineering how MTH stores sounds in the memory chips of Protosound engines.  So given enough time and effort, I suppose the same could be done for the sounds in the Fire House.  It's one of those when pigs fly scenarios!

As GRJ suggests, your best bet is to effectively disconnect the stock audio electronics and replace it with a sound-module with your custom sound.  It would not be particularly expensive (say, less than $10) but would require soldering, poking around the Fire House circuit board with its tiny components, and so on.  There have been many OGR threads on custom sound modules for layout accessories and rolling stock. 

mp3%20player%20for%20DIY%20enthusiast%20-%20ebay%20free%20shipping

Above photo from this OGR thread.  What you have going for you is the Fire House's existing source of DC power and speaker. 

Also, you probably have in mind what the sound should be - perhaps a segment from the movie.  As mentioned in the various OGR threads you can use a "free" audio editor to create the MP3 file to store in the memory card.  There are "free" youtube-to-MP3 converter programs also since most popular scenes from movies are on youtube.

But, it's not plug-and-play so understandably not in everyone's comfort zone.

It is one thing to say you can modify a read/write chip that is meant to be reprogrammed.  And another to say you can change a read only write once chip under a blob of epoxy, so do tell how you would reprogram the board, even if not realistic or practical.  Doesn't that really mean no not yes? 

Sure you can add your own sounds etc...  But the integrated board is triggered off switches to do the specific sound when the engine or what ever accessory it is, is at a specific phase of the operation.  Replicating that is much harder unless you are going to manually trigger it at each station.  Gas station, car wash, firehouse, etc...  Integrated motion and sounds.  Not a reprogrammable board.  G

Actually, the firehouse looks pretty straight-forward, it only has two sound tracks, one for the truck going out, and one for the truck going in.  A fairly simple sound board with two sound clips of your choice would probably do the trick here.  I have made several sound modules with multiple selectable inputs, and I have one in process with totally isolated input triggers that would do this function very well.

Obviously, it would be a case where you'd have to dig into the firehouse to pick a trigger point or two.

@GGG posted:

It is one thing to say you can modify a read/write chip that is meant to be reprogrammed.  And another to say you can change a read only write once chip under a blob of epoxy, so do tell how you would reprogram the board, even if not realistic or practical.  Doesn't that really mean no not yes?

...

Are you looking at a fire house circuit board and is there really a "blob-of-epoxy" (a.k.a. COB or chip-on-board)?  Please post a photo for the greater good.

I was relying on the wiring diagram that GRJ posted earlier in the thread:

fire house

I do not see a COB component on the board - but a photo would tell all.  I suppose the COB could be on the bottom of the board too.

But I am convinced this board uses re-programmable read/write digital memory to store the audio.  The board is dated March 2015.  If this was a design from the last century, then perhaps they used read-only technology.  But today, an engineer who designs-in read-only memory for a product like this should consider another line of work.

Again, a photo would tell-all, but circled on the diagram is a 28-pin SSOP chip next to an 8-pin SO chip.  There are 3 pins labeled SCK, SO, SI.  This suggests the 28-pin chip is a microcontroller and the 8-pin chip is a serial read/write flash memory, Serial ClocK, Serial Out, Serial In.  To wit, I just checked DigiKey and a 4 Mb serial flash chip goes for less than 25 cents.  As I recall, the initial PS2 engines only had twice that much memory and I figure a fire house is not as complicated audio-wise as an engine.

As stated previously, the heavy-lifting is reverse-engineering what is stored in the memory chip.  Is it just two snippets of sound as GRJ observes...or is the sequencing of the lights/motors also stored?  This would require test equipment that very few OGR readers have.  And it would take much more time than adding an external sound board triggered by some light or motor signal coincident with when the audio is active.

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Last edited by stan2004

Here's the wiring diagram, it appears that it would be pretty easy to trigger on either the lamps or motors with the proper sound board.  I think I have settled on a sound board design that I'm going to produce, it offers five totally isolated triggers for five sound clips of any duration, and it also has an option to plug in an RF receiver to remote control one or more of the sound clips, I'm waiting on prototypes now.  I think it would make adding the sounds fairly easy, the hard part is actually coming up with realistic sounds for the sound clips.

Fire House Wiring

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  • Fire House Wiring

 

Pretty sure it's not a COB, here's a picture of the actual board I got from this thread.

...

Well that seals the deal!  The 28-pin chip is the MSP430G2403 microcontroller (less than $1) which doesn't have enough memory for audio.  Hence the companion reprogrammable read/write flash chip.  That the board has evenly spaced pads for SO-SCK-SI suggests this might be how the manufacturer programs (or re-programs) the sound memory chip in-situ.  The days of popping out and replacing a memory chip to change sounds is so last century!

MSP430G2403

 

...

I think it would make adding the sounds fairly easy, the hard part is actually coming up with realistic sounds for the sound clips.

I think the OP could cut-paste some clips from the movie.  And perhaps using Audacity or similar "free" audio editor can mix in some additional mechanical-sounding effects. 

I dug up this video of a fire truck I made in 2003.  It uses the microcontroller plus read/write flash memory combo.  The sound was spliced together from various audio clips off the web.  It can take hours and hours to scour the web to find a snippet of clear audio that doesn't have music or whatever in the background.  

Plus, based on the linked OGR thread on distortion in the fire house audio amplifier electronics, I don't think modifying the existing memory is worth any further study.  If you do go with an MP3-based sound board with integrated audio amp (as shown in an earlier post), the audio quality will be vastly superior to what I heard from the online videos of the fire house.

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Last edited by stan2004

I was referring to metsno1fan's Ghostbuster modification.  If you search Ghostbusters Ecto 1 on youtube there are hundreds of clips from the movie.  Or, many free MP3 downloads of just the Ecto 1 siren.  Also lots of assorted electronic gadgets, kits, and paraphernalia to simulate the lights and sounds from the Ecto 1.

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