@gunrunnerjohn posted:You can change the tach tape to a custom tape to change the chuff rate. Note that it will also change the scale MPH calibration, but I doubt that's accurate since this is a different brand locomotive, so that's not a big deal. If you're getting too many chuffs/rev, reduce the number of stripes on the flywheel, and it'll change the chuff rate. If it were exactly double the proper number, then you'd want half as many stripes on the flywheel.
A simple way to reduce the number of stripes by half is to simply use a Sharpie marker and color in every other white stripe.
MTH sells the top board alone for $31, and they show it in stock. I recently bought several of them. You might guess I'm somewhat of a stickler for things working properly, so it would bug me that the headlight didn't work as intended.
Again, awesome info!
I appreciate the "work arounds" offered, but I'm OCD enough that it not working quite like it should, especially because of my mistake, would annoy me to no end, so I ordered the top board. It's more or less a deal where I gently pry up and unplug the top board, and then reverse the process for the replacement, correct? No need to reprogram anything?
That's interesting about the tach stripe. I'll get out a sharpie this week and update on how that goes, lol. Still learning a lot... I didn't even know that it was the black/white color difference that triggered it; I thought maybe there was something magnetic about parts of the strip that it read off of, kind of like an ABS reluctor ring on a car or something.