jamesed

Maybe start with a reset which is cv8=4 for Lais / Imperium. That will clear anything odd like consist settings etc. which can affect speed settings. With the Lais cv set you must have cv29 set to 128 speed steps for 3 point speed curves. Your cv29 value of 6 indicates that you have 128 steps enabled and dc running enabled. Just for now, try turning dc off and set cv29 to a value of 2. If you want dc on then you can go back and change it later once you have got the speed steps for dcc correct. Next, you must have a value other than zero (which is the default) for all of CVs 2, 5 &6. CV values need to be in the range of 1-255. So, start maybe with cv2=2, cv5=160 and cv6=60. See how that works and adjust as required.

I'd recommend a Roco z21 Start system that comes with a wired Multimaus (which has a knob!) but is fully upgradeable at a later date if you want to take advantage of wifi and mobile app options. At £234 for the set it's a bit of a bargain. They appear to be out of stock in most places at the moment but no doubt will be available again soon.

I'm inclined to agree with @chiefpenguin Some 13A wall sockets just aren't built as well as others (MK and Crabtree are pretty good but some of the cheaper ones just aren't as good quality and don't stand up to misuse so well). It's possible that with the weight of the psu the pins are pushing up at an angle and there is a bit of arcing going on in the socket, which, over time, will get worse and could be dangerous. This could be causing spikes which aren't being picked up fully on the monitoring app but may be what has caused the decoder damage. First off, don't plug this psu directly into a wall socket. Use an extension lead with a loose trailing socket so it can plug in without stress on the pins. It would be worth inspecting the plug pins first to make sure there is no damage or carbon build up due to arcing. The other option is to replace it with the more common psu type as shown in the photo Iain posted but that may not be necessary. On the other hand, there may be nothing wrong at all with the psu or controller and the problem may originate elsewhere.

Easiest way is to get a prepaid visa card or mastercard. You can get them at Post Offices or Tesco and a number of other shops I think and just top up using cash. Often the card is supplied free but you may have to show ID to get one. Once you've got it you can use it in the same way as any other card, online, paypal etc. with the same security protection. Usually you can manage the cash balance and see payments using a phone app. It doesn't need to be linked to your bank account.

Are you using the Roco power supply? I ask because you mention using a 19v psu. The Roco supplied power supplies are normally 20v or 18v. I'm wondering if you are using a psu that doesn't have a regulated output.

This is a frequently discussed topic of discussion and you will receive a lot of recommendations. For what it's worth, my opinion is that one should question why anyone would buy a NCE system which is a 30 year old design using old technology and has a number of known shortcomings. However, it appears they still have plenty of customers. I'd go a bit further and ask why anyone these days would buy any control system that relies upon remembering dcc address numbers and then having to punch them into a keypad. I have a Roco Z21 system, like plenty of others on this forum, which I think is fantastic in pretty much every respect for me. It offers the latest technology and I find operating through a mobile device app works well for me. Some prefer to use it with a Multimaus device that has a knob to drive trains and you have that choice or a combination of the two. The Z21 can cope with all the expansion options you can think of. If you don't think the Z21 is for you then I'd seriously recommend looking at the new Ace Signatrack 3 which, although perhaps not quite as advanced as the Z21 appears to be a great design using modern technology.

The information about litigation, and the relationship between Lais and the other chap in China who makes Lais clone decoders is all quite interesting. I recall reading about it on this forum (but before anyonde asks, no I can't provide a link) but surely none of this is relevant. We're all quite capable of seeing that the performace derived from using a Lais decoder falls short compared with a quality brand and even mid priced brands. I've certainly seen the difference between Lais and Zimo which backs up that well known phrase "you get what you pay for". If you're on a tight budget and are prepared to compromise on performance then why not use Lais. They work, in their own way, and are cheap, and they meet the demand at that end of the market. A bit like when you go to Tesco and you have the choice of the "Tesco Value" range or the "Tesco Taste the Difference" range, both may satisfy your hunger but one will have more flavour and be more satisfying - if you are happy to oay a bit extra. I use Lais decoders for accessory switching and they are great for that but I'd never put one in a loco. That's my choice and one that I know a lot of other people share but that choice isn't in the slightest bit influenced by whatever international litigation may have taken place in the past.

Ditto. Both my Z21 and my club's Z21 use the default settings and I've never found there to be any need to change that. The default trip time seems to be just about as right as it could be. There's a lot to be said for interchangeability. Because there is no layout programming stored in the Z21 itself you can always swap one unit over for another if using default settings. Quite recently we lent our club Z21 to Peco for a couple of days as they had a problem with a Z21 being used on a demonstration layout. It was a seemless swap for them and got them back up and running quickly. Using the Z21 and Z21 App is extremely intuitive despite being a very powerful control system, given its capabilities.

There does seem to be a lot of nonsense spouted around the internet about dcc track voltages. The advice given here by Iain and John is all you need to know. The default voltage on the Z21 is 18v and that works fine for all the common gauges Z to O. If you turn it down then you may find that Railcom doesn't work properly and you won't be able to read decoders on POM. I found this out to my puzzlement when I couldn't use POM on my club layout and after wasting considerable time trying to find out why I discovered someone had turned the track voltage output down to 12v. Once back up to 18v it worked fine. Anyone who is tempted to buy a Z21XL, to benefit from the higher current rating, beware that this unit has a fixed output at 20v that can't be adjusted.

The manual is actually quite helpful but skip through the first sections and start following at section 6. Before you do anything else you need to set the addresses using the program button mode 1 (and mode 2 if you want outputs 5-8 in a different sequence) . Once you've done that you can move on to the POM method of programming CVs to set up how each output operates using CVs 41-48 as Iain has described above. It's all quite straightforward if you follow the instructions.

I also use these, or very similar, and I completely agree. Very easy to adjust and use for all types of wire from tiny fine led wires to 2.5mm bus wire.

In reply to @dj_efk . . . As the previous two posts have pointed out, there are plenty of options for controlling a Z21 with a handset that has a knob. The wireless Maus is the obvious option but not the only one. However, you mentioned in your first post that you are building your layout for you and your children; I suggest that they would be more than pleased to operate a train using a phone app. That technology seems to be second nature to anyone aged 8 up. Who knows you might find, in due course, that you come to like it too. When I bought my Z21 system I bought it as a package with a wifi Maus supplied too. I can honestly say that my Mause hasn't been used for the last 18 months. I use a combination of 10" tablets and phones and don't yearn for anything else. The tablets are very useful but for mobility I can control a single train very easily one handed with a phone. If you have, like most of us do, old phones lying around then simply do a factory reset, connect to your home wifi and download the Z21 app. For your children you only need to load into the app the trains that you want to allow them to drive. They won't be able to do anything else with the correct settings. I suggest you download the app (free) and play with it. It works without being connected to a Z21, except for the programming screens, so you can see what it's all about. If you really want something with a knob, and cost isn't the driving force, then have a look at the LoDi-Con which is a great and fully up to date bit of kit. It works with a Z21 too.

Providing your decoders are NMRA Standard compliant then ensuring that bit 2 in cv29 is on will allow your locos to run on dc. The actual value of cv29 will depend on other settings within that cv. Use this online calculator to determine the required value for cv29. The best thing is to read your current cv29 value first and use the back calculation to view the current settings. Then switch on bit 2 if you need to and reprogram the new value of cv29. It's quite likely that you won't need to do anything as bit 2 is usually active by default in a new decoder so unless you've previously turned it off it's probably already on.

I guess the question here is how did you measure the voltage and was there a motor load on the track when you did?

@flockandroll, firstly, congratulations on buying one of the most powerful, versatile and user friendly DCC control systems on the market. The Z21 will do everything you need it to do and, in time, you'll find it easy and intuitive to use. However, There's no point in owning a Porsche if you've never learnt to drive. Similarly you're going to need to read up a bit on understanding the principles of dcc before you can start to understand what CVs do, how they work and the values required to set them up. If you have a local model railway club go along and join. You'll most likely find several friendly and willing members who'll spend a bit of time explaining it all to you. Once you have a good basic level of understanding of how dcc works, go onto Youtube and watch some of the many videos which will show you how to use your Z21. There are some really helpful videos which will help you see what to do. Setting up your layout (no need to use the pre-installed demo layout), adding vehicles (locomotives), programming CVs, understanding the difference between program track and programming on main, setting up and using functions. It's all much easier than it sounds and you'll pick it up quickly. Just make sure you are using the right app - it's the one that has an icon button with a completely black background with Z21 in white (see image below). With a Z21, it really doesn't matter what 'address' you set for your locos because, unlike with most other controllers, you are never goiing to need to enter that number again once you've set it up (if you are using the app to drive trains). You use your phone or tablet to take a photo of your loco, upload that into the Z21, add a typed in descriptive name (or the loco cab number for example) into the app and from then on you identify and select your locos from the visual image and name. For simplicity I suggest you start at address 11 (cv1 value) and work upwards from there when allocating a short address to your locos. Don't worry about long addresses for now, you can move on to that in the future should you need to.

Wise words Steve. Both @Nigelcliffe and @WIMorrison have amassed a huge amount of knowledge and experience and give a lot of their time to providing good, helpful and constructive advice to others on this forum and others. They are also good at identifying the question one may not have asked but gets to the root of the issue which helps both the OP and many others who read a thread. I have certainly learnt a lot from both of them over a period of time. They deserve respect. I've learnt something in this thread thanks to their posts. Like Iain, I don't use stayalives, preferring to concentrate on getting my track and wiring right, but it's something I may explore in the future (for Rolls-Royce running - to quote Nigel) so learning about the cv settings for run on times is helpful. Thanks for the info guys.

I'm sure your wiring discipline is excellent Iain. Have you tried swapping one of them out for a new one? I had one that kept reprogramming itself so I swapped it for a brand new one - same position, same wiring etc. - and it worked fine. I sent it back to DCC Concepts under warranty and they replaced it without question. I'm pretty sure the fault was with the contacts on the program switch and I read of someone else who had a similar issue that was caused by that. I keep a spare motor ready to swap out if I have a problem. Luckily, other than that one, I've only had one other problem and that was relating to the frog chageover switch failing on one side. I'd recommend to anyone with IPDs to keep a spare. It's easy then to swap over and sort out the warranty repair or replacement which, to be fair to DCC Concepts, they deal with efficiently and it's a lifetime warranty too.

Actually that's not quite right for the current version of the IP Digital but may have been correct for the older original versions. In idle mode they only draw up to 5mA and during operation up to 40mA. In most cases you're unlikely to be changing more than, say, 4 sets of points simultaneously so realistically that's only a maximum draw of 240mA or just under a quarter of an amp across the whole layout. However, I do agree with Iain that there is a lot of sense in adding more power capability. Multiple power zones are a good way of achieving this if you don't want a separate accessory bus for you point motors. My N gauge layout has 34 Cobalt IP Digital motors all of which run from the main track bus, albeit split into two power zones. I wanted to retain the S2 relay outputs for controlling signals and other accessories so that was the reasoning for my choice. I understand the benefit of running motors from an accessory bus and if I was running an exhibition layout then it would be helpful but I don't find it to be a problem and luckily don't have fault conditions where that would help very often. I guess having a Z21 system where clear track routes are highlighted in green on the screen in front of me helps minimise the chance of trying to drive a train into points set against it. So, what I'm saying is that it's fine to run your IPDs from the track bus if that suits you but give careful consideration to splitting it into two or three power zones. Keeping your fiddle yard as a separate power zone would certainly be worthwhile. Whilst you should be congratulated on your neat wiring, I am a little concerned about the potential risk of inductive interference. I assume you have used something like 16/0.2 wire and you have grouped them together in reasonable length runs. Whilst IPDs are great, they are susceptible to reprogramming themselves if they suffer from transient voltages caused by inductive interference which can result from activation of other motors. It's recommended to keep dcc droppers to no more than 250-300mm length max. I've ensured that all my IPD dropper pairs are separated from other motor feed pairs and are soldered directly to the bus with short runs (typically about 200mm). I've not had a problem with mine (except for one that I'm sure had a faulty program switch that was replaced under warranty) but if you read through the posts on the DCC Concepts forum you'll see plenty of people have suffered from problems caused by wiring deficiencies.

Very simple. Multimeter set to AC Volts range anything above 20 (probably 200). One probe to the centre of the frog and the other probe to the stock rail to which the switch blade isn't touching. If you get a volts reading (likely between 13 and 18 volts) then the phase polarity is correct. If you read zero then it's wrong. Then throw the point and do the same thing again to check that it has reversed. Maybe just test first by reading across two rails to make sure your multimeter is reading the voltage ok. On a N Unifrog the powered frog section is very small at the V so make sure you get your probe in the right place.

A cheap multimeter will never give an accurate result on dcc but a reading of 5.5v sounds low to me. I'm not sure where this notion of reading a half wave comes from. On my layout (controlled by a Z21) I know that the track voltage is 18v but my multimeter reads about 17.1v (using the 200v ac range setting). On our club layout I get a reading of 16.9v. If I were you I'd try another meter and hopefully find that you can read 11+ volts. If not, then start looking for wiring problems or deficiencies which might be creating high impendence issues.

I'm quite surprised that you feel it necessary to fit a stayalive to this model. They're pretty good runners anyway. I have two GF Class 57s (effectively the same model) both with a Zimo MX617 decoders fitted and they run very well. Maybe check that you haven't got a problem with the pickups first. If the loco is fine then you may need to look more closely at your layout to see why you are experiencing problems. Using a stayalive as an elastoplast is never the best solution.

I think it's all part of the worlwide component shortage and securing production time at the factory in China. Drop them an email and ask. I find they are always helpful in responding. They may even pick up on this thread and you'll get a reply from @DCCconcepts .

The DCC Concepts products are filtering through in small batches but most suppliers have back orders to fulfill which is why they don't often appear as being available. If you are happy to wait a short while then if you order direct from DCC Concepts you will get them the quickest. They fulfil their own back orders before sending new stock out to dealers. However you will have to pay the full price wheras most dealers discount by about 15%. It might also be worth talking to DCC Concepts at the Warley show in case they've held back some stock to sell there.

I don't really understand this thread. You have already received good advice in your previous thread including advice that is specific to your application using Cobalt point motors. In any case, with a Unifrog point it's all irrelevant anyway. The whole point of Unifrogs is that the blades are already bonded out of the box. You can see that in the picture you have posted, therefore any further modification is completely unnecessary. You even already have a frog wire attached (which will need extending) for wiring straight to either S1-frog or S2C on your Cobalt IP Digital. Just remove the spring from the points, extend the frog wire (and maybe add a bit of heat shrink over the bare wire) and you're good to go.

Ok, so on our Club layout we have used Peco Code 80 Electrofrog points and Cobalt IP Digitals without any modification, other than a wire soldered on for a frog feed, and they work fine. Out of the box the blades of the point are wired to the frog. So, if you power the frog from the frog output on your motor then both the frog and the blades will be powered without relying upon any physical contact. However, you do have do be careful when wiring up because if the phase on the frog output is wrong you'll immediately get a short. Obviously this is easily corrected by swapping the dcc power input wires over. Because the frog power switches over at the mid point of travel (with a brief off position during the changeover) you should always be ok in the phasing switching whilst there is no physical contact between the blades and the stock rail. You do need to make sure that your Cobalt throw wires are centrally lined up ok. This works fine and I can confirm this from practical experience with 22 sets of points and CIPDs. The only caveat to this is that I have heard of reports of people having problems running very old locomotives through the points with larger wheel flanges. However, with modern rolling stock (by modern probably up to about 30 years old) you shouldn't experience any problems.