marowicz

Yes, Soundtraxx, Zimo, CT Elektronic, Loksound ESU to name a few.

Funny you should mention glue, I have a distinct impression that some of the failures are due to a sufficient quantity of glue. I've had a couple of bits fall off at the slightest touch and looking at them closely, 'glue' doesn seem to be present in what I would use in those situations. BTW thanks for all the investigative and remedial info. Much appreciated. I had a slight accident with my 'Exe' when I was milling out the body for a sound decoder, nothing that cannot be fixed but I'm having to find a paint match for the green. It WILL go in. Mark K

The short answer is 'no' if it's a motor decoder. The CV's for things like acceleration, direction of travel and lights are set in NMRA stone and I believe that most if not all manufacturers are compliant, certainly the main brands are. However when it comes to sound decoders it's like the wild west and as the NMRA didn't get a chance to rule on which CV should be allocated to which sound it was a case of every man(unfacturer) for himself. Now, with the introduction of indexed CV's it's getting even wilder! Mark K

The NMRA spec requires the command station to shut down when it sees a short. But it then tries to start up again, if the short remains it shuts down again and so on. However if the wiring is not of sufficient gauge, the resistance in the wiring will prevent a complete shut down. Using too long a cable between the PCP and a PowerCab will create this problem.

Not a PowerCab but I had an NCE ProCab destroy itself because it was left on with a short present. What happens is that the output circuit eventually overheats and melts down if its left trying to restart and then immediately shuting down. Smelt bad when it went but it was repairable. Not sure that either the car brake light circuit nor a DCC CB would have made a difference. Basically never leave a short unsorted. Mark K