D&J RailRoad
Professor of HO
I picked up an MTH Veranda turbine a few months ago. It ran fine for a short while then the rear drive truck started binding. I took it apart and found the top cap on the truck gear tower was loose. I reassembled the loco but it still wasn't running right. I messed with it over the period of a few weeks but it turns out it was the decoder. I think the speed matching tach portion wasn't working. There are two motors in the model. The is a small circuit board on the rear motor that has a Hall effect sensor on it and the matching timing marks on the motor flywheel. That keeps each motor turning at the same speed. I tried to find tech support on the MTH web site but nobody works on the HO scale anymore. Most comments were, MTH's parts support is terrible. I decided to replace the decoder with an ESU sound decoder but using the MTH speakers.
My LokProgrammer got fried a few weeks ago from a surge or lightning strike so I had to have my ESU dealer program up the decoder then I installed it in the loco.
Sound is great. A little stutter starting but it rolls great above speed step 10. I borrowed a LokProgrammer yesterday and tuned up the starting voltage so now low speed is much better.
Yep, that's the GTEL on the track waiting for clearance.
My LokProgrammer got fried a few weeks ago from a surge or lightning strike so I had to have my ESU dealer program up the decoder then I installed it in the loco.
Sound is great. A little stutter starting but it rolls great above speed step 10. I borrowed a LokProgrammer yesterday and tuned up the starting voltage so now low speed is much better.
Yep, that's the GTEL on the track waiting for clearance.
If I ran that many cars on my 14' x 14' folded dogbone layout, the turbine would act as its own pusher! 