Athearn BB and DCC

[North Coast Railroad]

Is it possible to install a DCC decoder in an older Athearn BB loco?

 

[TMLW]

Easily done. The decoder just has to be hard wired in as their is no 8 pin plug in a BB engine.

 

[North Coast Railroad]

Great, thanks for your help. I have never done it before but I feel confident.

 

[AyTrane]

Digitrax makes a harness to directly install into an old BB loco. All you have to do is isolate the motor (piece of electrical tape on the bottom contact works).

 

[dozer]

Also, don't forget that it's easy to do if you have a newer BB loco wit hthe push in style platic motor mounts, but if you have the screw style mounts you have to isolate the mount somehow.

 

[seod]

Blue box DCC

The last few times I have put a decoder in a Blue Box I did not wire in a harness. I put a board (TCS A4X or something similar) I used some double sided foam tape to stick it to the top of the motor. Less wires to mess with and it worked very well.

Scott O'Dell

 

[seod]

Blue box DCC

The last few times I have put a decoder in a Blue Box I did not wire in a harness. I put a board (NCE DA-SR or something similar) I used some double sided foam tape to stick it to the top of the motor. Less wires to mess with and it worked very well.
I have even done this with the newer DCC ready units. A friend and I have had nothing but trouble getting the lights to work right with the plug in on the Athearn board. A NCE DA-SR stuck on top of the motor and soldered everything to it the lights worked great. These are on SP SD45T-2's and you need the top Gyra light to work right and we never could get it to work properly with the Athearn board. It was quite maddening and frustrating now it is easy and works great the first time what a concept eh!.

Scott O'Dell

 

[malletman]

Same here, I use the TCS AX4 decoders as well in my Athearn blue box units. I also have 2 Conrail GP40-2's that have MRC 2nd gen EMD sound boards in them. Next up I am looking at Conrail SD40-2 that will get sound/dcc. Mike