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Cost of Adding Sound to a Locomotive


Gerrard
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15 hours ago, Tallpaul69 said:

Shifting the focus of the argument a bit cos I think we have done the "We think sound chips are a rip off" v "We understand the costs involved" discussion to death, one thing that does my head in is the lack of standardization in the sockets fitted in "DCC Ready" locos. I understand that "small" 00 locos and N locos need small sockets. And I realise that the original sockets were designed before sound was widely used.

But just to complicate matters we have Bachmann coming up with yet another set of sockets! Do we really need this added complication, I don't currently see the benefit to us?


Maybe worth a new topic for this.
 

However, I think Bachmann are changing all of theirs to Plux22 as the low level drive design seen on the S-Stock and now the 158 seems to be their new standard.
 

Just a shame other companies don't get in on the same action - Pride is the word that springs to mind here.

 

Much the same why Apple are so obsessed with using their own lightning charge solution, instead of just fitting in with the USB-C standard.  So much so, they included an adaptor with new phones so the phone still had lightning charge ports but the cable was USB-C.  All because of their pride to be unique.

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15 hours ago, jpendle said:

 

An iPhone has nothing like 1000 pounds worth of components in it, a DCC sound decoder has nothing like 100 pounds worth of components in it. The margin on anything like this is at least 50% and probably more, AND that's as it should be.

 

I work for an electronics manufacturer, we sell stuff for $35k that costs $2k to manufacture. The manufacturing cost of any sophisticated electronics product is a very small fraction of the overall costs of bring a product to market.

 

Market research, design, manufacturing, cost of sales, etc. Then add to that mix, pensions, benefits, regulatory approvals, warranty costs, product liability costs, etc, etc. You could argue that the ancillary staff at any business don't add any value to the product (cleaners, caterers, receptionists), you could also argue that Quality Control, Warehousing, & Shipping staff add no value. But the bottom line is they all have to be paid, and all that work has to be done, but none of it has anything to do with taking a kit of electronics parts and soldering them to a PCB. I could go on, but I won't.

 

Regards,

 

John P

 

exactly, and the more rapid the pace of change, the higher the unit costs of that development. That's why industrial espionage, theft of IP, reverse engineering etc are such important subjects. That's why buying obsolete tooling and continuing manufacture of obsolete but still serviceable designs, at a low price, is such a worthwhile area of business. 

 

In my field the comparison would be the end stages of production in declining oil fields by secondary and tertiary operators, who come to fields with no exploration costs, most of the infrastructure in place and the reserves pretty much known. 

 

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sound at exhibitions, an interesting subject. I was thinking this at Peterborough - the sound from the locos etc couldn't compete with the general ambient sound. 

 

The most obvious sounds were the OO Live Steam display and the general clattering from the Hornby O Gauge layout - real world sounds, if you like. 

 

The whistles on my Post War Lionel locos are pretty piercing, but they are also "real world" sounds generated by a small siren in the tender, in effect; they draw as much power as the loco at times! 

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18 hours ago, Tallpaul69 said:

 one thing that does my head in is the lack of standardization in the sockets fitted in "DCC Ready" locos.

But they all use the 'Standard' socket, its just that the 'standard' keeps changing every 5 minutes.

 

As for the price I think its very easy to explain, the suppliers would have priced them to what they think the market will stand to give them maximum return, its called business.

 

Example-

I drive trains for a living, according to some its a very easy job because all I have to do is push a few buttons and pull a few levers, I dont even have to steer the thing, therefore I am overpaid for what is involved, what they dont see or (want to) understand is the amount of training and certification involved plus the ongoing testing, nor the amount of information we have to remember and be able to recall with 100% accuracy 100% of the time, we cant exactly pull out the rule book and start reading what has to be done in what order as the passengers behind the cab door burn to death because we have got our foot on the pass-comm (brake) over-ride button can we!

Edited by royaloak
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4 hours ago, Tallpaul69 said:

Laudable though your products and the effort you have put in are, I don't think the difference between £85 and £100-120 is sufficient to ramp up the demand to carve you more than a niche in a small market.

Now addressing the wider question:-

It seems to me that there will be little increased demand and hobby satisfaction unless the price can be reduced to sub £70.

 

Now I agree that everyone needs to make a living if it is their sole source of income even if they are doing something commercially in a hobby they love.

So how do we get below £70 for a sound chip. Whatever we do the development costs are going to be about the same, but might money be saved by reducing some of the added functions on the chips? Or not sourcing chips from Continental manufacturers?

How about one of our Retailer/model developers putting effort into getting a UK chip made in the far east instead of yet another niche model or duplication (with a few added bells and whistles) of another loco in good supply?

For instance how often does the "crew cooking their breakfast" function get used? Or the wheel squeal or the buffer clank?

I understand that shunting requires a different sound mix to main line running, but might some sounds be better (or cheaper) provided by stationary sound systems?

 

Or looking at it another way, does it really cost £40 per chip (difference between TTS and Locoman), to allow more than 2 functions simultaneously and synchronise the chuffs with the motion of the driving wheels?

What percentage of the time do you honestly use more than 2 functions simultaneously? (if not shunting!)

I find it hard to differentiate between synchronised chuffs and non synchronised chuffs, particularly with trains running at more than a snails pace. But maybe I am just deaf and blind! 

Better go and hide before you lot read the above!!!

 

Cheers

Paul

You can do a lot to reduce cost. You can use a smaller H-bridge, you can drop the comparator for the motor control, you can use a smaller memory, you can use a cheaper 2-channel amplifier, you can drop the 16-bit sound, you can reduce the number of physical outputs, you can use generic sounds from your library, you can do a lot more.

 

And you can have a more strict warranty policy that will reduce costs by (estimated) another 5%.

 

But then you will end up with - yes, a TTS chip.

 

2 functions simultaneously - well its not only the functions, it is the number of parallel running sounds. On sophisticated decoders the drive sound is played on 3 to 5 channels simultaneously (!) without havin any additional sound.

A real good playable whistle requires 2 channels in addition to work correctly.

 

If you refer to the cost of a sound decoder without sound n it, well, Locoman offers Next18 for 67£ and 6-pin for 69£. 

 

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4 hours ago, Tallpaul69 said:

Laudable though your products and the effort you have put in are, I don't think the difference between £85 and £100-120 is sufficient to ramp up the demand to carve you more than a niche in a small market.


Not sure about that, now I know Locoman can produce his quality of work at a general reduction in price due to the decoder being slightly cheaper I know where I’ll be going for my kettle sounds :good_mini:

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4 hours ago, rogerzilla said:

When I've heard sound at exhibitions, it's never struck me as particularly impressive.  Due to small speakers - and there's nothing that can be done about that - it's rather tinny.  Maybe that's how sound would "scale" anyway?  Works a bit better for diesels, since otherwise you miss the idling sound at rest (steam engines make little noise unless moving, just the blower and sometimes the injectors).

 

In N gauge, you'd need to run big mainline diesels throughout in order to have sound fitted to all locos.  Not much change of getting sound into a Class 03 shunter - it's hard enough to squash a normal decoder in there.  Apparently you can't even get sound into a Class 24 or 25.

I believe the problem being that too many “drivers” turn the wick up to try and replicate what they think should be a loud diesel/steam engine, they certainly can be loud standing next to them but when viewed at the kind of scale distances we see them at I believe the sounds should be actually quite quiet to be more than realistic, enough to hear them clearly of course but certainly not as if on the platform!

 

I find with the biggest and better speakers (I prefer the rubber suspended Cone mega bass type) played at a reasonable level they sound clear and quite convincing.

 

 

 

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1 hour ago, royaloak said:

I drive trains for a living, according to some its a very easy job because all I have to do is push a few buttons and pull a few levers, I dont even have to steer the thing, therefore I am overpaid for what is involved, what they dont see or (want to) understand is the amount of training and certification involved plus the ongoing testing, nor the amount of information we have to remember and be able to recall with 100% accuracy 100% of the time, we cant exactly pull out the rule book and start reading what has to be done in what order as the passengers behind the cab door burn to death because we have got our foot on the pass-comm (brake) over-ride button can we!

Piece of cake, my Uncle had to shift 6-7 tons of coal every run.....:lol:

 

The general public just do not realise what a train driver (or whatever the current title is) has to learn and completely memorise to enable them to pass as a driver, and then they have to do it every time they use a new route or class of Loco, when I used to accompany my Uncle (out of the +usually) I was amazed at the information he could just reel off as we travelled along, let alone the new stuff he had to make notes of in the drivers room before departure, I suppose it does become second nature but it’s not like driving a bus every day, that’s for sure!

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2 hours ago, royaloak said:

But they all use the 'Standard' socket, its just that the 'standard' keeps changing every 5 minutes......

 

The standard hasn't changed for 10 years.

It's a failure of RTR manufacturers to apply the standards correctly and continuing to install out-of-date sockets/connectors in new model designs.

 

.

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3 hours ago, boxbrownie said:

Piece of cake, my Uncle had to shift 6-7 tons of coal every run.....:lol:

 

The general public just do not realise what a train driver (or whatever the current title is) has to learn and completely memorise to enable them to pass as a driver, and then they have to do it every time they use a new route or class of Loco, when I used to accompany my Uncle (out of the +usually) I was amazed at the information he could just reel off as we travelled along, let alone the new stuff he had to make notes of in the drivers room before departure, I suppose it does become second nature but it’s not like driving a bus every day, that’s for sure!

 

Actually, I rather think that they mostly DO realise, to varying extents. Enough people are familiar with driving in our at times, quite abominably congested traffic to know that things often aren’t as simple as that. Come to that, don’t be TOO disparaging about (properly licensed) bus drivers, either - although they aren’t at the same level as rail drivers. 

 

Don’t believe everything you read in the papers, in particular, or accept it as representing public opinion. 

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2 hours ago, Ron Ron Ron said:

 

The standard hasn't changed for 10 years.

It's a failure of RTR manufacturers to apply the standards correctly and continuing to install out-of-date sockets/connectors in new model designs.

 

.

I never realised the next21 was the standard decoder 10 years not that I am up on all this DCC stuff.

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24 minutes ago, rockershovel said:

 

Actually, I rather think that they mostly DO realise, to varying extents. Enough people are familiar with driving in our at times, quite abominably congested traffic to know that things often aren’t as simple as that. Come to that, don’t be TOO disparaging about (properly licensed) bus drivers, either - although they aren’t at the same level as rail drivers. 

 

Don’t believe everything you read in the papers, in particular, or accept it as representing public opinion. 

Well I am not sure they do, surely the drivers just sits there pushes the lever forward and stops when he sees a red light :rolleyes:

 

As for disparaging bus drivers, I merely pointed out the difference, as you did also.

 

Why do you say “don’t believe everything you read in the newspapers”? I don’t believe I even mentioned newspapers at all.......odd one that.......then again I don’t read newspapers and know all about them as I started my career on the local rag and then Fleet Street for a couple of years, so I know what to believe :lol:

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On ‎18‎/‎01‎/‎2020 at 19:31, boxbrownie said:

Well I am not sure they do, surely the drivers just sits there pushes the lever forward and stops when he sees a red light :rolleyes:

 

As for disparaging bus drivers, I merely pointed out the difference, as you did also.

 

Why do you say “don’t believe everything you read in the newspapers”? I don’t believe I even mentioned newspapers at all.......odd one that.......then again I don’t read newspapers and know all about them as I started my career on the local rag and then Fleet Street for a couple of years, so I know what to believe :lol:

And the relevance of this to the cost of Sound chips??

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4 hours ago, Tallpaul69 said:

And the relevance of this to the cost of Sound chips??

About as relevant as your query about the relevance but this is RmWeb, the readers expect, nay DEMAND a topic wander at LEAST three times per page

 

:jester:

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46 minutes ago, Mattc6911 said:

About as relevant as your query about the relevance but this is RmWeb, the readers expect, nay DEMAND a topic wander at LEAST three times per page

 

:jester:

Three times?  Yes about correct.......you all welcome for my contribution :mocking_mini:

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2 hours ago, Mattc6911 said:

About as relevant as your query about the relevance but this is RmWeb, the readers expect, nay DEMAND a topic wander at LEAST three times per page

 

:jester:

If I took your post seriously, I would ask your evidence for your assertion readers LIKE topic wander!

 

However, as it clearly isn't serious I will say Ha Ha, now lets move on with the topic of this thread.

If you are not interested in the topic then please move to another thread.

 

You will probably say to me "Move on yourself", why should I, do you realise if you did say that then your so called humour could be interpreted as BULLYING!!! 

 

Getting back to the cost of chips, an earlier post suggested that if we start stripping features out of full priced chips than we end up with TTS.

Not so, I suggest there is room for something in the middle between TTS and full priced sound chips at say c£70?

 

What do others think?

 

If you agree with me,  post which features are MUST HAVE and which could be LEFT OUT ?

 

Best regards (even to the jokers!!)

Paul

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Zimo sound decoders are sold with sounds already loaded.  Not so ESU sound decoders.  However both suppliers provide free of charge a variety of steam and diesel sounds to download but it is necessary to have access to the relevant programmers.  Interestingly both suppliers have a very small number of British sounds against a multitude of European and USA sounds.  The sound decoders are becoming more sophisticated thus allowing  the purveyor of sounds to take advantage of the hardware and software available.  If one does not want to pay the £15 to £22 for the sounds to be loaded I would suggest looking at traders who provide sounds loaded to the decoders, such as Coastal DCC and certain Digitrains sounds.  Not so long ago "reblows" cost around £10 to £12 compared to the £20+ now being charged.  The costs to record are the same but the charges to the punter have increased double fold, I wonder why.

 

Mike

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48 minutes ago, Tallpaul69 said:

Getting back to the cost of chips, an earlier post suggested that if we start stripping features out of full priced chips than we end up with TTS.

Not so, I suggest there is room for something in the middle between TTS and full priced sound chips at say c£70?

 

What do others think?

 

A sound chip priced at around £70 - what about the Soundtraxx Econami - https://soundtraxx.com/products/econami-digital-sound-decoders?

 

These are for sale on Hattons at £67 - https://www.hattons.co.uk/265560/soundtraxx_stx882106_econami_sound_decoder_uk_diesel_21_pin/stockdetail.aspx?gclid=Cj0KCQiAvJXxBRCeARIsAMSkApq6RI_4roQoUlYvMR6APTlRhqKLmp2CRc8g1w2LyB1N50gvoQ7euGQaAibvEALw_wcB.

 

I suspect from the specification that these are better than Hornby TTS (I don't have any to make a comparison), but hits that mid-range price point.

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On 17/01/2020 at 01:52, legomanbiffo said:


 

In that case I feel you need to stretch your imagination a bit further :-) If it was so easy then why are there not dozens of sound programmers producing competing high quality sound chips at knock-down prices? Let us explore the path involved in bringing high qualty  loco sounds to market;

 

You need to invest in a high quality, multi-channel solid state recording device. Two actually, in case one fails on the day you paid £1000 to record a loco. Ditto with microphones, cables, boom poles etc.

 

You need a few years experience to work out where to put those mics to obtain the best, representative sound. Experience = cost, time, effort, mistakes etc 

 

You need to arrange access to the loco. If you worked in the industry you might be able to arrange free access to a handful of classes but to nurture the relationships that enable access to an extensive range of prototypes takes considerable time, effort and expense.

 

You often need to pay considerable sums to facilitate said access, four-figure sums are not uncommon in the case of preserved railways.

 

You need to travel to the venue, which might be at the other end of the country, and stay overnight to allow an early start. So then you’re paying for an evening meal and breakfast. And possibly a second night if you don’t want to travel home after an early start and a full day’s recording at the other end of the country.

 

And what if you do all that and the loco fails or is otherwise unusable on the day? That’s happened to me more than once. Imagine driving 200 miles, staying overnight, turning up at 0900 only to find that a simple breakdown in communication between two people at the railway had left the loco in bits for maintenance on the day you were supposed to be recording it?

 

Spend all day capturing the various sounds. Sometimes two days if you have to capture the static sounds separately for whatever reason. 

 

When you get home, back up the several Gb of data you’ve obtained onto multiple drives including offsite ones, to mitigate against losing your hard-earned raw material and livelihood if there was a failure.

 

Listen to hours of recordings to identify the usable bits.

 

Chop up the raw recordings into the small clips necessary to load onto the chip. Around 250 of them in the case of a sophisticated project like the Hattons 66. Edit each and every one of them so that it merges seamlessly with its neighbours.

 

Design a flowchart for the individual sound that mimics the operation of the prototype (so that your Class 56 compressor changes over once a minute for example, or your Javelin can change from overhead 25kV to third rail and back again with the correct sounds at each stage).

 

Add any sounds or functionality that’s changed over the years in the prototype (eg mk4 coaches; at least three combinations of door opening and closing mechanisms and beepers, HST’s; 3 different engine types and several different cooler groups, 08’s; replacement metal doors that sound completely different to the wooden originals, and so on).

 

Buy the target model if you don’t already have one. Think about that one for a moment. Every single new model that comes out you have to buy or borrow to allow you to set up the chip to suit the mechanism, lights, inertia etc.

 

Load the sounds into the model and test everything. Set up the inertia so the model accelerates as fast as the prototype and has the correct top speed. Set the lights to be as dim or bright as the prototype. Configure the various lighting modes. Set the individual sound volumes to be in proportion to one another. Make everything loud enough.

 

Repeat all of the above for the N gauge and O gauge model...

 

Then when your chip is on sale there’s the workload involved in supporting customers who rightly expect knowledgeable answers to a vast array of questions they might have. What’s the best speaker? How do I set the CV’s to do this or that? Will it work with this or that controller?

 

I could go on but hopefully this gives you some idea of the effort involved?

 

It is a fact of life that the cost of making something has no relation to how people (or the market is there are lots of the item ) value the resulting item. Those of us who make stuff just have to live with that.  Or employ marketing geniuses. 

 

Andy

 

 

 

 

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47 minutes ago, tarifa said:

 

Zimo sound decoders are sold with sounds already loaded.  Not so ESU sound decoders.  However both suppliers provide free of charge a variety of steam and diesel sounds to download but it is necessary to have access to the relevant programmers. 

Actually ESU usually come with a default diesel sound file and most people selling them will upload the file, from the ESU library, of your choice for free. Coastal and SWD have supplied me with default chips or pre-loaded at the same cost. Even though I have a programmer I usually ask for the file I intend to use to be loaded but I have swapped chips around and uploaded my own when reblowing or customising a file. 

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1 hour ago, Dungrange said:

 

A sound chip priced at around £70 - what about the Soundtraxx Econami - https://soundtraxx.com/products/econami-digital-sound-decoders?

 

These are for sale on Hattons at £67 - https://www.hattons.co.uk/265560/soundtraxx_stx882106_econami_sound_decoder_uk_diesel_21_pin/stockdetail.aspx?gclid=Cj0KCQiAvJXxBRCeARIsAMSkApq6RI_4roQoUlYvMR6APTlRhqKLmp2CRc8g1w2LyB1N50gvoQ7euGQaAibvEALw_wcB.

 

I suspect from the specification that these are better than Hornby TTS (I don't have any to make a comparison), but hits that mid-range price point.

Unfortunately these are only available for a limited number of Diesels, and no steam:-

Class 20

Class 31

Class 37

Class 47

Class 66/67

First Generation DMU

(According to Hattons web site)

 

So a possibility if you wand any of the above.

They also have the advantage (or not!) depending on your view of not having a speaker supplied.

 

So they have their place, what do others think?

 

Cheers

Paul

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11 minutes ago, Tallpaul69 said:

Unfortunately these are only available for a limited number of Diesels, and no steam:-

 

If you want steam, then there is this one - same price, just with UK steam rather than diesel sounds loaded - https://www.hattons.co.uk/265559/soundtraxx_stx881106_econami_sound_decoder_uk_steam_21_pin/stockdetail.aspx?gclid=Cj0KCQiAvJXxBRCeARIsAMSkApq9GGjPHKrcw8xOXz9i_-1q2gMu2EpCXcUTODVMKZaFaO5Z79ygY-caAqGWEALw_wcB

 

The issue is that it's perhaps too generic for some and doesn't capture the distinctive sound of a particular prototype, but then if you want a fully customizable decoder that can play back a diverse range of sounds of Hi-Fi quality from a library of 'correct' sounds collected from the prototype then you reach the ESU / Zimo price point.

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39 minutes ago, Dungrange said:

...

The issue is that it's perhaps too generic for some and doesn't capture the distinctive sound of a particular prototype, but then if you want a fully customizable decoder that can play back a diverse range of sounds of Hi-Fi quality from a library of 'correct' sounds collected from the prototype then you reach the ESU / Zimo price point.

Yes and no because that is exactly where you will find Locoman's D&H decoders.

For £ 85.

(Unfortunately, the vast library of sounds is still missing)

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