P2K Berkshire problems

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The engine is well over a year old, I bought it from an antique store, and it was tested and ran fine. I contacted walthers and they said that it would cost $45 and hour + parts and they said that if it was the decoder it would cost $120 for the decoder alone, and upwards of 4-7 hours for repair. You can do the math. I do not know if it is the decoder, but I know that it started running like a non sound engine, while the sound started up like it should, but the mars light would just come on not blink and the head light would not come on also. Then it started smoking from the tender and I took it out of service.
 
Sounds like its going to cost a lot of money for Walthers to replace the decoder at $120 plus $45/hour for 4-7 hours (which seems high). I would say try to buy and replace the chip on your own if possible.
 


Now that we are pretty sure it is a QSI decoder, call Norm at QSI Solutions, and tell him what you have. Chances are he can produce a decoder with the right sounds, so all you will have to do is install it.
Oh, before you install the replacement decoder, make sure you don't have a short somewhere in the engine or tender.
 
Okay, so I got the locomotive out, and under the circuit board in the tender in the middle are small black cube like boxes, the first one on the right hand side of the tender. There is a red oval circling the box if you can see it. Sorry for the bad quality picture. Thanks for all of the help.

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Call QSI, as had been stated. IC circuits are hard if not impossible to repair, if you don't know what's going on. I couldn't tell anything from the picture. The quality was so poor that even someone who knew what they were looking at would have a hard time telling what was going on.
 
I finally got around to emailing QSI today, I was watching a think on the "New River Train" and wanted another big berk to handle it. Heres hoping they can fix it!
 
Your camera cannot focus on things that close. If you stepped back, and let it auto-focus, you could always crop the photo to the wanted subject area and have a more clear photo.
 
Here is a picture I just took, I removed the board from the tender and here is an upside down view of what is wrong. The little black boxes in the middle are the problems and one of the edges of one is white after being burnt. I bought an identical tender frame off of eBay and it did not work either, no nothing. Walthers is out of parts and I couldn't get ahold of QSI. Please help!
 

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DC anybody? I admit the sound and being able to control more than one locomotive at a time separately is cool. But I can't walk and chew gum at the same time, and having a 14 x 14 layout, have difficulty controlling more than one train at a time. So when (not "if") a DCC w/sound shorts out or something, I generally don't fool with it! I just yank the electronics and run it with my selector switch on DC. :rolleyes:
 
The "little black boxes" are 8 pin SOIC (small outline integrated circuits) - commonly referred to as "chips". Back when I started in engineering the electronics in that part would probably have needed a circuit board about the size of a 3x5 card to make out of separate transistors and other parts. What that entire decoder can do would have been the size of a microwave oven :)

If you can read the part numbers you could try replacing them. There are thousands of possibilities as to what exact part they are. Most likely some type of "driver" chips that can handle high current switching of power. If the thing is cratered like that it's all over for at least that part. Not good news.
 
Trying again.
Call this number:
1-802-448-9899

Ask for Norm.
Tell him what you have, and what is wrong. See what he says.
 
bnsf971, i tried to PM you with a question and your inbox is full I would like to ask you a question if you get a chance! Thanks
 
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