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I have a MTH Metropolitan Transit Subway Set, 20-2281-1.   Today I smoked the power unit #3850.  It's powered via a TIU variable channel.  As soon as I put power on the track it seemed the ZW was struggling but the bulbs didn't dim.  In less than a minute the Subway faded to black.  A burnt electronics smell followed.  The unit was drawing about 8 amps.  When I removed the unit from the track followed by some conservative troubleshooting operation returned to normal.  TIU works and in-line fuse did not blow.  Concluded failure was the result of the unit shorting ?  I took the shell of the unit and no burnt item/area was obvious but it smells  This is a Protosounds 2 unit with a 9 volt battery.

 

It looks like the Protosounds boards are plug in.  It looks like there is a sister board with the power board heat sinked to the chassis ?  Can I just call up MTH and order the power board or are the boards only sold as sets ?   Cost/Availability ?  Do I need to do more troubleshooting ?  I presume the motors are OK.  Any help would be appreciated.

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Steve,

 

If the board has failed, which appears to be the case, it possibly can be resurrected by someone who can perform repairs at the component level. Forum member "GGG" is about the best there is at this type of work.

 

If the board cannot be repaired, direct replacement board are no longer available. You would need to replace it with either a PS2, 3 volt board with 5 volt connectors, or a PS32 board. Either way, you would also need to replace the 16 ohm speaker with a 4 ohm version. If you go with the 3 volt PS2 board, you'll need to replace the 8.4volt battery with a 2.4 volt one, as well.

 

The boards are available only from MTH and are sold only to factory-trained MTH repair techs, of which GGG is one.

 

You'd also need to reload a different sound file into either of the 2 boards.

Last edited by Barry Broskowitz

Marty,

for some reason I see more subways smoked then any other engine.  That is 5 volt subways. 

I currently own 11 subways, 6 RK and 5 Premier, all purchased new from dealers.

 

Twelve years ago one 5 volt RK had an issue brand-new, right out of the box. A year later, another RK 5 volt failed through mishandling. One Premier 3 volt had a weird issue and was replaced about 6 years ago.

 

Since then, I've had no issues with any subway electronics.

 

Thanks for the advise Barry/GGG.  The unit is off to GGG for repair.  It will be interesting to see what GGG finds.  I did add new additional 14 VAC transformers powering accessories and switch machines however the phasing is correct on these units and the commons are tied with the ZWs powering the track.  These transformers are causing PS 2 units to come up in conventional mode and/or unresponsive.  In conventional I can hit startup and go to command.  Unresponsive requires a power reset.

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