TMCC signal woes

Have you tried using just an old TMCC base with a cab 1 and no Legacy base at all. If it was me I would be looking at the legacy base maybe something came loose inside the legacy base. 

My guess on what to do what small scale test. Disconnect the base from your layout and connect to a small test track piece with a separate power supply. If you are getting the same result maybe the base is having an issue. I think I had read somewhere on the web last year sometime of someone having issues with their remote, but I would say that the base is more than likely the issue. Granted I have extremely limited experience tinkering around with things like this, but if it isn't the wires, isn't the remote, and isn't the power supply, that only leaves one thing.

Hey Eric-  are you using a Legacy base?  I experienced the same problem on my layout and discovered that the wire connecting the "U" terminal on the back of the base to the motherboard was loose inside the casing.

 I tightened the wire nut inside the case and the issue was resolved.  You may have checked this already but give it a try if you have not.

Good luck!

Chris

I would try another base. It sounds like the base may have gone south. Have you had any storms or lightning strikes nearby?

I agree with MartyE and Chris1985 above (not that I know a lot about the signals either, but I read a lot around here and the electronics and controls are what I am usually most interested in). 

I have read a few posts here where folks have had the loose connection inside the Legacy base on the signal wire and also some about the base itself having a problem with the signal. 

Eric:

If this is happening anywhere on the layout and to all engines then the is a general problem. As stated above most times the ground wire from the Legacy base to the track is the culprit for one reason or another.

A simple test - if you have a friend with a Legacy base switch it out with yours and see what happens.

Please let us know how this gets resolved.

Thanks

Joe

Have you changed anything electrical in the house recently? Can you test for proper ground at the panel?

I have heard of the ground changing in extreme dry conditions. Usually, there's a rod driven into the ground where the power enters the building. A connection is made there that also should be inspected.

I'm not sure how any of this would relate, I'm just guessing if the base ends up being good.

I don't run much TMCC. Can you tell?

Since the problem came on suddenly and is universal, I agree with those who suspect the base. Your symptoms scream weak signal output.

It's times like these when we really miss Dale Manquen. I had similar problems with weak signal. I could never get my Legacy base to work on my layout, and have stuck with TMCC ever since. My problems were related to the quantity of track I was trying to cover with signal. Dale created a signal booster, which cleared up most of the problems (but not all). I still have a few stubborn spots and engines, that don't work well.

However, since your layout had been working well, then quit, try another base.

Eric, were you able to find the culprit causing the problem?

If your hand over an engine solves the problem wouldn't that eliminate a bad base as the issue? The signal is there but not getting to the engine. I've had to run a ground wire from a receptacle cover screw over an area of weak signal. Just a thought.

Rod Miller

I believe Eric ran ground wires along his tracks when he built the layout. It sounds to me like the signal is not leaving the base unit. I've never heard of it, but is it possible for the wall-wart to go bad and loose the path for signal to the ground prong for the receptical? You can check it if you unplug it and use an ohms meter across the ground prong and the ground of the barrel plug. If you don't have continuity the wall-wart is bad. You can also use the meter to test your panel ground wire to the ground rod, as Engineer Joe mentioned, to make sure the connection is still good. If you are having dry weather conditions, also run water from a garden hose and soak the ground where the rod is driven in. I like when a home's ground rod is driven in close to a down spout like they do for lightning rod grounds.

Try another base. I too have seen loose outside rail connections inside the base, and as well, a much reduced signal strength from inside the base due to a failed component.

romiller49 posted:

If your hand over an engine solves the problem wouldn't that eliminate a bad base as the issue? The signal is there but not getting to the engine. I've had to run a ground wire from a receptacle cover screw over an area of weak signal. Just a thought.

Rod Miller

Not necessarily.  I've seen command bases that had very low output.  They'd run a train on a test track, but when you got to any amount of track, you had all kinds of signal issues.  I'd consider testing the signal output of the base, Dale Manquen had published an excellent piece on the process, I sure miss his expertise here.  Testing the TMCC/Legacy Track Output Signal

Thank you MTH for making testing of track signal so easy.

Dave Zucal posted:

Thank you MTH for making testing of track signal so easy.

It's a lot easier to getting a signal reading from a system that exclusively uses the track as it's delivery method than using RF. 

Before Mike Reagan left there was some talk of a signal test car but I have no idea what became of it.

Yes, Eric did run a ground to the wall outlet sometime during the construction of the upper level(before the bridge was installed I believe). He went into great detail as to why it was necessary for the layout.

I hope he has figured out what the culprit is. I am sure some may speculate that the crew talk overloaded the base and that is why nothing is working from it(just kidding).

MartyE posted:

Dave Zucal posted:

Thank you MTH for making testing of track signal so easy.

It's a lot easier to getting a signal reading from a system that exclusively uses the track as it's delivery method than using RF. 

Before Mike Reagan left there was some talk of a signal test car but I have no idea what became of it.

Dale designed an RF rectifier circuit which made a voltage level proportional to the RF signal strength. It can be easily constructed by any user...I think he published it here back then.

However using an oscilloscope, a normal signal out of the base banana jack I've measured is about 6 volts peak to peak. With a "broken" base, I've seen only about a half volt. That base needed to be sent back to Lionel. But it still ran trains, only very problematic.

MartyE posted:

Dave Zucal posted:

Thank you MTH for making testing of track signal so easy.

It's a lot easier to getting a signal reading from a system that exclusively uses the track as it's delivery method than using RF. 

Before Mike Reagan left there was some talk of a signal test car but I have no idea what became of it.

The test car idea, I think, was to use an R2LC for a receiver and derive a signal level off of it. The level could be displayed on an led bar graph for easy viewing across the layout. Although the banana jack level will directly affect what the test car reports, a bad output from the jack will cause the test car to report a poor signal every where on the layout. The test car is more valuable for reporting isolated poor signal areas around the layout than a wholesale base signal failure. The rectified RF circuit is best for that.

Hey guys,

Thank you for the suggestions. It turns out that the people who suggested that the Legacy command base might be going bad were CORRECT. I installed a new Legacy command base and, Viola!, everything is working perfectly now. I'd had the old command base since Legacy first came out...back around 2008 or 2009...so I guess it was just worn out. We've also had some big lightning storms recently so maybe that was a contributing factor. Who knows. At any rate, everything is working great now so I can finally finish the product review I was in the middle of filming when the old unit crapped out.

Thanks again,

Eric Siegel

Eric

As you know Lionel will repair the Legacy units for free so I'd send it in and have it as a backup. 

MartyE posted:

Eric

As you know Lionel will repair the Legacy units for free so I'd send it in and have it as a backup. 

Actually I did not know that. Even one from 2009? If that's the case, I'll send it in!

ericstrains.com posted:

MartyE posted:

Eric

As you know Lionel will repair the Legacy units for free so I'd send it in and have it as a backup. 

Actually I did not know that. Even one from 2009? If that's the case, I'll send it in!

yes!

Yep. Even from 2009. 

Glad to hear everything is up and running again. Evil base.

ericstrains.com posted:

MartyE posted:

Eric

As you know Lionel will repair the Legacy units for free so I'd send it in and have it as a backup. 

Actually I did not know that. Even one from 2009? If that's the case, I'll send it in!

Everyone here has sent their Legacy sets in at least once, maybe twice, and some are the original batch. Lionel seems to have quietly extended the warranty indefinitely so we can continue to buy and run those expensive Legacy engines. I have several sets and they've all been back...mostly for the charging update.

Still running the original TMCC base ... which runs on and on and on year after year.  Sometimes simple is best.

Better to have Legacy and lost than never to have Legacy at all ��

Kerrigan posted:

Still running the original TMCC base ... which runs on and on and on year after year.  Sometimes simple is best.

Sometimes... not always.

cjack posted:

Everyone here has sent their Legacy sets in at least once, maybe twice, and some are the original batch. Lionel seems to have quietly extended the warranty indefinitely so we can continue to buy and run those expensive Legacy engines. I have several sets and they've all been back...mostly for the charging update.

I'm not sure about quietly. This forum has known about it and have regularly posted about it for years. 

As long as the unit hasn't been blatantly abused, the repair will cost you one way shipping.  Pretty smart on Lionel's part to keep as cjack posted "so we can continue to buy and run those expensive Legacy engines."  I guess expensive depends on the engine though.

As I read this thread, I ran across several statements that interested me. The first was the reference to turning off power to the Entire House. It should be noted that the electrical breakers in the Electrical box only disrupt the power on the Hot Lead. The ground/nuetral wiring remains in tact and the TMCC/Legacy signal woul not be interrupted.   Secondly we should acknowledge that more and more new houses are using PEX for Water supply hence you may not have that ground system and further my house uses the mesh in the garage floor as the ground reference and hence no stake near the outside meter.  Fuel for thought. 

Jim, was a ground rod driven into the ground and attached to the mesh before the cement was poured? I always thought the idea of a ground rod was to be deep enough to reach a good wet source of soil in order for the faulted electricity to dissipate throughout the earth. When our home was built, a moisture barrier in the form of 1" foam was laid which would restrict any moisture from reaching the metal mesh.

We have both Pex plumbing and a ground rod driven into the ground near the electrical service entrance. One odd thing we have here is a 4-11/16" metal box in the concrete basement wall (adjacent to the garage) with a ground wire connected to something that goes through the wall? The ground wire goes back to the electrical breaker panel, also where the ground wire from the ground rod goes.

I haven't looked in the wall box since we moved in 4 years ago and I forget exactly what the connection looked like, but I am thinking it was a ground lug of some sort. You now have me wondering if that ground could be tied into the mesh in the garage floor? That's very interesting as I have wondered about that box and wire since I first saw it when we moved in?? Never seen anything like it until we moved here.

I should add that I have both Legacy and DCS and they both work great here. Haven't had a problem with either one as long as we have lived here. No errors from either system.

I also think it's really great of Lionel to continue repairing the Legacy units. It's probably gotten me into a few extra Lionel products too, so I think it is helping their sales as well. Very good idea and way above and beyond anyone else's regular warranties!! 

great news, thanks for letting us know the real issue. we had an electrical storm and we were out of town, yes, it knocked out my legacy base.....I tried and tried to get my layout to come on with no success. we took out the legacy base, connected up the cab 1  tmcc base and yes, all the power to the track came back on....we run our layout with a separate switch box, 60 amp and we have installed breakers with surge protectors built in....no more issues, sent the cab 2 set back to Lionel, and it was back within 2 weeks....the layout is a huge target for lightning and this probably happened to yours....I suggest unplugging your system when not in use, we do ours. good luck Eric, and keep the video's coming....Leapin Larry

Dave, Now you have me thinking. First, I do not think there is a vapor barrier. In the Winter Time around here, a good deal of snow melt while the car is in the garage would have me concerned if the water is held by the water barrier. Secondly, I know the mesh was connected but now am wondering if there was a ground rod installed under the concrete. Another sleepless night while I noodle this��.

Jim, hopefully a member here is a new home construction electrician and will enlighten us on proper home grounding. I'm in PA and the last I heard is that two 8' ground rods per panel are required for new construction. I have a feeling since the Lionel system utilizes the ground of a building, the better a panel is grounded, the better the Lionel system will operate. Thanks Eric for starting this topic.

The TMCC and Legacy system use the "ground" wiring in the house as an antenna. While the grounding of the "ground" and common wires back at the entry panel is very important to the AC wiring for the house, it will not significantly affect the TMCC and Legacy.

rtr12 posted:

We have both Pex plumbing and a ground rod driven into the ground near the electrical service entrance. One odd thing we have here is a 4-11/16" metal box in the concrete basement wall (adjacent to the garage) with a ground wire connected to something that goes through the wall? The ground wire goes back to the electrical breaker panel, also where the ground wire from the ground rod goes.

I haven't looked in the wall box since we moved in 4 years ago and I forget exactly what the connection looked like, but I am thinking it was a ground lug of some sort. You now have me wondering if that ground could be tied into the mesh in the garage floor? That's very interesting as I have wondered about that box and wire since I first saw it when we moved in?? Never seen anything like it until we moved here.

My guess would be you have a concrete encased ground electrode. Not sure if they use the garage floor reinforcing mesh for it though, it should be in the foundation or footing when used. It is of course pretty permanent, you may replace the garage floor but not usually the house foundation!

This thread is always interesting how some layouts never ever have any TMCC problems and other layouts have nothing but complex TMCC problems!  Not exactly a "one size fits all" operating system ....

Yes, that is very interesting. We see the same things around here with DCS systems. Fortunately, I have had no problems with either system, other than 'operator error' from the operator not being smarter the the equipment.  

I had DCS first, wired it per Barry's book as best as I could. It ran for a year or so and I then added Legacy in 2014 (I think?). I did nothing special other than follow the instructions and so far it's all working just fine. I have Atlas track and Atlas switches.

I have not seen many layouts other than my own, but I would love to see more someday, especially ones that are having problems (not that I could fix them) and just observe and try to find differences from my own setup. I think that would be interesting. Even more so if someone very knowledgeable (that's would not be me) was visiting as well.

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Now BobbyD has my curiosity up about that odd ground box in my basement wall. I am gonna have to go take the cover off and take another look here in a little while, soon as I get done goofing off here. Maybe I will take a picture and post it after I take another look.