I bought a 82716 Spectrum series DCC equipped Pennsylvania RR locomotive at a train show over the weekend. I paid and unfortunately did not get a receipt. The equipment was marked as new, and all of the papers including the registration card were in the box. All of the packing was included, and there was not reason for me to expect that the piece had been used.

When I got home to try it out, it would barely run. I have to the power up to full blast to get it to move at all with either my DC or DCC transformer.

Do I have any way to get this item repaired? As it is it is useless.

I found that the best way to match colors was to start with one of the paint palette kits and mix it yourself. I much prefer the latex paint to the enamel because it is much easier to work with it. One tip is that it takes a lot less of the dark colors like blue, than it does the lighter colors like yellow. If you have an eye for color, you'd be surprised what you can do.   

"I appreciate your seeing my point regarding the skill needed to build those 2 nice layouts and my question about the ability for Bill to solve his problems."

The answer is quite simple. I bought a book about  setting up scenery at the hobby store. Woodland Scenics also markets starter kits that provide instructions and opportunities to experiment to see what looks good or authentic.

And let's face it. It's a lot easier to spread or spray glue and cover it with the grass and soil stuff, or build a tunnel with newspapers, Styrofoam, plaster cloth, paint, and grass and soil stuff than it is take an engine apart or even put together a coupler assembly. When I get to the point of working with small parts, it's like my fingers seem to grow ten times in size. And when disassembling something is not intuitive to me, I get gun shy because I know the chances are good that I will not be able to reassemble it the way it was.

You guys who have mechanical find it so easy. My talents lie in the ability to grade antiques, spot counterfeits and deduce if something has been altered from its original state. People ask, "How can you do that?" My answer is 55 years of experience plus some innate ability that through the years I've learned that other people don't have. I received that gift or talent, but mechanical stuff is beyond me.

I have infinite respect for the guy who can fix my car, the plumbing in my house or build a great kitchen cabinet. I know how a car engine works and what the parts do so that I can usually tell the mechanic what's wrong, but I could no more fix it than fly to the moon without rocket. I don't why some college educated people look down on those who are in the trades. They have my respect. Sure I graduated from college with a couple of degrees, but I can't do what they do very well.

My parents pushed the concept that you were supposed to be good at everything. I found that that template was a recipe that could lead to ulcers and psychotherapy. From my studies of economics I've learned specialization and taking advantage of the freedom to find your own path led to success. 

And by the way, thanks for your posts, guys. I've learned a lot about DCC. As for couplers, that's another story.

"So why then, restrict yourself by relying on getting your items and info from there?"

As I said before getting to the train store from where I live is close to all day project. The main contacts I have had with them was to work on a group of vintage Bachmann Pennsylvania Railroad passenger cars that I bought off of eBay. I'd been looking for these cars for years, and finally found them there. They needed work in the interior lighting and other stuff, which I can't do. I have no mechanical ability what so ever. I can write articles for (other) hobby magazines that get published, and I can build kits. But it when it comes to taking something apart, like those cars to work on them, all I'd just tear them up.

I know Bachmann issued some new Pennsylvania cars this years, but this group included stuff like the observation and baggage combine cars, which not in the new Bachmann line-up.

I might add that this hobby seems to be in trouble. The people who run the train store are older and past the usual retirement age. Recently my brother-in-law sold a very large number of O gage engines and other equipment from the estate of a recently deceased uncle by marriage. The deceased train collector thought that he had $100,000 collection, which he had at one time considered leaving to a major operation like the Baltimore Railroad Museum. The collection filled a POD. My bother-in-law got $15,000 for it, and the company that bought it said that they doubted they would be in business five years from now because market is so weak. I have noticed this in other hobbies as well. The young people just don't seem to collect things any more.

The analog controller is a TECH MRC 260 "Model Rectifier Corp."

As might be expected the couplers on the "carpet track" pose more problems than they do on my main layout. The reasons are that "carpet track" requires a run out period to get rid of all the bugs between the track sections, and even after that is done it still moves slightly when the equipment rolls over it. That will result in uncoupling.

My main layout is Atlas track tacked to Woodland Scenics track bed with ballast glued around the edges. That is very solid, but there are still cars that won't stay coupled on it. Most of the time car in back of the first one has coupler lift when it is pulled. I have tightened the screws as tight as they can go. The only solution would be something in the coupler casing to make it stay straight, but good luck on finding something that works for that at the local hobby store.

The worst "carpet track" problem I have left is the connection between the GG-1 engine and the first passenger car. Though trial and error I have able to line up the passenger cars in a certain sequence, with numbers on them to keep them in order, so that they stay together. The problem between the GG-1 and the first passenger car makes that combination a non starter so the passenger train is pulled by the "A and B" freight units. So much for realism.

You guys talk about gaskets and height gages, but the people at the average hobby store don't carry that stuff, and most of them have no idea what it is. When your bread and butter is motorized cars and airplanes and model trains are only a sideline that's the way it is. Like I said the only store in the area is 60 miles away. It's run by some fine people, but getting there is a half day's project given the traffic, which has been getting worse and worse in the Tampa area.

Thank you for your response.

I bought all of those engines new with DCC already installed on them. I did get the GG-1 programed to position #1 and was able to get the engine sound going, but not all of the features. I can get the bell and the horn, but that's it. There is a list of sound features that came on a piece of paper with the unit, but I can't get them all to work. Oddly enough the headlights do not work on any of the DCC engines although they do work on the non DCC pieces.

So far as my DCC transformer goes, there is a label which reads, "Item # 44901" on the bottom. The front reads, "E-Z Command Control Center."

Thank you! By experimentation I have been able to get most of these features to work.

No, I only had one engine, the GG-1, on the track in addition to a few cars, which I presume do not count. That unit still does not make any sound of any type while it is on the track, but I know it works because it makes the sound on my main layout with the standard transformer.

When I bought the A and B unit engines, the clerk at the store advised me to always keep those two on position #3 since they run together.

As a show of ignorance, I have to pose the question: what is a horn hook coupler and what is a knuckle coupler and what's the difference? Is the horn couple the fixed hook that is harder to connect?

At the train shows I've noticed a dizzying array of couplers, and frankly it is a turn-off. Why are all of those difference couplers necessary? I think that Bachmann's concept of one standard coupler is a grand idea.

Another thing that drives me nuts are those little wires they put under the couplers that simulate the lines that connect cars. Some of them are so long that they catch in the rails. I gladly snip them off to a reasonable length. And yes I know that sometimes they sag because they are lose and I tighten them. Still, some couplers just will not match up no matter what I do.

When it comes to realism, couplers are the last thing on my mind. I'd much rather spend time weathering buildings, building scenery and even building cars from kits than messing with 100 different types of couplers. When people see your layout, they are more impressed the scenery and the trains. Couplers should be like a umpire at baseball game. You only seen him when he's NOT doing his job well. The same thing applies to couplers so far as I'm concerned.

Okay I got the GG-1 unit switched to position #1, but the engine still moves forward (but not backward) regardless which of the 9 buttons are engaged. How are you supposed to control each engine if they all move forward when the stop button is off?

Thank you for your response.

These A and B units do make a sound when they placed on the track with this controller.



This GG1 unit makes no sound at all although it does make the running sounds with the analog transformer I have. There was a list with sound function codes included with this unit. None of them work with the DCC transformer.



I have had this unit for two years, but never installed on my main layout because wiring issues (there is no on-off switch, I have to run an extension across the room under my layout and you must unplug it to turn it off) and because it is has never worked. Since the warranty has long since passed I guess I'm stuck with it. If I do try the DCC concept again, I think I will look into a better unit.

Okay, wrong nomenclature. DCC. I still would like to have an answer. Is there a higher level unit that provides sounds and the ability to switch for setting #3?

I can't get this one to do any of those things.

I'll see what I can do with the micro lens to show a before and after. I don't have a movie camera.

I have read your responses elsewhere, and I am sorry, but I have found them incomprehensible. I don't what you are talking about. The only thing I could do is print out your response and go to the train store in Clearwater, FL, 60 miles away, and ask him to translate it for me. And yes, maybe pay him $60 an hour to fix and repair the stuff as I have done in the past.

Why is that one can buy three Am Track passenger cars all made by Bachmann, all of the same series differing only in the labels and windows, all of the same vintage, and they don't line up so that you can link them together?

I don't find working on stuff like this fun. I have spent many hours with building and painting models, streets, mountains and laying track. I have a fair sized layout that took weeks to do. And yet I have some cars that are useless because I can't link them together to run around the track. The cars should line up. What is so hard about that? Is realism that important that you can't make cars that are compatible with one another even when they are same brand? Why is that you can line up two couplers and yet every time you start them one lifts and pulls out of connection?  

Here are a couple of photos to who you that I am not lying to you.





Under the tree ...