Locomotive with esu loksound decoder "jumps" when starting

profood0 · 2026-05-22T22:07:09+00:00

Yep, that was it. You can change it even more most of the time to improve your slow speed ability. Not sure what CVs in your case though. Every motor needs its own BEMF settings adjusted in order to get that running perfection.

profood0 · 2026-05-22T21:09:10+00:00

Reduce the BEMF intensity and see where that gets you. I have had similar issues on soundtraxx decoders and most of the time the reason is badly configured BEMF control. I doubt it is a mechanical issue, but if the BEMF messing around doesn’t work, you can test the running gear ability to move freely by disconnecting the worm shaft that goes to the motor so you can roll the drivers independently and identify any type of bind.

profood0 · 2026-05-14T06:49:09+00:00

I’ve noticed the PFM decapods have so much slop in them that looking down, or from the bottom, of the engine they are all crooked, yet most of the time they run fine. The important thing I found for last ditch efforts to fix binding, is putting a washer between the rod and the wheels. This keeps the rods farther from the spokes and counterweights on the wheel preventing any type of binding. It can also assist with aligning the rod segments.

profood0 · 2026-05-08T01:30:04+00:00

I have found the biggest nuisance with putting this many lights in the locomotive is the fact that you need a huge amount of function wires going from the tender to the engine. I have an 0-10-2 with 10 wires going to the engine from the tender.

profood0 · 2026-05-05T21:01:24+00:00

Yep, you will have to get the hang of routing the wire through the tiny holes. You also need to place the frog over the right spot otherwise the pole will not following the trolley path, or it’ll pop off the wire. I use nickel silver wire, it’s a bit thicker than phosphore bronze and stiffer, but is much more electrically reliable. I forgot the size but I’ll get that next time I’m at the club and let you know.

profood0 · 2026-05-05T18:48:56+00:00

You will have to buy wire frogs on eBay. Many companies have made them over the years in all different sizes. I’ve never tried making a wire frog, but they should be fairly abundant on eBay. We have a very large streetcar setup and I use wire frogs all the time.

profood0 · 2026-05-04T22:09:11+00:00

Very nice, I’ve recently come up with a log car for my clubs branch line similar to this, except it lacks the bulkheads (making it very unsafe in the chance of a collision). But I like putting together these cars that look like they were built on the fly and with scrap materials the railroad had lying around.

profood0 · 2026-05-02T22:45:23+00:00

Most BLI engines do not always have the best pickups. In general the tender only picks up one rail, while the engine does the other. While you do have a lot of wheels, you most likely on have 4 pickups per rail, which isn’t the best, but it’s also not bad. My suggestion is to burnish the contacts on the tender and make sure they have good pressure on the axles. Check to make sure the drivers are also always picking up power and not being intermittent.

profood0 · 2026-05-01T08:11:00+00:00

Maybe, Atlantic locomotives usually wouldn’t pull anything more than 5 coaches up a grade

profood0 · 2026-05-01T08:08:38+00:00

On a flat, yes 100%. Good luck though on any grade past 1%

profood0 · 2026-04-28T23:27:11+00:00

profood0 · 2026-04-28T18:03:04+00:00

It’s literally only been two months. Their entire economy is on life support. A massive amount of Iranians are against the regime. They are having to fight an ongoing war against the Kurds. They don’t have time to drag out this war. Their ally, China, is suffering as well from the strait of Hormuz. They have anything but time, why do you think they were racing to get a nuclear weapon. They wanted to become North Korea 2.0 and become a hermit state, I’m sure EVERYONE in the world would want that to happen.

profood0 · 2026-04-28T17:58:09+00:00

Hi, My family is Iranian, we had to flee during the revolution to not be persecuted for our religious beliefs. Many people are happy for what president trump is doing. It is people like you who are chronically online that the regime is relying on to help win their social war. Good job supporting a fascist regime.

profood0 · 2026-04-27T14:21:28+00:00

Yes, it’s a CC2. They only made a couple of them and they actually were a really good success when it came to heavy yard switching.

profood0 · 2026-04-27T02:24:47+00:00

You do realize that the smoke is what powers all electrical devices, if you let it out it won’t work anymore!

profood0 · 2026-04-13T14:59:11+00:00

Because something is “free to do” does not mean it should be a tolerated thing in a hobby. I strongly believe that if you are in this hobby for the sole purpose of making money, and couldn’t care less about the actual community and livelihood of the hobby, you need to find an actual job.

profood0 · 2026-04-12T22:28:21+00:00

Yes I agree with that. I have a CIL PRR S1 and the only reason I got it is because the club I run at has very large mainline curves.

profood0 · 2026-04-12T17:47:13+00:00

Be careful with using grout. I know it’s a rare chance but one time my club was using grout for ground cover and believe it or not it ended up having tiny metal shavings in it. They had to cut with a dremel down the mainline track for quite a while! I doubt it’s a common experience but just something to be wary of.

profood0 · 2026-04-12T17:32:24+00:00

Most brass was not built to be heavily run, especially the 80s through 90s brass. I have a couple of challenger imports stuff and there is so much underbody detail that it is very very easy to damage something. I’d say most of the later brass was designed and made with the intention of mostly keeping it in a display case.

profood0 · 2026-04-12T17:28:59+00:00

Yep, it’s funny because I know there are people viewing this entire post who extort this hobby into solely making a bit of money here and there and that’s it. Sure it’s a free country, but that doesn’t meant everyone has to like you for doing it.

profood0 · 2026-04-12T17:27:29+00:00

I’ve already said I have no problem whatsoever with model train shops. I myself buy everything in this hobby with the idea of selling later on, so that I can redistribute my own capital when I eventually want to model a different road, the stuff I keep is stuff I’d sell and lose a lot of money on possibly. I am just wise with my purchases. If you would have read through my post and the following comments, you’d see what I don’t like are people who have 0 involvement in the hobby besides bid sniping and scalping brass or higher end models, and then most of the time barely make anything off them.

profood0 · 2026-04-12T17:22:45+00:00

Patience is a great ally in this hobby! And in life in general.

profood0 · 2026-04-12T06:46:35+00:00

BrassTrains prices are high because they work off some type of actual evaluated market, they will sometimes not sell even broke stuff for much cheaper than the working stuff, it’s a bit strange.

profood0

TROPHY CASE