Lionel 153 IR Controller

Thanks for the reply.  I followed those directions, experimented, tried every combination possible, and the bottom line after spending most of the day on it was---I could not get it to be consistently reliable.  Before I call Lionel, I was hoping to get some ideas from this forum.

Just to let everyone know, I did call Lionel this morning.  They verified what I found out yesterday:

1-The 153 IR will only pick up LIGHT colors such as white and yellow

2-It will not work with dark colors such as brown or black

Had I known this, I would not have purchased the product or considered it to activate any accessory.   

Andy -

Are you sure? I am using one on a large radius which is awkwardly lined up and still reads a black colored steam engine...

Is the IR controller located in a tunnel? or low light area? Is is close enough to detect the cars? It could be hampering the detection.

If not, I would return to Lionel for a new one...

John--I tried everything.  Moving it to different locations, all lights were on and what drew my attention was when I moved a brown Santa Fe boxcar past the detector.  It would not change the signal until the side of the boxcar with the large WHITE Santa Fe logo passed by.  If I ran a YELLOW Chessie caboose by, it worked great.  Any all dark cars were a NO GO.

Andy,

I'm afraid my experience was much like yours. IR systems can have difficulty picking up dark colors.

As you discovered, running a light colored freight car or caboose will solve the problem.

I also separated the two halves of the unit and took out the circuit board from the bottom half (with the knobs) so that the circuit board is mounted underneath the layout and the IR unit in the "electric box" is on top of the layout. You'll probably have to add wiring to put the connection back through the layout. At that point, I experimented with raising the IR box so that it would pick up some light colors (usually white printing) on the sides of the freight cars and that helped. By separating the two halves it makes it easier to move the IR box into different positions and heights to see what helps and it's lot easier to mask just the IR box with some trees, shrubs, scenery, etc.

You can also remove the IR circuit board from its box and (very carefully) tilt the two lenses upward to pick up lettering as well, but be extremely careful not to break them off.     

Is there any benefit to creating a small shade hood over the IR sensor? I cut a small piece of black cardboard and taped it over the IR sensor on my culvert loader and that seemed to improve performance.

A transmissive IR detector with the emitter on one side of the track and the detector on the other side doesn't have this problem. I have also encountered this problem with reflective IR detectors and have resorted to placing a white banner on the trains.

Was there any behavior change at all when you adjusted the Sensitivity?  Perhaps it is defective.  For example, at different sensitivity settings wave a piece of cardboard different distances from your sensor and make sure the detection distance changes.  For this experiment set the TIME setting to minimum so you can quickly repeat the experiment if that makes sense.

Assuming the unit is functional, I'd experiment with the color issue.  The idea is to see how close you are to functioning.  At the maximum sensitivity setting when the unit detects the cardboard at the greatest distance move a light-colored boxcar toward the sensor window.  How many inches away does it detect it?  Do the same for a dark-colored boxcar.

A small shade hood (or window-awning as I like to call it) can help in situations where you are picking up IR reflections from other than the passing train.  So there may be a tree, pole, structure, whatever across the track that is reflecting some of the IR.  The hood creates "tunnel vision" like looking thru a tube so you only see what's right in front of you.  A hood is particularly useful when you crank up the sensitivity (to better detect dark cars) but then the unit starts to falsely trigger from layout features other than the passing train.

Question on the controller.
Does anyone know if it will work with the Standard #152 Operating Crossing Gate made by MTH/Lionel (MTH 11-90114).?

I notice that some folks are replying that they have no problems with Lionel's IR controller while others are reporting quite the contrary.  It may help clarify the situation a bit to note that Lionel changed the internal design of the 153 IR Controller several years ago without changing the product number.  The first ones that were released work beautifully and mine pick up just about every train that passes, dark and light.  The newer ones, at least in my experience, are incredibly undependable, and I shall not be buying any more of them!  Incidentally, one of the design changes resulted in reversing the positions of the power and common input wires (for those of us not using track power).  Did I notice this reversal of the input wiring connections before connecting a new IR controller in parallel (so I thought) with an older one?  Did my failure to notice the unannounced change consequently fricassee both controllers?

Not to end on a negative note, does anyone use MTH's IR controller #40-1028?  How well does it work?  Can the protruding prongs that plug into FasTrack be removed from the controller (when not using track power)?

Bill of the Paha Sapa Lines RR posted:

...Did my failure to notice the unannounced change consequently fricassee both controllers?

What do you plan to do with the fricassee?

stan2004 posted:

Bill of the Paha Sapa Lines RR posted:

...Did my failure to notice the unannounced change consequently fricassee both controllers?

What do you plan to do with the fricassee?

Scraped into the trash with the rest of the burned food!

Did the garbage truck already take it away?   If I pay you for shipping would you send them to me? 

As you can infer from this thread, I am interested in how the manufacturers approach IR occupancy sensing.  I was not aware that the older design works better than the newer design.  I can probably figure out why if I have it in front of me.  If you smoked it, you probably just smoked the relays and not the IR sensing electronics which is what determines the sensitivity or ability to detect dark cars.

stan2004 posted:

Did the garbage truck already take it away?   If I pay you for shipping would you send them to me? 

As you can infer from this thread, I am interested in how the manufacturers approach IR occupancy sensing.  I was not aware that the older design works better than the newer design.  I can probably figure out why if I have it in front of me.  If you smoked it, you probably just smoked the relays and not the IR sensing electronics which is what determines the sensitivity or ability to detect dark cars.

Sorry. This was not a particularly recent occurrence and the corpses are long gone.  

I have several of both the old and the new design and find no difference in the sensor capability.  They both work just fine.  However, as mentioned above the connections are switched around as well as labelled differently, and the timer behavior also not the same.  With the old one the timer starts from the time the sensor picks up something and will expire while the sensor is still blocked.  The timer on the new one only starts when the sensor has been cleared....making much more sense.

https://ogrforum.ogaugerr.com/...90#48874849342997690

I also have a number of these 153IR units and the ones that work seem to be reliable BUT I have a few dead on arrival.  My latest has caused me to dive in to see what might be the issue.  I used a camera and confirmed the blue glow, so it does generate IR.  What it doesn't is more perplexing? The NC (green signal works) but never NO (red) its not the red lamp (I checked).  It makes an odd double clicking noise. I also tried reversing the AUX power input to no avail.  No electronics wiz, but suspect defective relay?  This is frustrating as I like these units but hesitant to buy more given these issues? Any idea if it would be repairable, or is it now a pricey paperweight?

To control signals i've been using the "Logic Delay Switches Circuit Boards" from WeHonest at $15 to $20 each, depending on quantity. They have proven very reliable. Just a random thought.

@DMBX posted:

I also have a number of these 153IR units and the ones that work seem to be reliable BUT I have a few dead on arrival.  My latest has caused me to dive in to see what might be the issue.  I used a camera and confirmed the blue glow, so it does generate IR.  What it doesn't is more perplexing? The NC (green signal works) but never NO (red) its not the red lamp (I checked).  It makes an odd double clicking noise. I also tried reversing the AUX power input to no avail.  No electronics wiz, but suspect defective relay?  This is frustrating as I like these units but hesitant to buy more given these issues? Any idea if it would be repairable, or is it now a pricey paperweight?

How many is "a few"?  Do you know which version(s) of the 153IR you have?  By my last count, there are at least 4 variants.

Depending on the version, it may be repairable.  Some versions used custom electronic chips that cannot be purchased by Lionel outsiders.  But the bigger issue (in my opinion) is the 2-way shipping cost or even the hassle of driving it to an LHS.

Above shows a damaged 153IR that another OGR reader sent to me in the forum spirit.  I said I'd try to repair it but in any case the idea was it allowed me to perform a teardown and post what's under the hood...for the common good that is.  There's an OGR thread somewhere. 

Anyway, the darn thing weighs about 1 lb.  So at today's USPS pricing that's about $6 each way just for shipping!  So for an item that retails for $30-$40 (from what I can tell), this makes sending it in for repair a dicey proposition.  I figure an LHS or repair shop has got to charge at least $25/hour labor? 

If you want to mess around attempting a DIY component-level repair, I will make comments/suggestions if you post photos etc. of what you have.   Note that even if does turn out to be a faulty $1 relay, it seems the minimum shipping cost these days is $5 and up.

Given your symptom of a fast-clicking relay, I suppose there's a slim chance that you have a faulty "delay" adjustment knob if there's a timing-related problem.  A few squirts of contact-cleaner into the Delay adjustment potentiometer accompanied by rotating the knob back and forth thru its range might make for a lucky-day.  Here's an OGR thread which describes this in detail and a pic of the idea:

Thanks for the info. I have 4 one defective, so 3 operational but one other Lionel replaced as DOA, So seeing 2/4 (50%) reliability ratio not making me think these would make FRA standards out in the real world😉. The one newer one (with exteral wires for fastrack) seems a newer design and has been reliable. The dead one seems older.  Yes, a defective time/sensitivity knob is possible and will try the cleaner as suggested.  Agree for the price of these, repair and shipping seems a bad call.  I do have a meter to check things, but the process of elimination seems tedious and even if I isolated and had parts my soldering skills likely to damage further.  Oh well, just hoping for an easy fix, but in this hobby you win some and lose some.  The rail empire will go on! Thanks for your help guys!👍

I am looking for the article on using the 153IR to stop a train at the station and light the signal red. I cannot remember where I read the article. Any suggestions would be appreciated. Thanks, Jim

This might  be the article you are looking for, and I might still have a copy at home.  It was a layout that used 153ir's to "mimic" 153C contactors. Think is was October 2007 issue. Written by Bob Walker.

If I am correct, it was geared toward newer locomotives that do not draw but an amp or two. Older postwar locomotives would require a relay which the article did not address.

I use this:

https://www.tandem-associates....l_trains_253_acc.htm

@base11 posted:

I purchased the Lionel 153 IR Controller to operate the recently released Lionel trackside signal.  the infrared light picks up bright colors such as yellow and white, but not darker colors such as brown which is the primary color on many freight cars.  Has anyone had this same experience?  Is there any solution?  Thanks for any help.

Yup this is correct, all detectors that rely on a reflection of some type suffer from this; its not the color per say but the reflectivity. That's why a slow moving steam engine many times will cause a signal to work/not work. It is something that will only be noticeable if you are watching the signal and  you have many dark colors in a row.

@Motorman Jim posted:

I am looking for the article on using the 153IR to stop a train at the station and light the signal red. I cannot remember where I read the article. Any suggestions would be appreciated. Thanks, Jim

I was incorrect, the article I have a copy of was utilizing Z Stuff block detectors but I do/used to/might still have the article that had 153ir detectors.

Just a thought so please don't laugh. If your layout is somewhat modern, an easy fix would be to add light colored graffiti on your darker cars.

Found it, knew it was stored away on the computer archives. May 2011 issue of Classic Toy Trains using Lionel 153ir's Not sure if I can post a copy here, might set off the copyright alarms. There are a few sentences regarding wiring that do not make sense, maybe I read into it too deeply.

@AlanOGauge posted:

Found it, knew it was stored away on the computer archives. May 2011 issue of Classic Toy Trains using Lionel 153ir's Not sure if I can post a copy here, might set off the copyright alarms. There are a few sentences regarding wiring that do not make sense, maybe I read into it too deeply.

You can't post a copy here as it will be copyright infringement which will affect your pocketbook.