This is very cool.  I will have to chec what I have that will take it, and order at least one.

I can already see I'm going to need several of these!

Very nice. Best of luck with your new endeavor.

Bill nice job on the art work. Great job

Bill, Shouldn't that be CHUFFER verses CHUGGER? (Red Bolded)

Tomayto, Tomoto. 

The fingers and the brain are not always in sync.

<GRIN> I know the feeling Bill!

When editing the English/Japanese (Japlish) there are times when it actually looks right but is far from it! When you do it for a living, there are just little continuity issues that just tweak you! or could be the the OCD!

It's the OCD Dennis.

One feature that would have been cool to have is sensor that will shut the fan off if smoke fluid is too low.

Looks like an excellent product, regardless!

Paul, that was discussed, but it would require modification of the smoke unit and additional wiring and expense in the board.  Probably a task very few would undertake, so the extra cost didn't seem justified.  TAS smoke units had a sensor, but they supplied the whole package, the smoke unit and the controller.

Does anyone have a video of one of these installed?

There are two, one by John and one by one of the stores people.  A search should flush them out.

Yep, there was a link above, here's the direct link.  This is to the older version, I'm going to post a video of the enhanced one soon.



Here's a quick bench test of the new board with the enhanced electronics.  This is the one that will be shipping.  You'll notice the chuffs are more distinct, even at high chuff rates.  That was the goal of the circuit improvements.

A question was posed off-line about running this with a conventional locomotive.  As it sits, it requires about 8.5 volts AC to reliably operate.  That's more than the starting voltage for conventional operation.

I did a little experiment and created a voltage doubler circuit, it's just two capacitors and two diodes.  With that circuit powering the Super-Chuffer from track power, I got down as low as my transformer would go, 5.2 VAC, and I still had plenty of voltage on the Super-Chuffer for operation.

Bottom line, it is possible to use this with conventional locomotives, but it needs a small added circuit.  If there were enough interest, I could create an add-on little board that just adds the voltage doubler circuit.  Of course, it's also possible to just buy the two capacitors and diodes and wire it up.

Obviously, for conventional operation, the board would restart whenever you interrupted track power to change directions, but that is probably not a big issue, it initializes pretty quickly and is back in operation.

This would be an add on for Williams Steam Engines. With this we could get rid of the old suethe Smoke units and go for fan driven and puffing with an added fan driven smoke unit.  me personally got tired of replacing the Suethe Smoke units and went for a modified unit put out by another forum member Box Car Bill and they work absolutely flawlessly.  But with that unit the smoke come out like a Protosound 1 or Loco Sound Loco from MTH the more power you put on the track the more it smokes and comes out in a steady stream. with this you can get puffing smoke with very little modification to the engine. I for one am in for a couple of these boards as soon as I can afford them

come on guys lets show an interest in the conventional side of this

For the Cadillac installation, you can add a new RailSounds Commander and get synchronized sounds out of it as well.

What will be involved to install this unit?  Is it easy enough for the average person to do it or do you need special skills?

Very exciting!  Put me down for two of these, can't wait.  

Only for TMCC?  Will there be a version for Legacy engines as well?  

Great and impressive work John.  You set the bar high and the rest of us benefit.  Thanks for your contribution to this hobby.  Your efforts help many of us enhance our experience in 3-rail.  

Getting close to release.  Here's the first 50 back from the assembly house, programmed and ready for testing and packaging.

I've got engines just begging for these!

Jon

Hopefully, next week we can relieve their pain.

I am in for 4 for starters!

Rod

Bill, and John, this is great looking forward to the release of these units

Thanks,

Alex

The idea of running conventional comes up regularly.  As the board is now, it requires around 8.5-9.0 volts of AC to properly run.  That's obviously not all that compatible with conventional operation unless you start out at warp speed.  I sketched out a little voltage doubler circuit that would allow operation with AC voltages down to 4 volts AC.  Just curious how much interest there would be in such a board to solve the issue of running it with a conventional locomotive.  This would be a fairly inexpensive board, probably in the $5-6 range.  I tested this on my bench, and the Super-Chuffer operated down to around 3.5 VAC.

I would be interested, especially for my Williams 4-6-0, but it would have to work conventionally with fairly easy installation.

I guess that depends on what you think is "fairly easy".  

Here's the link I posted previously in this thread, you can look and see how "easy" you think the installation is.

Super-Chuffer Installation Guide

Adding the voltage doubler is just wiring track power to the input and the output to the Super-Chuffer board.

I am in for Two of the doubler Boards as well as two of the super chuffer just as soon as I can afford them

The first lot is just 50 boards until more parts come in, FYI.

Just ordered a couple for my upgrade projects... Can't wait to give them a try!  I really appreciate the effort in bringing an interesting new product to market.

-Dustin

Wow....congrats and best wishes on your product launch!

Peter

It was actually a very interesting project, and I learned a lot doing it.  Never too old to learn new tricks it seems.

I posted some short video shots of the current updated board in this thread, they're on the last page of the thread.

My New Super Chuffer Board Demo

I was thinking about what would be really helpful to those of us who are not so electronically savvy would be a YouTube video of how to install one of these. I believe it would also increase sales.  Asking gunrunner if that is doable?

John,

Just curious, are the wires already attached to the board or must they be added?

Well, I suppose that anything's doable.   I suspect a series of pictures and text would be easier to follow, and probably a lot easier to produce.  Making a good and clear video for something like this is not that easy.

The boards come without wires.  This is so you can either put a header connector on them or direct wire them. 

I just received a couple Super-Chuffer add on boards from Henning's Trains and the board is super indeed. Small actually tiny, wire supplied, and great documentation. And they arrived in just a couple days from the day of the order. Great service.

Thanks for designing this John.

I'll report back when I get to install this in a steamer.

Looking forward to hearing about your install.  Of course, we need video!

GRJ, I really want to add your Super Chuffer to some of my steamers. Only problem is the Lionel ones I have that with TMCC added all have puffer units such as my Hogwarts loco. So, three questions:

1. Any plans to make a similar unit for MTH locos which almost all have fan driven smoke units?

2. Will your unit work with Lionel's LionChief Plus locos which all have fan driven smoke units?

3. Hennings ad for the Super Chuffer at the beginning of this thread states it will work with both TMCC and conventional locos. So will it work with the fan driven smoke unit in my Lionel 2-6-0 conventional mogul (Lionel #6-11268)?

1. MTH PS/2 or PS/3 locomotives already have excellent smoke performance, including good chuffing, so it's not needed for those.  PS/1 locomotives don't have a chuff switch, they generate the chuff sound based on track voltage.  As such, I have nothing to sync the chuffs.

Of course, an MTH PS/1 or conventional with the stock smoke unit that's been upgraded to TMCC is a candidate, the Camelback that I did my original test installation with is an MTH locomotive with a TMCC upgrade. 

2. If the LC+ locomotive has a chuff switch to trigger the sound, the S-C would work fine with those.  Truthfully, I haven't had an LC+ locomotive apart to see if they use a mechanical switch or some other method of triggering the chuff.

3. I originally build a voltage doubler module for conventional operation as the S-C was designed with command in mind, and I truthfully didn't really consider conventional.  It turned out that there was a flaw in my thinking with the voltage doubler, and at higher track voltages it's output exceeded the capability of the power module on the S-C board and promptly killed it!

I went back to the drawing board and have a simple fix that allows conventional operation.  It's embarrassing that I didn't consider it previously.  I add a 1000uf 35V capacitor across the on-board input filter capacitance and the S-C board works fine down below 5V on the track.  I just put a few inches of wire on the capacitor and it can be placed anywhere in the shell to allow conventional operation.

John,

If you want I can pull my LC+ Mikado apart and see what I can see......????

If you don't mind, that would be great.  I'd go into the store and take one apart, but I'm afraid Harry would make me buy it then!

On 2nd thought, you should get a LC+! Never know what you can come up with for aftermarket addons!

I think my plate is pretty full right now.

LOL, I got something in mind but not sure if it has been done, and thinking of making a prototype, but it is something I think might be sell-able, but would need guidance and support from probably you and H3.

We can certainly do that Dennis.

Hi everyone,

A question for Gunrunnerjohn-but if anyone else has an answer please chime in;

I have a brand new K-line scale NYC Mikado 3670-1838cc-has railsounds and command control.  I would love to be able to use one of the new super chuffer boards in this engine,  but from what I understand the board needs to be used in conjunction with a fan driven smoke unit.  That's the problem as this engine has a piston driven smoke unit.  I figured that since Lionel basically used the K-Line tooling for their previously released Legacy Mikado's,  I could go to the Lionel website and order one of their fan driven smoke units for the Mikado.  However their parts listing states that many are unavailable and for others to call or contact Lionel.  John or anyone else,  do you have a good Lionel part number for a fan driven smoke unit that I can use in this engine?  I also would like to upgrade to one of the ERR cruise control boards.  I am retired after 40 years of being a machinist-the last 35 as a journeyman,  so electronics are not my strong suit,  but I'm going to give it a shot.

Thanks guys,

Nick 

Hi Harry here.

 You will have to get a fan driven smoke unit you can use Lionel or an MTH.

We pull out the old puffer and fit in a fan driven unit. We can order the parts for you or instal it for you. What ever you need.

Hello Harry,

Thanks for responding to my questions.  After looking over the various wiring diagrams, schematics and instructions of the various boards involved,  in addition to installing a new smoke unit,  I think I'm going to take a pass on doing this myself.  I will contact you by private email or phone to discuss having you do the entire installation.

Thanks,  Nick

I'm thinking my old scale J would love one!  

Nick e- mail me and will hook you up.

What reed switch would you folks recommend to work in conjunction with the board to get me 4 cuffs on an old 2 chuff engine? 

Hi Marty

We use the small magnet reed switches like the ones ERR sells and two magnets. On my Q-2 I have 4 magnets on the drive wheels.not all engines can you use the drive wheels. Most use the tender wheels with two magnets. ERR sells the reed switches as a kit with one magnet. You can buy the small magnets separate on e-bay.

Thank you John.

I'm hoping to do the drive wheels. Even though the trucks or tender wheels will do 4 chuffs, I prefer the more accurate drive trigger. 

Thanks is for the info guys. 

I am curious as to when a chuff should occur and how many. I'm thinking that the movement of the pistons in the cylinder might be the place to trigger the chuffs...difficult mechanically I guess but can we elaborate on this? 

To be perfectly honest, only a dedicated rivet counter could tell if the chuff sounds in exactly the right place.  I guess I'm an old hack, because I just space them equally around the wheel.

My comment towards more accuracy is I have noticed on some folks that have done the truck wheels or tender that the chuff rate can be slightly faster. Enough that I do notice. I'd really prefer to get to a more "timed" 4 chuff. 

I'm not rivet counter(not that there is anything wrong with that) but a poorly timed chuff will bother me.  

I've never thought about this. Yes, I googled it and it makes sense to trigger 4 chuffs off a drive wheel. And 8 chuffs for articulated, anybody do that?

Since the sound board generates the somewhat random secondary chuff for articulated, it's pretty difficult to add that and have it sound right.  I've often wondered what it would sound like if you put four magnets on each set of articulated drivers and used a non-articulated sound set.  However, I don't think you'd get the correct sounds.

 I agree that the driver is better, sometimes that's pretty difficult to do.

Just place an order!  I'll add the reed switch later.  I'll probably wire in a new LED headlamp that will do the Rule 17 lighting.  I believe the current one in my J is an incandescent.

Looking forward to this project.  Thanks GRJ for a really cool enhancement!

I sent you an email Marty.  Your engine most likely has a chuff switch, otherwise the sound would not be chuffing.  You just have to break the wire from it and run it through the S-C board.

Hey guys when ordering don't forget to use your OGR Forum promo code!

OGRJWA

What is an OGR Forum promo code and what does it do?

From the very first post in this thread...

For a limited time it has an introductory price BUT, for all of our OGR friends we are ALSO offering an ADDITIONAL 10% discount by entering the promo code: OGRJWA during checkout.

I tried using the code and it said it had expired!    

That was a Henning's limited time offering, I guess it's expired now.  Sorry, I don't have any control over that.

Discount code worked this afternoon 

I guess it's location sensitive, maybe you live in the wrong part of the country.

I'd give it another try and you could also call Henning's and ask about it.

I tried it again and it went through - thanks!

Will super chuffer work with TAS smoke unit?

Is Henning's discount still available?

You can use the Super-Chuffer with pretty much any fan driven smoke unit.  TAS has a number of different style smoke units, so the wiring may be slightly different, depending on what you have.

I honestly can't say if the discount is still on, but I believe so.

I bought one of these and discovered that my K-Line Hudson does not have a fan smoke unit.  Anyone know what fan unit will fit in there with the least amount of hassle?

LOL same here

Funny you should ask.  I put an MTH PS/2 smoke unit in a K-Line Mikado, the Hudson is pretty much the same size.  I just needed a small aluminum plate with a couple of spacers to line it up with the stack.  I did have to perch the Super-Chuffer on top of the motor in a large heatshrink sleeve, only place it would fit.

Sometimes you have to take the smoke unit fan off to access the screws when you do a custom mount.  On that Mikado and on the Hogwarts locomotive I just did, I had to bolt the smoke unit to the plate, then take the fan chamber off to mount the plate to the frame, finally put the fan chamber back on to complete the mounting.  The good part about the MTH smoke units is they're two-piece, the one-piece Lionel smoke units might be harder to get mounted at times.

How about a diesel version

Do you have any pics of the installation?  That would certainly help.  Also, how much do those smoke units go for?  I assume that you get them straight from MTH.

Everytime I click the link i'm being sent to the led passenger car lights.

Sorry for the mixup, the website has been updated and something is not right.

Click on the link in my signature, it has the correct link now.

Sorry to say I didn't take any pictures during the installation for that one.  I believe the MSRP on the MTH smoke unit is $50, but send me an email and I'll see what I can get you one for.

You want your diesels to chuff?

Anyone tried an SC in an older scale Lionel Mountain yet?

Should be doable as the Mountain uses a 3057 fan driven smu, but I am wondering about adequate space for the board?

Rod

I can't imagine not having room for it in a scale mountain!  I've put them into semi-scale K-Line locomotives.  The board is not that big.

John;

Thanks for the info.

I figure it should be a no-brainer, but I've been fooled before!

Rod

I've stopped using that term nowadays, someone is bound to try it with truly no brains!

In this case, it's should be a minimum brainer as the locomotive is way bigger than some.

No, well kinda, it would be nice to get ramping smoke with ramping prime mover RPM on a TMCC upgrade or even just a different smoke output at idle than while running

Good point Matt, having different smoke levels would require controlling the smoke heater as well as the fan, making this a bit more complicated.  Add to that the fact that I'd also have to decode the serial data to determine the prime mover RPM and the complexity rises a bit more.

A simpler version would be easier to do, just sense the motor speed based on the motor voltage and modulate it based on that value.  It still requires controlling the heater and the fan, so it's a bit more than the steam S-C board.

John;

The Lionel 8 VAC reg board already does this when used with the 8 ohm semi-smart smu. It responds to changes in the serial data stream to change the heater output to the smoke unit from about 3 VAC at idle up to near 8VAC at full throttle. This seems to work well with steamers, but I don't know if Lionel uses it on diesels.

I have no idea if this system could be retrofitted into an earlier engine and made to work with the original serial data link from the R2LC or the DCDS.

BoxcarBill or someone else may know.

Rod

Yeah, its beyond my capabilities but a thought that crossed my mind while doing a TMCC upgrade on a diesel and pulling the smoke unit al together because I did not want to deal with it running full bore all the time. Maybe a side project for you but I can imagine there is a small market for such a thing. Prolly wont amass a fortune with the diesel chuffer board tho

It seems that MTH PS3 diesel engines also have a similar feature (variable smoke intensity it's called) as discussed in this thread: 

https://ogrforum.ogaugerr.com/t...96#36766448564597296

I can't say I am wild about it or indeed the operation of the Lionel equivalent, which I think accounts for what I have thought up to now was the erratic operation of some Legacy diesels. Good old low-medium-high settings are fine by me but I'm interested to know how the more advanced SMUs work. I'm convinced GRJ could design something better.

There's nothing that stops you from using the TMCC AC Regulator and having adjustable smoke.  I've toyed with the idea of coming up with the "cookbook" for installing the regulator in upgrades, but it's one of those things that I don't know how much demand there'd be for it. 

The AC regulator takes serial data, track power and ground, and outputs the heater voltage for the smoke unit. Equipping a smoke unit with an 8 ohm resistor and wiring this in should yield controllable smoke in an upgrade.

Attached is a sample schematic of a Lionel locomotive.  Although this one uses the semi-smart smoke unit, that doesn't affect the function of the regulator, it's driven directly from the regulator and not the smoke unit logic.  I haven't tried it, but it seems pretty much as simple as that.

Attachment? I'm not seeing it...

That's because it's a "virtual" attachment!

Here's the non-virtual attachment.

DUH! LOL Good one John, I was going to post about it after I saw it yesterday but figured someone would ask at some point.

Ahh...thanks.

That diagram is kind of useless unless your a tech or repairing that engine.  Here is a diagram that identifies the connections for a smart smoke unit. If you have a non smart unit, you will not have serial data to the smoke unit.

The AC Reg takes track power in and serial data in and provides hot out to the heating element, along with Track outside rail ground.  The - are common on the AC Reg.  Lionel uses the outside rail as common for TMCC and early Legacy.  The newer Legacy is different.  

If you notice the smoke switch only interrupts the power to the AC Reg, the smoke unit still has power.  On the smoke unit that connection powers the diode and regulator that can make power for the smoke fan.  That is why in some variations the smoke fan always runs unless the smoke switch is off.  Despite this diagram wiring, Lionel had variations to how they wired the AC REG and also how the smoke unit operated.  Bottom line is the AC REG takes the power and serial data in, and can provide controllable AC output to the smoke unit.  3 Levels of power and off via TMCC.  The voltage provided is base on the resistor use in the smoke unit.  8 and 6 ohm are the 2 types I have seen.   G 

If you follow the wiring in the diagram I posted, you can see how the regulator is connected, but this one is clearly a better illustration.  I have that diagram somewhere, but I couldn't lay my hands on it.  I believe my original statements were correct as to the regulator connection and usage.

As far as Legacy, that's somewhat of a moot point as I doubt anyone is installing the S-C in Legacy locomotives.  I have to say, I've had a few Legacy models that might benefit from a Super-Chuffer...

The newer Legacy has an "all in one" board with everything on it, including the smoke regulator.

For a diesel, I was thinking that since torque is directly proportional to the dc motor current, I envisioned some small smoke at idle,  increased puff of smoke at engine start up, and then leveling off but increasing as the diesel climbed a steep grade. All done proportional to the current.

Do real 1:1 diesels smoke like that?

Most real diesels should have little visible smoke for the most part, but the quantity of smoke would certainly be proportional to the prime mover load.  The Legacy diesels do vary the smoke output based on the prime mover RPM (simulated of course).  You can use the train brake and crank up the prime mover and see the smoke level increase for most of them.  I don't think the smoke level has any connection to the motor current.

Except ALCO's.    They smoke.

So, we're looking for an Alco Super-Chuffer?