PS 2 Upgrade Q

The reason two kits would be needed is that those engines have four motors.  A single Proto-Sound 2.0 board can only handle two motors.  For Proto-Sound 2.0, engines or engine sets that have four motors have a slave board to control the additional two motors.  The slave board is directly connected to the PS2 board via a tether so it can be told what to do.  There supposedly is a slave board upgrade kit available to use in conjunction with the PS2 upgrade kit for engines or engine sets that have four motors, but I do not know the item number as I have never ordered one.  If you do not have the slave board kit, your options are to either remove the additional motors or install a second PS2 upgrade kit.

The slave kit has and MTH Service stock # vice a Retail Sales #.  The kit is a little more complex to install depending on the engine it is going into.  Including drilling and tapping the truck block for the harness standoffs, if necessary.  G

I am in the process right now of upgrading a # 80 Coal turbine. Not for the faint of heart! There is more work in the slave upgrade than the lead unit upgrade. The upgrade kit was designed for the 3 unit Gas turbine, and the instructions with the kit says it can be used for the Coal turbine, but MTH has not tried it and you are on your own to figure it out! One problem was fiding a way to mount the ten pin socket to the rear of the lead unit, as the instruction don't apply for the Coal turbine. The instructions left some wiring details out, and had to figure that out.

 I hope I don't ruin my customers engine with this project!

For the faint of heart, the safe course then is to limit PS 2 upgrades to units that contain two motors only? Does the manual or MTH box label indicate how many motors are in a particular unit?

All MTH single unit diesels are 2 motored, one for each truck. A upgrade kit will convert a single unit with 2 motors. A slave kit is used usually in a streamlined A-A combination, where the lead unit sends a signal to the trailing unit to operate. The PS-2 upgrade kit will not handle a load of 4 motors and will fail, hence the upgrade slave kit.

Sure, Give me a couple of days to finish (or destroy!) the project.

Just about finished...The soundset for this engine is AWSOME! This is one of MTH's better recordings. Correct horn and the turbine SCREAMS!

Which sound set did you grab?

The one for specifically the Coal Turbine. The Gas turbine soundset is somewhat

different.

Hi Chuck:  How did your Coal Turbine upgrade project end up?

Are you thinking about putting up a short video of the finished project?

If anybody is looking for one I have a brand new slave kit that I am not using  80.00 shipped anywhere in the lower 48

Which one is it?

Hope to finish it tomorrow. The loco to turbine tether is proving to be a bit if a headache. Have to find a different route for the tether, as it is thicker than the original 4 wire one. Also need to splice in the 2nd smoke unit on the turbine. Other minor glitches to finish yet.

I'll keep 'ya posted.

I'll take it if it's compatible with 3volt upgrade kits.  I'll send you an email.

Sure doesn't sound like one for the faint of  heart!

After this never-ending DDA40X, with all the hoops to jump through to keep the original spring board for lighting, I'm ready for something simple ... like an ABA set upgrade .
Am looking forward to doing my Coal Turbine when I get your notes on "what not to do; what to do."

Thanks for keeping us updated on the progress Chuck!

Here is my upgrade of the UP #80 Coal Turbine with PS2 Upgrade Kit and Slave Board Kit.  I did this upgrade in August and September of 2010.  This information may be helpful for anyone considering this project.

Very good info Susan; thanks!

Together with Chucks notes on recent work, I should be able to handle converting mine!

Susan:  What did you do for the directional control of lighting in the "empty" dummy A unit?

I just checked out Susan's Coal Turbine page. She doumented much better than I could have. I am going to use her method of mounting the PS-2 cable. Very well done.

(I know she is a Master Electrican, lives on the other side of town from me.)

Kerrigan, I don't understand the question.  There are no empty units.  The Upgrade Kit is in the 80 Unit, the Slave kit is in the 80B unit, and the Backup light is in the Tender.  The pin out page and notes from a MTH technician are in the second section/page below the Harness adaptations.

Oh sorry Susan; I was referring to the F unit set you upgraded ... with the slave in the B unit I was wondering what controlled the headlight in the trailing dummy A unit.

Re: The AT&SF ABA set that was converted to PS2 using the innards of the 20-2272-1 ABA set -  Denver Rio Grande . (in June 2010).

As seen in the photos below (posted in the article), D&RG trailing A Unit Slave board and 2 motors were moved to the B Santa Fe Unit and the tether between the B Santa Fe Unit and trailing Santa Fe A Unit feeds the reverse light from the wires that were feeding the reverse light on the trailing D&RG Unit. 

This project was considerably more involved than a shell swap would have been because the D&RG units had black trucks.

Susan:  Are these "strain relief" pieces used in your Turbine upgrade project an MTH product?

No, they're scratch built per my request by the generous machinist (my very patient husband) in the machine shop in my backyard.

Most of the people I know who do PS2 upgrades have metal machining capabilities of some sort.  The "strain relief" parts could also be made of hard plastic or probably hardwood.

Susan:  Is the "strain relief" piece used due to tight curves or is it a length-of-tether problem being addressed with them?

I have finished the upgrade of the Coal Turbine!  I wasn't disapointed with the challenge of the project! A lot of time and thinking involved  because the slave kit was not made specifically for the Coal Turbine, rather an adpation for the 3 unit Gas Turbine. The most time consuming in my case was the tether between the Diesel and Turbine.

 Picture one is the method I used to connect the socket assembly. It is not as elaborte as Susan's job, but works. I removed the original 4 pin socket from the drawbar. I super glued the socket board 90 degrees on the original drawbar, then made a fillet of JBWeld. Seems to have plenty of strenght. I then added a wire tie to the drawbar. Picture 2 and 3 show the I borrowed Susan's idea of drilling holes in the truck block for the turbine tether. I used a wire tie again between the drawdar and the cast in hole used for the original connector.