Synchronized Chuff & Smoke With Steam Blunami Installation

Sounds like more have to complain to Soundtraxx. I will give them my two cents. No synchronized chuff and puff is a non starter for me too.

Pete

While I do respect and understand the desire for puffing smoke, I don't see it as a full deal breaker. It is a feature I like having in my steamers, but Blunami still has tons of potential and offers plenty of capabilities IMO. I am personally in contact with Soundtraxx so it is possible with some discussion the option for puffing smoke could become a reality. I think what I did in this MTH Southern 4-6-2 speaks for what Blunami is and what it can do. Specialized smoke features like whistle steam, blow-down, pop off valve, and even animated stuff like swinging bell effects are all possible with Blunami. It just a takes a little creativity. This pacific has whistle steam installed with Blunami and man I must say it is amazing.

Great work Sid. 👍

I agree you can do anything Legacy can do plus with Blunami but hard to understand if they can do synchronized smoke with a 4400 why can’t they they do it with a 4408.

Using Bluerail with another DCC manufacturers board doesn’t make sense economically given the other options out there.

Pete

Unfortunate to hear that they won’t even consider adding improvements to their products. I don’t think it’s going to revolutionize the O gauge world either. If you can’t offer the same value or more, there’s no way you can expect to penetrate the market.

@Norton posted:

Great work Sid. 👍

I agree you can do anything Legacy can do plus with Blunami but hard to understand if they can do synchronized smoke with a 4400 why can’t they they do it with a 4408.

Using Bluerail with another DCC manufacturers board doesn’t make sense economically given the other options out there.

Pete

Enlighten me because I have not explored the 4400 generic Tsunami board much. Does it actually have a chuff input? From the reading I'm doing it uses the same DDE (Digital Dynamic Exhaust) to generate the chuff. Even on their sites diagrams it shows no connection for a chuff input. Am I missing something here?

@Calebro posted:

Unfortunate to hear that they won’t even consider adding improvements to their products. I don’t think it’s going to revolutionize the O gauge world either. If you can’t offer the same value or more, there’s no way you can expect to penetrate the market.

So due to the fact that a single option is missing from the smoke department, that means this product isn't going to be worth it to the market? Upgrades aren't just about smoke. Smoke does play a factor in models, but there is also lighting and sounds. ERR never did and never will offer anything close to the audio quality and diversity that Tsunami offers in their standard and Blunami decoders. I am a Lionel fan to the core, but I will admit ERR is not the best in terms of its sound quality/diversity. The only way to get top notch Lionel sounds is through Legacy and as someone who does Legacy conversions it is not a simple nor cheap option. MTH with PS3 is the only way to get the readily available diversity of sounds, lighting, and smoke. Even then you are limited due to their system. There is always a system to satisfy ones need, but to say a system as diverse in its capabilities as Blunami will not be worth it to a market because one little downside is a bit much.

Well, everyone has to make that decision for themselves.  I personally an not interested in an option without sound synchronization with the chuff, YMMV.  I see the potential with Blunami, but since synchronized chuffing has been a staple for 20+ years, refusing to support is pretty mystifying.  In any case, I'm moving on, I'll manage to live with Blunami.

@gunrunnerjohn posted:

Well, everyone has to make that decision for themselves.  I personally an not interested in an option without sound synchronization with the chuff, YMMV.  I see the potential with Blunami, but since synchronized chuffing has been a staple for 20+ years, refusing to support is pretty mystifying.  In any case, I'm moving on, I'll manage to live with Blunami.

Out of my own curiosity, did Harry talk to "Bluerail" like you said or to someone at Soundtraxx like George or Norman? The two brands are connected on this product, but it would be up to Soundtraxx to integrate an extra circuit for chuff input and not Bluerail.

@Sid's Trains posted:

Out of my own curiosity, did Harry talk to "Bluerail" like you said or to someone at Soundtraxx like George or Norman? The two brands are connected on this product, but it would be up to Soundtraxx to integrate an extra circuit for chuff input and not Bluerail.

He talked to George.  They don't need an extra circuit, just a change in programming for one of the function pins.  Harry seemed pretty positive that it was a definite no.  He did say that George told him the Tsunami2 board had that capability, and I know I've seen HO with synchronized smoke, so I suspect it's not a foreign concept in the DCC world.  Given that input, I'm not going to tilt at windmills, I have lots of other stuff I can spend my time on.

@gunrunnerjohn posted:

He talked to George.  They don't need an extra circuit, just a change in programming for one of the function pins.  Harry seemed pretty positive that it was a definite no.  He did say that George told him the Tsunami2 board had that capability, and I know I've seen HO with synchronized smoke, so I suspect it's not a foreign concept in the DCC world.  Given that input, I'm not going to tilt at windmills, I have lots of other stuff I can spend my time on.

Tsunami 2 must have the capability if they said that which doesn't surprise me. Other systems like ESU and TCS to my knowledge also have an input for chuffs. Either past boards from Soundtraxx had the extra input and or still do. Based on their YT channel over the passed few years DDE has been their main source for chuff generation and diesel rev generation. Their 4400 board shows no signs of having an input on the board so if it did have the input at one point it does not have it now. I understand and respect your lack of need/desire to go any further with a accessory board given your projects and what you like. No need to go further if its not going to be greatly beneficial. However my observations of what people think about Blunami, especially the younger crowd, has been that it checks so many boxes that they want and is beneficial to their needs. The 3 rail industry is really good at sticking to its roots and usually doesn't like to go outside of its comfort zone. Rightfully so and I understand why. I am not saying any product from you is needed now since for your needs and lots of people here it won't be beneficial. Personally my customer base and my observations have occurred elsewhere so my outlook is different. As a rising engineer and businessman I am all for exploring other options. If that means sacrificing something "normal" to me currently I am willing to take the "hit". Blunami and other radio/bluetooth controlled DCC options are something the upgrade world could benefit from as it is another option for the customer/user to chose from.

@Sid's Trains posted:

Enlighten me because I have not explored the 4400 generic Tsunami board much. Does it actually have a chuff input? From the reading I'm doing it uses the same DDE (Digital Dynamic Exhaust) to generate the chuff. Even on their sites diagrams it shows no connection for a chuff input. Am I missing something here?

Sorry, its not the 4400 but rather the earlier Tsunami boards that gave you the option of an external switch. Fx6 could be connected to a switch to ground for chuff in.

If Soundtraxx is not interested in providing this option we can hope other decoder manufacturers might be persuaded to enter the bluetooth controlled decoder market.

Pete

@Norton posted:

Sorry, its not the 4400 but rather the earlier Tsunami boards that gave you the option of an external switch. Fx6 could be connected to a switch to ground for chuff in.

If Soundtraxx is not interested in providing this option we can hope other decoder manufacturers might be persuaded to enter the bluetooth controlled decoder market.

Pete

Ah ok I see. Like I said I have not explored the Tsunami world a ton, but I have seen the documentation and videos and it seems everything now is based around DDE. I would also hope others would enter the BT controlled world in regards to DCC.

FWIW, I didn't say what model Tsunami board was discussed, only that George stated that Tsunami boards had a chuff input.  Since I'm not familiar with the product line, I just took it at face value.

@Sid's Trains posted:

The 3 rail industry is really good at sticking to its roots and usually doesn't like to go outside of its comfort zone. Rightfully so and I understand why. I am not saying any product from you is needed now since for your needs and lots of people here it won't be beneficial.

It's not an issue of going outside my comfort zone, it's just that for steam, most of the people I know insist on synchronized smoke, most also want 4-chuff/rev, etc.  If the Blunami can't do it, I'll stick with products that can.  I still will consider Blunami for diesel projects.

@Sid's Trains posted:

If that means sacrificing something "normal" to me currently I am willing to take the "hit". Blunami and other radio/bluetooth controlled DCC options are something the upgrade world could benefit from as it is another option for the customer/user to chose from.

It's not that they consider it "normal", rather they consider it "mandatory".   DDE is so Protosound 1 and lost in the 1990's.

@gunrunnerjohn posted:

FWIW, I didn't say what model Tsunami board was discussed, only that George stated that Tsunami boards had a chuff input.  Since I'm not familiar with the product line, I just took it at face value.

Other decoder manufacturers offer boards with a chuff switch input option but designed for track signal DCC. They can be coupled to a Bluerail board that receives Bluetooth signals and converts them DCC that can be connected to any other DCC board including the TCS WOW-501 board among others. Problem being it adds another 100 plus bucks to implement this. Far more than ERR, PS3, or even Legacy hardware.

Pete

@gunrunnerjohn posted:

FWIW, I didn't say what model Tsunami board was discussed, only that George stated that Tsunami boards had a chuff input.  Since I'm not familiar with the product line, I just took it at face value.

It's not an issue of going outside my comfort zone, it's just that for steam, most of the people I know insist on synchronized smoke, most also want 4-chuff/rev, etc.  If the Blunami can't do it, I'll stick with products that can.  I still will consider Blunami for diesel projects.

It's not that they consider it "normal", rather they consider it "mandatory".   DDE is so Protosound 1 and lost in the 1990's.

I get it that the people want smoke to be synchronized out of a steam engine. I know I do, but if I am faced with an upgrade I look at all sides. Smoke is just one out of the three main aspects of a model trains electronic features. Why not be persistent about the accuracy of sounds as well? What about lighting? Sure there are products that can give you improvements with older conventional/tmcc models. Many of those products are from you and I love all of them. They do what they need to do to make our models better. However there is no changing the sounds from an ERR RS commander to be more accurate to a prototype. There is no changing that improving lighting in an older model means several boards being added to make things like fireboxes flicker, rule 17, etc. Is it not beneficial that a single board can give you more sounds than the entire ERR roster combined? Is it not impressive that a board has 8 lighting outputs with a dozen effect options vs 1 or 2 with no effects? If smoke functionality is "mandatory" wouldn't sound accuracy and lighting capability be "mandatory" as well? I know Blunami is not an end all be all, but put it next to the two industry standards for 3 rail upgrades (ERR/PS3) and it is right there in terms of cost, sounds, lighting, smoke, and the customization of all of those combined. For this reason I am taking it on as an upgrade option in addition to the tradition options.

I'll take premium sounds, reliable operations, and product availability over synchronized smoke any day of the week.

Using the GRJ chuff generator and Superchuffer to sync the puffs to the wheels and then using the DDE to sync the chuff to the puffs works for me. I understand if good enough is not good enough for some, but what is does do is so far ahead of ERR that good enough is good enough for me. For those who need it, the loksound5 and bluerail gets them what they want, but cost a whole lot more. The 4408 is targeted to G gauge and the 2 rail market, who are not  all that concerned with sync'd puff and chuff I'm afraid so not having it does not impact their sales that much. If the demand were high enough I'm sure Soundtraxx would include it to reap the sales.

I'm with @gunrunnerjohn. Not having synchronized smoke, chuff, and rod position is a nonstarter for me too.

It's not a technical challenge, and accepting a trigger or interrupt input is a widely supported feature in a lot of microarchitectures.

@Darrell posted:

….The 4408 is targeted to G gauge and the 2 rail market, who are not  all that concerned with sync'd puff and chuff I'm afraid so not having it does not impact their sales that much…..

Good morning.  Interesting data point.  Where did you find it?  Thanks.

If it's like their Tsunami decoders the chuff rate is adjusted using CV114 and the various sounds of it of the DDE (Dynamic Digital Exhaust) using CV112.  It is based upon the motor revolutions.  I would assume Blunami is the same, but I don't see how sychronized smoke can be accomplished.  Works well on N Scale and HO, but there is no smoke involved.

John

@Craftech posted:

If it's like their Tsunami decoders the chuff rate is adjusted using CV114 and the various sounds of it of the DDE (Dynamic Digital Exhaust) using CV112.  It is based upon the motor revolutions.  I would assume Blunami is the same, but I don't see how sychronized smoke can be accomplished.  Works well on N Scale and HO, but there is no smoke involved.

John

You can get an accurate 4 puffs with a cam or optical detector and also four chuffs pretty close with CV114. Sometimes they start up in sync, other times not. Just annoying that Soundtraxx didn’t include the option of an external switch and even more annoying they have no intention to do so.

Chuff sound has been changed since this video of a MTH Hudson with Blunami.

Pete

I’m also in the camp with Gunrunner until someone does a good bluetooth DCC sound board with chuff input. I love Soundtraxx products and did a great number of Tsunami installs when I worked at a shop. The installs in G and O models were always really awesome and one of my best was an Airwire/Tsunami with synchronized fan driven smoke in an Accucraft RGS 41 C-19. It belongs to my buddy who worked at Knott’s and is now curator of equipment at the Colorado RR museum. Synchronized puffing smoke is such a cool feature that expanded into HO nearly 15 years ago and apparently is making the leap into N soon. It seems like total lunacy to not include such a simple feature in the decoder, especially given that Soundtraxx has a long history of providing a chuff cam input on their products. Given the disfunction and shaky future with proprietary control/sound systems in the 3R O market, if any of the DCC companies want to make inroads on this opened door, they will need to have puffing smoke as an option. Too many 3 railers are accustomed to this feature and will not want to sacrifice it; whichever product can meet that demand will get the lion’s share of our business.

Citing a shaky future for new control systems may be a bit premature. The new Blunami is a superb centerpiece for battery powered operation, a wave of the future.

@BOB WALKER posted:

Citing a shaky future for new control systems may be a bit premature. The new Blunami is a superb centerpiece for battery powered operation, a wave of the future.

He said shaky future of proprietary systems, i.e. what Lionel and MTH offer. Since there’s an opening for companies that make DCC controllers and boards, they’d be smart to offer feature parity to get more people to switch.

@rplst8 posted:

He said shaky future of proprietary systems, i.e. what Lionel and MTH offer. Since there’s an opening for companies that make DCC controllers and boards, they’d be smart to offer feature parity to get more people to switch.

Exactly. Lionel has effectively cut support for the TMCC system with the disappearance of parts. This puts the future of ERR on uncertain ground as well. Earlier generations of Legacy electronics have become unsupported and who knows what the future will hold. There are only a small handful of people who can perform Legacy upgrades which are very costly and some of those individuals have been playing with Blunami’s lately. MTH DCS is currently the only proprietary system that has solid support and availability for the foreseeable future. They already made the jumb to DCC compatibility which I think will continue to have a meaningful direction for the DCS spinoff company.

I think there are a number of 3 rail modelers/hobbyists who will have anxiety over the longevity of their high priced models’ electronics. Having a bluetooth/DCC plan B option if the boards go poof that allows many of the cool “gee whiz” features to be preserved will go a long way in winning their business. Not to mention the many hobbyists who purchase older models to gut the electronics and upgrade to newer tech will have a very competitive product to entice them.

@Norton posted:

You can get an accurate 4 puffs with a cam or optical detector and also four chuffs pretty close with CV114. Sometimes they start up in sync, other times not. Just annoying that Soundtraxx didn’t include the option of an external switch and even more annoying they have no intention to do so.

Chuff sound has been changed since this video of a MTH Hudson with Blunami.

Pete

How exactly did the optical detector trigger the chuff?  I've been trying to work out in my head how this was accomplished since it doesn't have a chuff input.  I know everyone has griped about no synchronized chuff but here it is.  your example is the only reason I'm even considering a blunami purchase.  It can be done.

Regards,

Tony Sunday

@BeefyT posted:

How exactly did the optical detector trigger the chuff?  I've been trying to work out in my head how this was accomplished since it doesn't have a chuff input.  I know everyone has griped about no synchronized chuff but here it is.  your example is the only reason I'm even considering a blunami purchase.  It can be done.

Regards,

Tony Sunday

Tony, the optical detector doesn’t trigger the chuff sound. All it does in this application is drive the smoke fan motor for four puffs. Thats why sometimes it will start close to chuff sound which is produced by the Blunami and other times it can be off. By as much as 45 degrees of driver rotation in this case. Most noticeable at slow speeds.

The video above was used as chuff and puff were pretty close in that case but it took a few takes.

Pete

@Norton posted:

Tony, the optical detector doesn’t trigger the chuff sound. All it does in this application is drive the smoke fan motor for four puffs. Thats why sometimes it will start close to chuff sound which is produced by the Blunami and other times it can be off. By as much as 45 degrees of driver rotation in this case. Most noticeable at slow speeds.

The video above was used as chuff and puff were pretty close in that case but it took a few takes.

Pete

Do you think a sound activated switch might work?  I found one on Amazon that I think might work and you might be able to install it near the speaker.  Seems like you could fiddle with it until it triggered when you wanted it.  So when it chuffed it would trigger the switch.  May not line up with the crank position but it might be synchronized with the chuff.  

Regard,

Tony Sunday

It could work. It would be better if you preceded it with a narrow band, bandpass filter tuned to the major component of the chuff sound. Otherwise every sound produced including whistle and bell would trigger it.

Do you have a scope? Many of the modern digital scopes have the ability to do frequency analysis.

BTW you can use other means besides the optical detector that I used. Johns chuff switch can do it as well but none have the ability to synchronize chuff and puff.

Pete

@Norton posted:

It could work. It would be better if you preceded it with a narrow band, bandpass filter tuned to the major component of the chuff sound. Otherwise every sound produced including whistle and bell would trigger it.

Do you have a scope? Many of the modern digital scopes have the ability to do frequency analysis.

BTW you can use other means besides the optical detector that I used. Johns chuff switch can do it as well but none have the ability to synchronize chuff and puff.

Pete

Pete, thanks for the tip.  I don’t currently have a scope but I might have access to one at work.  I stumbled upon this thread after I started doing some research and it’s really got the gears turning.  I think I might pull the trigger on the blunami with some kind of sound triggered switching for synch chuffs.  At the very least I’ll learn a lot more about it and then I can come back and report my findings.

Tony

The problem with sound activation is the difficulty of triggering just on the chuff sound.  I suspect without a lot of work you'd have missing chuffs or random chuffs, IMO it's just not worth the trouble.  All of this is because they're too lazy to add an optional output (or input) to trigger the chuff.  The Tsunami board has the capability, why they're being so hard-headed about adding it to Blunami I can't imagine.

I think one of the funny things about this discussion is this four chuffs per revolution is fantastic. Once the locomotive is an action. The four chuffs will start to get muddy. I have an older Lionel Mohawk with two chuffs per Revolution. When that engine is in motion, the sound is much nicer than the newer four chuff locomotives.

as for sound quality yes, the boards they use for HO do have nicer sound, but the reality is again once the engine is in motion, the quality of the sound becomes irrelevant. It’s the same thing I always say in G scale if it’s good at 4 feet it’s good

these arguments about sound are almost as good as the argument about paint color. It’s all subjective. And by the way in sound in order to get a rich deep sound, you need a large speaker. This is just physics. With the advent of three speakers per steam locomotive the sound has been taken to a next level. I know the argument will now begin about accuracy of sound. For someone who has been around real locomotives most of his life I can tell you there are no two that sound exactly the same.

let’s just say. All sound improvements are good for the hobby.

let just play trains

The PennCentral Shops

@ThatGuy posted:

I think one of the funny things about this discussion is this four chuffs per revolution is fantastic. Once the locomotive is an action. The four chuffs will start to get muddy. I have an older Lionel Mohawk with two chuffs per Revolution. When that engine is in motion, the sound is much nicer than the newer four chuff locomotives.

I will agree with limitations.  I cut the sound down on the little LC+ 2.0 0-6-0T switcher to 2-chuffs.  It has little wheels and it sounds like a machine gun before it gets going all that fast.  OTOH, my larger steamers I like to run at a rate where 4-chuffs sounds good.

@gunrunnerjohn posted:

I will agree with limitations.  I cut the sound down on the little LC+ 2.0 0-6-0T switcher to 2-chuffs.  It has little wheels and it sounds like a machine gun before it gets going all that fast.  OTOH, my larger steamers I like to run at a rate where 4-chuffs sounds good.

It’s all about the…….”I like it”.

For those that say that 4 chuffs sounds like a machine gun, well... That's sort of what it's supposed to sound like. Here's perhaps the best recording I've heard of what a prototype loco sounds like when it's pulling at speed. https://www.youtube.com/watch?...X1qM5_zJo&t=200s (Specifically at 3:20 in the video.

Granted, that's a British locomotive, but the mechanics are similar.

Here are some K4s at speed...
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MOXV_uAJxfI

@rplst8 posted:

For those that say that 4 chuffs sounds like a machine gun, well... That's sort of what it's supposed to sound like.

I certainly agree that the sound isn't all that far off for most of them at speed.  However, if you've ever run the LC+ 2.0 Docksider 0-6-0T locomotive at speed, you'd see that once it gets going at all fast (actually not all that fast), the sound suddenly totally breaks up into an unrecognizable hash, not just a fast chuff like a machine gun.  There is apparently a flaw in their higher speed chuff sound algorithm for this particular locomotive.  That's the reason that a bunch of us decided that this particular model needs a chuff lobotomy.

"MTH DCS is currently the only proprietary system that has solid support and availability for the foreseeable future. "

Seriously?

The LionChief sounds seem to have some limitations at higher speeds but I can say from my experience with Railsounds II through the latest Legacy Railsounds, the 4 chuffs per rev goes through a bit of an audible shift in the chuff cadence as the locomotive speeds up and it really sounds quite impressive. Not every chuff hits with the same fixed intensity which is correct with a real locomotive. Each of the 4 chuffs has its own dynamic variation in volume and intensity which is something Lionel’s sound engineers did a remarkable job of simulating in the Railsounds package. It doesn’t sound like a machine gun at all to me.

The sound systems that are more digitized seem to use a short track for each chuff which just gets played every time the chuff switch activates. This results in a machine gun sound at higher speeds because there is nothing dynamic about the chuff cadence.

@Ryan Selvius posted:

MTH DCS is currently the only proprietary system that has solid support and availability for the foreseeable future. They already made the jumb to DCC compatibility which I think will continue to have a meaningful direction for the DCS spinoff company.

I think we'd have to agree to disagree about the "solid support" and "availability" you mention. I can count on one hand and have fingers left over the entire staff of the MTH entity working on DCS, one car crash could wipe out the company. One key player deciding to move on could have the same effect.