TMCC in Sunset Models question

You don't need a battery but you do have know what TMCC boards are in your engine. Over the years 3rd Rail used TAS Saw boards, TAS EOB, and then ERR with Cruise. TAS EOB might have a different feature code vs the other two. About what year was this offered?

Pete

I would check the batteries in your remote first.

Do a factory reset on the tmcc boards. Whenever you get strange behavior running in tmcc or legacy mode try doing the reset first and if that solves it. You loco should only need a battery in conventional mode to keep the sound running while you cycle powers for direction

Thank you.  Is there a standard way to do the reset?  I don't have the instructions on resets.  Is there something mechanical or board/sensor that could have gone bad and cause the locomotive to act this way?  I put new batteries in the TMCC handheld(s), two of them, and neither made a difference.  Sunset Models said "change the battery in the tender."
Am I possibly chasing the wrong solution?  Is there something I could check to verify it's not a battery problem?

Most TMCC steam engines use Aux1 4 after programming the engine ID number. That should work if your engine has a TAS saw board or ERR Cruise. TAS EOB had a different reset code. Thats why its important you first find out whats inside that particular engine. If it does have EOB it will have a tach reader which may be out of alignment but those symptoms are a bit different than what you describe.

When you open the tender to change the battery you should be able to determine whats in there.

Pete

When you have it open, take a picture or two of the board set, that will help us help you.

If your loco has a Train America Studios SAW board (likely), the problem is likely in the motor driver circuit.  If this is the case, ( I hope not) the only solution is going to be replace the system is a ERR upgrade. I recently did one and it is difficult. It may be a radio board problem also. That would be a much easier fix.

I try not to jump all the way to a worst case scenario without all the information. This is a process, get in the loco and snap some photos of the boards, then the guys who know can help identify what you have and run you thru a reset. then you can move on to troubleshooting form there. I had a similar issue happen with a 3rd Rail H1 which uses ERR boards and the reset solve the problem so just follow the process

I've fixed several SAW and EOB boards, they're not impossible to repair.

Any progress on this problem?

Got her opened up and wow ... the Duracell battery had exploded, blowing pieces into the boards.  Going to blow it all out with air, then try it with the battery out.  Not looking good at this moment.  This is the worse Duracell failure to date, with most of the many others being leakers, many.  Ruined some devices.  Wish there were a different battery we could use.  Duracells suck!!

More leakers .. screwed up two more devices ... leaked out with years yet to go to expiration date ...  hate Duracells!!!

If you are operating in command only, i.e. all DCS and TMCC/Legacy, then there is no need for the battery anyway. It is only for maintaining the sounds over short "dead spots" and has nothing to do with TMCC operations. Take the batteries out and throw them away.

Sunset Models was as surprised as I am .. first time for one of these to actually blow up.  I do notice they are all made in China.

Hot Water posted:

If you are operating in command only, i.e. all DCS and TMCC/Legacy, then there is no need for the battery anyway. It is only for maintaining the sounds over short "dead spots" and has nothing to do with TMCC operations. Take the batteries out and throw them away.

10-4 .... I'm in the process of removing ALL the Duracell (junker) batteries from all TMCC-type locomotives.  Don't want any more "POP" surprise sounds as they blow up  :-)

Hopefully cleaning it up will help but you may have damaged to triacs which John alluded to. Your symptoms to point to damaged triacs. Can be repaired but its time consuming.

Pete

My method of repairing the triacs is to simply cut the leads on all of them and replace the whole set.  The way they did the heatsink, this is by far the easiest way to fix them. 

I reach in and clip all the leads to the triacs, then remove the stubs from the PCB.  I then bolt the new ones to the heatsink and get all the leads aligned to poke into the PCB, and solder them up.  It's really not bad, and the parts are cheap, so trying to save one or two isn't worth it.

Getting those boards off the heat sink sucks

Like I said, replace $6 worth of triacs and just take them all off.  Trying to save one or two isn't worth it.

Unless you bought a used board as a replacement for one that went really bad and the heat sink was wrong so you had to change it

I don't see how a motor Triac failure damages a battery like that.  Some thing else failed and allowed the 9V power supply to feed the battery.  G

You're right George, we just got sidetracked into a discussion on how to repair the triacs.

If any of those modular boards are toast Id have a hard time trusting that motherboard

Best guess on this one is a failure in the board which let track current heat up the battery until it exploded out the back end.  The guts of one cell which blew it's cap out the back ended up white powder splattered all over.  The solid material got molten. 

With the battery remains removed and the cap taped off, it runs in conventional only with sounds and smoke.  TMCC is dead.

Sunset can upgrade it which will repair it.   That's the rather expensive option mentioned.

Going through the rest of the TMCC engines to make sure all batteries are out.

I wouldn't be so quick to blame the TAS EOB board, the battery is just piped over to the Railsounds power supply board.  The TAS board doesn't really do anything with the battery voltage.  My top suspect would be the RS power supply.

Scott suggested replacing the "radio board" with an old spare from previous conversions.  Which one is the "radio board" is my next questions ... lol!  Then I can dig for one and see if a swap works.  It runs in conventional now with sounds, but is dead to TMCC signals.

I'd first replace the power supply board.  The audio board is the one with the two socketed PLCC chips.  The power supply board is the one with the coil, sometimes the coil is in a metal can.

Audio Board

RailSounds Power Supply

Sunset is sending me a radio board to try to get it responding to TMCC.  I can live without the battery and that circuit I guess.

If this doesn't work I'm in the market for a TMCC mechanic to give it a shot.

John:  Do you repair/upgrade battery blown up TMCC engines ...?  :-)

Well, I can fix it, but obviously without actually seeing it, it's hard to know what it will take.  I do happen to have a TAS motherboard and of course the other bits like the R2LC and RailSounds boards.  I still suspect the RS power board...   Unless something very odd happened, hosing off the TAS EOB board should bring it back.

Kerrigan, I did not answer this because I assume you wanted a local guy to save on shipping.  You may want to just upgrade to an ERR if you want to retain TMCC, or go PS-3 if you want DCS.  Swapping to ERR removes other potential failure points on the unsupported TAS board.   You know how to contact me.  G

I could obviously upgrade it to ERR if you decided to go that way, I figured you were trying to repair it for less money.