Zimo Stay alive not working

[Dan Griffin]

Hi

 

A few years ago, i bought a Zimo sound decoder fitted with a 2 second stay alive capacitor for my Bachmann class 40 from the Peterborough show off a guy called Paul Chetter, and it runs nicely and sounds better! but i have only realised in the last week or so that the stay alive that was provided doesn't seem to work. It only came to light after looking at the stay alive inside my Accurascale 92. When I lift that off the rails the sounds carry's on for around 5 seconds. when I lift the 40 off, the sound stops immediately, showing the stay alive is not working. 

 

i have been told it is possible that the stay alive is not activated and i should alter a CV to turn it on. can anyone advise which CV i need to alter to try and activate it?

 

thanks in advance

 

Dan

[LMSfan72]

I believe Paul is on this forum @pauliebanger. He is far more expert than me... The only reference I can see to stay-alives in the manual is where it can be disabled on an MX645 decoder. Do you know which Zimo decoder you have - I am assuming since it's a few years old that it is not an MS series?

 

ONLY ZIMO-Config. 4 SW version 33.14 and higher

CV #394

values 0 - 255

 

Bit 0 = 1: switch. sparks on ELEC. locos on FO6.

Bit 1 = 1: turn Beilhack Schneeschleuder on FO2

Bit 2 = 1: I2C onSUSI output.

Bit 3 = 1: deactivate stay-alive unit with GPIOC on MX645

Bit 4 = 1: acceleration depends on range between current and target state

Bit 5 = 1: fade steam chuffs64

Bit 6 = 1: inhibit accel. when braking key is active

Bit 7 = 1: thyristor sound starts before departure

 

So, assuming you have it disabled in this way - and it's the correct decoder and software version on it - then you could subtract 8 from the value of CV 394. Obviously if CV 394 is already 0 then it's not disabled...

[peterm1]

How many years ago? It might only be a small capacitance to stop the sound cutting out on a dirty piece of track. You can now buy stay alive units (I use Kung Fu brand) with much more storage. I have a class 40 as well and it's not fitted with a stay alive as it has such good current collection from the wheels, so maybe not worth bothering about.