This engine has been tested extensively to evaluate the impact of various electronics modules.
This is one of a series of tests being performed with and without electronic modules. The purpose in this series is to understand some significant performance differences that have been observed when a module is in the circuit. These electronics can take many forms. The most obvious is a DCC decoder. It can be as simple as a light card. It can be as complicated as a sound system added to a decoder or something else. It may be one of the new DC control modules.
This is by no means a complete examination of the electronics. It is intended to understand how the addition of the electronics in the overall circuit impacts the engine performance.
The standard test activity is to be performed on each variation and the results compared and discussed. The intention is to examine this over a series of engine, motor and electronic variations. It is important to verify and define the usual result and the anomaly. This will require several tests. Each of these reports will focus on a test series on one engine. The overall results will be examined as testing proceeds. The motor test bed engines will also be used in this activity. An electronic module or modules will be added to the end of each of these tests.
For this specific test series, the engine configuration is a P2K B&LE SD7 engine with the following characteristics:
1. P2K Motor & Drive Parts
2. Stock P2K trucks
3. Stock P2K Wheels
4. New Axle Gears
5. No weight added
6. Motor & Trucks Cleaned & lightly lubed
7. Wheels polished with Kadee wire brush
8. P2K 5-Wire connections
This engine is a stock configuration showing the impact on a P2K can motor system.
In this test series there were two basic variations tested. This consisted of examining one can motors and two DCC decoders. These configurations are:
1. P2K motor- no light board
2. P2K motor w NCE DCC
a. DA-SR Card DCC decoder
In retrospect, it would have been interesting to see how a stock P2K with a light board electronics would have compared here. For this engine the original light board had failed and a new one was not available for this series. This will be shown in a later test series.
This engine is shown in the following figure:
This discussion is available for download for $0.50 here.
If you are interested and are having trouble with the down load, please send me a message through my e-mail: ggnlars@verizon.net.
