You can find 2" 16 ohm speakers in all sorts of places.  Look for one rated between 1W and 3W at 16 ohms, it'll work fine.  Are you sure it's the speaker?

One of the things I've been looking at is good quality H.O. speakers for DCC decoders. Most are 8-ohm/2 watt, but have enclosures and are small enough so you can put two of them in series to get your 16 ohms (or in parallel for 4 ohms). Depending on how things are arranged in the tender, you might be able to use this as an option.

gunrunnerjohn posted:

You can find 2" 16 ohm speakers in all sorts of  Are you sure it's the speaker?

No. But everything else works fine and its about 16 yrs old, so its probably time.

I've used this one with good results. Last summer I replaced every speaker in every engine. Much clearer sound in all of them. 

http://www.parts-express.com/2...amp;utm_campaign=pla

One thing to check with a garbled speaker is to see if it picked up any stray metal pieces from running it.  A small screw, nail, or wire can make the speaker "rattle".  Eric from Eric's Trains has a video on Youtube if you need a how to guide.

ChiTown Steve posted:

I've used this one with good results. Last summer I replaced every speaker in every engine. Much clearer sound in all of them. 

 

http://www.parts-express.com/2...amp;utm_campaign=pla

I started looking online last night.  I saw this one but at less than a dollar I was a little worried about "getting what I paid for" type of quality.  Thanks for letting me know you have used it successfully already.

JZ

Started trading email with Midge. She asked for a picture and I am glad she did.

The installed speaker is not the same as what the BOM said it was. 

The best I can tell it is still a Star, but I can't tell if the first letter is a F or a P, but it looks like FR-050-A1421. What is clear is that a 16 ohm, 5 watt speaker, not 2 watt as called out.  

Also some of the coating around the diameter of the magnet has frayed. I don't know if this is cosmetic or related to the garbled sound.

By the way is there supposed to be a cover over this ?

GET RID OF THAT SPEAKER!

The flaking is a sure sign of a speaker going bad.

You can use almost any 16 ohm 2" speaker in the 2-5 watt range, I've used a host of different ones, depending on the situation.

Working on it GRJ!!  I  am glad I didn't order one yet, I would have gotten something underpowered. 

I have speakers if you needed.  Both the BF-0000033 shown, or your originally called for speaker.  E-mail in profile. G

Get a 16Ω fatboy from Lionel.  It will sound better and you will not have to deal the the speedy delivery of the locos OM

David Minarik posted:

Get a 16Ω fatboy from Lionel.  It will sound better and you will not have to deal the the speedy delivery of the locos OM

Dave,

Thanks for chiming in.  What is the difference between a "fatboy" and any other speaker?

What is the difference between a "fatboy" and any other speaker?

Stronger magnet for one thing!

The Fatboy will typically have better bass, and usually renders more accurate sound.

GGG posted:

I have speakers if you needed.  Both the BF-0000033 shown, or your originally called for speaker.  E-mail in profile. G

Sent you an email.

Okay, so I ordered a replacement speaker.  

Now, since there is some room to mount the speaker a little higher, would there be any benefit to trying to make a cylinder of some kind to create a sound chamber? Admittedly I probably won't get more than 5/8", so I'm not sure it's worth the trouble.

You might get some benefit by making a tube as tall as possible and covering the top as well.  Airtight is best for a baffle, or as close as you can get.

Not being too adventurous, I ordered an in- kind speaker replacement from ggg.  I don't know if speaker magnets lose strength over time, but the new one definitely had a stronger magnet!  Here's a side by side with the new one installed.

And since we are dealing with a speaker replacement here's an obligatory how-does-it-sound? clip.

This was with the sound turned way down.

As long as the tender was open she got a replacement battery.  Next up is some lube for the gears, four new traction tires and she'll be good to go for another million miles��

(edit - in all honesty at first it was dead quite, and I thought I somehow fried the new speaker while soldering the leads.  That's when I remembered it was still unplugged inside the shell!)

The metal flaking is the issue, and internally it gets around the coil preventing proper operations.  I did find out that the manufacture is no longer making that speaker with reasonable minimum orders and MTH is looking for an alternative.  G