Capacitors and lights.

[driverod]

I have a new Spectrum 2-8-2 DCC equipped engine. Due to poor running I had to cut capactior C-1 out of the system, this made the engine run very smooth with a Digitrax DH163 decoder but I lost the forward headlight.
When I cut capacitor C-2 it runs even better but then I lost the reverse light.
What do I need to do to regain use of the lights?
Thanks,
Don

[richg]

The best that I can tell is you cut more than the capacitor. Use a magnifying glass and look very closely at the PC board.

Rich

[Jim Banner]

At this point, you might want to replace the lights with 12 volt grain-of-wheat bulbs wired directly to the decoder.  Even better, use white LEDs and appropriate resistors.  "Appropriate" is usually about 1000 ohms, 1/4 watt, connected in series with one or the other LED lead.  Operation without the resistor, even momentarily, will destroy the LED and/or the decoder.  And remember that LEDs are polarity sensitive - if they fail to work one way, reverse the leads and try again.

Jim