I have look through all of the books I can find and there is nothing which gives me a detail step by step way to change the speed on my loco. I'm tring to "MU" a Kato cw44-8 with an Athrens cw44-8 the Kato will be the lead loco. Please help!!!!!!!

-- Lawrence Hannahan (lhannahan@aol.com), July 11, 1999

Answers

Lawrence, Your title say's as much as the question. The speed of the loco is governed by the command being sent and the decoder program mode and table for the step in question. Different systems handle MU operation in different ways. Different decoders have features that support MU in different ways. The command stations of the differnt systems have very differnet steps in setting up commands to the decoder equiped locomotives for the different step modes. The NMRA DCC specification is a compatible means of the signal information and the basic capabilities. The NMRA Recommended Practices have additional advanced options for systems that WHEN IMPLEMENTED are interchangable and compatible. THERE IS A WAY TO HELP YOU - BUT WE HAVE TO KNOW MORE ABOUT WHAT YOUR SYSTEMS AND PARTS ARE. What command sation system are you using? Which cab (or throttle) is attached to the system? What decoder model and make is in each of the respective locos? Note: that there may be a possible solution with some systems that would be different on other systems. If you have advanced decoders or recent maufacture, there will be custom speed tables that can be programmed into the separate decoders that allows for each loco to effectively be tuned to respond externally to the same speed step in a like manner. Much more info is needed to give any useful help to the problem as given. There are available some real experts on the varied systems which can help you get started in the right direction - but the DCC world has lot's of options beyond the very basic standards. Some systems, using only the basic standard, may not allow for really effective MU operations on engines that are dramatically different in their mechanical construction - but adding upgraded decoders may allow for the results to be much improved.

-- Ed McCamey (emccamey@cheerful.com), July 12, 1999.

Lawrence,

On an off-line message you identified all the components to be Digitrax stations, throttles, and decoders. Contact Don Crano directly for the best of guru assistance with you particuliar system. (donc@sssnet.com)

-- Ed McCamey (emccamey@cheerful.com), July 25, 1999.