Played with it some more tonight. If I disconnect the power to the chuff board but leave the chuff input connected, the engine and tender start up perfectly. Tender is quiet until I address the engine. I then reconnected the chuff board. Applied power. Tender started up right away. And when I turn the voltage all the way up, without moving the engine, the tender started chuffing at warp speed.
I then disconnected the chuff input but left it connected to power. Engine powered up correctly. Tender quiet. I then noticed a difference in the chuff board. The led light was out. And it only lit up every quarter turn of wheel rotation. When the chuff input was connected, the led was always dimly lit and turned bright the moment full power was applied. So it appears its something feeding back into the chuff input.
So..... what do you think is the magical tweak to get it happy? Something must be unique with this older tmcc loc.
