[neil_s_wood]

A couple of weeks ago I discovered the smoke unit in my Brawa BR 19 wasn't working so I installed a brand new one. It worked perfectly as you can see from the photo below. At the weekend we were having a bit of running session round at my mates house so I took it along to show the guys as they hadn't seen as smoke unit before. My mate has a NCE powercab system and the loco seemed to function fine sound, motion and light wise although when I pressed f4 for the smoke generator to work nothing happened. I spent some time faffing around with it and notice when I injected the smoke fluid in there would be a very tiny whisp of smoke but not the continuous stream of thick smoke that I normally get when I use it on my ECoS system.

I thought maybe a connection had come loose so when I got back home I was ready to take it apart to check and see what needed to be done. I fired up my ECoS first to check that it wasn't working on my system too and lo and behold it worked perfectly straight away.

Does anyone have any ideas why a smoke generator would work on an ECoS powered system and not on an NCE powercab?

I'm baffled. My best guess is that the voltage on the Powercab maybe too low at 15v but this is just my speculation. I am interested as I can't see why it would work on one system and not another.

 

[neil_s_wood]

QUOTE (Richard Johnson @ 14 Apr 2008, 14:15) <{POST_SNAPBACK}>***Hello Neil

The problem isn't with PowerCab.

If the smoke unit is installed to directly replace an ex factory fitted it will probably use half wave power - ie 1 function lead with the chassis as earth. This is a common Mfr fudge - it lowers the current load on the decoder so protects it from the high current need of the smoke unit and lowers the available voltage to protect the smoke unit from early burnout via the overly high voltages of most EU made DCC systems.

So... the cause is not low voltage at the PowerCab. Exactly the opposite really. Brings us back to the NMRA standards and DCC standards interpretation.... guess which brand DOES meet the standards

surprise me NCE?

so...

This half-wave power is OK with the "actually too high" rail voltages of ECOS but not with the correct "NMRA recommended rail voltage for HO" of the NCE PowerCab.

So would this mean that all American DCC systems are likely to have the same issue?

If you want to have lots of smoke on another system, change the smoke unit to one with two wires, and wire via blue and function wire, not chassis and function wire.

The Brawa one is different to most others in that it is directly soldered to two wires, whereas most others are slotted in and touch two electrical. I did not trace these wires back to see what they were connected to. Most other locos with smoke units I have Liliput, Trix, Roco are as you describe where they slot into the chassis.

At the same time, look carefully at the Seuthe range - there are a couple of voltage ranges available.... The problem you face is if it will work fine at correct rail voltages you will have to be very sure you never let it run dry on the ECOS - or you risk a burn out.

Richard
DCCconcepts

Thanks Richard This explains a lot. The problem I have is that the Roco locos with smoke generators have the smoke activated when the lights are on. The Trix Big Boy has the smoke on all the time, there is no off switch. At least with the Brawa ones I can switch it off digitally.

Would using a lower voltage smoke generator enable it to work with Powercab?

 

[neil_s_wood]

Ah ha the ones I use are number 11 16-22v

The 22 is for 10 to 16 v.

If you were to use the 22 on ECoS what is likely to happen if it overheats?

 

[neil_s_wood]

Hmm, I may try switching over to the low voltage ones.

 

[neil_s_wood]

QUOTE (john woodall @ 15 Apr 2008, 17:30) <{POST_SNAPBACK}>Another option maybe to make Neil not only bring his locomotives to your layout, but his ECOS as well.

Maybe give him a few beers, throw him in a taxi to send him home,

and remember to forget to throw the locomotives and the ECOS in the taxi with him.

John
He's tried that already

Fortunately he's close enough that I don't need a taxi.

Unfortunately Seuthe seem to do 8-14 , 16-22 and 10 -16 but no other variants.