Another Sound Conversion

 Hi Folks -- So this particular DCC project has taken me awhile to finish. I have 2 Atlas Classic (Maine Central) GP-7s that I bought new when they were first released back around 2004. I converted them to DCC back then using a TCS 2 function decoder. They have always worked very well with excellent slow speed performance. Finally it was time to bring them up to date with sound. I decided to select Soundtraxx Econami decoders and give those a try - they are considerable cheaper than that companies Tsunami 2 decoders so this was appealing to me given the age of these 2 locos. I ordered the decoders back in early December from Yankee Dabbler - a train shop in New Jersey ( I bought some stuff from their booth last year at the Big E show in Springfield, Mass and was impressed with them and have ordered a couple of times from them now) - I highly recommend them. As luck would have it (or otherwise), I ordered when the huge pre Christmas rush was on and from the news reports, the mail systems in both the US and Canada became "grid locked" due to the season and ongoing Covid 19 pandemic. It was not until the middle of January when  I finally got the parcel. In between ordering the decoders and receiving them, I was originally going to use a Soundtraxx Sugar Cube speakers, however I was doing some research and found out about speakers from Scale Sound Systems and decided to order speakers for these two locos from them. There are lots of rave reviews on the web about them. Here is a link to the model of speaker that I ordered:

Atlas Classic GP7/9 | website (scalesoundsystems.com)

So I received these speakers around the middle of February and went to install them. What I found out was that because of the size of them, you have to modify the lighting in the loco - using Surface Mount LED's  because of the stock light pipes. I didn't have any of these LED's on hand , so another mail order was necessary. I received these about a week ago and was finally able to finish up the project. So morla of teh story is its a good thing to have multiple projects in progress, so in the event you get stalled, you can still work on your other projects. Till next time folks....

  

SRY #151

  A couple of years ago when I decided to get back into HO scale, I was browsing on Credit Valley Rail website The Credit Valley Railway Company Ltd (cvrco.ca)   ,   I came across this Atlas MP15DC locomotive and noticed it was ESU sound equipped, it was from a Canadian Road (Southern Railroad of British Columbia), and most importantly it was on Sale. It was on a bit of an impulse buy, but at the time I didnt have any experience with ESU sound decoders (which i wanted to get), and I thought that because I was getting such a good deal on it that worse case scenario that I could sell it in the future and get my money back. I say this as even at the time, I knew that a release for a Road Name for a small Canadian Short Line such as this would be hard to acquire in a few years time once they were all sold out - this seems to be the case with what I have been seeing on Ebay and the like lately - Locomotives that were released years ago are going for prices above what they sold for new! As an ESU equipped Atlas, it runs exceptionally well and I have fine tuned the programming to make it even better. The only modification I made was to swap out the plastic couplers for Kadee Scale Head couplers. The model mainly sits in my display cabinet and I take it out a couple of times a year to give it a run. I like it very much and have decide I am going to hang on to it for now...you never know where my modeling direction will take me in the future. Till next time....