Trainsound static?

The older Lionel Audio, Trainsounds and RailSounds 4 and earlier, tend to have some background hash.  In some locomotives it is worse than others, and I've never come up with a good reason why there is a difference.

As gunrunner John has said, there is some noticeable backround noise in the speakers; as this is a "starter set", the speaker may not be of the highest quality!  But lets try and make your sounds louder and perhaps the "backround noise" will not be as objectionable as it is now.

          Due to a change in the  Child Safety Laws, LIONEL has been forced to reduce the loudness of the train sounds in the starter sets (it's okay for junior to wear "Ear Buds" and blowout an eardrum with his I-tunes, but don't you have that whistle/horn tooo Loud!!).

          Lionel controls the audio with a volume control and they installed a resistor on one of the terminals. If this resistor is removed/bypassed, volume is increased;

          Also, I have seen a number of the General tenders have a clear plastic disc placed over the holes in the tender frame where the speaker is mounted to the  frame. I'm really not sure what the purpose of this disc is for, but it does diminish the sound of the audio and perhaps is part of the cause of the distortion in the sound. I would try to remove these items and see if you have any improvement; I've done many, and there is noticeable improvement.  Hope this helps,  Dennis M.

I've often thought of trying to devise a noise filter to damp the sudden spikes of audio hash, too bad we can't get to the source easily before the amplifier.