Bricktrix Posted January 24, 2014 Share Posted January 24, 2014 Please forgive me if this is so obvious that its never been addressed before, but when I tried searching over tinterweb and in here I drew a blank, so thought it may be useful to share my findings with experimentation. Bascially I've been looking at ways of obtaining extra pulling power using non-soundchips synced up to soundchips without having to goto the price of an XL chip (that allow 2 motors to be safely operated in tandem via the same chip) I always use Loksound V4 soundchips for my projects, so obtained a couple of Lokpilot chips presuming they would be closely matched. The Loksound chip is wired up in the usual way. i.e. chip within loco, wired to motor, speaker, lights etc. Recently we have been looking at using 2 motors to power my most recent model (Deltic in this case). I will say now that it is more O gauge than oo/ho and possibly near scale weight (Yup, its LEGO) and will be measuring / testing current draw, etc before I ever attempt to connect 2 motors to it via 1 chip. So looking for alternative options to power this using 2 motors, I've had Lokpilot chips installed into the self contained motor bogies, which do track pick up and power within the sealed units. So, 1x Deltic running on a Loksound V4, CV setup, etc all good now, but struggling to pull 8 carriages....needs extra traction power. 1x Lokpilot V4 installed into a bogie with CV motor parameter settings the same as the Loksound chip powering the loco. Both chips set to the same address. All working good when running without sound, but when sound applied massive delay between the performance. The Lokpilot starts straight away, whilst the Loksound take around 7 secs to pull off after the sounds have done their stuff. Looking through the setting options of the Lokpilot using a LokProgrammer I found the starting delay "enable virtual sounds" check box, which I then ticked, and that enabled the scaleable time adjustment. Great I thought! Wrote the info to the chip and tested it, it was still the same. Then I realised that I somehow have to "enable" the virtual sound, hence searching around. After finding nothing and the manual not making much sense to me other than CV O (not zero) needs to be mapped, I then started looking more into the programmer and found the drop down menus for function mapping on the Lokpilot allow you to enable the virtual sound there. Job done, all now working perfectly.......it took an hour or so to get the motors timed together, but now when the sounds are running, the 2 chips / motors run identical to each other and the thing is pulling 8 heavy carriages easily and amp draw is nicely low. Bonus that I can also add further motors with Lokpilots if needed. The 2 chips together are still 40 quid or so cheaper than an XL chip. Again, appologies if this is so obvious that its not written up anywhere, but then, maybe it could be useful to relative "newbies" like myself into this game and save the searching and experimentation that I had! Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
RMweb Premium newbryford Posted January 24, 2014 RMweb Premium Share Posted January 24, 2014 Job done, all now working perfectly.......it took an hour or so to get the motors timed together, but now when the sounds are running, the 2 chips / motors run identical to each other Having spent quite a few hours a couple of years ago trying to synchronise sound and non-sound and giving up, your findings are hugely informative. A quick question - you say you've got them working together in sound mode, what happens if the sound on the Loksound is turned off? Does the Lokpilot still have a delay, whilst the Loksound moves straightaway? Or is there a similar "virtual sound on/off" function for the Lokpilot Cheers, Mick Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
Bricktrix Posted January 24, 2014 Author Share Posted January 24, 2014 Having spent quite a few hours a couple of years ago trying to synchronise sound and non-sound and giving up, your findings are hugely informative. A quick question - you say you've got them working together in sound mode, what happens if the sound on the Loksound is turned off? Does the Lokpilot still have a delay, whilst the Loksound moves straightaway? Or is there a similar "virtual sound on/off" function for the Lokpilot Cheers, Mick Really?...Blimey thats good then useful to someone Yeah, at the moment if the sounds are turned off then the delay is still there on the Lokpilot. I figured this isnt so much of a problem as I'll always be running with sound and if I plan on doing anything without the sound then I'll just go back into the programmer and turn the delay setting off. However, from what I believe, the setting can be mapped to a function button so you dont have to go through all that. Although I've set the mapping and CV's to the same as the soundchip, so whatever function button I press for the soundchip would also opperate the Lokpilots equivilant function.........I'm thinking if I were to set the function higher up the range to a blank slot in the soundchip then that could be avoided, whilst I'd rather not do that I think the option to do so is there. Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
Bricktrix Posted January 25, 2014 Author Share Posted January 25, 2014 Update, ..above problem now fixed after we looked at a few options today. Screenshot attached of new settings, so now when f1 is pressed the delay happens on the Lokpilot, and when f1 is turned off the delay is also. Happy days Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
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