Tickplan Posted December 30, 2014 Share Posted December 30, 2014 I wonder if someone could help shed some light (no pun intended) I am having with some coach lighting. I have these installed in two Midland push pull coaches which are arranged either side of the loco. Each coach has an LED lighting strip which is wired via a DCC Concepts "Flicker free" unit and controlled (On-off) by a TCS function decoder set to the same number as the loco. This is arranged (mapped) so that when the headlights button on the NCE Powercab is toggled the lights go on and off. So far so good. the problem is that the lights are intermittent when the train is running. Pick up is arranged using Gibson wheels shorted out to one side on one bogie and the other side on the second. The lights turn on and off OK but when running along the track they go on and off intermittently. I know the flicker-free units work because when I pick the coach up off the track the lights stay on for anything like 20 minutes. At first I was convinced there was some sort of short and did detect sparks from where the brake blocks were too close to the wheels but I have checked these over meticulously and am sure I have eliminated that problem. By the way I have made sure that the loco body is neutral: running the coaches on their own along the track also recreates the problem. Does anyone have any ideas what may be the problem? Thanks in advance. Bryan Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
Tickplan Posted January 2, 2015 Author Share Posted January 2, 2015 Thanks for the suggestion. I will have a look to see. However, the problem is replicated on both coaches - and they work independently of each other. In other words if that was the source of the problem it would also have to be happening in the set up of both coaches. That seems unlikely. Does anyome have a similar arrangement to mine that works? Bryan Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
RMweb Gold trw1089 Posted January 13, 2015 RMweb Gold Share Posted January 13, 2015 Hi Bryan I just noticed this topic and was wondering how you are coupling these coaches together. If you use any sort of metal couplers, you can inadvertently cause a short if you have the live side of the bogie on opposite sides on each coach. I had this happen previously with some brass locos double heading and took me ages to figure out the problem. The other issue may be body roll causing a short when the tops of the "non-live" wheels touch the live body (if it is live for one side). Cheers Tony Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
Adrian Wintle Posted January 13, 2015 Share Posted January 13, 2015 I'd be looking at the feed to the decoder. If it is seeing intermittent pick up issues it may be dropping out occasionally and turning off the light function until the next refresh command arrives to turn them back on. Adrian Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
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