MTH RailKing (30-1255-1) 0-8-0 Steam Engine without Proto-Sound 2.0

Rich,

Try doing a Recover Engine command using a TIU that has DCS ID# 1and, if the engine is recovered, try to add it to the DCS Remote. 

Since it sat dark and silent when it saw a DCS watchdog signal, I would believe that it has DCS capability.

p.s.  I did try to "add engine" via the DCS controller, just in case the magic marker notes were wrong, no engine found.

Did you use a programming track  or equivalent?  It's been my experience over the years that  if the engine being added has the same ID as another engine on the layout  it's not  going to  add  unless using a programming track... The engine should add anyway but....

Does it have a front coil type coupler??   I believe the original ps-1 had thumb tack couplers.

@Barry Broskowitz - Thank you, I'll give that a try tomorrow night as I think I'm heading to the club then.

@Gregg - it does look like it has electrocouplers, which I thought were just non-functional because of it's pre-production sample status.  Thank you for your note.

So, sounds like I need to find out which track at the club might be a programming track.  It also seems like I probably got a PS1 engine for a great deal, nice.

Pictures of the packing foam, and bottom of the engine/tender are below.  I could have sworn it said "no ps1/2" on the foam, but I guess that was just on the invoice or something?  not sure as I don't see that now.

Thanks guys, I'll play with this a bit!

Best...Rich

Rich,

It might be helpful for this conversation to take off the tender shell and post a picture of the electronics.

 Do  you  have a pic of  the board in the tender? It sure looks like ps-2 to me.

Hey John @jhz563 - welcome to the "Rich Murnane is a dummy and bought something he didn't completely understand" party.

I think I was "duped" - bought a cool engine under the premise it was conventional but it was really PS-2 under the covers.  Worse things have happened, but to me it feels like winning a scratch-off lotto ticket.

Below are some pictures of the guts of the tender, and a video.

From above, it looks like the next steps I think would be to:

1. walk through Barry's steps 

2. figure out if the track is a programming track

3. maybe replace that battery?

I also noticed that one side of the speaker looks to be corroding a little bit.  Another "weird" thing was the white stuff next to what looks like a capacitor on top of the board.

Maybe the PS-2 was fried somehow, but this thing normally runs fine conventionally, I've run it tons at home without command.

Thanks again everyone for the help.  I'm clearly a DCS/Command-Control newbie and feel a little bit like a fish out of water with this stuff.

So, here is why I thought the DCS wasn't installed, there was a sticker in the cab that said "No DCS", and the seller said something along the lines of "the pre-production model probably didn't come with it" - something like that!  Image below but kind of hard to see I think.

It was purchase at a small new/used train and hobby shop in March of '16, didn't it look nice on the shelf!

Murnane posted:

Hey John @jhz563 - welcome to the "Rich Murnane is a dummy and bought something he didn't completely understand" party.

 

I would more call it the “hey - maybe Rich got more than he bargained for party.” 

There is still a chance that as a preproduction unit it may have one of a kind problems, but not likely.  

I would definitely swap the battery and the speaker.

Good luck with that Rich.  I too got more than I bargained for on a recent e-bay purchase.  I thought I was getting a conventional Lionel GP-38 repaint with railsounds but it wound up being a re-painted GP-38 shell on a TMCC GP-9 frame.

Get that speaker out of there for a replacement NOW!  That is a classic failure of the early 16 ohm PS/2 speakers!

By all means, try Barry's procedure, occasionally the engine parameters get scrambled and the "recover engine" will find them and bring them back.

There is also a "hardware system reset" that can be performed by a tech as a last resort.

I ordered a new speaker, no idea how long it will take to get here and I'll pick up a new battery and then try these things out.  

Thanks guys!

Looks like a nice engine Rich. I hope you get it running.

Bob

Update:  I replaced the battery and the speaker and then took it down to the club last night to try out everyone's suggestions, but had no luck getting it to start up.  It still runs conventionally on track without TIU/DCS/etc., so I don't think I did any damage while doing my simple repairs, which I'll consider a minor victory.

I'm going to see if the one club member who is an MTH Certified Tech can spend some time on it next, unless one of you has time to tinker with it, if so please send me an email and we can work out the details.

Thanks again for all the responses....Rich

Hi Rich,

Sorry to hear about your switcher problems. If all else fails and you want to run it in a "more than conventional mode" (says the prewar dinosaur)...Hennings is a nice, honest place if you want to get it repaired. 

Tom 

Did you try a recover engine?  G

George,

Rich, Did you try this to recover your engine as Barry and GGG suggested?

1. Menu         

2.System     

3. Engine Setup

4. Recover Engine         

 The engine must be seeing the dcs signal  , It's doing what it's suppose to do.... remain dark & silent until addressed by the remote. Problem is we can't get it added , unless it's been added and is hiding someplace... Is a remote reset a option along with the recover mentioned by others. Programming track is a must. (small test track will work)

Hi Guys,

Yes I tried the recovery process as Joe outlined above (and was originally suggested by Barry), I also removed all the other engines which were already on the remote before doing this as it seemed like a reasonable approach.  I was doing this all on the club track #1 which is a programming track.  I'm not sure what a "remote reset" is as I'm a newbie to DCS/TIU/etc., if that is one of the options on the remote I did not try that, as it is a club remote and TIU/track/etc.

I'm also tempted to get my own TIU/Handheld for the home layout since I don't want to screw up the club setup by playing around with all this.  And of course then I'd have the setup, first I need to figure out how much "milk money" I have saved up for trains though, we'll see.

Thanks again all...Rich

Rich,

A Recover Engine must be done on a track belonging to a TIU #1. Otherwise, it will not work, no matter what.

And   no other engines on the track except the lost one?   I forget. 

Whenever you're having any adding issues, it's always smart to have only the problem engine on the tracks and to use TIU #1.

Gregg,

Hi Guys, no other engines were on the track, I think there were a few passenger cars on a siding though.  

When you guys say TIU #1, do you mean out1 (circled below)?  The club's track one is on that out1 if I'm not mistaken.

 Not really.  It's possible to have 5 tiu on a really big layout and each TIU  has it's own ID(number)  from 1 to  5.

The recover feature must be used with tiu 1. it won't work with the other tiu numbers.(2 to 5)

 You're at a bit of a disadvantage when you have to try every thing at the club but it's certainly possible to do.

oh, I didn't catch what you guys meant by that.  As best I can tell, the club has a Z4K and TIU for Tracks 1&2, and another set for tracks 3&4.  When I looked at the setup it seemed pretty straightforward and uncomplicated, but I can try again in a couple days when I go down there.

Thanks again for all the help...Rich

With multiple TIU's, they're most likely running in Super-TIU mode, so you may have been trying your recovery on a TIU that is not TIU #1.