Model Railroading > Rapido F40PH-2D 21 pin decorder installed.

We finally received our three Lokpilot ESU 54615 V4.0 DCC with 21MTC decoders that we had ordered from Italy last month. The install was pretty basic but Kylie broke off one of the sunshades and had to glue it back on. The shell comes off with the removal of the couple pockets and pulling the sides of the shell off the frame. All the packaging and 77 page instruction manual are in German.

The locomotives run extremely well and quiet and responds well in 126 step mode. The functions are not as listed in the Rapido manual and we can`t manage to get the ditch lights to operate although they are supposed to be function 6.

Does anyone with an NCE PowerPro system know how to access functions 10 and above on the throttle!

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I must agree that I absolutely love my Rapido VIA F40PHs as well. They perform flawlessly and I've been steadily working to get my older Rapido VIA cars upgraded so I can have a long consist.

Don't those units have Lok Sound decoders?

Regards, Jim Evans

eminence_grise Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
> We finally received our three Lokpilot ESU 54615
> V4.0 DCC with 21MTC decoders that we had ordered
> from Italy last month. The install was pretty
> basic but Kylie broke off one of the sunshades and
> had to glue it back on. The shell comes off with
> the removal of the couple pockets and pulling the
> sides of the shell off the frame. All the
> packaging and 77 page instruction manual are in
> German.
>
> The locomotives run extremely well and quiet and
> responds well in 126 step mode. The functions are
> not as listed in the Rapido manual and we can`t
> manage to get the ditch lights to operate although
> they are supposed to be function 6.
>
> Does anyone with an NCE PowerPro system know how
> to access functions 10 and above on the throttle!

EXTENDED FUNCTION CONTROL
Control of functions F13-F28 has been added. To access these function numbers
program the OPTION key to a value of 122 (see cab setup, below). Pressing OPTION
will display "F10 through F19 on the bottom line of the cab. pressing a digit will toggle that number plus ten, For example, pressing 6 will issue a F16 command

Ed Stewart
Jacksonville, FL

Phil, Kylie,

The Loc Pilot decoders I got here in the US were 53614 and were non sound with 4 pages of instructions in English. I wonder if we are talking about the same decoder?

While you have the lid off the model look to see which AUX terminal the ditch lights are wired to.AUX1 and AUX2 are not specified because these are the front and rear headlight. If the lights are flashing they will probably on two AUX tabs. If they are just on and off then probably they are on a single AUX.

You use the numbers of the AUX connections, 2,4,8,16,32,64 to set up which F key is going to turn it on and off. Then the instructions will give another value set for getting it to flash, alternate flash, work with the horn button, on forward or on both directions. This information is all found in the three table boxes in the 53614 decoder instructions.

With regard to the window awnings I have replaced the plastic ones on my GMD-1 models with brass etchings from A-Line. It is well worth the effort.

Posted from Windows Phone OS 7

From the manual:
EXTENDED FUNCTION CONTROL (F10 - F28)
Control of functions F13 through F28 has been added. To access these function
numbers program the OPTION key to a value of 122 (see CAB SET UP, below). Pressing
OPTION will display “F10 through F19 on the bottom line of the cab. Pressing a digit will
toggle that number plus ten. For example. pressing 6 will issue an F16 command.
Pressing OPTION a second time will display “F21 through F28” on the cab. Pressing a
digit with this display will toggle that number plus twenty.
Pressing OPTION a third time will return to the F10 through F19 display. Pressing Prog/
Esc at any time will abort the operation.

Jim in Oregon

Thank you all for the instructions on how to access the functions 10-28 on the NCE PowercabPro system, easily changed and completed.

These are non-sound units with the decoder added by us.

fbe- these are LokPilot ESU #54615 V4.0 DCC with 21MTC decoders as recommended in the Rapido F40PH-2D manual.

With access to the full functions 0-28 we have number boards, red class lights, and headlights but no ditch lights. Every time we have installed a 21 pin decoder in locomotive we seem to get everything but ditch lights, the decoder installed in our MPI locomotive from TrueLine trains is the same thing. Rapido recommended this decoder but all the functions are different numbers than those listed in the manual.



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 01/31/15 23:41 by eminence_grise.

Phil,

If the lights are wired to the motherboard then the decoder can be set up to operate them. You just need to check out the printing on the top of the motherboard to see what the soldered tab they are connected to is called.

If we can't figure this out tomorrow a call to Rapido Monday or Tuesday will probably get an answer.

Posted from Windows Phone OS 7

This is the link to the decoder manual I came up with when I searched the ESU site for your 54615 Lok Pilot. The information you need is in the yellow boxes in 12.2.2.2, 12.2.3 for mapping. Some are in fig 28 and fig 29.

Post if you need help in getting things figured out for the ditch lights.

http://www.esu.eu/en/downloads/instruction-manuals/digital-decoders/?no_cache=1&tx_esudownloads_pi1[downloadItem]=b36631575a6e835aec102b5fbe865440

From the download manual you can look in one of the yellow boxes to see each F button has an assigned CV in the lower 30s range into the 40s. The values which can be programmed into these CVs determine which AUX pads these F keys will control. The value starts at 2 then 4 next 8 followed by 16, 32, 64, 128 and so on. So if you can see what AUX the ditch lights are on you read from the table under the AUX pad you want with the F key at hand and program that in. Read the CV before you change it to see where it was in case you want to go back to it. This should give you a toggle light if it isn't set up like a horn button you hold down for the effect.

Next is another table for lighting effects. This is another set of CVs in higher number ranges. One CV might give a beacon in the forward direction only with the F6 button. There is another CV number which gives the same beacon effect on F6 in reverse only. So if it is a beacon you want you will need to program both CVs to get it to stay on always. You will only need to push one F button to get it to stay lit both directions. If you want the beacon on F7 you will have to set the CV assigned to F7 to the AUX with the beacon wires on it. You will also have to change the beacon forward and beacon reverse to new CVs for button F7. Note F3 and F4 are not available for lighting use. I don't believe they have CV to link to a solder pad for AUX functions. These are linked to an internal function in the logic functions. I may be wrong with that but it will take much more work than if you just go F1, F2, __, __, F5, F6, F7 etc. F1 is the bell function in a sound decoder so it is a toggle switch. One push turns it on and it stays on until you push it again. F2 is the horn button a sound decoder and that carries over to the non sound decoders as well. It will stay on as long as it is held down and will turn off as soon as it is released. I could not find any CVs to convert it to a toggle so I just skipped it like F3 & F4.

All this is actually easier to do than to explain it.



Edited 4 time(s). Last edit at 02/02/15 00:54 by fbe.

The ditchlights are connected to AUX3 reading the manual we don't know where to start.

eminence_grise Wrote:
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> The ditchlights are connected to AUX3 reading the
> manual we don't know where to start.

Phil,

I have just been reading this newly downloaded manual and cannot make hide nor hare of the CV A, CV B, --- CV H. I will go back to the manual which came with the 53614 decoders. These are not V.4 versions of the Lok Pilot so there may be some differences but I would hope there is some continuity in the Lok Pilot line.

To get F3 connected to AUX3 we need to set CV40 to 16. The 16 is default value for F5 so read the value for CV39 to see if it is set to 16 or some other number. CV40 is for F6 in the forward direction so reversing the loco will extinguish the light with F6 on. If you want it to stay on in the reverse direction then CV137 needs to be set to 16 as well to connect to AUX3. This will mean if F6 is on the ditch lights are on in both directions. Use CV117 to adjust brightness of the lights on AUX3. If these ditch lights alternate then you need one light on AUX3 and AUX4 and set CV117 and CV118 to get the values to set this up.

So see if this sets up the ditch lights on F6 and get back to me if these are still no show.

arb

Finally some luck! Strange but Rapido has the left ditch light to AUX3 and the right one to Aux4, so they don't work together.

CV 32 to 3, then CV266 was changed to 16 for AUX3, CV298 to 32 for AUX4, which gives functions 6 and 7 use of ditch lights. However if you reverse you cancel the ditch lights and have to hit functions 6 and 7 again.

Thank you so much Alan, took some interesting and confused reading of the manual and your information but they work as well as can be expected.

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Phil,

Great news at last.

So do these lights flash alternately on the prototype? Do we need to open these features up?

arb

Posted from Windows Phone OS 7

fbe Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
> Phil,
>
> Great news at last.
>
> So do these lights flash alternately on the
> prototype? Do we need to open these features up?
>
> arb
>
> Posted from Windows Phone OS 7

No, the ditch lights on the prototype don't flash, at least not on the pre-rebuild version depicted.

I'm thinking that the reason for the complex coding is for the planned Amtrak version which I guess will have flashing ditch lights.

Phil,

I guess we are done here then. I am sure there will be others who will appreciate the CV numbers you have worked out and posted.

arb

Posted from Windows Phone OS 7

Phil,

Your setting of 3 for CV32 was strange since I have yet used this CV with my 53614 decoders. So I looked around in the Lok Sound V4 manual. CV32 allows "indexing" of other CVs. With settings of 0, 1, 2, 3 the CVs greater than 256 can have different functions depending upon the value of CV32. These CVs covered are 257-511.

If you look at the two decoder numbers here is what I think.

53614 and 54615

I believe 5 is a number for decoder. The next number is for version 3 or 4. Number 6 tells these are 6 function decoders. The other 4 or so decoders I have looked at have 1 behind the function number.



Posted from Windows Phone OS 7



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 02/03/15 23:05 by fbe.