UNION PACIFIC LC2 LIONMASTER BIG BOY #4014 SKU: cs-1932162

Well, before you rip it apart, no reason to suspect it went bad on the shelf.

I personally would unplug my Legacy base power for a moment, test it in conventional and bluetooth modes first, and just ensure I wasn't using a CAB2 ID setup in Legacy mode- because this engine ONLY understands TMCC commands.

CAB1 or TMCC modes are valid for LC+2.0 engines, Legacy mode the engine will not respond.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wDiZKWZJXSs

The known weak point on this is the Lionchief Plus drawbar connector system. I don't have one handy to know how the tender lights are powered, but again, not unheard of for a partially seated Lionchief Plus drawbar system to not connect the speaker to the engine- thus no sounds.

Again, 2 mistakes could be made-both causing it to sit silent and not respond to changing the ID

#1 You have TMCC/Legacy signal present, so the engine would come up silent until addressed.

#2 Because you have Legacy CAB2, mistakes can be made in setting up the ID and Legacy format commands can prevent you from sending either the set address command, but also if all commands were legacy, it would just sit there dead silent as if you never sent a valid addressed command to it.

Thanks for the info. Still no life in it. In conventional, it's dead. I hope it's a connector that hasn't quite been pushed in all the way. Just have to see about opening it up. I was hoping for some experience on that.

These aren't that old, shouldn't there be some warranty left on them?

I've had it a little over 3 years. Trouble is it was working when new a day or so, put it on the shelf, and I haven't run it since then.

Before I take the engine apart, can this be the fault of the tender? What does what in the engine and tender? Does the engine have to get data from the tender thru that unusual hookup to wake up the engine?

With tmcc, a tender wakes up in conventional. This tender does not. I don't know if that is an issue. The engine does nothing tmcc or conventional.

Has anyone had one of these apart? If Lionel is only doing warrantee in a timely manner, it would be helpful if they maintained a least a parts site for the engine instead of just a picture of LCP2 / REV A / LCM5 / LIONMASTER pc board.

Help...

The resistance between the pickups, collectors, is essentially zero ohms and the resistance between the pickup and the ground is over 1 megohm. On the multimeter diode setting, I get 2.3 vdc in the forward voltage position and infinity in the reverse.

The antenna (railing on the engine) is open to ground, not shorted.

OK...the tender doesn't have anything in it but 2 speakers and a small LED lighting board. So that's why it doesn't boot up in conventional. It gets the sound from the single board with all the connections in the engine. Tempting to buy the board, but there is a small shrink-wrapped module in the engine's clump of wiring. I should unwrap that before I jump to any conclusions.

Anybody out there or is everybody at York?

@cjack posted:

OK...the tender doesn't have anything in it but 2 speakers and a small LED lighting board. So that's why it doesn't boot up in conventional. It gets the sound from the single board with all the connections in the engine. Tempting to buy the board, but there is a small shrink-wrapped module in the engine's clump of wiring. I should unwrap that before I jump to any conclusions.

Anybody out there or is everybody at York?

That little clump under heatshrink is nothing more than an inductor in series. It's just a power filter blocking high frequency (might be EMI/RFI FCC licensing related or also help with MTH DCS signal) but key here is not required and technically not "electronic" in the sense of any semiconductors.

Again, for testing you can bypass it- it's the same JST-EH syle power plug coming from the pickup rollers and frame ground wiring.

I would not just buy the board. Heck, you can test this with a 9V battery. My guess is you just are not getting power to the board.

From previous LCP2 board documentation I posted.

Backside of the board and labels for connectors

Also, just like I warned about in this other related Lionchief plus 2.0 topic, you better be extremely careful with the TMCC radio antenna connector and that daughter card. A known physically weak and easy to break point of these boards.

https://ogrforum.com/...9#180636388668824739

Easier to read...

The 18vac makes it to the board. There are a couple of biggish electrolytics next to the AC in connector. They are not puffy or anything. I guess the next step is to remove the board and see if the power makes it thru a bridge, etc. But I do get a diode drop at the power in connector when I have the Fluke on "diode" in the forward direction. In reverse, it measures open.

In thinking about it, that 2.3 volt diode drop from the collector pickup to ground sounds fishy now. Almost like half a bridge or something not quite right.

It's getting like I need to remove the board and see where the power goes...or doesn't go. Does anyone know how it goes?

?

Honestly never reverse engineered power through the board. I've personally yet to have an LCP2 or LCP3 board fail other than the TMCC radio module I mentioned previously. That symptom is it just then never responds to TMCC. It misses the signal being present booting always in conventional and again doesn't respond to any TMCC signal or command. But then bluetooth and conventional operation still worked.

I tried it on the layout without the shell just to eliminate the antenna issues.  Usually without an antenna plugged into a radio board, an engine gets enough signal.

I removed the pc board and powered it up. The full wave rectifier has the proper 22 vdc across it and several of the electrolytic capacitors. One small electrolytic has 5 vdc across it right near what looks to be a switching supply. Farther down the board near the radio board and BT there are two small 10 vdc electrolytic capacitors with only 0.4 volts across them. That seems to be a problem to me. That's about as far as I have gone.

Is there a similar Lionmaster board on the forum or elsewhere with a similar setup...schematic or block diagram? It's pretty hard to trace this out. Not sure how many layers it has, etc.

Well...$200 later with the board from Lionel it's alive again! Great sound as I remembered.

@cjack posted:

Well...$200 later with the board from Lionel it's alive again! Great sound as I remembered.

I have to be honest, I have mixed feelings about this. Good that you fixed it. What's not good- the board failed- why did the board fail? I'm saying that because honestly, through this and other forums, I am not aware of many if any posted known absolute dead no function failures of the LCP2 board. I'm sure like anything there are things just not reported to a forum. What I'm saying- no, it's not a "bad" board- opposite, I'm saying it's a good board that should not and does not fail often. Worse, it implies something else external may have killed it.

Even more worrying- that "what might have killed it" scenario is the IMO, ridonkulous Lionchief connector based drawbar system if I was a betting person. That is because there are known incompatible signals and voltages present in a single connector that also happens to have a higher than normal (or acceptable IMO) failure rate, not to mention just questionable on this size and class of loco and the typical consist of cars it would pull.

Again, if it makes and breaks connection (the drawbar just unplugging and making contact electrically while running) or worse, if one of the wires breaks at the connector solder points and the heatshrink is not effective strain relief= wires possibly shorts to other terminal and thus kills the board - all while hidden under the heatshrink.

Again, honestly, I have a really hard time with this model and the implementation and expectations that surround this engine all about the questionable drawbar connector design.

I've looked the coupler over, it seems intact and I'm resisting cutting off the shrink just to see the wires. I think the things it transmits on the lionmaster is the audio to the speakers, rear electro coupler, and rear light in the tender. The tender has a pickup, I assume, for the rear marker lights. I'm not sure if a short of one of those can totally kill the board. The odd thing is that the engine was running perfectly well when I turned it off and then set it on the shelf. When I set it on the track again, I'm now recalling...I think it was this engine..., there was a small spark from the wheels touching the switch track behind the track I was setting it on which was powered separately. If I remember that correctly, that may have been what caused it. I've had that happen over the years with engines, but never had a negative consequence from it. Running trains with the local club folks, I've never thought much about a small spark when we had collisions at a crossing, etc. Well, we'll see...this may be the 200 dollar experiment.