I have powered up one of the tracks conventionally and the engines powered up as well. They were making the usual idling sounds, cab chatter, smoke and everything you would normally expect.
I need to know if your DCS engines powered up by themselves when power is applied via a TIU channel with the DCS signal turned on. If they do, there's a problem with either the TIU itself, or the layout wiring or tracks.
This would also occur if you inadvertently reversed the wires between the TIU Chanel output and the tracks. The TIU's RED channel output must connect to the center rail and the BLACK channel output to an outside rail. Reversing them would cause DCS engines to power on by themselves when track power is turned on, and be unable to be run from DCS.
Can you tell me what could be affecting the DCS signal strength? One of the engines I was trying to add is sitting right next to the transformers and the TIUs and the handheld unit was about a foot away. The track should be fairly clean as I went over it last week. Layout is 8 X 20 so the track run isn't extremely long.
There are many things that can cause a DCS signal to degrade, however, engine proximity to the transformer has nothing to do with it at all.
Connect (tether) the TIU'sRemote Input port to the base of the remote with a curly,4-conductor, telephone handset cable and see if things improve.
I'm thinking about putting up a separate test track and connecting to it to see what happens but I reall don't think my track wiring would be a problem as it has been reliable for several years with no changes.
Your track wiring is, at present, one of the "usual suspects" for this kind of problem. A tests track is highly recommended.
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