PS-2 flywheel size

Hugh, I have done over a dozen upgrades.  Stripe spacing does become an issue if you use lashups (which I don't), since you want the locos to run at the same speed to avoid overheating motors.  It;s more than merely being a rivet counter.

I have done 2 upgrades where spacing was an issue.  One was the Weaver 0-6-0 mentioned above, and as to that, it would have been nice to have the remote read accurately for the occasions when I have 2 or more separate trains running on same track or if I want to launch a loco and have it run at about some speed.  The other was an upgrade of a 1950 Lionel Berkshire, with the markedly different Lionel dual-wrom gear ratio, with the same would-have-been-nice consideration.  But the ability to control these through DCS outwieghs the lack of accurate readouts.

I looked upon these as mental challenges, not vital necessities.

I was thinking of using a piece of 1mm thick styrene and super gluing it around the flywheel.  That'll make it 27mm diameter

Now to find a spot in the Vanderbilt tender for the speaker, boards, and battery

A 3V BCR clone will save lots of space.  You don't need the charging harness for this one either.

The GRJ capacitor packs sure are small.

John, great idea

Well said! You are right about the lashups and I am in favor of all  the stimulating challenges one can get. Keep it up!

Something else I just found.  I was looking for a hole pattern for a 50mm speaker and found one here:

http://thingiverse-production....0mm-hole-pattern.pdf

This can be taped to the location for the speaker (in my case on the sloped wall of the Vandy coal bunker) and the holes drilled following the pattern.

I haven't seen the 2/3 AA ones yet, but I have an unopened upgrade kit here, I'll have to check and see if that's what they shipped.

I wonder what is the difference in capacity between an AAA and a 2/3 AA.  Haven't seen the latter--are the cells side-by-side or end-to-end?

I believe they'd be side by side, just shorter.  I think someone posted a picture of one here at one point.  I thought they were 2/3 AAA, but as I said, I haven't seen them.  They obviously have sufficient capacity for the task.

Side by side 2 AAA, rating was the same, but I have had to replace those more often than AA.  The 2/3 are also side by side with same rating.  It was more like a BCR size.  Came in handy with a diesel upgrade.  I only got one out of about 10 kits.  G

Wanted to close the loop on this one since it was quite interesting.  The audio amp failure occurred during the actual download of the sound file.  When I got the board the processor was shorted and the audio amp burned.  I removed the audio amp and tested the board, short was cleared and the board started up and functioned properly less sounds.

Replaced audio amp and tested.  Had normal startup sounds and idle sounds.  When I used the whistle button I got a distorted cracking sound.  Almost like the board was shorting.  Same with bell, also bad chuff sound if motor engaged.  Fired the couplers and sounds were normal.  Shut it down and replaced the audio amp again.  Same symptoms.  After conferring with owner, and rereading the post I realized the failure occurred during an actual download.  It is interesting that the download completed.

So I reloaded the sound file.  Got through all 10 segments and than it failed the final test which is the Feature Reset.  Wouldn't not pass a reentry.  So I closed the file.  Tested the board and now it was totally non responsive.  No lights or sounds.

Tried a second reload and it would not initialize said no memory detected.  Hit reentry and it cleared the fault an loaded.  Completed successfully and started up with sounds at the end of the load.

Now the real test, pressed the whistle button and low an behold it worked, bell also. Everything normal.  Clearly some level of file corruption occurred but passed the owners initial load and was working fine except for sounds. 

This was my first experience with a corrupted sound file, in this case it occurred with a hardware fault on the board during the load.  I guess the check sums don't catch everything, and I am surprised it passed for the owner.  Not sure why it didn't load the first time for me.  Never had that before.  At least the story ends well, I get paid, and the owner gets a fully functional board.  :-)  G

That's pretty wild George, and you wasted a perfectly good audio amp!

I know, luckily the owner said he had issues with the sound file on the spare board.  I went back an reread the post and it struck me this failed during a sound file load and I know what an audio amp shorting does to the 5VDC power supply circuit.

Of course having to work through twice I really was thinking the processor took a hit.

It does make me rethink what the check sum is really doing, clearly the memory was corrupted, and failed to take a reload once.

I was trying to recover a PS-2 5V board on the tester.  Worked fine in conventional, but could not address it in DCS mode.  I tried 3 times, the first 2 said no engine to recover and on the third it found it and reset the address.  Never a dull day around the work bench!  G

Looks like I opened quite a can of worms!

This has been a real education for me - thanks to everyone.

Frank

Not at all!

Every once in a while a good thought stimulating thread comes along. You have generated multiple replies from some of the best in the hobby and that is how we all learn something