WHy did Lionel 'cheapen' their beautiful PA's when they moved to Legacy?

Interesting. I would also expect that the Legacy product would offer the most amount of features, especially the spinning roof fans.

 

Having friends at your club with other versions of the same loco to see and compare is a nice benefit. At the end of the day, all of the locos in your photo do look very nice!

Its seems like these days "Lionel is like a box of chocolates. You never really know what your gonna get".

 

After the initial legacy offerings from 2008- 2010 ( pre dreaded smoke unit diagnostics) which were great, some legacy locos are home runs while others are "ho- hums".

 

IMO even the new berkshires, aside from the whistle steam feature, are not as good as the previous run. I.E chuffs are all identical and they all have the NKP whistle except for the PM/PE.

 

Lionel sets the standard in the sound dept. Why can every loco have the "wow" factor?

 

 It sure "appears" like some locos get more attention to sound/detail/ features. While others are rushed off the production line. Best examples are the poor raspy hooter whistle found on every( rushed) mallet regardless of protoype and the cast in coal load with "recycled" k4 sounds on the Pennsy S2.

 

If I was in the market for the new Legacy y6 and it comes with that same raspy hooter I'd return it.

 

 IMO Lionel spent a ton of time on the VL bigboy.  Other locos like the berks got " meh, thats good enough".

 

Even the VL hudson could have been much more with some correct valve guides, rivets on the steamchest and builders plates to name a few.

 

It really makes one second guess a preorder, not knowing if it will be a hit or a dud.

 

While I'm not a big fan of MTH sounds, at least it seems for the most part folks know what to expect, and prices are held constant. 

I think that Lionel did something similar with the Legacy GP-7's as well.

The first run (Union Pacific) had mars light, directional markers, random wheel grind sounds, etc. but the later runs did not.

 

Yup I missed that one too. Actually Lionel no longer offers bi- colored directional LED markers on any diesels.

You probably already know this, but the "MARS" light ("MARS" is a brand/company;

"Gyralite" is another and does the same thing; neither is used much in RR'ing these days -

ditch lights replaced them) was not found on all locomotives. Each RR determined its own 

policies; the NYC did not use them. (I still would like to remove the lower light on my Williams GM&O E-7's, but I probably won't - might turn into unintended butchery.) 

 

Anyway, I don't know if this is part of your thinking on the matter, or not. But there it is.

Correct or not, the TMCC Santa Fe PA's had the working "Mars" lights, the Legacy units do not. The working "Mars" lights have also been dropped from the new Legacy FM Train Masters as well, correct?

An incorrect white background was placed behind the Santa Fe Indian head for some reason on the Santa Fe Legacy PA unit sides.

What ???!!!  Get a rope!!

Since most folks running these are also modeling the period they were used in, the fact that MARS lights are not in current use isn't really a factor here. I don't know many roads using steam nowadays either, but most of us have a ton of steam locomotives!

When they are less accurate than the previous ones at $750? Yes!!

The Mars light feature was not available across all Legacy PAs. My SP Alcos have them but they are not quite as realistic as under TMCC. Go figure.

 

It's not hard to figure the absence of the roof fan feature - cost (to Lionel). I have the hardware (the TMCC motor, mount, PCB) to install in my Legacy units but I can't see how it would be variable speed as mentioned above. Unless it's possible to wire them to the Legacy board, which I have not figured out yet,  I was simply going to power them through a bridge rectifier drawing track power - rather like the K-Line engines that had a similar feature.

You might be able to run the fan from the motor voltage, that should give you a proportional speed.

What it is to be an expert or at least a true engineer!  (Also I might have remembered this from various lighting projects I've undertaken.) Thanks (again) GRJ.

Depending on the specifications of the fan motor, you might want some current limiting for it, I'm guessing it's probably a little 5V motor.  The drive motors can get to 10-12 volts running, that might be too much for the little motor.  Perhaps a resistor sized to give you 5V at the motor with 12V input would do the trick, that way it would be proportional to the motor speed and stay within specifications.

 

If the motor is anything like the smoke fan motors, they consume around 30-40 ma at 5V.

 

I'd start with a 220 ohm 1W series resistor and see how that looks.

 

It's called building to a price point.

 

Pete

I don't have a wiring diagram for these models (If anyone has had their TMCC version apart and can say what the connections are or otherwise has an idea I 'd be grateful to know it) but here is what the relevant parts appear to be.

 

You're right that the fan motor looks like a conventional smoke unit motor and it comes mounted on a frame that attaches to the stamped metal engine frame:

 

 

There is also what is described as a constant voltage PCB, which the parts listing rates at 10 volts. The four wire connections must be current input and output but I have not had a chance to figure out which is which. I would think that this can be powered from the motor DC supply so that it only runs when the engine is in motion:

 

 

 

incidentally, I don't see that the TMCC Alco PAs are described in the relevant Lionel catalog (2003) as having variable speed roof fans, just "operating radiator fans." Surely a constant voltage supply means that there's no variation in the power supply that might create a variable speed effect.

 

For the sake of completeness I include the fan that mounts on the motor spindle. Despite the appearance in the photo this fan is much smaller than the roof fan that is mounted in the roof of the body shell. That larger fan spins freely and I assume in operation that the smaller fan fits below it and creates an airflow that spins the bigger fan:

 

 

 

This is whole assembly is somewhat more complicated than the fan drive mechanism that I have found in K-line diesels that had motorized roof fans. There the fans were driven by a motor that runs whenever there is track power and is connected to a small PCB fed from wires connected to outputs on the main board. The motor runs the fans through a pulley system whereas in the TMCC Alco PA there is only the spindle and fan described above.

 

Obviously all these parts added to the price of the TMCC version of this engine and were left out of the Legacy version.

I suspect that power supply is a fixed voltage one that just supplies a constant voltage.  Pry up that 3-pin regulator and tell me what's on the other side.  If it's really a 10V supply, I'd probably just stick a 50 ohm resistor in there for a little current limiting and try that across the motors.

 

As far as inputs and outputs, the input leads will go directly to the diodes, the output leads will come from that regulator, one is common, the other is the positive regulated voltage.

 

I don't think that this is off topic as the more I look at the parts the more I see differences between the two generations of these models.

 

It does say 10V. I now notice that there is a different PCB for non-powered Alco PAs; I haven't got one of these but the connections are different and so is some of the circuitry:

 

 

 

This is is also rated 10V in the Lionel parts listing.

 

If I'm defeated trying to figure out exactly how to wire in these boards when I get around to attempting it, I wonder whether another constant voltage board like the ones available for headlights/LEDs would work? Or the small DC power source boards Ngineering sells in connection with their lighting products. I've wired those across the motor to provide power to their Mars light simulators, which have much better effects than the Legacy version in my SP Alco set.

Two Trainmasters I own had the noisy gear driven fans.I disconnected them because of the noise.

they may have been a mistake, and Lionel's newest offering of Trainmasters do not have them, which is good.

Fred 

Personally, I have the NYC 2000 A/B set and no Mars-type lights (NYC didn't have them anyway), no spinning fans, no Railsounds in the A unit... But still look great! And since they were inexpensive compared to the new ones, we're talking upgrade! Fixed pilots, nose grabs, et al, are coming.

As for a spinning fan, they look great, but I think I'll pass for installation, but I'd bet even money that GunRunnerJohn's AC/DC converter with variable DC output up to 12v, available through Henning's Trains, would do the job!  this way you won't have to tap into the motor circuit.

How about it, GRJ?

PS - I also have a set of MTH PAs with PS1, that I had converted to TMCC and look and sound great, to. Alas, no spinning fans there, either. But, the powered A is slated to fodder for conversion to an FM Erie-built, using Atlas parts.

We shall see...

Thanks,
Mario

Any DC supply that will spin the motor will do the trick.  I'm "assuming" the motor is similar in specifications to the smoke motors as it appears to be about the same size. 

 

The only way to really know is to have one of these and do a little testing.  I still like the idea of the variable speed based on the motor speed.

 

Same here and for that purpose I doubt I need the Lionel PCBs but can substitute putting a 220 ohm 1W resistor in the power feed from the main motor to the fan motor - assuming that this will not play havoc with the motor control/sound.

 

Don't know what the "AC/DC converter with variable DC output up to 12V" referred to above is as I could not track it down on the Hennings website but as it's an alternative to drawing power from the motor circuit I guess it's not what I want.

I was thinking that I actually like the idea of the constant voltage fan myself, if stopped after a hard run, my PA would be panting and the fan at speed... and as for it while moving, who could see it?

 

Since I ordered four of GRJ's Constant Current Regulator, maybe I'll have to try it on these... It would take its AC straight from the rail, so no interference with the motor.  And with the capacitor, possibly stay on for a few seconds after losing power.  Cool.

 

I remember Life-Like did something similar on their HO models back in the day; even with moving radiator fins when changing direction.

 

Thanks,

- Mario

 

OK, so now I'm wavering between variable and always on. But to get back to the original theme of the thread, why did Lionel dump this feature (and Mars lights) in Legacy Alco models? Cost is an obvious possibility esp. if the Legacy electronics were more expensive to install. 

 

But what about noise? The roof fan feature on the Baldwin centipede is very noisy until it has been run in a while and even then it clatters at full power (it has variable speed).

 

No one who actually has the Alco TMCC version has said that these particular fans were noisy. There's a video of the Santa Fe Alco that shows (starting at about the 5:30 min. mark) the fans spinning once the engine moves but they make no discernible noise - nor is it clear exactly how they were meant to work! 

 

See https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VBHSpgx65AI

Because that's what business does.  If you can't raise prices reduce costs.

The drive motor won't notice this at all.